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FlamesNation Mailbag: The trade deadline spectacular (and other things)
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christian tiberi
Feb 26, 2018, 10:00 ESTUpdated: Feb 25, 2018, 21:37 EST
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It’s the biggest day of the year and, accordingly, the biggest mailbag this year (megabag?)! Let’s dive in.
I feel Brad Treliving will show restraint at the deadline, but only because his hands are absolutely tied.
The Flames aren’t exactly at expectations, but they’re still in a very tight race for the playoffs, so it certainly makes sense to add. The issue being that Treliving’s already invested a ton of 2017 and 2018 draft capital (first, two seconds for Travis Hamonic, 2019 second/2018 third for Mike Smith, third and fifth round pick for acquiring and re-signing Michael Stone, second round pick for Curtis Lazar) into regular pieces. That kind of leaves him without assets to make a trade. Given the prices for some of the higher end rentals (e.g. Rick Nash, Derick Brassard), I don’t think the Flames are players at all.
For the very same reasons, the Flames are probably not going to sell. They seem completely comfortable with what they’re working with and they are still in the playoff race. What good would it do to sell? The team is concerned with optics, so I feel selling is perhaps sending the wrong message. Besides, what they sell isn’t going to recoup them anything. The biggest name is T.J. Brodie, who they probably aren’t going to get rid of quite yet, and after that is Stone, who is probably not going to get much more than a fourth round pick. Pack the fireworks away for next year.
He would have to do a lot of damage to hit Darryl Sutter levels. He’s already traded away a lot of picks (remember when the Flames only drafted twice in the second round under Sutter? Hahahahaha) but he at least acquires longer term and higher quality pieces than Colin Stuart, Anton Stralman, Olli Jokinen, Rene Bourque, etc. I don’t mind Treliving’s use of picks because, unlike Sutter, he seems to not actively hate the drafting process. He can make do with what he has, as he did with the 2015 draft (five picks: Oliver Kylington, Andrew Mangiapane, Rasmus Andersson) and the 2017 draft (five picks: Juuso Valimaki, Adam Ruzicka, D’Artagnan Joly look promising).
He also does not like trading prospects, only having sent Brandon Hickey and Keegan Kanzig packing in trades. I think he values his prospects more so than GMs of Flames past, and given ownership’s stinginess, I think they value the cheap contracts more than other ownership groups.
Low.
If we remove UFAs and other non-regular players and assume the Flames are going to keep RFAs, here’s how the roster could shake out starting next year:
Johnny Gaudreau
Sean Monahan
Sam Bennett
Matthew Tkachuk
Mikael Backlund
Michael Frolik
Micheal Ferland
Mark Jankowski
Garnet Hathaway
Curtis Lazar
??
Troy Brouwer
Certainly not a complete picture, but workable. The Flames are likely wanting to touch up that right side and will probably move a few pieces around as they probably want a spot open for Mangiapane at the beginning of the season, so we can assume more is going to happen. But Matt Stajan’s spot is certainly open for taking.
And Dillon Dube, Matthew Phillips, and Glenn Gawdin all play centre. That’s three competitors, all of whom are tearing up the WHL, for one spot. If the centre spot is taken by someone else, well they all play wing, too. That’s nothing but great news.
Even so, the AHL team is going to get purged. Austin Carroll is certainly very replaceable, and Morgan Klimchuk, Emile Poirier, and Hunter Shinkaruk are not going to be NHLers anytime soon. I imagine they keep at least one of that latter group, but that’s a lot of prime spaces open for young talent. Given that the Flames are not coy about handing spots to AHLers, keeping their prospects gives them the flexibility to replace underperformers easily. I think they keep those prospects around.
The most common answer is Kylington, but he’s having a very strong season at age 20. Given Brodie’s decline, it’s hard to see the Flames dealing away a very promising player who can potentially replace Brodie sooner rather than later. Valimaki projects as a #1 LD, whereas Kylington projects as just below that (i.e. too good as a #2LD, not good enough as a #1LD). It’s hard to give that away without a great return.
Otherwise, I feel the only realistic expendable prospects who could get you value are probably Klimchuk, Shinkaruk, and Gawdin. Klimchuk and Shinkaruk could entice a few based off name value, and someone could be interested in Shinkaruk as a reclamation project given his numbers before joining Calgary.
I know I said the Flames would be hesitant to trade Gawdin, but if you have to dangle someone, it’s him. He’s a guy who has exploded in the WHL, but it’s most likely due to being an overager with two dynamite linemates in Tyler Steenbergen and Aleksi Heponiemi. He’s a wildcard with great numbers, so someone is likely interested. He’s not going to be what Dube and Phillips could be, so I think he’s the first out.
Honourable mentions: Ruzicka (hockey build, numbers increase, but still lots of questions), Tyler Wotherspoon (older, lower ceiling, could contribute now, but dime a dozen).
We have to wait and see which Sam Bennett has come to play. It was great that he immediately scored two points with his new linemates; can he keep it up? We all thought him and Mark Jankowski were a surefire duo until it became clear that they could only score once every 10 games. I’m not sure who that’s on but Bennett was, as usual, riding the wave. Another question to ask is: can we be sure that this is Bennett’s doing and not Johnny Gaudreau and Sean Monahan carrying whoever their third linemate is a la Jiri Hudler, Josh Jooris, Micheal Ferland, etc?
I think Bennett is still a passenger on the Flames, but if he can at least hold court with Monahan and Gaudreau, it’s a workable situation for the time being. The Flames would rather they get great production from $1.95M than pay up for a more expensive and older asset. It’s going to take time to find out.
