“I’m not allowed to ever use the word rebuild” - Calgary Flames

[wintersej]

Its almost all about getting lucky. But burning the team to the ground when you know there is a generational talent going #1 over all, is more than luck. It is basic strategy. I hate the Hawks with a passion. But the current management group used some common sense and now they have Bedard.

There was a 75% chance they were not getting Bedard.

 

[STL fan in MN]

As a Blues fan, I’ve come to one obvious conclusion in the first 7 games of the season - the St. Louis Blues are quite bad. The Blues were also quite noticeably better than the Flames a couple nights ago. With their backup goalie, Joel Hofer.

Now, that was just one game but yeesh, the Flames were horrible Thursday night.

 

[Brookbank]

There was a 75% chance they were not getting Bedard.

Who cares. Its a generational talent and they cast their bet and won

 

[SeanMoneyHands]

They'll probably eventually get rid of them for 50% retained and not much back.

Huberdeau is unmovable. Flames are stuck with him. I can see Kadri getting bought out in 2 years.

I think both have NMCs?

 

[FrankMTL]

The Canadiens were stuck in mediocrity for the longest time. Yes there were seasons where they were a little better and seasons where they were a little worse, but they were basically just "there". They somehow managed a Cinderella run through to the Stanley Cup finals but it was clear they needed a rebuild. Nobody thought the fans could tolerate a real rebuild (management didn't even want to use the word in public), but they decided to do one (no choice) and low and behold, the fans actually accepted it without much of a complaint. The arena is packed every night. They're in year 3 of their rebuild and still nowhere close to being a "good" team, but some of the pieces are there, and the fans see glimpses of what the team can potentially look like in a few seasons. Just like the Flames, they have some long term contracts they're trying to get rid of (clean up) from the last management team, but they're getting there.

All this to say that there's actually no worse place to be then a middling team that's just "there". Hope the teams rebuilds (at least somewhat) even though there's no guarantee it will end up working.

 

[BLNY]

I proud of how this vid came out:

Savage and brilliant.

 

[SeanMoneyHands]

These guys are right, you need to blow it up in Calgary.

 

[Diversification]

There's a lot of doom and gloom in this thread and perhaps rightfully so. But it's important not to conflate the need for a rebuild and the (seeming) anchor contracts for Huberdeau and Kadri. Anchor contracts are much worse when you are at the cusp of becoming competitive and need that cap space to get over the hump. So either the Flames are close but are cap strapped preventing them from competing or they are about out to be forced into a rebuild despite management's attempt to put on a brave face.

Unfortunately for Flames fans, it looks more and more like the latter in which case, Huberdeau and Kadri will need to rot in mediocrity and that's their problem and won't affect things overly much during a rebuild process.

What I would worry about more is that the Flames have an outstanding goaltending prospect in Justin Wolf. Nothing like stellar goaltending to destroy draft lottery odds...

 

[NVious]

The Canadiens were stuck in mediocrity for the longest time. Yes there were seasons where they were a little better and seasons where they were a little worse, but they were basically just "there". They somehow managed a Cinderella run through to the Stanley Cup finals but it was clear they needed a rebuild. Nobody thought the fans could tolerate a real rebuild (management didn't even want to use the word in public), but they decided to do one (no choice) and low and behold, the fans actually accepted it without much of a complaint. The arena is packed every night. They're in year 3 of their rebuild and still nowhere close to being a "good" team, but some of the pieces are there, and the fans see glimpses of what the team can potentially look like in a few seasons. Just like the Flames, they have some long term contracts they're trying to get rid of (clean up) from the last management team, but they're getting there.

All this to say that there's actually no worse place to be then a middling team that's just "there". Hope the teams rebuilds (at least somewhat) even though there's no guarantee it will end up working.

Yeah its the same thing in Toronto post lockout, except our "run" was a 7 game series vs Boston lmao.

It probably comes from all sides;
Owners think fans will stop supporting the team
GM has an incentive to keep his job and thus act like "it's all going according to plan, just 2(0) more seasons and we'll get there"
Coach and players doing the best they can and don't want to state the obvious for "not being a team player" by pointing out they can't possibly win with the personnel there

Winnipeg is going through the same thing, ironically the teams are so meh that if you merged these middling teams (Winnipeg+Calgary and Toronto and Montreal when they were mediocre), they probably still aren't even a cup contender.

Personally I'd rather a tedious rebuild than a tedious mediocrity because that can always be followed by the tedious rebuild anyways.

 

[TBF1972]

Gonna be a tough few years but I think in 3 or 4 you guy can start looking forward to the idea of a long painful rebuild.

Hold strong till then

this^ kind of makes it difficult for non canadiens to distinguish between the 5 canadien nhl teams.

or are there even 6 of them?

 

[Frank Drebin]

this^ kind of makes it difficult for non canadiens to distinguish between the 5 canadien nhl teams.

or are there even 6 of them?

I'm sorry but who are you?

 

[TBF1972]

I'm sorry but who are you?

me

 

[SmoggyTwinkles]

This is all so doom and gloom............I might actually tune into this heritage classic game.

Just to see what's goin' on.

Maybe throw on my Kadri jersey, love that guy! Super flawed sure, but I'm a big fan.