The original interview and the "apology" were all covered by media at the WJC.
That started the story.
Not sure it's Francis' fault for covering a story that was already out of the bag. Plus his article brought Flames' player quotes into it playing it down.
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Yup, I bet the actual talk with the vets is how to be more careful around the media in the future, and how innocent comments can get blown way out of proportion if not careful.
Whoever squealed to Steinberg saying that they "weren't thrilled" about the comments should have known better than to say anything to the media. What they did was a bigger issue than anything Parekh said and really makes the point about needing to make simple boring answers when talking to the media.
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"A pessimist thinks things can't get any worse. An optimist knows they can."
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I had a good talk with an Oilers fan friend yesterday about organizational DNA. We were both lamenting how, no matter how much certain personnel might change, there are things about organizations that seem to persist. With the Oilers it's what we all make fun of -- terrible depth, over-focus on star offensive talent, and weak D and goaltending.
With the Flames, it's this ridiculous pride about "doing things a better way", which in a very real sense can be translated into "not being the Oilers". We have this focus on team identify and defence and being a complete player and never tanking. This all makes sense.
... except that how it often manifests in practice is never drafting star talent and never letting skill flourish and develop. We constantly force all our pegs into square holes regardless of what shape they are and as a result you get consistency ... but it's boring, and consistently mediocre.
The fans and media in this city play a part in this too. This is not a good hockey team and everyone knows it but we cling to this pride that we're not the Oilers and that we're not going to tank.
I'm genuinely concerned that we're going to force the genuinely star-shaped Parekh into this same medicore, "consistent" square hole. This is the best prospect we've had since Tkachuk and we need to be building the organization around him, not forcing him to become the same lifeless square peg we expect all our players to become.
InB4 the "you're overreacting" crowd chimes in, as if we don't have 30 years of evidence that this is just the most recent, Exhibit A to.
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I had a good talk with an Oilers fan friend yesterday about organizational DNA. We were both lamenting how, no matter how much certain personnel might change, there are things about organizations that seem to persist. With the Oilers it's what we all make fun of -- terrible depth, over-focus on star offensive talent, and weak D and goaltending.
With the Flames, it's this ridiculous pride about "doing things a better way", which in a very real sense can be translated into "not being the Oilers". We have this focus on team identify and defence and being a complete player and never tanking. This all makes sense.
... except that how it often manifests in practice is never drafting star talent and never letting skill flourish and develop. We constantly force all our pegs into square holes regardless of what shape they are and as a result you get consistency ... but it's boring, and consistently mediocre.
The fans and media in this city play a part in this too. This is not a good hockey team and everyone knows it but we cling to this pride that we're not the Oilers and that we're not going to tank.
I'm genuinely concerned that we're going to force the genuinely star-shaped Parekh into this same medicore, "consistent" square hole. This is the best prospect we've had since Tkachuk and we need to be building the organization around him, not forcing him to become the same lifeless square peg we expect all our players to become.
InB4 the "you're overreacting" crowd chimes in, as if we don't have 30 years of evidence that this is just the most recent, Exhibit A to.
Interesting discussion. Personally I get the vibe that fans/media/organization have a bit of a tendency to overvalue/revere guys who are more defined by being hard working, blue collar, "plays the game the right way", "well rounded", underdogs. I imagine this comes from the hard hat wearing 2004 team which had elite talent (Iginla, Kipper) but was more greatly defined (IMO) by it's hard working, rough and tumble, grindy style.
This is obviously not always the case, Gaudreau being an obvious outlier amongst several others, but year over year I feel like you see almost a prioritization of celebrating the engine room guys rather than a coveting of elite elite talent.
Some examples of this that spring to mind off the top of my head in some level or another are guys like Lance Bouma, Justin Kirkland, Ryan Lomberg, Josh Jooris, Corey Sarich, Curtis Glencross.
That's obviously not to say that they view a Lomberg and a Parekh as interchangeable pieces. But when you look at what this team has previously coveted as their "organizational DNA" as you say, it is a stark contrast between the graceful, confident, silky, riverboat gambling style of Parekh versus the scrappy, hard working, blue collar, "complete" player that frequently gets celebrated here.
Going to be really interesting to see how Parekh fits into this organization long term.
The original interview and the "apology" were all covered by media at the WJC.
That started the story.
Not sure it's Francis' fault for covering a story that was already out of the bag. Plus his article brought Flames' player quotes into it playing it down.
He didn't have too though. Its stupid and could have easily chose to ignore it because its so stupid. What if the story was whether he is circumsized or not or something equally stupid, doubt he covers that.
He didn't have too though. Its stupid and could have easily chose to ignore it because its so stupid. What if the story was whether he is circumsized or not or something equally stupid, doubt he covers that.
Why wouldn't he? There's a public apology out there from Zayne, and the commentary was continuing to burble.
This story puts the perceived issue to bed and it allowed the Flames veteran leadership to add context and defend their player, as well as talk about how funny his comments are (really shows how valuable good leadership is).
