Flames Trade Deadline 2015: Five Likely On The Move

The trade deadline is tomorrow!

Who’s going out the door? Who’s coming back? What all shall happen? We will soon find out. For now, here’s our quick and dirty primer on the five current Calgary Flames organizational assets I anticipate could be donning another team’s colours by 1pm MT on Monday.

This one is a no-brainer. Glencross is a pending unrestricted free agent. He carries a $2.55 million cap hit, which is pretty easy to tuck under most salary cap structures. He’s 32, plays a physical style of game and can push puck possession. And given the crazy returns generated by other, similar players, the Flames could find themselves with an extra second round pick soon.

Ramo’s excellent week has elevated his stock, and lots of playoff teams could use a good back-up goalie down the stretch. Ramo isn’t the world’s greatest goalie, but he’s capable of hot stretches and he’s a pretty mellow personality, evidenced by him being pretty chill by sitting as the back-up for most of this season. He could garner Calgary a solid draft pick in return (a third or so), but the team would also need to add a goalie somewhere.

The Colorado Eagles added a full-time back-up goalie yesterday, indicating they don’t expect Doug Carr back. So if the organization lures Jeff Deslauriers over, then something is likely afoot.

These two were the players I feel probably WILL be moved. Now, we had into the possibilities.

Diaz is a power-play specialist. He’s a veteran, he’s inexpensive, and he can move the puck well. And he was seemingly only signed because the Flames weren’t sure if Tyler Wotherspoon was 100% ready after shoulder surgery. Guess what, he’s ready now. Diaz probably doesn’t have a spot in Calgary past July 1, and it makes sense to turn him into an asset before he goes UFA.

A pending restricted free agent, Reinhart is this year’s version of Roman Horak. He’s a good kid, a hard worker and a bit under-sized, but he’s also not quite great enough at anything to crack the NHL roster (like Johnny Gaudreau’s speed and offensive creativity and Josh Jooris’ insane work ethic and face-off skills have). And considering he’s moving up in age a bit, it may be time for the Flames to give him a shot in another organization.

Arguably the biggest name on this list, and the player I’d least want to part with given his talent, Baertschi is in a tough situation. He’s a left winger, but he’s definitely behind Johnny Gaudreau on the depth chart. The impending departure of Curtis Glencross should open up a spot in the NHL for him. But say a team comes to Calgary and offers to upgrade their defensive group for a price; if they ask for Gaudreau, Sam Bennett or Emile Poirier, you probably balk. But given that Baertschi’s had previous shots at the NHL, including a few with Calgary’s current coach, and hasn’t yet stuck, potentially he becomes a tempting asset to move if it solves other organizational problems.