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

[Paulie Walnuts]

UHC to me gets the last spot. Will be good for the market as well.

[Roof-Daddy]

Hopefully this team just loses out the season, or close to it.

[GreenLantern2814]

Originally Posted by SuperMatt18

Sure if they lose 3 or 4 more in a row then you're at 6 but the team has pretty pretty resilient all season that I just don't see them putting up a 6+ game losing streak.

Would I mind if they did? Not at all because ideally they go on one streak or another here. Either win 6 straight and make the playoffs or lose 6 straight and finish bottom 10.

It just seems unlikely to me based on how they've played all season. Every time they are written off they string together a couple wins - just like they did against Washington, and then again after the Florida/Carolina losses.

Halfway there.

They’re facing a bunch of teams who either loaded up or are fighting for their lives.

If the streak isn’t stopped at three, it could spiral out of control rapidly.

[Gugstanley]

They turn it around whenever we think this team is out of it.

[Badgers Nose]

Start Vladar tomorrow. We can still ‘compete’ and probably still lose.

[442scotty]

It was fun thinking about the playoffs while it lasted. They might win another 3 or 4 games this year especially without Backlund in the lineup

[GreenLantern2814]

Originally Posted by Gugstanley

They turn it around whenever we think this team is out of it.

And it’s harder to do that against teams that have made big additions in the last month.

[Calgary4LIfe]

Can't quote you Greenlatern - manual it is:

And it’s harder to do that against teams that have made big additions in the last month.

While true, I think simply the fact that teams are in the stretch drive and jockeying for position, and trying to ramp up for the playoffs makes it more difficult. Flames were winning games in large measure to out-working other teams. Now that other teams have matched that effort, their talent level assures the Flames of finding enough wins really difficult.

[GreenLantern2814]

Originally Posted by Calgary4LIfe

Can't quote you Greenlatern - manual it is:






While true, I think simply the fact that teams are in the stretch drive and jockeying for position, and trying to ramp up for the playoffs makes it more difficult. Flames were winning games in large measure to out-working other teams. Now that other teams have matched that effort, their talent level assures the Flames of finding enough wins really difficult.

It’s for sure a mixture - you’re running up against a $100M team or you’re playing someone with just as much to play for who will have better players than you 9/10 times.

[CroCop]

At this point both scenarios are unlikely. Best to hope for may be a low chance lottery win that puts us top 10 in the draft.

[3thirty]

I've yo yoed all year between team tank and make the playoffs, but I think at this point the odds of a bottom 10 are greater than making the playoffs, albeit both slim. If only Wolf had a nagging ailment they wanted to shut him down for and gave Cooley some NHL starts to see where he is at...

[Macho0978]

Originally Posted by 3thirty

I've yo yoed all year between team tank and make the playoffs, but I think at this point the odds of a bottom 10 are greater than making the playoffs, albeit both slim. If only Wolf had a nagging ailment they wanted to shut him down for and gave Cooley some NHL starts to see where he is at...

I fully expect the Flames to lose to the Rangers in OT, lose to the devils and beat NYI and 3 games from now the odds of both get worse and they hurt the value of the Devil's 1st too

[Monahammer]

It's probably too late to be "team tank" now. Not only do we have to be critically bad, but teams below us have to be abnormally good. Very likely we finish around 12th pick and thus give it up to Montreal.

The time to tank was christmas. Should have traded everyone possible before the freeze. But now we just have to live with the outcome. Might as well cheer for success. There's almost 0 point in even cheering for a tank now.

[Macho0978]

Originally Posted by Monahammer

It's probably too late to be "team tank" now. Not only do we have to be critically bad, but teams below us have to be abnormally good. Very likely we finish around 12th pick and thus give it up to Montreal.

The time to tank was christmas. Should have traded everyone possible before the freeze. But now we just have to live with the outcome. Might as well cheer for success. There's almost 0 point in even cheering for a tank now.

Overall, the Flames have an easy schedule to finish the year, but it is very difficult in the next 7 games.

If they are still in the hunt come April, go for it. But they could be out of it by April 1, if they are anyone with a nagging injury can sit.

