On a few levels, it feels like Jay Feaster got a raw deal.

Best known in hockey for his stint as general manager of the Tampa Bay Lightning, for which he has his name engraved on the Stanley Cup, Feaster joined the Flames as an assistant general manager in 2010 and soon succeeded Darryl Sutter as general manager, serving for three years in that role.

On one hand, Feaster proceeded over the unceremonious dismantling of the Flames’ core, featuring the departures of Jarome Iginla (via trade), Robyn Regehr (via trade), Jay Bouwmeester (via trade) and Miikka Kiprusoff (into retirement), with the club receiving disappointing returns in the trades. On the other hand, the Flames of that era were not sustainably built, with the club’s aging roster amounting to a house of cards.

The Flames all-but-officially began a rebuild with the trade of Iginla to Pittsburgh on Mar.  27, 2013. Feaster departed the organization before the end of 2013, with Brad Treliving hired the following spring to bring the team back to relevance.

The Flames did not have a robust farm system when that rebuild began, nor did they garner a ton of assets for their departing stars. But promising 2011 draft choice Johnny Gaudreau emerged as the top player in all of American college hockey and developed chemistry quickly with 2013 first-round pick Sean Monahan. Combined with a few savvy free agency additions, and the Flames functionally emerged from their rebuild when they made the post-season, and won a round, in 2014-15. (Gaudreau and Monahan were complimented by 2016 first-round pick Matthew Tkachuk a little bit later.)

That, unfortunately, began a lengthy boom/bust cycle for the Flames, featuring alternating playoff appearances and misses every other year – and a method of roster construction fairly reliant on free agent additions and trading high draft picks for established players.

When he began general manager of the Flames in May 2023, Craig Conroy inherited a hockey club that wasn’t quite as much of a house of cards as Feaster did, but it was well on its way to becoming one. Aside from retaining Mikael Backlund, and naming him captain, Conroy’s opted to make his team younger at nearly every fork in the road, trading no fewer than 11 everyday NHL players in exchange for picks and prospects. (Yeah, an argument can be made that the rebuild flag was flown even higher after the trades of MacKenzie Weegar and Nazem Kadri, both of which had term left on their deals, but this was already the direction the wind was blowing in Calgary.)

So as the 2026-27 season approaches, where are the Flames in their rebuild process?

The short answer is “somewhere in the middle.”

The Flames have been accumulating futures for awhile. They made multiple first-round draft picks in 2024 (Zayne Parekh and Matvei Gridin), 2025 (Cole Reschny and Cullen Potter), and 2026 (Carson Carels and Jack Hextall). They’ve added college free agents. They’ve made oodles of mid-to-late round gambles, too, some of which look promising. They had enough draft picks accumulated that they could trade three early draft picks (and Etienne Morin) for Simon Nemec without really putting a dent into their ample futures.

While they’ve added a lot of promising pieces, the Flames are now at the point where they’re waiting to see if they can grab a game-breaking talent in an upcoming draft, or if one of the many young players they’ve added recently can become that game-breaking talent. They’re not yet in a position where they can be reasonably expected for the maturation of their most promising youngsters can lift them out of the doldrums… but they may be getting a bit closer to that spot, especially if a few more of their recent draft choices can arrive in the NHL and become productive players.

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