Quote:
Originally Posted by dustygoon
I hear you, but the fatal flaw for me was not locking in top players earlier when he had the chance. Even if there was perceived overpay. Sticking to salary structure like Gio's 7mm "cap" and putting money into Troy Brouwer types instead of just paying up for our young talent.
He nailed Rasmus. That contract at the time seemed to be a gamble for a guy that only a year and a half of NHL duty for $4.5mm x 6. It worked though.
It's been discussed on here numerous times before that there were windows to sign 19 and 13. Would have been big numbers.
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Was bit of a damned if you do, damned if you don't scenario. The Flames top players were very inconsistent. Gaudreau and Tkachuk had two pretty awful down years in 2019/2020 and 2020/21, yes, in hindsight they could have locked them up for an overpay then and given Tkachuk captaincy. At that point, though, it looked like a failing core.
2021/22 just resulted in a bunch of factors all coming together to convince Gaudreau and Tkachuk to leave: Sutter, a painful playoff run, Covid, both guys having career years, etc..