[Signing] Flames sign Joakim Nordstrom (1 year, $700k AAV)

[Erick Estrada]

I don't remember Ward overplaying depth players last season. This season it's so odd that he's rolling 4 lines regardless of the circumstances.

[Funkhouser]

I want a 4th line comprised of the following players: Ryan, Robinson, Phillips, Gawdin (yes I realize they are all right shots, which is odd in itself considering the Flames inability to have right shots for the past 5+ years).

Nordstrom should be in the taxi squad.

[BigErnSalute_16]

Originally Posted by Bingo

The guy is elite when you're collapsing in your own zone and and hanging on for dear life ... he sacrifices his body and goes right after the puck carrier.

Unfortunately that only happens when the other team pulls their goalie or you're killing a penalty.

He had a decent stretch of five on five play with Lucic and Ryan, but that's not happening with last night's fourth line.

Originally Posted by 1qqaaz

When Nordstrom was signed, a lot of people were saying "what is there to complain about? Depth never hurts so nothing can go wrong with a league minimum contract"

Except this just isn't true.

Yesterday, Nordstrom played 12:02.
Monahan played 14:56.

Mediocre coaches like Ward tend to overplay the zero-skill guys just because they're willing to block shots, get physical, and they put in solid efforts.

But Nordstrom has been played way over his head. It's not his fault per se. Nordstrom is simply one of the least productive forwards in the league, and he shouldn't be anywhere near the top 9. When you don't produce at all, it's nearly impossible to contribute to the success of the team. This is evident by the fact that Nordstrom has consistently had a horrendous +/-, even while on goods teams. Modern NHL games are too close - you can't sacrifice a line of scoring just for grit. Yes, he's fine as a 4th line forward who plays in tough situations. Be he shouldn't be playing even half as many minutes as Monahan.

The problem with players like these is that they somehow move up the lineup, then take the production out of the entire line. On the PK, they do nothing except block shots. Nordstrom takes way too many penalties and that's unacceptable when you're playing against teams that overly rely on the powerplay. He's not even very large or physically imposing. Lindholm is slightly larger than him.

Finally, guys like Nordstrom take opportunities away from ripened prospects who are clearly superior players. Development should always be the utmost priority.

Nordstrom embodies the reasons I don't like it when the Flames sign older depth players. Our coaches fall in love with them in a manner that detriments the team. It also hurts development.

It's not a coincidence that the Flames almost always play better when they are playing young rookies. The energy helps. So do the actually offensive contributions from the bottom 6.

I'm not too big of a fan of his, but if they really want him in the lineup for his pk ability, which it seems like they do, then I'd definitely like to see him only playing about 5-6 minutes just in those roles. Rotate guys on that fourth line for regular shifts and keep Nordstrom for just the situations he excels at.

Ryan, Lucic, Simon, Leivo, or whoever ends up on that fourth line outside of Froese and Ronaldo have enough skill to be an effective line but are dragged down by Nordstrom.

Get Gaudreau, Tkachuk, Dube, Bennett and Mangiapane some extra shifts either because they are on and dangerous or use it as a way to get one of them going. But enough is enough of Nordstrom playing 10+ minutes a night

[blankall]

Originally Posted by Erick Estrada

I don't remember Ward overplaying depth players last season. This season it's so odd that he's rolling 4 lines regardless of the circumstances.

Too be fair Rinaldo had just over two minutes of ice time. Froese had under five, and Nordstrom was deployed as pk specialist. The pk is tiring. That's where you want a guy who can chase down pucks but has hands of stone.

[ben voyonsdonc]

When someone is a "PK specialist", they really shouldn't be taking stupid penalties like he did.

[Erick Estrada]

Originally Posted by blankall

Too be fair Rinaldo had just over two minutes of ice time. Froese had under five, and Nordstrom was deployed as pk specialist. The pk is tiring. That's where you want a guy who can chase down pucks but has hands of stone.