[Jiri Hrdina]

Originally Posted by Monahammer

It's probably too late to be "team tank" now. Not only do we have to be critically bad, but teams below us have to be abnormally good. Very likely we finish around 12th pick and thus give it up to Montreal.

The time to tank was christmas. Should have traded everyone possible before the freeze. But now we just have to live with the outcome. Might as well cheer for success. There's almost 0 point in even cheering for a tank now.

Trade who?
Anderssson....OK. Does trading him alone get you to a high draft pick.
So who else?

[Monahammer]

Originally Posted by Jiri Hrdina

Trade who?
Anderssson....OK. Does trading him alone get you to a high draft pick.
So who else?

Andersson and one of Coleman, Kadri, or Backlund. As Kadri allegedly denied all trades, I suppose one of Coleman or Backlund is who I would have tried for.

We are seeing how bad the team is without backlund right now. IMO Coleman has a similar impact on the forward side, Kadri potentially slightly more.

We also saw the impact losing Bahl had, one of our top 4 d. Also very bad result as our depth is fine but we have no one capable of reasonably filling top 4 duties for sustained time.

We trade one of each of these pieces and we would be in the cellar right now, no question. Add in some additional load management on Wolf once we start getting slogged down...

[Royle9]

reposting from other thread.

TLDR for me on Flames.

1. No superstar - This team went downhill when we lost Johnny and Matthew in the same season. This team needs something, someone who can carry this team on their back on those nights where its just not clicking. All the good teams have this, and yes most of these teams drafted these types of players which means most of them bottomed out/got lucky at some point.
   
2. The wrong system - I'm not a Huska hater by any means, but this system just doesn't work for this team. We have a number of skilled east/west players that are great with possession and we do not use their skillset to our advantage. Huska insists on a hardnosed dump to the corner style of forecheck and we don't have the speed or size to get there.
   
3. On the topic of Huska, our offensive numbers are down significantly this year and guys appear (to me at least) to be playing outside of their strengths. I don't mind being defensively minded, but you need to let your best players do what they do with the puck in the o-zone. Frost and Huberdeau have extremely strong east/west play making abilities, lets use that to our strength and that starts with MORE SKATING and people trying to get open. You watch the Flames in the o-zone and they just continue that cycle around the perimeter with a weak shot from the point and nobody around for the rebound. I cant for the life of me understand what we're trying to accomplish.
   
4. We have the best rookie goalie in decades in the NHL and he's single handedly carried this team to a playoff spot alone. Without Wolf we're not even in the realm of losing our 1st pick this year and likely where we were slated at the beginning of the season which is bottom 10.
   
5. Special teams continues to be an absolute nightmare. Our PK has flashes of being quite good, but our PP remains embarrassingly terrible. Why on earth is this a repetitive problem? It looks terrible, players dont move nearly enough and we don't put players in the right spots to maximize their strengths. For how much they supposedly practice it, I remain absolutely stunned how bad it is.

Losing 8 of your last 10 in a stretch where your fighting for your playoff livelihood shows you just how poorly this team is constructed. The game against Vancouver sealed it for me, if they couldn't get hyped up for that game and couldn't compete in that scenario they really aren't going anywhere.

I do wonder if guys will have a change of heart after this collapse to end the season, I can't see how the 3-4 guys who bring it most nights would want to come back to a team who has no direction, no desire and no compete.

This team is the same team we've rotated through for the last decade plus. Just a mediocre hockey team, not bad enough to pick well and not good enough to compete. That mediocre middling, flash of skill but ultimately not strong enough against the good teams.

Lets not waste our years of Wolf, we're clearly not going full re-build so lets build around him and a few of your younger guys and bring in a system and playstyle that works to our strengths. If you want that to be the hard nosed dump style then we better get bigger and faster. Or let our guys play east/west transition style and play the possession game, you simply cant play the speed/size game with the roster we have constructed today.

/end rant sorry.

