LeBrun talks to Treliving ahead of trade deadline

[transplant99]

Job No. 1 in the hours and days leading up to the trade deadline is separating the emotion of the moment from the decision-making.

“At the end of the day, nobody lives it or dies more than the people on the inside,’’ Treliving told The Athletic on Thursday afternoon. “This is our livelihood. So when it doesn’t go the way you anticipate or planned, obviously you’re miserable. But you can’t just react because it feels good to throw a body off the tarmac. That doesn’t help you. You have to be realistic of where you’re at and you have to act accordingly. We’ve always tried to do that. You get pissed when things aren’t going well, but you have to separate that from action. That’s why you have a staff and that’s why you have checks and balances that you go through. Because especially when things aren’t going the way you wanted them to, it’s an emotional time for everybody.

“It’s the manager’s job as the leader to take a deep breath, step back from the fire, and be able to say, ‘OK, we have to be steady at the rudder here and make sure that we’ve identified what the issues are.’ Not emotional or superficial reasons, but what are the areas where you’re or what are the reasons that you’re in this situation. And you try to address them.’’

“Hey, you look at deals all the time, as far as the deadline it’s the last time you can do anything until the season is done. I think every team looks at ways they can improve themselves regardless of the situation they’re in,” said the Flames GM. “The separating factor is that you’ve got teams that are in good spots that are looking to help themselves now. And then when you look at hockey deals, the reason you don’t see a lot of those now is that if you take a good portion of the teams that are in a good spot right now, they’re not looking to take anything off their team right now.

“And then the other things, with all the moving pieces in an expansion year and how that may affect your protection list, or taking on a contract beyond this year in a flat cap, those are all the things that usually sets it up for those types of deals to happen in the offseason.’’

These final 16 games will still help answer some questions leading up to the offseason. It’s not a wasted time frame.

“No, that’s a good point, you’re constantly evaluating,” said Treliving. “Especially in a Canadian market where there’s a bright light on you, you have to remove all that noise, black that all out, and your evaluation continues the whole time. And you’re right, who knows what will happen the next few days, but that’s not the be-all and end-all of trying to help yourself; especially in an expansion year where I think there’s going to be a lot of moving pieces come the offseason. You can’t make offseason moves within the middle of the season, right? So what you do if you stay present to where you are right now and all you can do is do all the work leading up to the deadline, whether you do something or not if predicated to what’s available to you; then you work with what’s next. But you can’t get to second base before you get to first base.’’

https://theathletic.com/2509446/2021...ce=weeklyemail

[Mr.Coffee]

I don’t understand this “can’t make moves in the middle of the season” stuff. Why?

Yesterday there was a trade, day before that a trade. Trades happen all the time. You try to not make a bad trade but a trade can happen in the middle of the season.

This guy does come across as always wanting to be the smartest in the room and sometimes appears as a cut your nose to spite your face type attitude. If the value is there take it if not sure, don’t. But you’ll have a tough time convincing me that over multiple years there was never any opportunity to make a mid-season trade. Seems highly doubtful.

[The Original FFIV]

Originally Posted by transplant99

https://theathletic.com/2509446/2021...ce=weeklyemail

Didn’t he say something exactly the same after last off season? He didn’t make changes as he didn’t want to make the team worse?

He can’t Telegraph his plans to the media but at the same time bringing up the same old canned speech doesn’t reassure us as fans. He’s in a no win situation. Either he spews out the same recycled speech and gets called out, or he avoids interviews and is labeled as distant and inaccessible.

Would much rather him avoid media before the deadline (as we aren’t getting anything out of him) and judge based on results after the deadline has passed.

[genetic_phreek]

"you have to be realistic where your at"

He obviously wasn't realistic after getting destroyed by Colorado in the playoffs.

[transplant99]

Originally Posted by Mr.Coffee

I don’t understand this “can’t make moves in the middle of the season” stuff. Why?

Yesterday there was a trade, day before that a trade. Trades happen all the time. You try to not make a bad trade but a trade can happen in the middle of the season.

This guy does come across as always wanting to be the smartest in the room and sometimes appears as a cut your nose to spite your face type attitude. If the value is there take it if not sure, don’t. But you’ll have a tough time convincing me that over multiple years there was never any opportunity to make a mid-season trade. Seems highly doubtful.

He didn't say that.

He said you cant make off-season moves during the season.

I think its a very telling statement too.

It makes me believe he is pretty sure he has a deal cookin that simply cant be completed at this time because of cap restraints and/or the trading partner wants to hold onto their part of the deal through the playoffs.

Oh...and he has made 19 transactions during the season since becoming GM.

[keenan87]

Horrible interview by a horrible GM. Basically pretending to be the smartest man in the room (as always). So tired of him and can't wait until he is gone.

[transplant99]

Originally Posted by keenan87

Horrible interview by a horrible GM. Basically pretending to be the smartest man in the room (as always). So tired of him and can't wait until he is gone.

Well you are going to be waiting a long while i would suggest.

