Making the playoffs or keeping our top-10 first round pick 2025?

[Wolven]

Originally Posted by Rhett44

Stop pushing for mediocrity and let's tank and restart.

That doesn't even mean anything. You may as well just say "let's win all the gamez". The statements are equally informed and detailed.

[Mathgod]

Originally Posted by Jay Random

What were they trying to ‘win now’ when they sold off Iginla, Bouwmeester, and anything else they could move in 2013?

What were they trying to ‘win now’ when they shipped out half a dozen pending free agents last season?

This idea that the team has been following the exact same strategy for 20 straight years is a damned lie, and a very stupid and tiresome one.

From 2006 to 2012, the organization was stuck in a win-now mentality, despite ample evidence that it wasn't working. In 2013, they sold off their vets when things got so bad that they could not make the playoffs even when hanging on to those vets for dear life. The team's core players moved into their mid to late 30s and it was clear that the team wasn't good enough to compete. At that point there was no choice left but to sell.

In other words, those changes were made reactively, not proactively.

Then at the very first sign of playoff success (winning a playoff series vs a mediocre Canucks team), they moved a bunch of futures to try and build a contender in a frantic rush. This was the wrong approach, and hurt the team in the following years.

Things eventually got better, and things arguably would have worked out if not for Monahan's injuries and Bennett not panning out here. But at the end of the day, were we a Monahan or a Bennett away from beating Colorado in 2019? or the Oilers in 2022? No. The team has always been further away from contending than it ever would admit.

Johnny and Chucky ran for the exit as soon as they could, and now we're here. I'm happy with what Conny did last season, shipping out our pending free agents and focusing on building up the team's pool of prospects and picks. We're now finally on the right track, and although it will take some time, things should be trending upwards before too long.

[Major Major]

Originally Posted by Jay Random

As Bingo likes to point out, this team went into the season with $20 million in cap space and the second-lowest payroll in the league. That is not ‘pushing for mediocrity’.

At this point, the only effective way to tank would be to trade Wolf so he can't spoil the tank by stealing games. You up for that?

No, you just keep the asset churn going for the next year or 2. Draft a ton, not just once but over 3 drafts. Stop thinking about layering players on top of this core. It's not going to work. Let the team be as good as it wants to be. I think overachieving is awesome. But don't look at this team and think, well if we just add Morgan Frost or Dylan Cozens or even Elias Pettersson, we can become contenders. That is a doomed mindset, a departure from what I understood the plan to be and it would show a pretty big flaw in Conroy's team building.

The fact that he seems to want the two longest contracts on the team to be RSD when our top 3 prospects are RSD is dumb af.

[Jay Random]

Originally Posted by Major Major

No, you just keep the asset churn going for the next year or 2. Draft a ton, not just once but over 3 drafts. Stop thinking about layering players on top of this core. It's not going to work. Let the team be as good as it wants to be. I think overachieving is awesome.

So how is that supposed to get them the top-5 draft pick that the tank crowd is absolutely certain they must have?

[Hackey]

Originally Posted by All In Good Time

That’s debatable isn’t it?
Scorched earth pretty much guarantees 4 years of crap if the first one is successful. But, like I said, as long as 15 or 16 thousand buy 41 tickets a year for 4 or 5 years AND the first run at a complete tear down/rebuild is successful AND we still have a decent goalie, there isn’t anything to worry about.

It's quite typical in business to lose money in the growth stage because you're heavily investing into the future. If the bottom line is the top priority then you're likely never going to be the best team in the league.

[All In Good Time]

Originally Posted by Rhett44

Stop pushing for mediocrity and let's tank and restart.

Stop pushing for teaching our youth to lose and fostering a loser culture
Forfeit!!!!

[All In Good Time]

Originally Posted by Hackey

It's quite typical in business to lose money in the growth stage because you're heavily investing into the future. If the bottom line is the top priority then you're likely never going to be the best team in the league.

Right
All I said is that there needs to be 15 thousand ticket buyers for those 5 years of garbage, if it’s successful

[Major Major]

Originally Posted by Jay Random

So how is that supposed to get them the top-5 draft pick that the tank crowd is absolutely certain they must have?

We are talking about 3 guys... 3 guys left with any value. Andersson, Kadri and Coleman.

Is that enough to drive them down? I have no idea. I actually think there's a decent chance that they will essentially be unchanged or even better standings wise. But it might get them a high pick.

