Covid Jersey Vote - Best #53 Flames History

[Bingo]

#1 - Turek (Riggin)
#2 - MacInnis (Commodore)
#3 - Phaneuf (Musil)
#4 - McCrimmon (Bouwmeester)
#5 - Giordano (Albelin)
#6 - Housley (Sarich)
#7 - Mullen (Brodie)
#8 - Risebrough (Bure)
#9 - McDonald (no vote)
#10 - Roberts (McGrattan)
#11 - Backlund (Yelle)
#12 - Iginla (Loob)
#13 - Gaudreau (Cammalleri)
#14 - Fleury (Nilsson)
#15 - McCarthy (Simon)
#16 - Chouinard (Stillman)
#17 - Hrdina (Bourque)
#18 - Stajan (Lombardi)
#19 - Tkachuk (Hunter)
#20 - Suter (Huselius)
#21 - Ference (Jokinen)
#22 - Conroy (Langkow)
#23 - Monahan (Reinhart)
#24 - Peplinski (Hudler)
#25 - Nieuwendyk (Plett)
#26 - Reichel (Nilson)
#27 - Hamilton (Tonelli)
#28 - Regehr (Lindholm)
#29 - Otto (Engelland)
#30 - Vernon (Sauve!)
#31 - Lemelin (Tabaracci)
#32 - Lydman (Byron)
#33 - Wilson (Rittich)
#34 - Kiprusoff (Macoun)
#35 - Reese (Grimson)
#36 - Petrovicky (Rinaldo)
#37 - McAmmond (Kidd)
#38 - Cowan (Lakovic)
#39 - Gilmour (Talbot)
#40 - Tanguay (Brathwaite)
#41 - M. Smith (Boyd)
#42 - Makarov (B. Sutter)
#43 - B. Evans (L. Kohn)
#44 - Warrener (Niedermayer)
#45 - Lundmark (J. Lemieux)
#46 - St. Louis (J. Morgan)
#47 - Baertschi (Giguere)
#48 - Nemisz (Van Brabant)
#49 - Lombardi (Richie Regehr)
#50 - Sabourin (Torgaev)
#51 - Gagner (Horak)
#52 - Bollig (N/A)

[Bingo]

Gaudreau the best player, but one game doesn't tenure enough support to take out Derek Morris.

Morris was one of the first times I remember the team going off the charts in the first round at the draft. I can remember the TSN panel all looking through documents when they made that selection.

Not a player in the next ten after him in that draft that was a better pick though (my own personal line is three for hindsight look at drafts which he bests easily)

[transplant99]

Morris was a really good player that played on a lot of bad teams.

Really had a hell of a career but had a hard time staying healthy towards the end of it.

His sister used to post here way back when IIRC.

[looooob]

Morris played over 1100 NHL games, which is a heck of a career no matter how you slice it. only 5 players drafted by the Flames have played more


so yes that was a heck of a pick in 96- sure he had some brainfarts, and everyone was waiting for another gear that didn't come, but he was a good player


I'm interested in the 2nd place vote between johnny and his buddy

[Flashpoint]

Morris was indirectly responsible for NHL netting being added. His point shot deflection with worst outcome possible.

[tvp2003]

The Gaudreau/Arnold signing watch thread in 2014 (after he won the Hobey Baker) was pretty epic. Right down to tracking the private jet that they sent to Boston to pick them up:

https://forum.calgarypuck.com/showthread.php?t=136454

Originally Posted by Flashpoint

Morris was indirectly responsible for NHL netting being added. His point shot deflection with worst outcome possible.

Oh wow. I knew Espen Knutsen shot the puck, but had no idea it was Morris who deflected it (or that it was even a Flames game).

[AC]

Originally Posted by tvp2003

The Gaudreau/Arnold signing watch thread in 2014 (after he won the Hobey Baker) was pretty epic. Right down to tracking the private jet that they sent to Boston to pick them up:

https://forum.calgarypuck.com/showthread.php?t=136454



Oh wow. I knew Espen Knutsen shot the puck, but had no idea it was Morris who deflected it (or that it was even a Flames game).

Other way around as Flashpoint said:

Morris shot the puck, Knutsen deflected it into the crowd.

[Reggie Dunlop]

Morris

Kudos for sticking with a training camp number.

[Locke]

I hated Derek Morris and everything he stood for. It'll be a cold day in Hell before I vote for him.

Call it a protest, call it unreasonable. I dont care. That man was a blight upon this organization and if there werent already a Pox upon all of our houses I'd wish one upon his.

[AC]

Originally Posted by Locke

I hated Derek Morris and everything he stood for. It'll be a cold day in Hell before I vote for him.

Call it a protest, call it unreasonable. I dont care. That man was a blight upon this organization and if there werent already a Pox upon all of our houses I'd wish one upon his.

Yeah but Morris helped become Drury and Yelle, and Drury helped become Reinprecht and Warrener.

Also, I forgot the Warrener trade was a 3 way trade.

July 3, 2003
BUF gets Reinprecht and Warrener from COL for Keith Ballard.
CGY gets Reinprecht and Warrener from BUF for Begin and Drury.

