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

[Aarongavey]

Originally Posted by Paulie Walnuts

No your strategy is not what Conory is doing.

It’s very obvious you have no idea how teams are built and rebuilds go. It’s not all the same and they don’t always work the first try. I never said Vegas was the model team and again maybe sit back and think to yourself why Vegas didn’t do a rebuild. THEY ARE A EXPANSION TEAM. They came into the league with a great expansion draft they had no other way to build a team. Do yourself a favour and before you keep suggesting things like we go sign free agents and reup aging player go look at how the cup winners got their top tier talent. Find me one team that signed their #1C in free agency. Tell me how many teams won a cup without an elite #1C.

We should have known from your username. You’re a Rider fan so you have been cheering for mediocre teams your whole life. It’s not how you win the Riders know that best.

The past 6 Stanley Cup champions got their number one center the following ways

Florida - Top 5 pick
Vegas - trade
Colorado - top 5 pick
Tampa - 3rd round pick
St Louis - trade

[Rhett44]

Flames are not going to be a cup contender unless they start drafting some high picks.

Teams don't win cups without elite level talent. I'm not sure exactly why people are saying Florida didn't have elite talent because I'm pretty sure Barkov was #2 overall and Tkachuk #6.

Colorado had Mackinnon and Makar. Vegas regardless how they got them had Eichel and Pietrangelo. And players are lining up to go to Vegas for cheap, that isn't happening for us so get that delusion out of your head. We aren't trading for a bunch of elite level players.

Again, we find ourselves right in the mushy middle. It's good we probably found a number 1 goalie, but we need just about everything else now. We currently have zero top line forwards.

And players like Kadri, Huberdeau, Backlund, Coleman are actively hurting us. They are playing good enough to win games, but they aren't part of the long term plan and they are old. We need to be losing games, not winning.

[GreenLantern2814]

Originally Posted by Paulie Walnuts

You can look at your thanks and see who they are. I’m not going to summarize anymore.

This is probably the only year they can possibly make the playoffs on the backs of the “core” of Andersson, Kadri, Huberdeau, Weegar Backlund, Coleman and Sharky.

They won’t be able to replicate this next year when they’re all a year older, when there still won’t likely be any ascendant young players in starring roles.

So they’ll finish horribly again.

Which they’re going to do this year - they’re not a good team, they can’t score, and half the time they can’t defend/they’re playing with young/limited goalies.

They’re not about to get magically better when half the league loads up and they’re still icing the lowest payroll team out of 32.

[Goriders]

Originally Posted by Rhett44

Flames are not going to be a cup contender unless they start drafting some high picks.

Teams don't win cups without elite level talent. I'm not sure exactly why people are saying Florida didn't have elite talent because I'm pretty sure Barkov was #2 overall and Tkachuk #6.

Colorado had Mackinnon and Makar. Vegas regardless how they got them had Eichel and Pietrangelo. And players are lining up to go to Vegas for cheap, that isn't happening for us so get that delusion out of your head. We aren't trading for a bunch of elite level players.

Again, we find ourselves right in the mushy middle. It's good we probably found a number 1 goalie, but we need just about everything else now. We currently have zero top line forwards.

And players like Kadri, Huberdeau, Backlund, Coleman are actively hurting us. They are playing good enough to win games, but they aren't part of the long term plan and they are old. We need to be losing games, not winning.

They didn’t draft Tkachuk though. That’s the debate. I don’t disagree with what you said about high level talent. Just what’s the avenue to get them. Only through the draft? Only via free agency and trades? Or a mix.

[Rhett44]

Originally Posted by Goriders

They didn’t draft Tkachuk though. That’s the debate.

We can thank Treliving for that.

No decently run organization puts itself in a position to lose their 2 elite players. Sorry, this rarely happens.

[GreenLantern2814]

Originally Posted by Rhett44

And players like Kadri, Huberdeau, Backlund, Coleman are actively hurting us. They are playing good enough to win games, but they aren't part of the long term plan and they are old. We need to be losing games, not winning.

If you traded just Kadri, Huberdeau, Backlund and Coleman, you’re $27M under the floor.

Who are you going to add who’s worse? Or better?

[Paulie Walnuts]

Originally Posted by Aarongavey

The past 6 Stanley Cup champions got their number one center the following ways

Florida - Top 5 pick
Vegas - trade
Colorado - top 5 pick
Tampa - 3rd round pick
St Louis - trade

Now do Chicago, LA, Pittsburgh, Washington. Also let me know which one of these teams took a roster without a homegrown top 5 pick to the finals.

I’m waiting.

[GreenLantern2814]

Originally Posted by Paulie Walnuts

Now do Chicago, LA, Pittsburgh, Washington. Also let me know which one of these teams took a roster without a homegrown top 5 pick to the finals.

I’m waiting.

Please dude, just let us know where you think the improvements are coming from next year.

The top-3 point getters who are due to hit UFA next year are Matt Duchene, Jason Zucker and Jack Roslovic.