He managed the bench better on Saturday. I always assumed the addition of Lucic meant the team didn't have to employ plugs that could fight. Rinaldo can't play. I just don't understand why he's still employed by this organization.

[transplant99]

Originally Posted by Erick Estrada

He managed the bench better on Saturday. I always assumed the addition of Lucic meant the team didn't have to employ plugs that could fight. Rinaldo can't play. I just don't understand why he's still employed by this organization.

You dont understand why Rinaldo was signed and dressed, (for the 1st time this season) against the Oilers?

[Erick Estrada]

Originally Posted by transplant99

You dont understand why Rinaldo was signed and dressed, (for the 1st time this season) against the Oilers?

No I don't understand why he was dressed to play 2 minutes. He's one of the worst players I have seen in a long time.

[Bingo]

Originally Posted by Erick Estrada

I don't remember Ward overplaying depth players last season. This season it's so odd that he's rolling 4 lines regardless of the circumstances.

Is he though?

When I look at ice time it looks pretty clear he's not rolling four lines at all.

Tkachuk and Lindholm have averaged 13+
Five other players (Gaudreau, Backlund, Monahan, Mangiapane and Leivo) have been around 12.
Dube and Bennett are around 11
Lucic at 9
Ryan and Nordstrom at 7

That's not rolling lines and it's pretty close every NHL team's deployment.

[Bingo]

Originally Posted by 1qqaaz

When Nordstrom was signed, a lot of people were saying "what is there to complain about? Depth never hurts so nothing can go wrong with a league minimum contract"

Except this just isn't true.

Yesterday, Nordstrom played 12:02.
Monahan played 14:56.

Mediocre coaches like Ward tend to overplay the zero-skill guys just because they're willing to block shots, get physical, and they put in solid efforts.

But Nordstrom has been played way over his head. It's not his fault per se. Nordstrom is simply one of the least productive forwards in the league, and he shouldn't be anywhere near the top 9. When you don't produce at all, it's nearly impossible to contribute to the success of the team. This is evident by the fact that Nordstrom has consistently had a horrendous +/-, even while on goods teams. Modern NHL games are too close - you can't sacrifice a line of scoring just for grit. Yes, he's fine as a 4th line forward who plays in tough situations. Be he shouldn't be playing even half as many minutes as Monahan.

The problem with players like these is that they somehow move up the lineup, then take the production out of the entire line. On the PK, they do nothing except block shots. Nordstrom takes way too many penalties and that's unacceptable when you're playing against teams that overly rely on the powerplay. He's not even very large or physically imposing. Lindholm is slightly larger than him.

Finally, guys like Nordstrom take opportunities away from ripened prospects who are clearly superior players. Development should always be the utmost priority.

Nordstrom embodies the reasons I don't like it when the Flames sign older depth players. Our coaches fall in love with them in a manner that detriments the team. It also hurts development.

It's not a coincidence that the Flames almost always play better when they are playing young rookies. The energy helps. So do the actually offensive contributions from the bottom 6.

Nordstrom has averaged 7 minutes of five on five hockey this season.

He isn't playing in the top nine. All teams move guys up and down if things aren't working, but Nordstrom is a pretty constant presence at forward #12 (or even 13) of forwards when it comes to average ice time.

I and I'm sure they hope he can put in his 7 minutes of five on five hockey and be good on the penalty kill.

The Saturday game was odd in that they dressed two players they couldn't even play. That required some extra ice to go around.

[GioforPM]

Originally Posted by Bingo

Is he though?

When I look at ice time it looks pretty clear he's not rolling four lines at all.

Tkachuk and Lindholm have averaged 13+
Five other players (Gaudreau, Backlund, Monahan, Mangiapane and Leivo) have been around 12.
Dube and Bennett are around 11
Lucic at 9
Ryan and Nordstrom at 7

That's not rolling lines and it's pretty close every NHL team's deployment.

This. Every single coach I ever heard talks about rolling 4 lines but they only ever do it in a runaway win.

