2025/2026 Season Trade Rumours and Speculation Thread

[The Original FFIV]

Originally Posted by Badgers Nose

Why not use the cap space and shake things up by acquiring some expiring contracts?

Turn the tables and try to get some distressed inventory along with picks/prospect from other teams.

No one is buying AND no one is selling? That seems unlikely.

If that's true, take a heavier hand with the roster Huska can ice. Send veteran guys without move protection to the Wranglers. Tell Huska to sit guys.

From the outside, it looks like Flames are doing nothing. The players look like they are waiting for something to happen.

Weegs is in front of the camera every night taking bullets. Give him the C. #### how Backs feels about it.

100% agree. Been waiting forever for us to weaponize cap space. Higher cap is making that hard but there’s still opportunities out there. Should have taken on Kampf but now it looks like he might terminate his contract. Imagine we could have taken on a pick to take on his contract.

Edmonton needs to make room with Hyman close to being back. SJ is up to the contract limit. Hope GMCC is open for business.

[BigThief]

Originally Posted by Sec214

What to share….

Guys are not enjoying coming to the rink and the cracks are starting to show.

Leadership is suspect - Yes our captain is a legacy guy, community guy and love him for it but he doesn’t drag you into the fight or inspire confidence. young guys aren’t buying in because “veterans” aren’t being held accountable but the young guys are punished swiftly, demotions, lack of opportunity or a leash of 120 seconds of ice time.

The other teams are throwing chum at the flames to see if CC will come play… just rock the boat already.

More to come…

Sounds like a bad team that's at the bottom of the standings. The details might not be the same team to team but a bad team that has good morale and laughing and hugging coming to the rink would be suspect.

[Toast_Man]

Originally Posted by Badgers Nose

This is very interesting.

Backlund. Another mistake by CC?

Extending a coach just before he loses the room. That seems like a mistake now, too.

I hope CC is learning fast. His strongest skill seems to be sell-off trades. The other parts need work.

We need better pro scouting. Time to get serious about fixing that. Are we some kind of country club?

He needs to stop rewarding non-core people with contract extensions unless absolutely necessary (not a year in advance). If waiting means they earn a bigger payday, good for them. We have the cap space, or trade them as rentals.

CC is not ruthless enough - or doesn't appear to be based on what he says publicly and what we hear about him from insiders. For example. he seems to want guidance from the players whether he can trade them or not.

All this nice guy business is going to cost him his future as an NHL GM if he keeps going like this.

The quicker he makes the moves the sooner this will be over. Start the auctions. We are still talking years before we get to 21/22 levels, but it will be easier to take once we see progress.

Backlund would have been a great trade piece at the deadline, but no, Flames had to sign him for 2 more years. Maybe unrealistic, but if he wanted to sign in Calgary, they could have done it next summer.

[GioforPM]

Originally Posted by Monahammer

Who cares what the current group of "pro nhlers" thinks? Tbh. They are working for the team and its not going well. Sorry but its on them too. Showing up with a ####ty attitude because they suck just makes them suck more. All the more reason to clear them out.

We only need to care about what 3-5 of the current roster players think (Wolf, Parekh, Kuznetsov, coronato, maybe Honzek.) Management should start meeting with them as a group and "core" and having them take active roles in seeing/understanding how the club will build around them. Foster the next group of club leaders and start now. The other guys dont matter to the club after the next 2-3 years at most, so why should we really care what they're feeling.

The kids are the pro NHLers I’m talking about. Losing sucks. Being told it’s for the greater good sounds great but it doesn’t change much in the head of a 20 year old.

The vets are way more likely to take losses in stride because they’ve seen the ups and downs.

You people are thinking way too hard about this. Team loses, players are unhappy about it. Simple as that. It’s not about young players “being mistreated”. It’s not about roles. It’s about playing on a bad team.

[Rhett44]

Originally Posted by GioforPM

The kids are the pro NHLers I’m talking about. Losing sucks. Being told it’s for the greater good sounds great but it doesn’t change much in the head of a 20 year old.

The vets are way more likely to take losses in stride because they’ve seen the ups and downs.

You people are thinking way too hard about this. Team loses, players are unhappy about it. Simple as that. It’s not about young players “being mistreated”. It’s not about roles. It’s about playing on a bad team.

Read Sec's post again. He specifically mentions the younger players not being happy they are on a short leash while the vets can do whatever they want.

[GioforPM]

Originally Posted by Rhett44

Read Sec's post again. He specifically mentions the younger players not being happy they are on a short leash while the vets can do whatever they want.

Yeah, I don’t put much stock into that extrapolation. I seriously doubt that came out of any player’s mouth.

[Macho0978]

Originally Posted by Sec214

What to share….

