After a week of hardcore speculation, the New Jersey Devils finally found a new home for forward Taylor Hall on Monday afternoon. The 28-year-old was swapped to the Arizona Coyotes in a seven piece trade. After the trade was consummated, fans of the Calgary Flames likely asked themselves whether the Flames were in the mix for Hall.

The short answer is “yes.” And it might be a good thing that the Flames didn’t land their big fish.

First off, were the Flames in the mix for Hall? The answer from a pair of fairly prominent sources seems to be a resounding “yes.”

Over at The Athletic (paywall), Pierre LeBrun broke down the trade negotiations. Without blowing up LeBrun’s entire piece, here’s an interesting nugget: “I’m not so sure the Flames don’t think that what they were willing to pay package-wise wasn’t just as good as what Arizona did.”

On his hit with Pat Steinberg and Ryan Pinder on Monday afternoon, Sportsnet insider Elliotte Friedman had this to say:

It’s the second time in the 2019 calendar year that the Flames just missed out on a big name player. The Flames were infamously the runner-up to the Vegas Golden Knights, another divisional rival, in the Mark Stone sweepstakes.

Speaking with Steinberg and Pinder, Friedman surmised of Hall’s future: “I would say it’s most likely that he goes to market.”

The full Hall swap was Hall (with 50% of his cap hit retained) and forward Blake Speers for 22-year-old forward Nick Merkley, 20-year-old forward Nate Schnarr, 19-year-old defenseman Kevin Bahl, a lottery protected 2020 first round pick and a conditional 2021 third round pick.

If Hall walks, the Coyotes will have given up three solid prospects and two early draft picks for four months of Taylor Hall. The Flames equivalent of that trade would likely be something resembling Matthew Phillips, Emilio Pettersen, Oliver Kylington and the two picks for Hall. That’s a lot to give up.

The Flames are right up against the cap and the situation won’t get significantly better next season. Aside from Juuso Valimaki and Alexander Yelesin, they don’t have any defensive prospects. Heck, the team arguably doesn’t have any game-breaking forward prospects that aren’t already in the NHL. And with the cap situation unclear for the next few years with the renewal of the CBA and the NHL’s American television deal (and a looming expansion draft), it’s critically important for the Flames to maintain cost certainty and roster flexibility. In other words: they need all the picks and prospects they can get their hands on to back-fill their roster for the next few seasons.

Blowing up the team’s future flexibility for potentially just four months of Hall would have created more problems than it solved.