[PGT] Flames lose another season opener

[Erick Estrada]

Originally Posted by flamesforcup

Brodies been horrible since his peak season. Starting to get me worried. Oh and Monahan and Gaudreau play with no spine. Put Bennett on that line ffs

His struggles coincide with being placed on the left side. He's never been the same since.

[habernac]

Smith looked great. The rest of the team looked to be taking a nap. And holy crap, McDavid is fast.

[_Q_]

I thought goaltending was great last night. I also thought that the defence was generally good. Once we get some offended going, this will be a tough team to beat I think.

[CalgaryFan1988]

After years of having no true quality RHD, we suddenly have too many.

Hamilton
Brodie
Hamonic
Stone

Left side?

Giordano
(wind and silence)

[tkflames]

After sleeping on it two themes come to mind:

1. I don't think we had a dangerous opportunity in that entire game. Even the Tkatchuck one was mediocre at best.

2. I don't understand why we are so intent on matching Edmonton's size and game. Looking at the roster, the oilers have no depth. So rather than putting out glass and brouwer (I thought glass did well in his role), put out four lines that can score. The reason that Hathaways line did well is because the oilers have nothing past the second line. So let them neutralize our first and then bring waves. I don't know what we are scared of? Where are all these liberties everyone is taking that were prevented by Glass and Brouwer last night? The second half to that is find ways to agitate McDavid. Get under his skin, give him an extra shove, an extra face wash. To me a line up including Janko, Jagr, Lazar, Kulak would be far more effective than Brouwer, Stajan, Glass and Bartkowski.

[Bourque's Twin]

Originally Posted by tkflames

After sleeping on it two themes come to mind:

1. I don't think we had a dangerous opportunity in that entire game. Even the Tkatchuck one was mediocre at best.

2. I don't understand why we are so intent on matching Edmonton's size and game. Looking at the roster, the oilers have no depth. So rather than putting out glass and brouwer (I thought glass did well in his role), put out four lines that can score. The reason that Hathaways line did well is because the oilers have nothing past the second line. So let them neutralize our first and then bring waves. I don't know what we are scared of? Where are all these liberties everyone is taking that were prevented by Glass and Brouwer last night? The second half to that is find ways to agitate McDavid. Get under his skin, give him an extra shove, an extra face wash. To me a line up including Janko, Jagr, Lazar, Kulak would be far more effective than Brouwer, Stajan, Glass and Bartkowski.

Good luck agitating McDavid without guys like Glass in the lineup.

[Looch City]

Can't wait until the Oilers face a real NHL team and lose.

Embrassing effort by the Flames.

[GranteedEV]

Originally Posted by Bourque's Twin

Good luck agitating McDavid without guys like Glass in the lineup.

McDavid had a hat trick with glass in the lineup He was jardly "agitated"

[crapshoot]

Like always, I forgot over the summer just how gloomy these threads get after a loss. Now I'm looking forward to the exceptional euphoria after the first win of the season.

[red sky]

If you asked me before the game what the worse outcome would be I couldn't have described it any better. McDavid hattrick? Check. Shutout? Check. Flames 'stars' non-factor? Check. No intensity? Check.

Oilers play a really good transition game and no matter what the Flames tried to do to gain the zone, the Oilers defense was quick to the puck and made short passes to exit the zone. Wait. That sounds familiar.

Smith played well. His puck moving skills were on display.

The Flames looked very slow in comparison. Monahan was skating in cement and Tkachuk couldn't forechek fast enough to put any pressure on the dump ins. Disappointing but not surprising result.

[Huntingwhale]

Disappointing result, but I'm not at all surprised. This is a team that stumbles out of the gate every season, regardless of the turnover or lineup. I predicted that the Flames would be digging themselves out of a hole early on to start the season and I see no reason to think otherwise.

Other then that, Smith looked fantastic. If that's Elliott in net, it's 1-0 Oilers 45 seconds in. If this is the Smith we get, then I think we'll be okay in the long run.

The forward group for Calgary didn't do too much. What ever happened to Johnny spinning off checks and using his crazy edge work to dance and spin around players? A couple of times he was along the boards and in years past he'd cut back, spin and head the other way. Instead he looked like a guy who gained an extra couple pounds who suddenly thinks he can muscles his way through bigger people.

I can see the potential of the Brodie/Hamonic pairing. Brodie was really off. But I thought Hamonic was decent and he has a really solid outlet pass. But like the Fan Radio said this morning, it was Bob Hartley 101 defense out there.

As excited as I am to start the season, October and November are almost ALWAYS painful to get through. Just got to chug along and wait for the team to hit its groove and the good times will roll.

Credit to the Oilers. They aren't pushovers anymore and played a great possession game. Talbot wasn't really tested. But he looked calm and cool. And McDavid...wow. Hate the guy all you want, but his speed is almost unfair to the rest of the league. Reminds me of a guy playing EA NHL on easy mode who just skates past everyone and does what he wants. It really sucks he plays for the Oilers.

[btimbit]

Originally Posted by Bourque's Twin

Good luck agitating McDavid without guys like Glass in the lineup.

