Brad Treliving needs to go

[Calgary '89]

Originally Posted by DeluxeMoustache

Tre started with a clean slate. Feaster did the dirty work

He walked in to a pretty sweet situation, a couple of gems on the roster who are still the core pieces, no cap issues

Dream situation for a GM, with a primed canvas

So punish Tre? What’s your point man?

I’m as mad as anyone! I’ve been yelling at the TV since 1987 as a Flames fan but right now there’s no easy fix. Just because we’re not seeing a Hiroshima blowout doesn’t meant change isn’t coming. I’m just saying Treliving doesn’t make these boys so complacent. Plus, there’s no great GM candidate out there right now so a new GM is very likely Conroy, Pascall or Maloney and they’re as handcuffed as anyone else.

Trelivings biggest mistakes? Finding a top 6 RW. Just about every guy he signed for that spot sh*t the bed and the team is in salary cap hell because of it. Find me 4 NHL teams that don’t have that and let’s pluck their GM.

It’s not gonna happen man.

[DeluxeMoustache]

Originally Posted by Calgary '89

So punish Tre? What’s your point man?

I’m as mad as anyone! I’ve been yelling at the TV since 1987 as a Flames fan but right now there’s no easy fix. Just because we’re not seeing a Hiroshima blowout doesn’t meant change isn’t coming. I’m just saying Treliving doesn’t make these boys so complacent. Plus, there’s no great GM candidate out there right now so a new GM is very likely Conroy, Pascall or Maloney and they’re as handcuffed as anyone else.

Trelivings biggest mistakes? Finding a top 6 RW. Just about every guy he signed for that spot sh*t the bed and the team is in salary cap hell because of it. Find me 4 NHL teams that don’t have that and let’s pluck their GM.

It’s not gonna happen man.

Don’t punish him.

Thank him for his effort. Tell him they think that he has taken the team as far as he can. He himself says it starts at the top and the buck stops with him. It sends a message about accountability.

Change is a process too

[PepsiFree]

Originally Posted by DeluxeMoustache

Tre started with a clean slate. Feaster did the dirty work

He walked in to a pretty sweet situation, a couple of gems on the roster who are still the core pieces, no cap issues

Dream situation for a GM, with a primed canvas

Not to defend Treliving because I'm fine to see a new mind run this team at this point, but you're overstating the situation Treliving walked into.

A dream situation is walking into a team that is right on the cusp and can't get over the hump. One where you're tweaking, not starting from scratch knowing it might take you 5+ years just to build to anything worthwhile.

The Flames had 4 good/potentially good young players, one good defenceman, and one great looking prospect... that's basically it.

Feaster did the dirty work, but nobody is going to stand up and say he did a good job of it. Think about it: he made 25 trades over his two years at the helm, which included moving out Jarome Iginla, and not a single one of those trades produced anything of value. That's a mixture of the players acquired just not being that good and the draft picks he made with those he acquired not really panning out. But 25 trades, and literally not one you can point to and say "that helped us today."

Well, maybe Brian McGrattan, considering he now works for the club and was a good leader.

But that's it. One enforcer who brought more than anyone could have imagined he would.

Fine to say Treliving started with a clean slate, but nobody in their right mind is calling it a dream.

[chedder]

If the team you assembled over 7 years has no heart, compete or whatever you want to call it, who's fault can it be but the GM?

I don't care about continuity in the position if that produces ugly results year after year. Tre has had more than enough time to figure this out and he seems incapable of doing what seems obvious to many.

I'd go so far as to argue that all of the 'almost got this guy' failed trades have caused more strife in the locker room than anything.

[Strange Brew]

Originally Posted by PepsiFree

Not to defend Treliving because I'm fine to see a new mind run this team at this point, but you're overstating the situation Treliving walked into.

A dream situation is walking into a team that is right on the cusp and can't get over the hump. One where you're tweaking, not starting from scratch knowing it might take you 5+ years just to build to anything worthwhile.

The Flames had 4 good/potentially good young players, one good defenceman, and one great looking prospect... that's basically it.

Feaster did the dirty work, but nobody is going to stand up and say he did a good job of it. Think about it: he made 25 trades over his two years at the helm, which included moving out Jarome Iginla, and not a single one of those trades produced anything of value. That's a mixture of the players acquired just not being that good and the draft picks he made with those he acquired not really panning out. But 25 trades, and literally not one you can point to and say "that helped us today."