And then oddly enough a year later Ballard and Morris were traded together:
March 8, 2004
PHX gets Ballard and Morris from COL for Gratton, Vaananen, 2nd round pick (#44-Paul Stastny).

[Locke]

Originally Posted by AC

Yeah but Morris helped become Drury and Yelle, and Drury helped become Reinprecht and Warrener.

Also, I forgot the Warrener trade was a 3 way trade.

July 3, 2003
BUF gets Reinprecht and Warrener from COL for Keith Ballard.
CGY gets Reinprecht and Warrener from BUF for Begin and Drury.

And then oddly enough a year later Ballard and Morris were traded together:
March 8, 2004
PHX gets Ballard and Morris from COL for Gratton, Vaananen, 2nd round pick (#44-Paul Stastny).

All you're doing is proving my point.

The absence of Derek Morris aided the Flames more than the presence of Derek Morris.

#notmy53

[foofighter15]

Voted wrong, meant to pick Morris. He was one of the line bright spots during a pretty dark time. Gotta give it to him

[browna]

Morris was really good for his first season and a half. Then he got hurt, and at the same time realized or got told how good he was in the league compared to others, natural talent wise.

He held out for a bit, and then was lazy and unmotivated the rest of his time with the Flames. He was not interested in being the star player he could've been and the Flames needed, and refused to work harder...and really, lazy and unmotivated the rest of his career as he hopped from team to team, who thought they were getting more then they did out of him, each stop.

He could've been up there in Norris discussions for the better part of his career, as a Flame and otherwise if he continued to work on his game to add to his talent, but was happy making good money and GMs get buiyng into his "potential" tag.

Great trade to sell high on him and fleece Lacroix; Drury and the trade tree that landed Warrener, and Yelle laid the groundwork for 2004. Morris went and played for 5 more teams after that, disappointing fans of each team along the way.

[browna]

Originally Posted by Reggie Dunlop

Morris

Kudos for sticking with a training camp number.

Like most things he did in his career, it was too much work and effort to change it, so he left it.

[Party Elephant]

Originally Posted by Locke

I hated Derek Morris and everything he stood for. It'll be a cold day in Hell before I vote for him.

Call it a protest, call it unreasonable. I dont care. That man was a blight upon this organization and if there werent already a Pox upon all of our houses I'd wish one upon his.

You know, given your voting history, you don't need to announce that you're not voting for the consensus pick.

[BrennyBaller]

Originally Posted by Locke

I hated Derek Morris and everything he stood for. It'll be a cold day in Hell before I vote for him.

Call it a protest, call it unreasonable. I dont care. That man was a blight upon this organization and if there werent already a Pox upon all of our houses I'd wish one upon his.

I’m too young to remember Morris playing for the Flames. What’s the story here??

[FireGilbert]

I was tempted to pick goal per game Gaudreau but have to pick Morris.

It brings back a lot of bad memories from the young guns era though. Morris was a poster child for the disappointment of the time being a massively hyped first rounder eventually run out of town after poor development and bad luck with injuries stopped his progression. At least his trade netted a good return and helped build the 04 team.

[CroFlames]

Originally Posted by Flashpoint

Morris was indirectly responsible for NHL netting being added. His point shot deflection with worst outcome possible.

I think I remember him smashing the glass to a zillion pieces on a non-deflected cannon from the point too.

The guy had a rocket I guess.

[Sylvanfan]

Morris to me represented the NHL which brought about the salary cap. He was a good but not great player. That type of player in those days still could make 4 million a year type of thing to be a bit better than most. So for a guy with what seemed like limited motivation he was able to find that comfort zone and stay there. Which in the end probably proved a good move for him as he got to hang around for a lot of seasons. So for a team like the Flames he would have been the third highest paid player, but he wasn't going to be the third best player and didn't seem driven to try and get to that next level.

Still he was an off the board pick who made the team as a teen ager and stuck around the league for a lot of years. Had a few more of those late 90's to early 2000's picks turned out like Morris, the team could have been better.

[browna]

It sounds ludicrous now almost 2 decades later, but Morris could've had a very similar career path as Iginla if he put in the same work Iginla did in his formative NHL years.

In early 2001 when the 2002 Olympic team hype started, Morris was in the conversation (he had already peaked in his career, but the oustide hockey world didnt see that, just potential, that he never fulfilled), and Iginla nowhere near that prominence.

By the time the end of the summer came along, Morris was more of a long shot because they realized he wasn't as good as he once was (even though he was young) and had a poor attitude. Iginla stepped in to selection camp only because of an injury or two and made the team.

Iginla took off from that point and had his first 50 goal season, Morris faded into career obscurity and wasn't a Flame for much longer.

As Flames though, their career timelines started at the same time basically, Morris in the first season or two was more noticeable and seemed to have a higher potential than Iginla with his abilities, and he was a year younger then Iginla. Iginla though kept working to get better, stronger, and more disciplined by doing the extra things, and it paid off in his 4th year whereas Morris was fine plodding along, already on the downside and on his way out of Calgary.