Can the Flames become a contender without tanking?

[CroFlames]

Originally Posted by Bingo

The push back is what I don't get.

I don't think many argue that high draft picks are necessary, and I think there would be a vocal angry majority if the team loaded up this summer, or started moving futures now to bolster a team close to a playoff spot.

They didn't. They're not.

They moved 6 UFAs for futures and younger players. They moved their starting goaltender a two years before he will be a UFA. They carried 20M in cap space into the season.

The decisions are fine.

If that's the case I don't think you need to worry, as they seem to be on the same page. The team is winning, largely on the backs of young players pitching in more than expected.

Bad asset decisions, and no direction drive me nuts.

This team isn't doing that.

Lamenting on ice results after good decisions is pointless.

This is an excellent way of putting it. Conroy is making the right decisions to build this team the right way - from the ground up.

This young group is refusing the go quietly into the night, and that is exactly what you want.

To argue you don't need high picks to win Cups is simply wrong though.

[Bingo]

Originally Posted by CroFlames

This is an excellent way of putting it. Conroy is making the right decisions to build this team the right way - from the ground up.

This young group is refusing the go quietly into the night, and that is exactly what you want.

To argue you don't need high picks to win Cups is simply wrong though.

But aren't most people just debating the word "need"?

I think it's the easiest path to finding elite talent, but "need" is likely proven to be a reach.

[Fan69]

Answer is no.

The run of what was it 2015 was one if the worst things to happen to this team. Pretty sure it gave management a completely false perspective of where we were and i was of the opinion we were 2 years from thinking of those moves. Had we kept most of that team together added some more draft picks instead trading firsts and seconds for hamonic and back up goalies this team would have looked a lot different and would probably have been a contender for an extended time.

When i hear most posters talk about tanking it usually goes well we can’t win unless we have, insert any of the top three players at any position. Those players usually come top three in the draft and about every three to five years. I look at team structure.

Top line has to be able to compete against other top lines. Johny, Monahan, Hudler. Not top three players but were still one if the best lines in hockey.
Second line has to be dependable defensively but still provide some offense. Third line has to be able to have great games. Fourth has to provide some momentum cant get caved.

First pairing defence has to able to chew up minutes, contribute offensively. Second has to he steady be on the plus side most nights. Third pair has to be able to tread water minimum.
Goalie, seems to be a crapshoot a lot of times.

Those combinations should make you a playoff team. Each section you improve increases odds of success, chemistry and depth is more important to my mind than one if the top three players in the game. Edmonsuck has two of the top ten offensive guys in the league has to have a but load go right to get to the final then still failed.

A 70 to 80 point center who is defensively responsible to my mind is as valuable as a 110 point center who ends the season plus five. Not top three players mention that player has to play above his average due to the massive cap hit these players have.

I guess my point is identifying what the team actually needs. In the next two years you need two top six centers. I am all for trading Anderson which means at least two top four defence. How much of that comes from within will you have to trade to maybe get that piece?

We have Zary who looks to be trending to top six center but we need one more. Thats the center depth.

Pachal looks like top four. Weegs is top four, need two top fours internally or externally and we have a ton if defence depth for the bottom pair. We have a plethora of wingers not worried about long term depth.

We need a top line center. Two top four. The depth will come internally. My plan would be get into the top ten this year try to use our winger depth to try and move up and nab misa in this draft. Misa, zary, kadri, backs as center depth, or maybe keep the picks and see about getting wright if that rumour has any actual legs and just keep our pick where it lands.

Depth and covering team bases is what makes contenders not necessarily having a top three players. Does having skill help? Certainly but as we have now seen multiple times over multiple teams tanking is not a guarantee.

[Bend it like Bourgeois]

I think the key is to have white as the main colour in away jerseys.
Every cup winner in the last 20 years has it.
The pure dumb luck of sink low and draft high has never beaten it.

[Jiri Hrdina]

Originally Posted by BoLevi

Aren't the stats wildly in favour of a team needing at least one top three drsfted players on their team to win a cup?

Since those are hard to get via trade or even UFA without being busts already, then your chances of winning without I've are basically zero. (With one, your chances are merely just very very low).

The stat is flawed because most teams have a top 3 pick.
So most teams that win a cup have a top 3 pick because most teams in the entire league have a top 3 pick.

[the-rasta-masta]

Originally Posted by Bend it like Bourgeois

I think the key is to have white as the main colour in away jerseys.
Every cup winner in the last 20 years has it.
The pure dumb luck of sink low and draft high has never beaten it.

This is true and not talked about enough. We are in a good position there, but I just checked and over the last twenty years, teams with red jerseys for the home have won 7/20, teams with blue have won 4/20, yet teams with black have won 8/20. Teams with gold have only won 1/20 so Vegas and Nashville are pretty hooped.

I think we will need to cut our current red homes in half and replace the one side with the Blasty blacks. And add back the alberta flag for good measure so we have all the bases covered. Ken King please read.

[Jiri Hrdina]

Originally Posted by The Cobra

Them you basically have the best non-playoff teams with the best draft picks.