Well, maybe Brian McGrattan, considering he now works for the club and was a good leader.

But that's it. One enforcer who brought more than anyone could have imagined he would.

Fine to say Treliving started with a clean slate, but nobody in their right mind is calling it a dream.

Feaster was a bad GM but he stumbled into some nice moves. Russell for a 5th, salvaging the Erixon fiasco. Those helped position the new guy.
I’d say Treliving inherited a good situation, far better than most new GM’s.

[Roof-Daddy]

This core did have heart, back when Hartley was the coach they worked their asses off and never gave up.

[PepsiFree]

Originally Posted by Strange Brew

Feaster was a bad GM but he stumbled into some nice moves. Russell for a 5th, salvaging the Erixon fiasco. Those helped position the new guy.
I’d say Treliving inherited a good situation, far better than most new GM’s.

Erixon was good trade, but we still ended up with nothing from it at the end of the day.

Russell though is a good point. We eventually transitioned him into the pick that got us Dube. So, he was a good one.

[Chonger]

Originally Posted by Roof-Daddy

This core did have heart, back when Hartley was the coach they worked their asses off and never gave up.

The team had an identity and every player was fighting for there minutes cause the coach demanded it and held his players accountable for there play. We have none of that from Ward.

Sent from my SM-G930W8 using Tapatalk

[Aarongavey]

Originally Posted by PepsiFree

Erixon was good trade, but we still ended up with nothing from it at the end of the day.

Russell though is a good point. We eventually transitioned him into the pick that got us Dube. So, he was a good one.

Russell was good too because he was a pretty important piece in our longest playoff run in the last 16 years and then we got assets for him in his contract year. You contrast that with the Hamonic trade where we gave up premium assets and got nothing back when the music stopped.

[Hot_Flatus]

Originally Posted by Chonger

The team had an identity and every player was fighting for there minutes cause the coach demanded it and held his players accountable for there play. We have none of that from Ward.

Sent from my SM-G930W8 using Tapatalk

Sure, but what happened under Gulutzan and Peters (season #2 anyway)? There's meritt to the coach being a problem, however, the track record of many core players not giving a damn, not able to start on time, not able to elevate their play is far more well established.

[GioforPM]

Originally Posted by Aarongavey

Russell was good too because he was a pretty important piece in our longest playoff run in the last 16 years and then we got assets for him in his contract year. You contrast that with the Hamonic trade where we gave up premium assets and got nothing back when the music stopped.

LOL. Do you really want to talk about getting nothing? You actually have to do something with the assets you acquire, so Iginla - nothing of value. What did he get from the Jaybo trade? Nothing of value.

Add in horrific drafting outside of Gaudreau, which was not a Feaster selection, and just about screwing the team big time for the right to waive ROR...

[GioforPM]

Originally Posted by Roof-Daddy

This core did have heart, back when Hartley was the coach they worked their asses off and never gave up.

In one out of 4 years. A team that worked its ass off doesn’t drop 20 points no matter how bad their backup goalie is.

[DeluxeMoustache]

Originally Posted by PepsiFree

Not to defend Treliving because I'm fine to see a new mind run this team at this point, but you're overstating the situation Treliving walked into.

A dream situation is walking into a team that is right on the cusp and can't get over the hump. One where you're tweaking, not starting from scratch knowing it might take you 5+ years just to build to anything worthwhile.

The Flames had 4 good/potentially good young players, one good defenceman, and one great looking prospect... that's basically it.

Feaster did the dirty work, but nobody is going to stand up and say he did a good job of it. Think about it: he made 25 trades over his two years at the helm, which included moving out Jarome Iginla, and not a single one of those trades produced anything of value. That's a mixture of the players acquired just not being that good and the draft picks he made with those he acquired not really panning out. But 25 trades, and literally not one you can point to and say "that helped us today."

Well, maybe Brian McGrattan, considering he now works for the club and was a good leader.

But that's it. One enforcer who brought more than anyone could have imagined he would.

Fine to say Treliving started with a clean slate, but nobody in their right mind is calling it a dream.