A) Are we signing them all?

B) if we miss out on all three, who then could we add who would keep us a top-5 pick? (Bear in mind, Rasmus will be traded next season if he isn’t extended by camp.)

You’re getting worked up over nothing.

[Paulie Walnuts]

Originally Posted by GreenLantern2814

This is probably the only year they can possibly make the playoffs on the backs of the “core” of Andersson, Kadri, Huberdeau, Weegar Backlund, Coleman and Sharky.

They won’t be able to replicate this next year when they’re all a year older, when there still won’t likely be any ascendant young players in starring roles.

So they’ll finish horribly again.

Which they’re going to do this year - they’re not a good team, they can’t score, and half the time they can’t defend/they’re playing with young/limited goalies.

They’re not about to get magically better when half the league loads up and they’re still icing the lowest payroll team out of 32.

Ok so you pretty much agree with me minus calling that a core group, but I guess it is which probably highlights the fact why we suck.

So I’m not sure why you’re calling me out when I’m saying the Rider fan just went on pages and pages telling us this team is too talented laughable and we we have a lot of young forwards on the roster getting better daily again laughable when we have 2. He also suggested we use our cap space in free agency to address holes because we aren’t far off being an annual 9th place contender.

Sends me a list of teams that outside of Buffalo have just started to come out of the super bad phase and even then most teams continue to suck for a bit after getting the talent in the top 5 for a bit before they make progress. Even with the progress it takes more time because you have to plug holes now with trades and free agency and push your chips in. Those teams also usually go through a coaching change, some even a manager change. Takes time.

Crosby missed the playoffs his first season. MacKinnon went through some serious lows. McDavid barf toom time and the worst western conference of all time to get to the finals. So I’m not sure why they are expecting Anaheim and San Jose to be contending this season.

[Aarongavey]

Originally Posted by Paulie Walnuts

Now do Chicago, LA, Pittsburgh, Washington. Also let me know which one of these teams took a roster without a homegrown top 5 pick to the finals.

I’m waiting.

Well the number of NHL teams that currently do not have a homegrown top 5 pick on their roster or in their system are

Vegas (made the cup finals twice without one)
Bruins (made the cup finals without one)
New York Islanders
Winnipeg Jets (currently 1st overall in the league)
Minnesota Wild
Nashville Preds (made the Cup Finals without a top 5 pick)
St. Louis Blues
Calgary Flames

The other 24 teams have top 5 picks that were homegrown. So 75% of teams have top 5 picks. Not sure it is an indicator of anything beyond most teams have top 5 picks in their system at any given time.

Hope this helps.

[Goriders]

Originally Posted by Geeoff

Thankfully, the guy who made this stupid trade is not with the team anymore.

Also, thankfully, Montreal is in the East, so even if they draft the next Crosby with our pick, it's not that bad.

It's not really worth worrying about where the Flames finish in the standings because we can't really control that anyway. I do think Conroy should go into the trade deadline as a seller.

Tricky part is if they make the playoffs and handcuff him. Less urgency in the summer so probably a lower return.

Probably get rid of Kuzmenko, Mantha, Rooney, Barrie and Hanley salaries after this year. Guessing they’d start rolling in some of their Wrangler D men to replace Hanley and Barrie. Especially if Miromanov experiment is over.

They need some scoring horsepower though. I don’t see any of that coming from the wranglers. Might need one or two journeymen free agents on shorter contracts or the potential Anderson trade for forward/center help. Or hope players like Sharongovich regains his confidence.

Vladar is the one guy that will have to be moved if they don’t see him in the longterm plans. I would not have a problem with them keeping him. He’s cheap and he can win you games.

[Aarongavey]

Originally Posted by Goriders

Tricky part is if they make the playoffs and handcuff him. Less urgency in the summer so probably a lower return.

Probably get rid of Kuzmenko, Mantha, Rooney, Barrie and Hanley salaries after this year. Guessing they’d start rolling in some of their Wrangler D men to replace Hanley and Barrie. Especially if Miromanov experiment is over.

They need some scoring horsepower though. I don’t see any of that coming from the wranglers. Might need one or two journeymen free agents on shorter contracts or the potential Anderson trade for forward/center help.

Vladar is the one guy that will have to be moved if they don’t see him in the longterm plans. I would not have a problem with them keeping him. He’s cheap and he can win you games.

I think they will either move Vladar or let him walk in the offseason. Suspect Conroy will give Cooley a chance either way next year. They seem high on him and if they don’t give him a chance next year he will almost certainly move to a team that will give him a chance after next year.

[Goriders]

Originally Posted by Rhett44

We can thank Treliving for that.

No decently run organization puts itself in a position to lose their 2 elite players. Sorry, this rarely happens.

Yeah. That set the Flames back big time. They have not recovered since then.

