The new CBA includes a restriction on paper transactions; players sent down must play a game in the AHL prior to being recalled. However, there is an exception on deadline day. Teams can send down & then recall players all on deadline day to make them eligible for AHL playoffs.
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A summary of Flames roster, salary cap and CBA rules ahead of the 2026 NHL Trade Deadline
Photo credit: Sergei Belski-Imagn Images
Folks, the National Hockey League has its trade deadline for the 2025-26 this coming Friday, with 1 p.m. MT being the deadline for transactions where acquired players are eligible to play in the Stanley Cup playoffs.
In the run-up to the deadline, there are a lot of rules and regulations and guidelines that frame how NHL clubs are allowed to run their rosters. So with that in mind, here are the things that the Calgary Flames (and other teams) will have to remember and balance over the next few days leading up to the deadline.
Roster spots
The Flames’ active roster has to be at least 20 players and at most 23 players during the season. Currently they’re carrying 22 active players.
- 2 goaltenders: Devin Cooley and Dustin Wolf
- 7 defencemen: Kevin Bahl, Zayne Parekh, Zach Whitecloud, Yan Kuznetsov, Joel Hanley, Brayden Pachal and Olli Maatta
- 13 forwards: Mikael Backlund, Morgan Frost, Yegor Sharangovich, John Beecher, Blake Coleman, Matt Coronato, Adam Klapka, Connor Zary, Ryan Lomberg, Martin Pospisil, Joel Farabee, Nazem Kadri and Matvei Gridin
Three players are on the injury reserve list and don’t count against the roster limit, but do count against the cap: Sam Honzek, Jake Bean and Jonathan Huberdeau.
The salary cap
The Flames are currently carrying $83.196 million in daily cap commitments – this is everyone on the active roster and injury reserve list, plus the buried cap penalty for Daniil Miromanov and the retained salary commitments for Rasmus Andersson and Jacob Markstrom.
Factoring in past cap savings, the Flames can accommodate $47.083 million in cap hits at the trade deadline and remain compliant. If they someone get beyond that amount, they could dip into long-term injury reserve space – Honzek, Bean and Huberdeau are all eligible for long-term cap relief – but it’s incredibly unlikely that would happen.
Suffice it to say: the Flames have a massive amount of salary cap room.
Retained salary slots
NHL clubs are permitted to retain salary from three active contracts through trades at any time, and they can retain up to 50% of any of those contracts.
The Flames have used two of their three retention slots. They retained 31.25% ($1.875 million) of Jacob Markstrom’s salary in his trade to New Jersey. They also retained 50% ($2.275 million) of Rasmus Andersson’s salary in his trade to Vegas. Both of those contracts expire on July 1. Until then, the Flames have one retention slot remaining.
Waivers
The Flames have a single player who is exempt from waivers and eligible to go to the AHL: Matvei Gridin. Zayne Parekh is waiver exempt, but he’s not eligible to play in the AHL this season due to his age. (No, it doesn’t change once the OHL season is over; since he’s in the NHL, the NHL restrictions apply in this situation.)
The recall limit
This is the first season of the expanded recall limit after the trade deadline. NHL clubs will be permitted to call up five players on “regular” recalls – recalls that are not required to meet roster minimums, which are called “emergency recalls” – following the trade deadline, and can have a maximum of four players up from the AHL on regular recalls at the time.
Teams have unlimited emergency recalls, but those emergency recalls are tied to the availability of specific players. If a player is brought up on an emergency recall they can be kept around by convert them to a regular recall, but that would count against the five recall limit.
The contract limit
Clubs are permitted to have 50 players on active NHL contracts at a time. The Flames currently have 45 players on active deals this season – 25 in the NHL, 19 in the AHL, and one (Andrew Basha) in the WHL.
Between trades and signing college players to deals that would begin this season, the Flames can add five contracts. This is primarily important in the sense that the Flames can offer potential college signings the ability to go straight to the NHL and burn the first year of their NHL deals.
AHL playoff eligibility
The AHL’s trade deadline is in another week, but the NHL trade deadline is important because to be eligible to play in the NHL (at all) for the remainder of the season, players need to be on an AHL roster as of the trade deadline. This is only a restriction on NHL roster players moving down for the AHL’s playoffs, as ECHL players, junior and college prospects can be added to AHL clubs over the rest of the season.
Paper transactions
A new rule this year regards NHL players being sent down to the AHL. Starting this season, if a player is sent to the AHL from the NHL, they have to play an AHL game to become eligible to be called back up to the NHL. There’s been discussion regarding whether there will be an exemption to allow paper transactions on trade deadline day – otherwise Flames players sent to the Wranglers wouldn’t be eligible for recall until after their Saturday game.
Update: Per PuckPedia, it sounds like there’s an exemption allowing paper transactions on deadline day.
(Paper transactions back to the NHL have counted against the recall limit in past years and, if they’re allowed in this specific situation this year, they would still count against the recall limit.)
Thinking out loud
The only player that could potentially go down to the AHL is Gridin, but all indications from the Flames recently are that they consider him an NHL player and so it seems probable that they might just keep him on the big club’s roster and avoid any moves to maintain his AHL eligibility this season.
Unless the Flames need to make call-ups to maintain roster numbers due to trades, we think they might just stand pat and save their five call-ups for later in the season. (Or, if they move a defencemen in a trade before the deadline, potentially use one of their five call-ups on bringing Hunter Brzustewicz up from the Wranglers.)
The trade deadline is 1 p.m. MT on Friday.
PRESENTED BY THE DAILY FACEOFF TRADE DEADLINE SPECIAL
The 2026 Trade Deadline Special is going LIVE March 6th. Join the Daily Faceoff crew on Friday, March 6th, from 9 AM-1:30 PM MT for wall-to-wall coverage of every single move as it happens. Get instant reaction, expert analysis, and exclusive insights from special guests throughout the day. Tune in LIVE on the Daily Faceoff YouTube channel and don’t miss a second of deadline day chaos.
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