[keenan87]

Originally Posted by transplant99

Well you are going to be waiting a long while i would suggest.

Fair enough, who knows. Thanks for posting the article though.

[Yrebmi]

Originally Posted by genetic_phreek

"you have to be realistic where your at"

He obviously wasn't realistic after getting destroyed by Colorado in the playoffs.

We were not destroyed. We were routed games 5 and 3. Arguably we routed them game 1. The other two games were decided in overtime.

[keenan87]

Originally Posted by Yrebmi

We were not destroyed. We were routed games 5 and 3. Arguably we routed them game 1. The other two games were decided in overtime.

Hahaha. Seriously? You really think the Flames didn't get dominated in that series? Mike Smith is the only reason the Flames even had a chance in those games.

[Vinny01]

Originally Posted by genetic_phreek

"you have to be realistic where your at"

He obviously wasn't realistic after getting destroyed by Colorado in the playoffs.

The team went from 19th to 2nd overall and had a ton of contracts to work out that summer. Clearly that team was going to be hard to retool and unfortunately the Avs beat us out for Kadri as well.

Where he blew it in my opinion was nothing this past off-season. The team failed to get out of the first round yet again so big changes should have been made. Swapping Brodie for Tanev and adding Markstrom and a bunch of cheap depth clearly was far from enough.

He will make moves this offseason and they will likely be hated at the time because on paper it seems tough to win a trade with our core players getting worse every year

[Matty81]

I dont really like the noise coming from the media and org around the flames deadline and not doing much. Even though they are not stars plenty of expiring deals he should be moving out. Although they won't get blue chip pieces back moving 4-6 players out as he should isn't being quiet.

This should be a textbook deadline... you missed the playoffs, its a simple trade any assets you are not moving forward with for picks mission to make the team stronger in future.

Ryan, Rittic, Leivo and some of the other expiring spare parts will bring back low end picks. Do your job and sell them off, don't let your pride about where you think the team should be blind you.

Hopefully it is all smoke the comments about them mostly sitting tight.

[tkflames]

Originally Posted by genetic_phreek

"you have to be realistic where your at"

He obviously wasn't realistic after getting destroyed by Colorado in the playoffs.

What do you mean? We were a player rejection away from trading a top 2 defenseman for a top 2 center...

I understand that everyone is frustrated and I am not sure where I stand on Treliving myself....however, claiming that:
1. Treliving is blind to the situation
2. Treliving is too proud to address his mistakes
3. Treliving is trigger shy

It seems to me that these are just everyone's own projections based on frustration onto a person they have very little info on.

[Joborule]

Originally Posted by Yrebmi

We were not destroyed. We were routed games 5 and 3. Arguably we routed them game 1. The other two games were decided in overtime.

COL wins series 4-1.

At the end of the day, Flames only won 1 out of 5 of a possible 7 game series. Doesn't matter how they lost it, it was ultimately a short series where they essentially got swept since they only won game 1. That's being destroyed.

[Badgers Nose]

Originally Posted by keenan87

Horrible interview by a horrible GM. Basically pretending to be the smartest man in the room (as always). So tired of him and can't wait until he is gone.

Relax, he is just trying say it’s a process.

[Two Fivenagame]

You have to read or listen to these interviews and really distance yourself. You have to keep the emotion out of everything BT says. You have to really think about it rationally.

At the end of the day, you have to go back and process all the info. You evaluate what's going on, and then you make a plan to process the info. You wait for the right time to really understand what is really being said....

Starting to sound like Loubardias answering a simple question.

[Yrebmi]

Originally Posted by keenan87

Hahaha. Seriously? You really think the Flames didn't get dominated in that series? Mike Smith is the only reason the Flames even had a chance in those games.

I thought we were the better team in the first two games.
...but if I am honest, once the Aves shook off the rust they did look dominant.
A better coach might have had better results.
Smith's performance was overrated IMO.

Treliving has been a good albeit not great GM. I want him to stay at the helm.
I acknowledge that not replacing Ward before this season is hard to defend.
I can also agree the team needed changes, but without knowing what could have been it's difficult to say.

[Strange Brew]

Originally Posted by transplant99

He didn't say that.

He said you cant make off-season moves during the season.

I think its a very telling statement too.

It makes me believe he is pretty sure he has a deal cookin that simply cant be completed at this time because of cap restraints and/or the trading partner wants to hold onto their part of the deal through the playoffs.

Oh...and he has made 19 transactions during the season since becoming GM.

Poulin for futures
McCollum for nothing
Knight for Shore

A preponderance of minor deals. He is one of the less active GM in the season. Scorp posted a fantastic analysis of this about a year ago.

Regardless, looking for insight from a GM’s public comments is futile.

[zamler]

nm

[transplant99]

Originally Posted by Strange Brew

Poulin for futures
McCollum for nothing
Knight for Shore

A preponderance of minor deals. He is one of the less active GM in the season. Scorp posted a fantastic analysis of this about a year ago.

Regardless, looking for insight from a GM’s public comments is futile.

As the vast majority of ALL deals are no matter when they occur.