[Goriders]

Originally Posted by Aarongavey

I think they will either move Vladar or let him walk in the offseason. Suspect Conroy will give Cooley a chance either way next year. They seem high on him and if they don’t give him a chance next year he will almost certainly move to a team that will give him a chance after next year.

That’s what I think happens too. Next few months will determine a lot of things. If the Flames go down the tubes I think Vladar and Andersson will probably be moved. I don’t think we have any vet forwards that anyone would want outside of Coleman and Kadri. I have a feeling they want to stay though.

Problem is what happens if they don’t go down the tubes. At some point Conroy is going to use his cap space as well. Guess you just have to wait and see.

[Paulie Walnuts]

Originally Posted by Aarongavey

Well the number of NHL teams that currently do not have a homegrown top 5 pick on their roster or in their system are

Vegas (made the cup finals twice without one)
Bruins (made the cup finals without one)
New York Islanders
Winnipeg Jets (currently 1st overall in the league)
Minnesota Wild
Nashville Preds (made the Cup Finals without a top 5 pick)
St. Louis Blues
Calgary Flames

The other 24 teams have top 5 picks that were homegrown. So 75% of teams have top 5 picks. Not sure it is an indicator of anything beyond most teams have top 5 picks in their system at any given time.

Hope this helps.

Again Vegas is a bad example. So which teams won a cup without a top 5 pick?

Just the Bruins? They had Seguin but he wasn’t really a key cog.

How will the Flames get elite talent ?

Winnipeg has always been a flawed team. Much like the Treliving Flames bouncing in and out of the playoffs one good year a bad year. I suspect they will be bounced easily again this year.

[gvitaly]

Originally Posted by Goriders

That’s what I think happens too. Next few months will determine a lot of things. If the Flames go down the tubes I think Vladar and Andersson will probably be moved. I don’t think we have any vet forwards that anyone would want outside of Coleman and Kadri. I have a feeling they want to stay though.

Problem is what happens if they don’t go down the tubes. At some point Conroy is going to use his cap space as well. Guess you just have to wait and see.

Speaking of cap space, I think Conroy will take a swing at Ekblad, or Chychrun this summer. Especially if Andersson is traded. If the stories about Ekblad being great friends with Weegar and Huberdeau are true I could see there being mutual interest. I think it would be pretty consistent with how the Flames build teams.

I really doubt the Flames are going to offer any UFA forward more than a 3 year contract in the offseason.

[Aarongavey]

Originally Posted by Paulie Walnuts

Again Vegas is a bad example. So which teams won a cup without a top 5 pick?

Just the Bruins? They had Seguin but he wasn’t really a key cog.

How will the Flames get elite talent ?

Winnipeg has always been a flawed team. Much like the Treliving Flames bouncing in and out of the playoffs one good year a bad year. I suspect they will be bounced easily again this year.

Your proof point for success is something almost every single team has. It is not a distinguishing feature. Especially when Vegas is a bad example because they did it without a top 5 homegrown pick.

If you are saying that 75% of teams have a homegrown top 5 pick and out of those teams 12.5% of them have won the Cup over the past 5 years and 25% of teams do not have a top 5 homegrown pick and 12.5% of those teams have won a Stanley cup over the past 5 years I would agree with you.

[Paulie Walnuts]

Originally Posted by gvitaly

Speaking of cap space, I think Conroy will take a swing at Ekblad, or Chychrun this summer. Especially if Andersson is traded. If the stories about Ekblad being great friends with Weegar and Huberdeau are true I could see there being mutual interest. I think it would be pretty consistent with how the Flames build teams.

I really doubt the Flames are going to offer any UFA forward more than a 3 year contract in the offseason.

It would be smart to cash in on Andersson and use Ekblad as a stop gap on a 2-3 year deal because our prospects probably aren’t ready yet.

We can make the money work on a short term deal. The problem is free agency brings out the worst in some GMs so the term could become an issue.

[Paulie Walnuts]

Originally Posted by Aarongavey

Your proof point for success is something almost every single team has. It is not a distinguishing feature. Especially when Vegas is a bad example because they did it without a top 5 homegrown pick.

If you are saying that 75% of teams have a homegrown top 5 pick and out of those teams 12.5% of them have won the Cup over the past 5 years and 25% of teams do not have a top 5 homegrown pick and 12.5% of those teams have won a Stanley cup over the past 5 years I would agree with you.

If we could just zap our roster and get great rules to draft players from other teams the ability to shake down half the league so they can have you pick a player they don’t want drafted do you think it would be fair to use that as an example ?

You can skirt the question all you want, just like the rider fan. How will the Flames get the elite talent ?

Or maybe you like the Sutter model feee agent shopping for scraps just to back into a 8tj place finish to get destroyed. Or the Treliving when you push your chips in when a fluke playoff appearance happens with a roster with players like David Jones, Joe Colbourne having career years.

[Sandman]

Without a doubt, you need real strength and depth down the middle if you expect to be a contender, and that's one area where this team needs to improve- especially in regards to our pipeline. We need centers for the future.