[Monahammer]

Also to Royle's point, we allegedly didn't get any good offers on these players. But I personally think that is down to negotiation tactics. The current age NHL (and frankly, current age business dealings) values transparency and honesty in a negotiation process. Starting all "negotiations" by saying a player isn't available may have previously elicited attempts to overbid to get the player anyways, but that is not how it works today in my experience. IMO the better tactic these days is to shop the player around, work with other teams medium term on potential returns that fit for both, and then when you have a couple firm in hand you shop to trusted other GMs in order to drive competition.
That is not what we did this year with our players. This exact tactic is what Vancouver, Carolina, and the Avalanche employed this year around Rantanen trades.

[Enoch Root]

Originally Posted by Monahammer

It's probably too late to be "team tank" now. Not only do we have to be critically bad, but teams below us have to be abnormally good. Very likely we finish around 12th pick and thus give it up to Montreal.

The time to tank was christmas. Should have traded everyone possible before the freeze. But now we just have to live with the outcome. Might as well cheer for success. There's almost 0 point in even cheering for a tank now.

If we lose the 3 games in New York, we're 10th, depending on what the Islanders do. They play 3 games, against PIT, MTL and us. If they play .500 or better, and we lose these 3 games, they're ahead of us and we're bottom 10.

So I don't think it's too late to tank.

It would be hard to get much lower than 10th (unless BOS can get their #### together), but 10th is still right there.

[Enoch Root]

Originally Posted by Royle9

reposting from other thread.

TLDR for me on Flames.

1. No superstar - This team went downhill when we lost Johnny and Matthew in the same season. This team needs something, someone who can carry this team on their back on those nights where its just not clicking. All the good teams have this, and yes most of these teams drafted these types of players which means most of them bottomed out/got lucky at some point.
   
2. The wrong system - I'm not a Huska hater by any means, but this system just doesn't work for this team. We have a number of skilled east/west players that are great with possession and we do not use their skillset to our advantage. Huska insists on a hardnosed dump to the corner style of forecheck and we don't have the speed or size to get there.
   
3. On the topic of Huska, our offensive numbers are down significantly this year and guys appear (to me at least) to be playing outside of their strengths. I don't mind being defensively minded, but you need to let your best players do what they do with the puck in the o-zone. Frost and Huberdeau have extremely strong east/west play making abilities, lets use that to our strength and that starts with MORE SKATING and people trying to get open. You watch the Flames in the o-zone and they just continue that cycle around the perimeter with a weak shot from the point and nobody around for the rebound. I cant for the life of me understand what we're trying to accomplish.
   
4. We have the best rookie goalie in decades in the NHL and he's single handedly carried this team to a playoff spot alone. Without Wolf we're not even in the realm of losing our 1st pick this year and likely where we were slated at the beginning of the season which is bottom 10.
   
5. Special teams continues to be an absolute nightmare. Our PK has flashes of being quite good, but our PP remains embarrassingly terrible. Why on earth is this a repetitive problem? It looks terrible, players dont move nearly enough and we don't put players in the right spots to maximize their strengths. For how much they supposedly practice it, I remain absolutely stunned how bad it is.

Losing 8 of your last 10 in a stretch where your fighting for your playoff livelihood shows you just how poorly this team is constructed. The game against Vancouver sealed it for me, if they couldn't get hyped up for that game and couldn't compete in that scenario they really aren't going anywhere.

I do wonder if guys will have a change of heart after this collapse to end the season, I can't see how the 3-4 guys who bring it most nights would want to come back to a team who has no direction, no desire and no compete.

This team is the same team we've rotated through for the last decade plus. Just a mediocre hockey team, not bad enough to pick well and not good enough to compete. That mediocre middling, flash of skill but ultimately not strong enough against the good teams.

Lets not waste our years of Wolf, we're clearly not going full re-build so lets build around him and a few of your younger guys and bring in a system and playstyle that works to our strengths. If you want that to be the hard nosed dump style then we better get bigger and faster. Or let our guys play east/west transition style and play the possession game, you simply cant play the speed/size game with the roster we have constructed today.

/end rant sorry.

Yes, the team isn't very good. We all agree with that.