Last game I'm pretty sure sure Ward had full intentions of maxing Backlund's time because of McDavid. So he knew the 4th would get hardly anything. it's not shocking that he played the only regular on that line, Nordstrom, a little more.

[Bingo]

I'm not even a Geoff Ward guy ... I wasn't high on bringing him back.

Given how this group has gone through coaches, I liked that they all liked going to war for him but I didn't like his lack of adaptability in the Dallas series (both in tactics when the "Winnipeg plan" wasn't working, and in roster when he stuck with things when Tkachuk went down), and the way he handled the Talbot pull.

But this blame everything on him day in and day out has an effect of trying to beat back the extremes.

It's a character flaw of mine!

[GioforPM]

Originally Posted by Bingo

I'm not even a Geoff Ward guy ... I wasn't high on bringing him back.

Given how this group has gone through coaches, I liked that they all liked going to war for him but I didn't like his lack of adaptability in the Dallas series (both in tactics when the "Winnipeg plan" wasn't working, and in roster when he stuck with things when Tkachuk went down), and the way he handled the Talbot pull.

But this blame everything on him day in and day out has an effect of trying to beat back the extremes.

It's a character flaw of mine!

I'm sort of the same. I'm not a big Ward fan. I just have difficulty with all of the narratives that are either outright false or, at the very least, have no evidence, especially about the system he supposedly coaches (which is highly different depending on who's talking).

Do we know for a fact Ward expressly coaches dump and chase, or are forwards just skating into spots where that's their only option? Not to mention - lots of successful teams do it (TB for example).

Do we know for a fact Ward coaches a D to D pass every time, or are the forwards flying the zone and getting too far to pass to (or maybe are people only noticing when it happens and not lots of other plays when the puck goes up the ice quicker)?

[dino7c]

Originally Posted by Erick Estrada

No I don't understand why he was dressed to play 2 minutes. He's one of the worst players I have seen in a long time.

Ward doesn't know that the ref is going to call a penalty on the first hit of the game and turn it into a no hitter.

He is dressed incase things go off the rails, they didn't so he didn't play.

[Rollin22x]

Originally Posted by ben voyonsdonc

When someone is a "PK specialist", they really shouldn't be taking stupid penalties like he did.

I thought that was a really weak call.

[442scotty]

I don’t watch a lot of the other teams other than the ones the Flames play but they seem like the worst team to exit their zone with speed and move up the ice with speed. They always make it look so hard to do. And it’s been pretty standard for them over the last few years 80% of the time. Maybe it’s just me idk

[Strange Brew]

Originally Posted by Rollin22x

I thought that was a really weak call.

The second one, I agree.

The first was all on Nordstrom IMO.

[Erick Estrada]

Originally Posted by dino7c

Ward doesn't know that the ref is going to call a penalty on the first hit of the game and turn it into a no hitter.

He is dressed incase things go off the rails, they didn't so he didn't play.

How would things go off the rails? What tough guys do the Oilers have? They don't really have any goons. Lucic could easily handle Kassain and Nurse isn't a heavyweight or anything. This isn't that kind of league anymore as Saturday night played out like pretty well every regular season game. There's no need for a guy like Rinaldo in the NHL anymore.

[Bingo]

Originally Posted by Erick Estrada

How would things go off the rails? What tough guys do the Oilers have? They don't really have any goons. Lucic could easily handle Kassain and Nurse isn't a heavyweight or anything. This isn't that kind of league anymore as Saturday night played out like pretty well every regular season game. There's no need for a guy like Rinaldo in the NHL anymore.

I never know what % to allocate to intangibles these days but Ward did suggest that the guys like having Rinaldo around.

Could have been as simple as killing two birds with one stone.

Team hasn't been all that emotionally invested these days ... maybe Rinaldo helps in that regard.

And if the game does go nutbar you have a solid nutbar at your disposal.

[powderjunkie]

So much pearl clutching over forwards 11, 12, 13, and 14. These players are nowhere near the top 10 list of reasons this team hasn't succeeded.

With very few exceptions, every team is very similar in benefits/pitfalls from these slots.