Value of: Juuso Valimaki

[Bounces R Way]

You can't have him. Don't even look at him.

Well, assuming it was strictly a rental then I suppose that’s a different case. But if Stone were willing to extend, it was a huge mistake.

We didn't have 76 million laying around to throw his way.

 

[Mazatt]

Well, assuming it was strictly a rental then I suppose that’s a different case. But if Stone were willing to extend, it was a huge mistake.

I mean, it depends on the big picture. Let's go back to when the trade was supposed to go down. Valimaki is playing strong in the AHL and had a strong NHL showing to start the year while Andersson had overtaken Stone for the 3rd pairing job and was trusted at the end of games to play with Giordano when we were pulling the goalie, and the Flames had just acquired Fantenburg to play with Andersson while also having Prout. Going into the offseason Flames had 12 million in cap space and tradying Andersson and Valimaki (plus a first) opens up about 1 mil in cap space so 13 million available. 9.5 of that goes to Stone leaving us with 3.5, allowing us to sign one of Bennett or Rittich. Let's assume we sign Rittich to the same deal of 2.75 so we have .75 million in the bank. We can take away most of that .75 for Mangiapane signing for .715. This leaves us with a lineup of

Gaudreau - Monahan - Lindholm
Frolik - Backlund - Stone
Mangiapane - Ryan - Neal
Quine - Jankowski - Czarnik

Giordano - Brodie
Hanifin - Hamonic
Kylington - Stone

Rittich
Gillies/Zagidulin

So we end up with a very unproven back up, and are in line to lose Fantenburg, Prout, and Hathaway to the offseason. Just off of looking at it I trust that d-core alot less in the playoffs. Assuming we sign players Tkachuk and Bennett to the same deals, we need about 10 million dollars in cap space. We could buy out Stone in this prospective world but without someone to replace him on the blue line we're SOL there since we can't re-sign him (with Valimaki gone the injury doesn't happen, meaning there's more of an argument for cap circumventation). The easy way to look at dealing with this crunch is to make some trades. Say, trade Czarnik and for Jankowski, getting whatever we can for them, and call up Dube and sign Rieder for 700k. Going off memory we end up without about 1.5 more in cap space. Now we're getting somewhere. Let's also say we trade out Stone along with a pick and bring back someone like Prout, or get a not so great, but league minimum player in return. That's another 3 million, bringing us to 4.5. Now we can sign Bennett. Nice. Now a combination of trading Neal for no salary, or trading Ryan and Frolik for next to nothing allows us to sign Tkachuk. Let's say we miraculously trade Neal for nothing and end up only losing a 1st. For shits and gigs we can even just say this is where we lost Jankowski. Now let's take another look at the lineup.

Gaudreau - Monahan - Lindholm
Tkachuk - Backlund - Stone
Bennett - Ryan- Frolik
Mangiapane - Dube - Rieder

Giordano - Brodie
Hanifin - Hamonic
Kylington - Prout/Petrovic

Rittich
Gillies

In an absolute best case scenario, we make out pretty good. However we are also right up against the cap and can't have any injuries, especially in net, or our season is done for. Things like trading Stone and Neal for next to nothing aren't realistic so we're looking at it being even harder to get enough cap to sign Stone and would probably need to trade one of Hamonic or Brodie.

All in all, I had no idea what I was thinking writing this all up, especially since I bet no one's gonna read it and I still don't know if I 100% wouldn't make the trade, but I think I've cleared it up in my head a bit more that we sacrifice too much for a stronger top 6 , and would end up turning our strong d-core into a mediocre/below average one for the sake of improving our top 6. NGL though Tkachuk - Backlund - Stone is a dream line and I would have loved to see them make it work, but I'm not sure if it's feasible.

 

[kevrondl]

Valimaki is the best chance the Flames have for a Giordano replacement. They won't move him.

 

[Nate070]

Where'd you hear that?

In his own little head?

