Free agent period: successful or not?

[Vinny01]

Originally Posted by flambers

Agreed, as the roster stands at this time

Flames look like a bubble team, solid goaltending will keep them in the race for a wild card.

They were a bubble team with average goaltending. Now their 1A from last season is the clear 2 and they have a top 4 goalie from last year.

They were actually a top 10 team after they dumped Peters. I think they are a bubble team on the low end and competing for the division (Canadian) on the high end.

[Vinny01]

Originally Posted by DeluxeMoustache

Like Tanev?


Also, the Flames were not a good defensive team for their goalies. Lots of feeds from behind the net to uncovered men around the hash marks was the obvious scouting report

Tanev was #2 in Vancouver coming in to be #4 in Calgary.

Also weren’t the Flames one of the best teams at minimizing shots and chances in 2019? The were certainly significantly better than Vancouver last season

[Enoch Root]

Originally Posted by TheoFleury

Depends on Markstrom. If he can maintain his excellent play which has been a recent revalation, then yes. Other than that I see three bubble teams that would probably finish 4th/5th in the other three divisions. The pacific is truly a terrible mess. It's Vegas, three bubble teams and three bottom teams. People are going to lose their minds when Vegas and Seattle finish 1/2 in 2021/22.

When?

There is almost no chance of this happening.

As for 'depends on Markstrom'... well yeah. The Flames had below average goaltending last year. THey signed one of the best goalies in the league. If he does his thing, they are clearly the 2nd best team in the league. If he forgets how to goaltend, then they are the same bubble team as last year.

Not sure why he would suddenly forget, but of course, anything can happen.

[TheoFleury]

Originally Posted by Enoch Root

When?



There is almost no chance of this happening.



As for 'depends on Markstrom'... well yeah. The Flames had below average goaltending last year. THey signed one of the best goalies in the league. If he does his thing, they are clearly the 2nd best team in the league. If he forgets how to goaltend, then they are the same bubble team as last year.



Not sure why he would suddenly forget, but of course, anything can happen.

Half joking about Seattle but I thought Vegas would be trash so I won't assume the same for Seattle considering they will pick under the same rules

[Itse]

Originally Posted by Itse

I'm leaning towards a B-.


I feel this team really needs to add another forward, and finding nothing from an unusually cheap UFA market does feel like missed opportunity... buuut there's always the chance that that cap space turns into something a lot more valuable later, and it's not like we need a forward right now. The move we didn't make now could allow us to make a better move later.

Tanev I think is likely to become a bad signing. I don't expect him to play up to that contract more than maybe one year. He does address a need though, but other than that I think it's both too much money and too many years.

Markström is a great signing. While there are risks involved like with any goalie, there would IMO have been more risk involved in any other option. This is money spent in the right place, in the right guy, and I think the length and dollars are perfectly acceptable.

With the Nordström signing I'm bumping this grade to B+.

TBQH I don't know much anything about Nordström, but he seems like the kind of cheap signing I was hoping we'd make; fast, physical, hard working and hopefully useful on the PK (which would take some of the PK load off offensively better players.)

[powderjunkie]

Originally Posted by Vinny01

I really don’t get this line of thinking. How terrible are teams supposed to be before they can come out of a rebuild?

Flames started rebuilding in 2013 and currently have 5 players picked in the top 6 in the 4 drafts between 2013-2016.

Looking at the roster as it is right now

Gaudreau-Monahan-Lindholm
Tkachuk-Backlund-Mangipane
Dube-Bennett-Lucic
Rindalo-Ryan-Robinson
Gawdin

Giordano-Andersson
Hanifin-Tanev
Valimaki-Kylington
Mackey

Markstrom
Rittich

Of that current team 11 of 22 skaters were drafted by the team (13 if you include Gio and Rittich who were signed as prospects and developed by the org)

Giving up the boatload of picks for Hamonic was a big mistake but I think trading a mid 1st and 2 2nds for a former top 10 pick who just scored 40pts as a 21 year old Dman is a great trade.

I guess I don’t get this shortcut comment. What team really sucked forever and won something. Edmonton, Florida, Arizona, Buffalo still wandering in the dessert.

Signing an elite goalie in his prime is not a short cut it is filling a need with cap space and luckily the Flames had the flexibility to do it

The price for the bolded is that 2017-2019 = 3 picks in the top 100 (Valimaki, Pelletier, and 88OA Nikolaev).

