[Trade] Flames acquire Kris Russel for a 2014 5th round pick and sign him (1yr, $1.5mil)

[Flames Draft Watcher]

Originally Posted by Kipper_3434

Any info regarding him being sent to the minors at anytime having already cleared waivers?

Pretty sure he'd have to clear again next fall if the Flames wanted to send him down. Don't think they signed him to this deal to put him in the minors.

[Badgers Nose]

Russel's addition mean nothing. If the kids beat him in camp they will play, its that simple.

I don't like losing a pick for this player though. If a messianic player like Gaudreau can be found in the fourth, Flames scouts could probably do better than Russel in next year's fifth.

[cowtown75]

Would of much rathered getting Ference, now he is in the Oilers organization. That sucks. Not to mention, there have been guys going today at center who could of been had at a good price- Weiss, Roy, etc and we did zip there. Frusterating...just more wingers that we didnt need from a positional standpoint.

[Street Pharmacist]

Originally Posted by cowtown75

Would of much rathered getting Ference, now he is in the Oilers organization. That sucks. Not to mention, there have been guys going today at center who could of been had at a good price- Weiss, Roy, etc and we did zip there. Frusterating...just more wingers that we didnt need from a positional standpoint.

Not sure any of those guys would be a big upgrade on what we have

[Yoho]

Originally Posted by cowtown75

Would of much rathered getting Ference, now he is in the Oilers organization. That sucks. Not to mention, there have been guys going today at center who could of been had at a good price- Weiss, Roy, etc and we did zip there. Frusterating...just more wingers that we didnt need from a positional standpoint.

No thanks to Ference 4yrs and signed till he's 38 that the Oilers gave him.

[kyuss275]

Originally Posted by cowtown75

Would of much rathered getting Ference, now he is in the Oilers organization. That sucks. Not to mention, there have been guys going today at center who could of been had at a good price- Weiss, Roy, etc and we did zip there. Frusterating...just more wingers that we didnt need from a positional standpoint.

Im sure Feaster put down an offer on most, if not all, high level centers that were available today. Look at the teams all the centers signed with. Most have a realistic chance to make the playoffs. Even Tampa has a much higher chance of making it over Calgary. Considering how much they got and term i can't imagine what the price would have been to get them on a rebuild team.

[cowtown75]

Guess that's one downside of the re-build- attracting good players.

[wireframe]

Any player that is good enough to play 33 games on the Blues blueline last year is easily good enough to play top 6 minutes for the Flames. It does seem odd that they didn't collect him on waivers but I think some other posters are right that the Flames were looking at one of the UFA D-men until the offers got too rich.

[Calgary4LIfe]

I would rather Feaster have just waited until the cheap reclamation guys get desperate and sign with the Flames to prove themselves.

Sure, chase the top center and a top 4 defencemen. However, after that, just sit back and wait until agents come to you with your available cap-space, as other teams fill their's up. I don't know anything about this kid, and I hope he does really well. Just seems like this is a guy you could probably scrounge up in the bargain bin within the next month.

[VladtheImpaler]

Russell sucks, but... if we give him lots of PP time to inflate his stats we might be able to get as much as a 3rd for him in April. Furthermore, by giving him lots of icetime, we will greatly enhance our chances of getting Reinhart/Ekblad. So, as long as he is not here by the draft next year, it's an OK move. If he is still here, fire Feaster.

[Enoch Root]

Don't know why people are upset about him being in the way of others. I would think he is just as likely to be sent down as anyone else.

I am a big Wotherspoon fan but it is very unlikely that he is ready to jump straight to the NHL.

As for Breen, Feaster mentioned ont eh radio yesterday that he thinks he is ready to make the big club but is concerned that he won't be ready to go in October due to injury.

A team needs like 14 defensemen to ice the two teams - relax people

[Coys1882]

Go to hockeydb.com
Click draft history
Click 2010 and all the way back for ten years or so
Scroll to the fifth round of each year
compare career number of NHL games for each selection
Realize why a fifth round pick is worth trading for a guy even if he was on waivers two days ago.

[Stealth22]

Pat Steinberg‏@Fan960Steinberg26s
Feaster says they didn't want to inherit a salary arbitration case, hence not claiming Russell off waivers. #Flames

EDIT: I beat sureLoss at something?!

[sureLoss]

lgary Flames ‏@NHLFlames 27s "We had no interest in inheriting a salary arbitration case ... that's why we did it as a sign & trade." - Feaster on Russell

[dissentowner]

What??? So he is saying if he claimed him off waivers he could not come to a deal with him before arbitration? Ok...

[Wolven]

Originally Posted by dissentowner

What??? So he is saying if he claimed him off waivers he could not come to a deal with him before arbitration? Ok...

No, I believe how one would interpret that is that we paid a 5th to ensure arbitration wasn't an option. Sign & Trade > Waivers & Arbitration.

[speeds]

Originally Posted by speeds

Why did they not just claim him on waivers?

Feaster's explanation makes sense - the walkaway point has moved up to 3.5 mil in this CBA. If CAL views Russell as a 1.5M player, and want him, but don't want to take the risk that he gets 2.5M in arb, it makes sense to avoid that sort of outcome.

Whether that's worth a 5th, I don't know, maybe other teams were interested in Russell via trade for the same reason, maybe that would explain why CAL couldn't make a trade like their 6th rd pick for Russell and STL's 7th rd pick?

[Muta]

Somebody posted this on HF:

Feaster doesnt want to lose our high waiver wire position on a guy like Kris Russel.

Waiting closer to the beginning of the season when teams are in cap crunch mode and sending guys down to the AHL that they may not want to place on waivers is the time to be picking them up. We are near the top of the list instead of at the bottom because we wasted a waiver pickup in July.


Then again, I dont expect a lot of people to use their heads around here, just a giant Feaster bash.

Any merit to this? If so, it's a good point.

[sureLoss]

Originally Posted by Muta

Somebody posted this on HF:

Feaster doesnt want to lose our high waiver wire position on a guy like Kris Russel.

Waiting closer to the beginning of the season when teams are in cap crunch mode and sending guys down to the AHL that they may not want to place on waivers is the time to be picking them up. We are near the top of the list instead of at the bottom because we wasted a waiver pickup in July.


Then again, I dont expect a lot of people to use their heads around here, just a giant Feaster bash.

Any merit to this? If so, it's a good point.

You don't lose waiver position if you claim a player. Waiver position is purely based on standings

[FlamesAddiction]

Originally Posted by speeds

Feaster's explanation makes sense - the walkaway point has moved up to 3.5 mil in this CBA. If CAL views Russell as a 1.5M player, and want him, but don't want to take the risk that he gets 2.5M in arb, it makes sense to avoid that sort of outcome.

Whether that's worth a 5th, I don't know, maybe other teams were interested in Russell via trade for the same reason, maybe that would explain why CAL couldn't make a trade like their 6th rd pick for Russell and STL's 7th rd pick?

It still doesn't make any sense to me. There is no way that an arbitrator would give Russel more than what he signed for, and so what if he did? Walking away form a #6 defenseman picked up off waivers isn't a big deal and going on waivers in the first place wouldn't put Russel in a great positon to bargain.

I tend to think what others were stating. Russell was likely plan B after something else didn't transpire and the timing of the waivers didn't work out with the other timeline.