The type of Flames fan that honestly evaluates the Flames chances of even making it to the conference finals. Has everybody forgotten how badly the Flames sucked this year? I mean.... they REALLY sucked..
The Flames are lucky that they are even playing in the playoffs as there was a good possibility that they wouldn't, the way they were playing, if the covid-19 pandemic hadn't hit.
I'd rather lose to Winnipeg and have a 12.5% chance of drafting Lefrenier than beat Winnipeg and get blown out in the first playoff round (the chances that the Flames don't make it past the 1st round are pretty high).
Oh.. and no need to name call just because I have a different opinion than you. I'm just a Flames fan who would rather take one step back this year so we can take a huge leap forward in the next couple of years.
To me, just making the playoffs, isn't good enough anymore. Our window of opportunity is closing.
I’ll be the first to agree that it was absolutely a let down from last year, but honestly that should have been expected. Does that mean they “really sucked”? I disagree with that.
First 29 games (through the end of November):
13-12-4 for 30 points. Prorated is roughly an 84-85 point pace over a full 82. Barely over .500.
Final 41 games (from the end of November):
23-15-3 for 49 points. Over an 82 game season this is a 98 point pace.
Admittedly, the end of November is an arbitrary cutoff, but a slow start from the big guys certainly led to an underwhelming start.
Like, at the pause the Flames were very much in a fight for a divisional spot...and playing at almost a 100 point pace over the last 40+ games makes me genuinely believe they would have been top 3 in the Pacific.
My point is, saying that they were in a real danger of missing playoffs is disingenuous. In my mind that was really never a threat. Something would have had to go quite wrong to bounce them off the 100 point pace. They dug themselves a hole early and had begun to make up for that by playing better hockey. I don’t think the Flames “really sucked”...I think fans set unreasonable expectations based on an overachievement last year.
It’s just unimaginable to me that fans of a team who had a very real shot a a divisional spot would not believe in the teams ability to at least compete in a playoff series