Guys are not enjoying coming to the rink and the cracks are starting to show.

Leadership is suspect - Yes our captain is a legacy guy, community guy and love him for it but he doesn’t drag you into the fight or inspire confidence. young guys aren’t buying in because “veterans” aren’t being held accountable but the young guys are punished swiftly, demotions, lack of opportunity or a leash of 120 seconds of ice time.

The other teams are throwing chum at the flames to see if CC will come play… just rock the boat already.

More to come…

This is also what happens when you have a log jam at forward. I can't imagine Zary is happy losing 20% of his ice when he is on a bridge deal. Esepcailly when everyone else has been as bad as he has. At least he has the excuse he isn't playing enough.

[Macho0978]

Originally Posted by BigThief

Sounds like a bad team that's at the bottom of the standings. The details might not be the same team to team but a bad team that has good morale and laughing and hugging coming to the rink would be suspect.

Not always. Too many players never works. You can't role 4 lines of 2nd/3rd liners thinking you will out depth teams. Too many players are sitting on the bench and probably thinking if they got more ice they could contribute more. Then when the players who are playing are playing terrible, it would be frustrating.

Lots of bad teams lose just because they are too young and inexperienced

[Jiri Hrdina]

Originally Posted by The Original FFIV

100% agree. Been waiting forever for us to weaponize cap space. Higher cap is making that hard but there’s still opportunities out there. Should have taken on Kampf but now it looks like he might terminate his contract. Imagine we could have taken on a pick to take on his contract.

Edmonton needs to make room with Hyman close to being back. SJ is up to the contract limit. Hope GMCC is open for business.

Why would Toronto have dumped him with a pick when he’s willing to walk away and let them off the hook completely?
With the cap higher not sure how many cap weaponization opportunities there really are

[The Original FFIV]

Originally Posted by Jiri Hrdina

Why would Toronto have dumped him with a pick when he’s willing to walk away and let them off the hook completely?
With the cap higher not sure how many cap weaponization opportunities there really are

That’s what I was saying. There probably was a point where we could have taken on the deal with a pick. But now he’s probably going to terminate. So opportunity lost. A Buck short and a day late.

[SuperMatt18]

Signing Backlund is fine - as long as you actually trade the other leaders - becasue you do need to maintain some veteran core.

I'd rather re-sign Backlund and trade guys like Kadri, Coleman, and Andersson who likely have more trade value at this point.

I don't think Sec214 has ever liked Backlund based on prior posts, so there is for sure some personal feelings of his view of Backlund mixed into what the reality of this roster is.

And the reality is no group of veterans likes losing. Backlund, Weegar, Kadri ... doesn't matter who the captain is right now the end result is going to be the same when you get into a scenario like this where the team can't find a way to string together wins.

And GioForPM has it right too in that none of the younger guys like losing either, and it's hard to lose when it's your first time going through it at a pro level.

Winning makes everyone get along and it's easy, losing is hard.

The teams issue isn't a lack of effort which is how guys can hold each other accountable. . It's a lack of skill combined with tactics that leave very little margin for error and some questionable player utilization decisions from the coach.

Really it's 22-23 all over again. Effort is fine, underlying metrics are strong at 5v5, but they have no creativity, can't score, give up a disproportionate amount of high quality chances compared to total chances against which leaves their goalies out to dry.

Even last night is a perfect example - they didn't give up much volume of chances - but they give up 4 odd man rushes to the best player on the other team and now it's 4 goals on 27 shots and looks like your goalie played bad when you hung him out to dry.

[ST20]

Originally Posted by GioforPM

Of course players are not enjoying coming to the rink. Losing sucks for a pro NHler. Armchair GMs can sit back all they want and say that players should see the bigger picture, but day to day, a bad season is just a grind for these guys. I doubt Backlund or Huska can do anything about that.

I’d hope that my captain and coach would have an impact on what it is like day to day coming to work…

[Jiri Hrdina]

Originally Posted by The Original FFIV

That’s what I was saying. There probably was a point where we could have taken on the deal with a pick. But now he’s probably going to terminate. So opportunity lost. A Buck short and a day late.

And I’m saying i doubt there was ever an opportunity

[Fan69]

Originally Posted by Toast_Man

Backlund would have been a great trade piece at the deadline, but no, Flames had to sign him for 2 more years. Maybe unrealistic, but if he wanted to sign in Calgary, they could have done it next summer.

Its one of the things that make start to question what Cc is doing.

We currently have two 35+ centers locked up for the next three years. I see only three scenarios on how this can he justified.

One. CC getting directed to lock ip the core thats great from ownership. This has been reported with no real proof. Hope that's not the case.