Mike Hoffman would be the guy you put up there instead of Bennett, as he is a reliable, tested, and measurably good first line winger. But it’s a tough choice because any deal for Hoffman is going to require Bennett. Do you trade away Bennett on the assumption that he isn’t going to push the needle in Calgary, or do you hold on and assume that he was just miscast for a long time? If Bennett didn’t produce against Arizona, this decision would be easier.
Max Pacioretty and/or Hoffman is likely the best case scenario, but they’re probably too expensive. Alex Galchenyuk has been floated around, which could also be a good move for a lesser price than the first two. Among the worst is Zack Smith, who is a 3C at best. I haven’t heard of any other serious connections.
Both.
Ferland is a guy who does ride the SH% waves, for good and bad. After the 2014-15 playoff run, many complained that Ferland was a one hit wonder, having produced only 18 points in his sophomore season. That was untrue, as his underlying metrics suggested a better player than how he was being used. He was a miscast with bad luck.
Then Glen Gulutzan put him on the first line, where he’s mostly been a miscast with good luck. The disparity between him, Monahan, and Gaudreau is much much more obvious than before. The first line was riding or dying on his performances, and when he went south, he dragged the whole line down with him. It worked for the time being, but now it’s not.
TOI with
Ferland TOI without
CF% together
Ferland CF% without
Teammate CF% without
Gaudreau-Monahan-Ferland
617:24
87:04
53.01%
48.17%
60.47%
Gaudreau-Ferland
653:06
125:58
51.91%
50.54%
56.92%
Monahan-Ferland
656:18
122:46
53.19%
43.32%
56.00%
No matter which way you cut it, Ferland is along for the ride on that top line. I don’t necessarily think you have to shuffle him back down to the bottom of the rotation, but his first line days are likely over. The Flames could sub him in with the 3M line and move Matthew Tkachuk around without significantly weakening that line.
On a tangent, and to relate to trade deadline, it’s not too out there to suggest that Ferland could hold great value as a trade asset. He’s big, can score, good in the room, and still comes cheap for another year. If the Flames can get better at the cost of Ferland, it’s something they should look at.
Pacioretty going to the Kings would be deadly. That’s another goal scorer for a team that refuses to be counted out. I don’t worry about Erik Karlsson in Vegas this year because they’ve already wrapped the division up. In the future? Yes, I would be very afraid.
Evander Kane to Anaheim or Los Angeles is also floating around, which would be another issue. I don’t think the Flames should be in contention, as Kane is a known shithead, but he’s a talented hockey player who could make lives miserable in March.
I think that’s fair to say. Brodie has been not great for so long this year that it’s hard to argue anything otherwise. Even Hamonic, who had a lot of doubts heading into this year given his 2016-17 results, has settled down. Brodie still makes inexcusable gaffes with little hope of eventually trending the right direction. As much as it sucks to say, he’s clearly regressed and is likely more expendable than what we could’ve thought two years ago.
Having Brodie of old back would be wonderful. Given the odd insistence to play Brodie-Hamonic more than actual first pairing Giordano-Hamilton, it would be much better to have a solid second pairing than a consistent third line. That gives you two five man units of firepower for anywhere between 30-40 minutes per night.
I think the internal cap is working in the Flames’ favour, so I wouldn’t worry about too high a price. I think the team wants to get him around Backlund money ($5.35M) before he hits Monahan ($6.375M) or even Gaudreau ($6.75M) money. I could foresee a 6×5.75M contract.
That’s nearly exactly Dougie Hamilton’s contract (one additional year for Tkachuk, same cap hit), which I think is fair given their relative production on their ELCs. In all of his three years in Boston, Hamilton was the top relative corsi for defender – likewise for Tkachuk among Flames forwards in his 1.75 years. Their importance relative to their teammates cannot be understated.
I think the earlier the better, but Brad has a lot on his plate this offseason (five RFAs, maybe a few UFAs, managing a bare draft) so I imagine talks start in August. Tkachuk has the same agent as Troy Brouwer, so he knows how to get max value for his agents.
(I am writing this on Sunday, so this may have happened by the time this is published.)
Stewart is interesting. He kind of checks all the boxes the Flames are looking for in a forward: big, right-handed, likes scoring goals.
He is also very bad. His 5v5 CF is 40.37%, and he is currently rocking a -7.41 CFrel%. This is with fourth line minutes against other bottom sixers. He’s not going to be much of a solution for the Flames. I’d stay away.
No. There’s not really an existing goalie market, so any good goalie is going to fetch a fortune. The AHL call-ups pretty much mirror what the team did last year. David Rittich has predictably fallen off the wagon as an NHL starter, so Jon Gillies is now the hot hand. The Flames had to ride the hot hand down the stretch with Brian Elliott last year when Chad Johnson fell apart, so it’s nearly a mirror situation.
I think that the team’s major woe is goal scoring. The goalies have been good enough to keep them in games, and as obvious as it sounds, what’s really going to stop them from going forward is not putting more pucks in the net.
Pegged around mid-March, so maybe in the next two weeks?
And I think he’s the reason why the Flames are going to hold off this deadline. Kris Versteeg returning would add a powerplay specialist (not that he’s that desperately missed now, but the more the merrier) who could slide in as a finisher on that third line. He could be that extra little bit that the Flames need down the stretch, and they’re just waiting for the green light.
Probably not. Hope to be proven wrong so I don’t get up early for nothing.

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