Picking 5x top 100 this year helps, but we are still well under the 4 year expectations:
1st rd: 3/4
2nd rd: 1/4
3rd rd: 3/4
total = 7/12

Even if we include 4th rd: 6/4, we're still well under at 13/16.

Even if everything goes really well, we're probably facing a gap of ELC support to help keep things rolling.


As for the shortcuts, it's been beaten to death (under various terms), but you can draw a dotted line from chasing the lineup that [they thought] gave them the best chance to win on opening night in October 2015 to Lucic's $5.25M cap hit on this team in the '22-23 season (as opposed to focusing on players who might actually contribute to the future - an assessment that was proven 100% incorrect in both the short and long-term).

Too many other examples to list right now. I'm not saying you can't make trades or sign UFAs...but you shouldn't do it this much.

[GranteedEV]

Originally Posted by Vinny01

Tanev was #2 in Vancouver coming in to be #4 in Calgary.

Also weren’t the Flames one of the best teams at minimizing shots and chances in 2019? The were certainly significantly better than Vancouver last season

Calgary had an expected goals against of 2.69 (20th in NHL)
Vancouver had an expected goals against of 2.95 (28th in NHL).

So yes, we were better than Vancouver, but I would not call us "one of the best". Markstrom went from a bad defensive team to a less bad defensive team.

[Textcritic]

Originally Posted by ricardodw

There was no great outrage that Markstrom was robbed of the all-star honor. Markstrom was 18-13-3 with a 2.71 GAA and a .917 save percentage and 1 shut out...

What on earth? Jacob Markström played in the 2020 All Star Game.

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[Heavy Jack]

Originally Posted by GranteedEV

Calgary had an expected goals against of 2.69 (20th in NHL)
Vancouver had an expected goals against of 2.95 (28th in NHL).

So yes, we were better than Vancouver, but I would not call us "one of the best". Markstrom went from a bad defensive team to a less bad defensive team.

I still think Markstrom though will allow our defenders to play a more comfortable game; not having a starter signed for longer than 3 years for almost a decade has left this team in a fragile state of mind with regards to the goalie position which a team would hope provides a sense of stability to be successful as opposed to not really knowing who holds the crease. Markstrom is going to help this team immeasurably IMO and I don’t think it’s as simple as comparing past team stats versus other teams past stats; it’s a mental benefit that will make the team stronger and hopefully when you pair that to the future numbers it leads to dominant numbers in net.

[Textcritic]

Originally Posted by Vinny01

Free agency perspective the team got a top 4 free agent that filled a hole that has been here for 7 years...

I have seen this mentioned a couple times, now. Who was the fourth top free agent? I had Markström, Pietrangelo and Hall alone at the top of the class.

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[Jiri Hrdina]

Originally Posted by Textcritic

I have seen this mentioned a couple times, now. Who was the fourth top free agent? I had Markström, Pietrangelo and Hall alone at the top of the class.

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TSN had Krug at 3, Markstrom st 4

[BagoPucks]

I like the question for discussion by OP but the question I would respond with is when is a fair time to judge?

Its been an interesting Free Agency period. Did we get better in the following?

Net - Yes but at what cost? I might be wrong but only Edmonton offered him more money and they arent really an organization you can use as a measuring stick if you want to get better

Blueline - I would say we got worse by quite a bit so far. Tanev is a downgrade on Brodie and we lost Gustavsson and Forbort to Free Agency while not really adding there.

Forwards - I would say we are probably par for where we started.

So given we havent really moved much and all we have done is add money to a position with uncertainty I would give it a C+ with potential to improve. I do believe this grade is premature

[cowtown75]

Originally Posted by Textcritic

What on earth? Jacob Markström played in the 2020 All Star Game.

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There is literally a pic of Rittich and him sitting together on the bench at the game.

[Heavy Jack]

Originally Posted by BagoPucks

I like the question for discussion by OP but the question I would respond with is when is a fair time to judge?

Its been an interesting Free Agency period. Did we get better in the following?

Net - Yes but at what cost? I might be wrong but only Edmonton offered him more money and they arent really an organization you can use as a measuring stick if you want to get better

Blueline - I would say we got worse by quite a bit so far. Tanev is a downgrade on Brodie and we lost Gustavsson and Forbort to Free Agency while not really adding there.

Forwards - I would say we are probably par for where we started.