Two. Conroy like a lot of GMS has fallen into the trap of giving people and players. He likes too much money for too long a time and altering the direction of the franchise with it. I really hope that isn’t the case here.

Three. Conroy is actually playing 3-D chess because he absolutely plans on trading Kadri because the price is right and the demand is there and he signed backlund as insurance to make sure that the team can run over the next couple of years at the centre ice position while at the same time honouring a veteran.

To me at this point of the season, this is a no-brainer and I can’t believe that it isn’t for the brain trust of the flames. Only a miracle run at this point would basically get them into the playoffs and I think everyone is fully realistic enough to know that even if they got there, they wouldn’t get anywhere anyway.

At this point Coleman should be on the block. Anderson should be on the block and I think in the kadri situation you’re sitting and wait for the best offer to come in and if nothing looks good, you keep him as a mentor. He likes being here the team likes him he’s good for the city.

We have a decent prospect base, but we don’t have defensive depth and we don’t have any centre depth. There’s only one way to address that situation and that’s moving bodies that are currently doing basically nothing.

[Jiri Hrdina]

Has there ever been a team that was in last place but everyone was feeling great about things in the room?
Again this is what being bad is. None of this should be a surprise

[SuperMatt18]

Originally Posted by Jiri Hrdina

Has there ever been a team that was in last place but everyone was feeling great about things in the room?
Again this is what being bad is. None of this should be a surprise

But it's also why the "keep all the veterans around to maintain a strong culture" thing is a bit of a false narrative.

You need some veterans around to help the players on the ice, so you don't compeltley throw them to the wolves. But if you are losing then most veterans are going to be unhappy so it's not going to really help in the locker room anyways.

Conroy needs to realize it's time to focus on maximizing returns for the key veterans that have trade value and aren't part of the longer term plans (2+ years) and that it shouldn't matter if those players love to be Calgary Flames or not, it's time to move them.

[Strange Brew]

Originally Posted by Sec214

What to share….

Guys are not enjoying coming to the rink and the cracks are starting to show.

Leadership is suspect - Yes our captain is a legacy guy, community guy and love him for it but he doesn’t drag you into the fight or inspire confidence. young guys aren’t buying in because “veterans” aren’t being held accountable but the young guys are punished swiftly, demotions, lack of opportunity or a leash of 120 seconds of ice time.

The other teams are throwing chum at the flames to see if CC will come play… just rock the boat already.

More to come…

Some of the vets (Kadri, Huberdeau, Coleman) have been just fine IMO.

Some of the young guys haven't.

Not sure what category Sharangovich and Frost fit in. They have not been good.

Blaming Backlund for the state of the team is a choice I guess. I'm not blaming him for how poorly some of these guys have played.

[Rhett44]

Originally Posted by Jiri Hrdina

Has there ever been a team that was in last place but everyone was feeling great about things in the room?
Again this is what being bad is. None of this should be a surprise

I do think there is a pretty big difference here with the team. Weegar, Kadri, Coleman etc signed these contracts to be on a contender. They were expecting to be on a winning team. Even last year, where we finished 1 point out they likely thought we were much closer to being a good team than we actually are.

I think they are in a bit of shock at just how bad they are this year. When Toffoli and other vets signed with the Sharks, they knew fully well they were going to a losing team. But that there was a good chance in a few years the Sharks would turn it around with the tank. But there wasn't an expectation placed on them by the coaches/gm/fans to be a playoff team. Where I feel like a lot of Flames fans and ownership/management genuinely fooled themselves into thinking we were a good team because of a historical season by Wolf.

[Fan69]

Originally Posted by Rhett44

I do think there is a pretty big difference here with the team. Weegar, Kadri, Coleman etc signed these contracts to be on a contender. They were expecting to be on a winning team. Even last year, where we finished 1 point out they likely thought we were much closer to being a good team than we actually are.

I think they are in a bit of shock at just how bad they are this year. When Toffoli and other vets signed with the Sharks, they knew fully well they were going to a losing team. But that there was a good chance in a few years the Sharks would turn it around with the tank. But there wasn't an expectation placed on them by the coaches/gm/fans to be a playoff team. Where I feel like a lot of Flames fans and ownership/management genuinely fooled themselves into thinking we were a good team because of a historical season by Wolf.

Then everyone is deluded.

Maybe someone can fact check me but in 30 years of watching hockey i don’t remember a single team ever with two almost 40 centers that won jack squat.

[PepsiFree]

Thinking of Weegar’s comments, in my mind that half the team that is failing to show up is usually the younger guys. Some have been good to great, but others have been really lacking.

I don’t really buy this idea that they feel unfairly treated. Most haven’t earned a lick more than they’ve had, and the ones that do get what they deserve. Real strange.