It would surely get them a boatload of assets. You make a ton of picks which leverages the strength of this org and this gm, and you infuse talent through pick volume.

Bonus points for getting more unprotected 1st rounders a couple years down the line.

[Hackey]

Originally Posted by All In Good Time

Right
All I said is that there needs to be 15 thousand ticket buyers for those 5 years of garbage, if it’s successful

If you truly want to win and that is your top priority you're not going to worry about a few leaner years. It's the price you pay.

[Jay Random]

The difficulty is that Andersson, Kadri, and Coleman all have trade protection. Reports are that Kadri in particular does not want to go anywhere.

[Jay Random]

Originally Posted by Hackey

If you truly want to win and that is your top priority you're not going to worry about a few leaner years. It's the price you pay.

Why would that be any business owner's top priority? You stand to lose tens of millions a year in actual cash during the lean years, and then maybe, if you're lucky, you get a couple of deep playoff runs from which the league skims half the gate revenue off the top.

[Inferno]

Originally Posted by Jay Random

The difficulty is that Andersson, Kadri, and Coleman all have trade protection. Reports are that Kadri in particular does not want to go anywhere.

And the only two teams that Kadri apparently would waive for (Colorado and Toronto) aren't interested at the moment.

[Rhett44]

Originally Posted by Jay Random

Why would that be any business owner's top priority? You stand to lose tens of millions a year in actual cash during the lean years, and then maybe, if you're lucky, you get a couple of deep playoff runs from which the league skims half the gate revenue off the top.

Some owners actually do want to win a cup.

I know it is hard to wrap our heads around as Flames fans with the Flames ownership and Murray Edwards, but there are actually some good owners out there. That care about winning. Not the Flames though. We are more interested in mediocrity and getting 2 home playoff games at any cost.

[Jay Random]

Originally Posted by Rhett44

Some owners actually do want to win a cup.

All owners want to win a championship. NO owners have that as their top priority. The top priority is to make money. This is what is called ‘business’.

[All In Good Time]

All Im saying is, go ahead team tank, buy the tickets.
Many in this market aren’t interested in a product that isn’t even trying

[Jiri Hrdina]

Originally Posted by Rhett44

Some owners actually do want to win a cup.

I know it is hard to wrap our heads around as Flames fans with the Flames ownership and Murray Edwards, but there are actually some good owners out there. That care about winning. Not the Flames though. We are more interested in mediocrity and getting 2 home playoff games at any cost.

There is very little evidence of that.

[Goriders]

Originally Posted by Hackey

If you truly want to win and that is your top priority you're not going to worry about a few leaner years. It's the price you pay.

If you’re paying the bills you might

[Flamesfan05]

It’s obvious team is not close to compete
Few young pieces had a good year . That’s good enough. Team needs some more young pieces

Get rid of the deadweights

If Seth Jones can be traded, maybe they can trade Huberdeau, Kadri, Backlund and Coleman.

[Aarongavey]

Originally Posted by Mathgod

20 years of win-now mentality, resulting in zero west final appearances, is a pretty strong argument against continuing the win-now mentality, don't you think?

For the record, I'm not on team tank, I'm on team good-asset-management. I'm also on team realism. If you don't have the talent needed to make the playoffs, it is foolish to keep gunning for the 16th overall pick. It's even more foolish to trade away futures just to squeak into the playoffs and become first round fodder.

Get younger, move out aging vets for draft picks, keep improving the team's prospect pool through the draft. Conny has done well so far, and needs to continue this path.

This entire post would be relevant if there was any evidence Conroy was trying to win now. Since he is not and has not made any moves to make anyone rationally think he is trying to win now you have nothing to worry about.

[Aarongavey]

Originally Posted by Major Major

No, you just keep the asset churn going for the next year or 2. Draft a ton, not just once but over 3 drafts. Stop thinking about layering players on top of this core. It's not going to work. Let the team be as good as it wants to be. I think overachieving is awesome. But don't look at this team and think, well if we just add Morgan Frost or Dylan Cozens or even Elias Pettersson, we can become contenders. That is a doomed mindset, a departure from what I understood the plan to be and it would show a pretty big flaw in Conroy's team building.

The fact that he seems to want the two longest contracts on the team to be RSD when our top 3 prospects are RSD is dumb af.

Do you think trading a 24 yr old winger, a 29 year old winger, a 2nd round pick and a 7th round pick for two 25 yr old players is some sign that they are departing from the plan and a doomed mindset?