It will be the death of small market teams, as they are the teams that will routinely fall to the bottom of the standings, especially if they aren't going to get the best chances of draft picks.

And a team gets eliminates with one game to go in the year, and wins their next game, gets rewarded with the best draft pick?

The point of the draft is to give the worse teams the best chance of getting better. The lottery is to take the certainty of the order away to some extent, but it's always in the best interest of the NHL to give the worse teams the best odds.

I disagree with this statement. I'm not sure it is because it promotes taking. If I were the head of a league and I observed that fans are cheering against their team and are angry when they win, I would say to myself that something is not working riht.

The questions are all solvable. For instance, in order to be eligible for the 1st overall pick you have to be eliminated within X games to go.

Someone put together a pretty good proposal for something like this, but using the NBA as the example, a few years ago. I can't find it now.

From a fan point of view, imagine if once your team was eliminated, you still are cheering for them to win such that they improve their draft pick? Seems more fun to me than cheering for them to lose.

[Paulie Walnuts]

Originally Posted by Vinny01

We always talk about tanking and picking high to build a contender but trades are equally as important to successful cup winning teams.

Florida last year for as much as we talk about Barkov and Ekblad it was Tkachuk, Reinhart, Bennett and others that were just as key to that win.

Vegas is not a fair sample because of expansion but obviously Eichel, and Stone were huge trade acquisitions.

Colorado has Toews and Kadri

Tampa had done a great job at drafting but key trade pieces like Coleman, Goodrow, Hagel were low cap hit, high caliber players that helped get them over the top

The Blues remade much of their roster prior to 2019 with RoR being a huge trade piece

Those teams traded players they drafted for those guys. They also made those trades when they built a core from drafting players, not make trades with patchwork rosters.

Calgary tried to do the same trading away drafted players to change the look of the team, but covid hit.

[Hot_Flatus]

Originally Posted by TheIronMaiden

The issue isn't that the Flames are refusing to field a weak team, its that this "weak team" is refusing to collapse. They've not gone on a season ending losing streak. The most they've lost is 4 in row. This teams WANTS TO WIN. and despite a definite lack of top end skill they've been winning enough, and not losing enough to stay in the playoff race.

So long as Conroy doesn't get any stupid ideas, the rebuild is on track and the bottom could fall out any time.

That's the point right there. Stay the course and don't try to bolster the roster and eventually this group is going to run out of gas or stop getting some of the bounces they have been getting. The bonus is that you have a group playing the right way.

There are a lot more road games to be played this year as well that have not been kind to this team (they are also one of the worst scoring teams in the league) and all of this leads me to believe that we are still looking at a bottom 10 team when the dust settles and on track to draft a really good player again.

Coronato/Zary/Wolf/Suniev/Honzek/Gridin/Battaglia/Stromgren/Basha/Parekh/Mews/Bruz/Morin is an incredibly solid group of prospects and young players to build from without even looking at the 5-6 high picks to be made this year. If 2-3 of these guys hit and turn into stars, there's no reason this team can't be a Dallas in a few years.

[The Yen Man]

Originally Posted by Wastedyouth

But almost isn't a win. So, no, you really can't.

Theoretically, if Wolf somehow shifts into God mode, and we win the cup because of it, the Flames team would actually help in your argument because they have the top 3 pick criteria in Huberdeau, even if the team only won because of the play of a 7th round pick rather than a top 3 pick as the bigger factor.

All I'm saying is, you putting everything black and white isn't how it works in reality.

[Rhett44]

Simply put, it is almost impossible to win a cup without tanking in this day and age.

So if you are cheering for wins and not losses this year, that's fine but just know we are never coming close to a cup if this continues.

[The Yen Man]

How is it even fun to cheer for losses? Again, the team isn't winning because Conroy and management aren't trying think long term on asset management. It's because their current roster is overachieving on the backs of, you know, developing their young talent for the long term.

So I guess good for you if you want to cheer for losses? I'd much rather watch the team play competitively, and let the chips fall where they may.

[Bingo]

Originally Posted by Rhett44

Simply put, it is almost impossible to win a cup without tanking in this day and age.

So if you are cheering for wins and not losses this year, that's fine but just know we are never coming close to a cup if this continues.

Just going in circles now.

They essentially did tank with their off ice decisions. The team is an aberration that is exceeding expectations.

I'm not sure how you cheer against that? Defeats the purpose of being a fan in my opinion (my opinion only).

Cheer for good decision making, which we've received and then just enjoy the ride.

[Bonded]

Yeah, I still think we are in for three years of some pretty painful hockey. I’ll take the wins as they are coming as long as Conroy doesn’t start making stupid decisions

[Roof-Daddy]

Good decision making and still need some luck.

Like for instance, when one of your young stars is moved back to C and is starting to break out there as an NHLer, not having his knee get blown up by some scrub.

Or if you're shrewd enough to draft a future Norris winner in the 3rd round, he doesn't force his way out of your org before even signing an ELC

Or when at the peak of your rebuilds competitive window your number one C doesn't become plagued by injuries for those couple seasons where you are really hoping to go for it.

Always going be some bad luck, so hopefully you've done enough things right that the bad luck is offset by it.