Ok. Note to self - seek out psychiatrist on recommendation of guy on internet named after soft drink

Right

So it’s a wee bit of hyperbole

Doesn’t matter what Feaster did before so much as the situation he left. He could have left better assets but he left what he left

Importantly in the cap world - no cap issues, no horrid contracts that needed to be dumped, tons of space!

As far as roster players, good young F core pieces, some really solid top D, culture reset and good work ethic.

It’s not the very top dream that probably involves Crosby, but yeah, it’s dream enough.

Lots of GMs are brought to clean up things. All he has to do was use his abundance of cap space and good pieces and build

[Jiri Hrdina]

It's all just a matter of what one's perspective is and presenting the information to fit that.
One could argue that BT received an organization with
- A lack of high end prospects
- A lack of elite talent
- Deficiency overall in the asset base of the franchise

He had a better situation relative to other Flames GMs coming in - but relative to what other new GMs around the league walk into - it was a poor state of affairs.

The lack of assets in this franchise is nothing new. It's decades old. And Feaster made it worse by not extracting any value of his core.

[Aarongavey]

Originally Posted by GioforPM

LOL. Do you really want to talk about getting nothing? You actually have to do something with the assets you acquire, so Iginla - nothing of value. What did he get from the Jaybo trade? Nothing of value.

Add in horrific drafting outside of Gaudreau, which was not a Feaster selection, and just about screwing the team big time for the right to waive ROR...

I would take two first round picks he got for Iginla and Jaybo over the Hamonic return myself. But this is not really about whether Treliving is better than Feaster, because even if he is a) that is a low bar and b) he is still a terrible GM.

The thing I miss this year is the media personalities mentioning that Brad is in on every trade and is super active (side note, one has to wonder which opposition GM is informing media personalities of this fact “hey Sakic, it is Elliotte Friedman here just checking in on the Avs. Well Elliotte, before we talk Avs let me tell you how active Brad is”. We know this has to be the case where it is another teams management group telling the media and not the Flames letting the media know what Brad is doing because Brad just takes care of business and does not leak to the press). But this year we do not even get those kernels of hope before we inevitably do not make the trade. Just crickets.

[VladtheImpaler]

Fundamentally, Treliving had a pretty good situation to walk in to, but not nearly as good as it should have been. Feaster bungled every major sell-off and got absolutely nothing for the best players of the Iginla era.
Overlaying the Treliving performance is the fact that our owners lack patience and I am sure there was a lot of pressure behind the scenes to "make the playoffs", especially on heels of Hartley's surprise year.
Treliving drafted (or at least oversaw drafting) well, though crucially missed completely on the highest pick (I do not know if anything could have been done about that). He sold well when he was selling and he started off trading really well - the Hamilton trade tree was very good, especially considering that we got the best of Ferland before he became unplayable. But, basically, everything after the Hamilton to CAR trade has been downhill. Wasting so many decent picks (especially considering how well we have drafted in those rounds) on garbage every deadline, wasting of more picks to pick up spares (Lazar, Smith, etc), culminating with the absolutely inexcusable Hamonic trade (do we have pro scouts and advanced stats analysts?). So many wasted assets for ZERO (kind of the mirror image of Feaster selling our stars). I don't even blame him for the trades that didn't close - **** happens.
The FA signings - more horror (do we have pro scouts and advanced stats analysts?), though Markstrom and Tanev look good THIS season.
The coaches... nothing to add there. The horror, the horror.
Finally, management of organizations and human resources - he has allowed employees way too much leeway and has failed to identify (how could you?), or, rather more likely, to excise the "bad apples"...

Verdict: TERMINATE.

[SuperMatt18]

Originally Posted by Roof-Daddy

This core did have heart, back when Hartley was the coach they worked their asses off and never gave up.

Yeah i hate the "the team is soft" or the "team has no heart" arguments.

These guys had a ton of heart and battle under Hartley, and even that first season under Peters they had a lot of comeback wins and never seemed to give up.

Plus pretty much every member of the core battled through a serious injury to try to win at some point.

The one that always bugs me is Monahan who is always labeled as soft...but after the 17-18 season he played to the point where he needed 4 surgeries (two sports hernias, groin injury, and wrist injury) , and in the 18-19 season he played with a broken thumb.