So given we havent really moved much and all we have done is add money to a position with uncertainty I would give it a C+ with potential to improve. I do believe this grade is premature

We will be adding Valimaki full time on D so losing two deadline guys in Forbort and Gustafsson isn’t as big of a deal and the addition of Tanev off-sets the loss of Hamonic. Typically teams stack up at the deadline on D and that’s what the Flames did, no one could have forecasted the way the season went so spending the assets we did on Forbort and Gus to me hurt more than actually losing them. Brodie is the big hole on D and the Flames are banking on Andersson taking a bigger role just in time for his new contract to kick in.

Markstrom was actually offered a million dollars less AAV with 1 year extra term from Edmonton; same term and 500 K less from the Nucks as well so the Flames got in the way of two division rivals while making themselves much better in net.

[GioforPM]

Originally Posted by Jiri Hrdina

TSN had Krug at 3, Markstrom st 4

By the time the process was on, Markstrom was top 2 IMO.

[BagoPucks]

Originally Posted by Heavy Jack

We will be adding Valimaki full time on D so losing two deadline guys in Forbort and Gustafsson isn’t as big of a deal and the addition of Tanev off-sets the loss of Hamonic. Typically teams stack up at the deadline on D and that’s what the Flames did, no one could have forecasted the way the season went so spending the assets we did on Forbort and Gus to me hurt more than actually losing them. Brodie is the big hole on D and the Flames are banking on Andersson taking a bigger role just in time for his new contract to kick in.

Markstrom was actually offered a million dollars less AAV with 1 year extra term from Edmonton; same term and 500 K less from the Nucks as well so the Flames got in the way of two division rivals while making themselves much better in net.

I tried not to include guys in the evaluation who were there before free agency and are here after (i.e Valimaki and Andersson). Not a perfect all encompassing way to look at it. However, Hamonic is an interesting one as he hasnt signed yet so I assume we might still get him back so I left him out of the equation too.

As for paying more than what the Canucks offered I am torn. They know him and you still end up paying more than they think he is worth. I understand team dynamics (cap, systems , other players) come into play. I have been on record stating I am not a fan of the Markstrom signing so I am probably biased.

Hence my grade. However, I am always impressed at how it appears that Flames management are tireless workers. A+ for effort, they are in on everything and that has been a Treliving attribute imo.

[Husky]

Flames have:

A#1 goalie

4 forwards in top 6 capable of ppg or near it.

Decent middle depth.

A bunch of good D. Some young ones who could and should mame the next step.


And this is considered a bubble team? Wtf.

[Heavy Jack]

That’s what I think too - the team went through a creepy weird coaching change last year after stumbling huge in the first round of a year they should have went deep and the rebuild contingent is out in full deployment. We still have the main parts of this core and have substantially upgraded the weakest part of this team for the past decade in net. Can we for once take a few cuts at the plate and swing for the fences?!?! Just this one time!

[indes]

C+ From me

Tanev and Markstrom each got 1m and 1yr more than I would've liked.

At least Markstrom has a chance to be a contributor for the duration of his contract.

I would've much preferred Holtby/Demelo/Turris. Mostly for short durations and chance of them outperforming their contracts.

My grade is mostly based on the ability of the team to get any sort of value from these players over the life of the contracts.

I hope I'm wrong and both Markstrom and Tanev live up to expectations.

[Macho0978]

I would give Treliving an A-. IMO the best way to build a team is to draft forwards and sign or trade for your d and goalies. Because of this I feel that Treliving targeted the right players.

I also believe if you draft well you shouldn't need to sign depth players. He would have got an A+ if he landed Hall or Pietrangelo. Unfortunately he missed out and he didn't compound it by overpaying for 3rd line 30 year old forwards. He may have done this with Tanev but I do believe Tanev is better than Brodie and $4.5 is 2nd pairing money.

Markstrom contract has risk too but he has the 9th highest cap hit out of goalies. IMO he is a top 10 goalie so seems fair. He also is coming into his own so maybe his best years are still ahead of him. IMO he is the best goalie this team has had since Kipper

I know some are worried about the forwards but for me this has nothing to do with the depth. If you draft well and draft fowards which the Flames have done for the last few years you should be able to fill out your 4 lines. I'm happy that he didn't make moves that push Mangipane to the 3rd line or Dube/Bennett to the 4th line. These guys have potential to be just as impactful as the Toffolli types for half the money. Unless we were to move Lucic I just don't see why we would add players like this and leave no room for youth. Zary and Pelletier are in the system now too. Adding vet 3rd and 4th liners also would block Gawdin, Phillips, Ruzicka from getting a crack too.

If the forwards have issues its on Tkachuk, Lindholm, Monahan and Gaudreau. Backlund, Mangipane, Dube and Bennett are very promising depth players.