Guys like Ferland can agitate him. Glass, who I thought was good in his role, hopefully never gets caught out there vs mcdavid

[belsarius]

Smith was outstanding, can't really fault him on either goal. Blown coverage and give McDavid enough break-aways and he will score. There did seem to be issues communication wise between him and the defensemen when moving the puck, the Flames just arn't used to a puck moving goalie.

I just don't understand the dump and chase strategy last night, that wasn't Flames hockey last year, and it was executed poorly. Slow dumps and no far side pressure made it very easy for the Oilers to move the puck out. I don't know that they were physically that much faster but positioning and transition was a whole level above what the Flames were playing at.

I would have liked to see some, any, changes or adjustments from the coaching staff. McDavid scored on the third line, the fourth line and empty net. As much as the first line generated no offense they really didn't let the Oilers first line generate much either. When Brodie keeps getting beat you have to switch up and have Gio shadow instead.

Tkachuk looked great behind the net but he always seemed to lack support, I didn't notice Frolik all night. Ferland needed to smash more instead of hanging out in the high slot and Johnny needs to attack those defencemen, not button hook for the pass 3 feet into the zone.. every. single. time. Oilers have a weak defense but the Flames made it easy on them. A positive note though is that I didn't feel worried once when McDavid was on the bench. They may have kept the Flames offense quiet but the bottom 3 lines didn't generate any either. In a game where the Flames looked so far behind, they still managed to make every other Oiler line a non-factor.

I am not one to pile on a player but I am over Brouwer. That give away with an extra player made me puke a little in my mouth. If you are not fast you need to be smart. If you are not smart you can be tough. Brouwer was none of these and just a flaming pylon last night.

[Royle9]

The irony here is the Flames looked (outside of Smith) EXACTLY like the did in preseason. Some of us even called them out on it and got lambasted by the fact "its just preseason, do you think Gio is going to give it 100% in preseason and risk injury"

Well folks, there you have it. Every year we float and play like dog#### in preseason and we are now 1-14 in Season openers. I think we should probably start "trying" a bit more in preseason, you know to get ready for the SEASON that starts soon after. The effort out there outside of 2-3 individuals was absolutely disgusting. They looked lost, they looked slow, they looked like they didn't want the puck at all.

Is there a team that ice's the puck more than Calgary?? They didn't want any possession, we generated maybe 1 good scoring chance in close?

Brouwer - Gone
Brodie - Traded in package for something better
Lines mixed up please
Stajan sent down/traded for anything we can get.
Janko up

This team needs an elite scoring RW, we've all been saying it for years but we truly do. Jagr can help but we still need one for the long term. Package starts with Brodie, we can add to it from there.

[jmac98]

https://www.google.ca/amp/s/globalne...udy-warns/amp/

[868904]

So much bias here.

The same posters all the time blaming the same players all the time.

The Flames didn't lose this game because Tanner Glass and Matt Stajan was in the line-up. The Stajan line was arguably the best line for the Flames and the only line that showed up to play. Sure they got hemmed in their own zone a few times, but so did every single other line the Flames had. Hell even the commentators were saying that the top line was not generating any offense because they were defending against McDavid the whole night.

The Flames lost because Johnny Gaudreau, Sean Monahan, Matt Tkachuk, Backlund, Frolik, and Sam Bennett did not compete. One poster even blamed Ferland for the top line's struggle, yet he was the best player on that line and generated the only scoring chances and cycles.

When your best players aren't your best players, you will lose, it's that simple. The Flames "best" players no showed, yet some posters love giving them a free pass. These guys are paid to score yet they couldn't generate any offense, that is not Tanner Glass's fault.

[GordonBlue]

gaudreau has to learn a few new moves. I can't believe when he has the puck he still does that curl back towards the blueline just to throw the puck across and hope someone is there.

[Beninho]

Originally Posted by 868904

So much bias here.

The same posters all the time blaming the same players all the time.

The Flames didn't lose this game because Tanner Glass and Matt Stajan was in the line-up. The Stajan line was arguably the best line for the Flames and the only line that showed up to play. Sure they got hemmed in their own zone a few times, but so did every single other line the Flames had. Hell even the commentators were saying that the top line was not generating any offense because they were defending against McDavid the whole night.

The Flames lost because Johnny Gaudreau, Sean Monahan, Matt Tkachuk, Backlund, Frolik, and Sam Bennett did not compete. One poster even blamed Ferland for the top line's struggle, yet he was the best player on that line and generated the only scoring chances and cycles.

When your best players aren't your best players, you will lose, it's that simple. The Flames "best" players no showed, yet some posters love giving them a free pass. These guys are paid to score yet they couldn't generate any offense, that is not Tanner Glass's fault.

I agree that Stajan and Glass weren't the reason why this team lost, I actually thought Glass played a good game. It's the fact that we sacrificed skill and scoring in Jankowski to play some players who are offensively inept, just don't think this team is any place to sacrifice what Jankowski might bring. Hopefully Brad can get him back up ASAP. It's really ridiculous that we have to continue and wait for this team to play Janko.

[CalgaryFan1988]

Games like last night make me miss Regehr and Sarich (to a lesser extent).

[Toonage]

This isn't an Anaheim situation, not even close, but how long before the media picks up on the Flames having yet to win in Edmonton's new arena and it becomes a thing?