I get that Francis has often been a bit of a sensationalist, but in this case the piece is a positive for the player. It's actually more of a PR win for the Flames, and I wouldn't be surprised (as someone with a PR past) if internal comms helped put it together by lining up the background with Francis and interviews with the players.
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Whoever squealed to Steinberg saying that they "weren't thrilled" about the comments should have known better than to say anything to the media. What they did was a bigger issue than anything Parekh said and really makes the point about needing to make simple boring answers when talking to the media.
That is the great irony of this - it wasn't Parekh's comments that created the story, it was the player(s) reacting, and commenting to the media about it.
The warning to Parekh to be careful with the media, was the careless event here that created the story about being careful with the media.
He didn't have too though. Its stupid and could have easily chose to ignore it because its so stupid. What if the story was whether he is circumsized or not or something equally stupid, doubt he covers that.
He doesn't have to write about a national story about the team he covers?
“It’s amazing,” Flames general manager Craig Conroy told Postmedia from St. Paul, Minn., where he was in the house at Grand Casino Arena to witness Parekh’s historic accomplishment. “A couple days ago, they were talking about how he could be the highest-scoring defenceman ever and I was thinking, ‘Wow, that’s impressive.’ All the years I’ve been coming to this tournament, and I’ve seen so many great young prospects, so to have him set a record? That’s very impressive.
“I’m proud of him.”
Quote:
“What he’s done offensively is special,” said Conroy, who selected this right-shot rearguard with the ninth-overall pick in the 2024 NHL Draft. “Overall, we’re really happy with his tournament.”
“Other than them winning the gold, I don’t think it could have gone better for him,” agreed Ray Edwards, the Flames’ director of player development. “What I liked about his tournament is that in the big games, he was a big player in those games. That’s what we wanted. We wanted him to be a guy who stood out against his peers, and we definitely saw that. You look at that team and I don’t care if you’re a Calgary Flames fan or not, it’s hard to say that Zayne Parekh didn’t stand out to you in a real positive way.”
Quote:
“At times, defensively, you’re going to have things you maybe want to tidy up,” Conroy allowed. “But you see that with all young players.”
Edwards echoed that sentiment, hammering home his point by name-dropping one of the all-time greats.
“Of course there were some mistakes made,” Edwards said. “But every player, on all the teams, made mistakes. It’s easy to point out, ‘Oh, Zayne missed an assignment there.’ Well, they’re all missing some assignments. That semifinal game was a game of missed assignments, so where do you want to start?
“Like, (Scott) Niedermayer made mistakes at the world junior,” he continued. “But what I really liked is how I thought Zayne was on his toes and making plays and doing the stuff that we liked so much when we drafted him and obviously in his last year of junior.
“My hope is it translates so that as he comes back, he’s feeling good about his game, he’s played some high-leverage minutes in tough games and he can find a way to get that done now at the NHL level.”
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What I liked too is his points / goals tended to come in big moments - not just points padding the stats late in blowouts.
Goal: 3-3 vs Czech
Goal: 4-3 vs Czech
Assist: 2-1 vs Latvia
Goal: 3-0 vs Denmark
Assist: 4-1 vs Denmark
Goal: 1-0 vs Finland
Assist: 3-2 vs Finland
Assist: 4-3 vs Finland
Assist: 3-0 vs Slovakia
Assist: 7-0 vs Slovakia
Assist: 2-2 vs Czech
Goal: 3-2 vs Finland
Assist: 4-2 vs Finland
The only point that was a nothing point in a blowout was the 7-0 goal.
The rest of the points were either tie games, or while the game was still within 2 goals.
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The Kadri comments are why we should be very careful moving him out unless it is a phenomenal return.
He was exactly the same the World Juniors. If you remember his. He was trying to go 1 on 4 and win it all himself. He refused to shake hands with a Swiss player and had to apologize.
He is EXACTLY the type of vet you want to have around Parekh (and other young cocky players). He lived the experience. He made a ton of mistakes with Toronto in the playoffs and learned how to deal with it in front of a sometimes hostile Canadian market media.
I think we should be wary of moving him at this point.
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Firstly, I think his comments are more about what pro hockey players and professional athletes now in general are coached to do. Simple answers, giving up too much info about oneself or heir game or whatever off the ice is eventually going to end up not worth the hassle.
But this is not agnostic to the Flames as an organization.
With social media the way it is, things outside of the norm (by evidence of this itself) get picked apart and analyzed. With so many talking heads and those looking to make some hot takes to build up their own reputation or credibility, and enough people run with it to make it a story.
And yes this particular case is the national media covering this.
But, Francis and Valji (is he still around, I don’t think so) are part of that brigade looking to make a name for themselves and establish credibility. The above mentioned pearl clutching from Francis around Gaudreau and Monahan, and other things where he’s been snubbed by players or the organization in some regard so he decides to fire back with some half rumors presented as half truth, where he can hop on Edmonton or Vancouver radio and tell his story and have his ego stroked.
Francis especially loves this because now he has license to be the guy that Parekh can let his hair down with and become chummy with. Something he’s tried with other Flames and also likely a big reason why Flames players have told him to keep his answers to a minimum because Francis won’t be able to help himself and will jump all over that and twist things into something they aren’t.
