I don't disagree with the ranking of the front office. Rookie GM that had seven free agents to deal with prior to camp and still has six left unresolved. Seems like a reason to have concerns about the direction of the leadership group.
On the future, this is something that remains fluid and is evaluated over a number of years. The Flames immediate future is way better than some are saying. If they can sign Lindholm and get performances out of the players that being paid to be top end, they could be quite good. A bounce back from Markstrom, Huberdeau, and Lindholm and the Flames are a playoff team. If we see Kadri's GAF return to expected levels we're really going to see improvement. The return of Kylington is found money. If we see Wolf, Pelletier, Coronato, Zary, Duehr, and Ruzicka all earn spots on the team, it means we're way better than we were last season. The immediate future is not that bleak.
Where we run into a futures problem is the gap in the pipeline that is going to exist in two years. We're going to feel the lack of quality prospects as some of the rookies from this year's team look for that second contract and bump some of the middle talent off the roster. You need that constant flow of bodies to control the cap and the Flames have a two year gap they are going to have to weather. That puts the longer-term future in question. Fortunately they had what appears to be a bumper draft this year and maybe a couple players step up and become NHLers quicker than anticipated. The futures game is very fluid and the Flames have some air bubbles in their pipeline to deal with.
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