A history of Flames numbers: #19, Matthew Tkachuk
By Ari Yanover
7 years agoMatthew Tkachuk isn’t on the Flames yet. He could be an NHL player this upcoming season; he could also have to wait a year. It’s unclear at this point in time – but it’s definitely still up to him.
For the time being, though? He got the number 19 in development camp. The number 7 he wore (still wears?) with the London Knights is unavailable in Calgary, but 19 is a good, solid forward number – and it looks like that’ll be the number he’ll have with the Flames.
#19 on the Flames
Matthew Tkachuk should be the 20th player in Flames franchise history to wear #19:
- C Morris Stefaniw
- D Arnie Brown
- D Ed Kea
- RW Paul Henderson
- RW Bobby Gould
- C Bruce Eakin
- LW Carl Mokosak
- RW Tim Hunter
- C Todd Harkins
- LW Vesa Viitakoski
- LW David Haas
- D Chris O’Sullivan
- LW Oleg Saprykin
- RW Chuck Kobasew
- C Wayne Primeau
- RW Jamal Mayers
- LW Fredrik Modin
- C Blair Jones
- RW David Jones
- LW Matthew Tkachuk?
At long last, the number leaves the tyrannical grip the Joneses previously had on it. There are a small handful of defencemen here – okay, three – but it’s wingers who have primarily occupied this number, with Tkachuk likely to be the 12th in line.
The best #19
I’m definitely hoping Tkachuk has it in him to be the best Flame to ever wear #19 – but the bar isn’t exactly high to start with. Henderson (Henderson!) only ever played 30 games for the Flames, while I still can’t figure out for the life of me what the point of acquiring Modin to play a whole four games was, exactly.
That just leaves a smattering of players who approached, and in a couple of cases, just barely passed, 200 points in their career. Tkachuk is going to get every opportunity to prove himself better than them. Hopefully he’ll do just that.
Previous numbers
| #1 – Brian Elliott | #3 – Jyrki Jokipakka |
| #5 – Mark Giordano | #6 – Dennis Wideman |
| #7 – T.J. Brodie | #11 – Mikael Backlund |
| #13 – Johnny Gaudreau | #15 – Ladislav Smid |
| #17 – Lance Bouma | #18 – Matt Stajan |
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