He's not a physical player, but he's also not a soft player. He goes to the dirty areas of the ice, takes a ton of punishment, and tries to get into those goal scoring areas...but he's soft.

If they aren't playing to their full potential, or giving it 100% it's because they are trying to send a message about something or are unhappy about a direction the org has taken.

Based on Lucic's reaction yesterday and calling out his teammates while defending Ward my guess is it might have something to do with this coaching staff.

[GioforPM]

Originally Posted by SuperMatt18

Yeah i hate the "the team is soft" or the "team has no heart" arguments.

These guys had a ton of heart and battle under Hartley, and even that first season under Peters they had a lot of comeback wins and never seemed to give up.

Plus pretty much every member of the core battled through a serious injury to try to win at some point.

The one that always bugs me is Monahan who is always labeled as soft...but after the 17-18 season he played to the point where he needed 4 surgeries (two sports hernias, groin injury, and wrist injury) , and in the 18-19 season he played with a broken thumb.

He's not a physical player, but he's also not a soft player. He goes to the dirty areas of the ice, takes a ton of punishment, and tries to get into those goal scoring areas...but he's soft.

If they aren't playing to their full potential, or giving it 100% it's because they are trying to send a message about something or are unhappy about a direction the org has taken.

Based on Lucic's reaction yesterday and calling out his teammates while defending Ward my guess is it might have something to do with this coaching staff.

The team members sometimes have heart and I’m 100% with you on Monahan. I think he is at least trying to improve his 200 foot game and the usual complaints about him are not apt.

But they are also not strong mentally - they react badly to adversity. This isn’t just a this year thing either. And the POs are where you need to get though tough times. Some of the players are emotional but not in a productive way. Tkachuk, Rittich, Johnny can each get that way.

[dino7c]

Calgary is also a really tough market to be a GM in if we are being fair. Multiple good trades nixed due to geography not to mention free agents.

There is a reason Calgary, Vancouver, Edmonton, seem to sign the worst FA deals

[SuperMatt18]

Originally Posted by dino7c

Calgary is also a really tough market to be a GM in if we are being fair. Multiple good trades nixed due to geography not to mention free agents.

There is a reason Calgary, Vancouver, Edmonton, seem to sign the worst FA deals

Treliving did a lot of this to himself though and overall I actually like Treliving as a GM, and think he did a lot of good. But also think it might be time for a new voice in the organization.

In the end to me three areas are what will get him fired and are what caused this team to not take the leap as a contender.

1) Terrible Coaching Hires: Gulutzan, Peters, Ward...in the end his coaching hires will be his demise. The team he built on the ice isn't actually the worst but his inability to actually bring in a coach that could get the most of this roster, or get this roster to overachieve is what will be hid demise.

2) Bad Free Agent Signings: His work in unrestricted free agency is pretty terrible overall. Brouwer and Neal are both horrible deals. Early returns on Markstrom and Tanev are okay but I feel like we might regret those within 2 years time. Ryan and Engelland were okay. Mason Raymond was bad.

Overall the biggest mistake is every time this team had cap space he felt the urge to go out and spend it on July 1. Instead of realizing the cap space itself is a valuable asset that could have been better used in trades for high impact players, instead of settling for what was available in UFA.

3) Mortgaging the Future on Short Term Fixes: At the start of his time here Treliving did a great job of turning Hudler, Russell, Baertschi, and Glencross into extra draft capital, which helped us acquire Hamilton.

But then the GM did a complete 180 and started wasting picks on low impact veterans. Elliott, Smith, Stone, Lazar, Hamonic cost this organization 1 First, 4 Seconds, 3 thirds.

Those assets turned into Noah Dobson, Jordan Kyrou, Ruslan Iskhakov, Samuel Bolduc, Alex Formenton, Stuart Skinner, Niklas Nordgren,

Mistake number 1 is what causes this team to underachieve. But mistake number 2 and 3 are what cause this team to lack depth internally without prospects to step in, or assets were used wastefully when they could have been used better.

If you don't sign James Neal or trade for Travis Hamonic then you probably have the cap space and assets for feel comfortable trading for Mark Stone.

But overall it was these signings or trades for "Low Impact, Middle Roster" players instead of focusing on using those assets on true top line high impact players that cost us.