[Paulie Walnuts]

Originally Posted by Roof-Daddy

Good decision making and still need some luck.

Like for instance, when one of your young stars is moved back to C and is starting to break out there as an NHLer, not having his knee get blown up by some scrub.

Or if you're shrewd enough to draft a future Norris winner in the 3rd round, he doesn't force his way out of your org before even signing an ELC

Or when at the peak of your rebuilds competitive window your number one C doesn't become plagued by injuries for those couple seasons where you are really hoping to go for it.

Always going be some bad luck, so hopefully you've done enough things right that the bad luck is offset by it.

Lol if the Flames didn't have bad luck we wouldn't have any luck.

What did we ever do to deserve this. Good honest hardworking people who pay our taxes.

[stemit14]

The more I look at successful rebuild vs unsuccessful rebuilds… it is all about luck, timing and drafting.

Luck: Either winning draft lotteries and/or having other teams ahead of you in the draft make bad selections which allows you to get players that should have gone higher in the draft (Mathew Tkachuk for example). I don’t think Detroit’s rebuild will be very successful because they were constantly unlucky with draft lotteries during the period when they were the worst team in the league and should have had gotten a chance to pick the best player in a draft.

Timing: This is often overlooked but so much of building a contending team is getting that franchise center that, at some point in their career, will be one of the top 5 (or at least top 10) centres in the league. That type of player is not available in every draft so you have to “bottom out” in the right years when those players are available. I think the last 2 drafts have had those types of players (Bedard, Celebrini and Carlsson will all be top 10 centres in the entire league IMO). Bottom out in the wrong year and you end up drafting Slafkovsky or Lafreniere - good players but not elite centres.

Drafting: You cannot just be a team that relies on picking top 5 and building your team solely through those select players becoming impact NHLers. If you don’t draft and develop other core pieces through the later picks in the draft, it will take too long to build a contender… you may be stuck losing your early rebuild stars as they get frustrated cause you are taking too long to contend (Buffalo). Calgary is drafting and developing really well so I think they have this aspect covered but they have to keep it up.

What sucks for Calgary is they missed out on getting any of the elite centres from the last 2 drafts (Bedard, Celebrini and Carlsson). If they had any one of those 3 in the system right now, I don’t think anyone would really be worried about bottoming out any further because they would already have the toughest piece to get.

The good news is that next year (2026) has another truly elite future centreman in McKenna. And I think the flames have a decent chance to truly “bottom out” in that draft but it will take some tough decisions to do it. That includes trading Andersson this year or in the summer at the latest. It also likely includes trading Coleman and one of Kadri or Backlund next year. It also requires Conroy to not sign vets in the offseason. Keep the open spots on the blueline open and fill them with the plethora of young defencemen in the system.

These things are about as sure of a way to make the team bad next season as there is. It’s very rare for a team with a young defence to not struggle. Guys like Poirier, Solovyov, Parekh and Brz are going to make lots of mistakes. If Coleman + one of Backlund or Kadri are gone, those are tough minutes going to young players instead (Zary and possibly Sharangovich both playing centre).

So next year could be a year of good timing (McKenna), good drafting (the flames are already doing that) and hopefully luck (no control over that and it takes a lot of luck).

[howard_the_duck]

Originally Posted by Bingo

Just going in circles now.

They essentially did tank with their off ice decisions. The team is an aberration that is exceeding expectations.

I'm not sure how you cheer against that? Defeats the purpose of being a fan in my opinion (my opinion only).

Cheer for good decision making, which we've received and then just enjoy the ride.

Certainly. And though it may be futile, it’s not hard to see why fans lament this situation that’s unfolding. An all-too-familiar result is staring us in the face (mushy middle) though this time it’ll cost them a first at a valuable stage in the rebuild.

I would argue more could be done (trading Rasmus) to both manage that asset and solidify their falling down to the bottom this season. I’m hoping the situation takes care of itself with the pre trade deadline schedule, forcing the Flames hand again.

I don’t fault management in Conroy’s regime, but I’m still annoyed with the results so far this season.

[Jiri Hrdina]

Originally Posted by howard_the_duck

Certainly. And though it may be futile, it’s not hard to see why fans lament this situation that’s unfolding. An all-too-familiar result is staring us in the face (mushy middle) though this time it’ll cost them a first at a valuable stage in the rebuild.

I would argue more could be done (trading Rasmus) to both manage that asset and solidify their falling down to the bottom this season. I’m hoping the situation takes care of itself with the pre trade deadline schedule, forcing the Flames hand again.

I don’t fault management in Conroy’s regime, but I’m still annoyed with the results so far this season.

But you can't trade Rasmus for a poor value just to try to move down the standings. At least I don't think that's the right approach.

It also doesn't cost the Flames a first. It costs them an earlier first. Which right now the gap is 7 spots in the draft.

[Wastedyouth]

Originally Posted by Rhett44

Simply put, it is almost impossible to win a cup without tanking in this day and age.

So if you are cheering for wins and not losses this year, that's fine but just know we are never coming close to a cup if this continues.

Impossible? Nay!

Improbable? Yay!