 

[FameFlame069]

@Mazatt I read your scenario and that was one helluva read, but that's 2 1sts out and both Vali and Andy for mainly just Stone, which IMO wouldn't be a good trade I'm fine with not getting him, and to other can bases remember we didn't draft Gio and he didn't start in the NHL until 25, so we're perfectly fine with letting players develop before pushing them into the bigs (wish we would of given Bennett development time)

I wouldn't go back and do the trade maybe if it was Kylington + Dube + Ryan/Neal with whatever adds

 

[Volica]

Yeah. Juuso isn't going anywhere.
Absolute Stud. Really was bummed out about his injury, but he's a big strong kid that'll come back bigger and stronger. High IQ, great footspeed, physical, offensively talented; there are 30 other teams that wished they had this kid in their prospect pool.

 

[Nanuuk]

Perhaps Valimaki's greatest strength, even at his young age, is that he doesn't panic back there. That allows for great decision making and use of his hockey IQ. Add in his physical talents and you have the makings of a very good d-man.

 

[Mazatt]

@Mazatt I read your scenario and that was one helluva read, but that's 2 1sts out and both Vali and Andy for mainly just Stone, which IMO wouldn't be a good trade I'm fine with not getting him, and to other can bases remember we didn't draft Gio and he didn't start in the NHL until 25, so we're perfectly fine with letting players develop before pushing them into the bigs (wish we would of given Bennett development time)

I wouldn't go back and do the trade maybe if it was Kylington + Dube + Ryan/Neal with whatever adds

I was going off the rumour that the ask for Stone was Valimaki +Andersson/Kylington +a pick, not sure if that was true or not, but I'd figure they'd probably up the ask to both Valimaki and Andersson with Brannstrom on the table from Vegas. I think it came down to them wanting a top tier defensive prospect (Valimaki), and then rounding up then rounding up the rest of the value with lesser prospects and picks (Andersson/Kylington in the same tier with Andersson having more value, them wanting a pick.

I would 100% be willing to make a trade based around Kylington and Dube but I don't think that base gets it done. Dube doesn't carry as much value as Valimaki and same with Kylington to Andersson, and with the cap dump it doesn't make a ton of sense. Maybe if we added someone like Bennett they'd consider it more.

In the end, after all that writing, I agree that I wouldn't do the rumoured trade for Stone, even without having to gut the rest of the team I don't feel comfortable going from a future top 4 of

Valimaki - Andersson
Hanifin - Kylington

Or whatever combination of that we like, to having

Hanifin - Kylington
???????????????

It's essentially trading two defenseman, who at their pace look like top pairing guys, for one of the top RWers in the game, but that hit to our defense does not scream worth it to me.

 

[CraigsList]

What an awful decision that was.

And how were we supposed to sign Tkachuk? What an awful take.

 

[Nanuuk]

If the Flames want to use Kylington at RD, they'd better start playing there down in Stockton. This isn't like flipping a light switch. There is a learning curve.

 

[CraigBillington]

His value isn't high at all. Flames would be stupid to trade him right now. Let him rehab and develop if that is the route they want to go unless they are sure he will bust, then deal him.

But these kinds of injuries are hard to come back from, especially when you miss a year of critical development. He has to prove he can perform when he comes back before his trade value is high.

They are a difficult injury for sure, and they provide much more maintenance. As long as you keep on your daily maintenance and checks with your trainers, it's manageable to come back from. I'm sure his value is still high until proven otherwise, but this type of injury is nothing like it used to be even 20 years ago when it shortened Pavel Bure's career. As for critical development, that's a tough call. We will never know on a player like Galchenyuk who played 2 games in his draft year, if his potential was affected, but still turned out an alright career. Chychrun is another one in a similar boat. Jury's out on Olli Juolevi as well.

I think Calgary is wise to hold onto him, they might not get as much in trade value, so he's more worth the risk to hold onto than to lose him for below his value and find out he's going to be OK. I've always felt the risk of holding onto a player with injury concerns and have the potential of him being a lesser player/retiring is better than the risk of dealing him away for a lesser asset because you're worried he will never recover and have him actually recover and light the league up.