TSN: Darren Dreger on TSN 1200 the Calgary Flames still trying to figure out if they are sellers. They likely can’t go into a full rebuild, just like the Winnipeg Jets, as their markets may not be able to handle it.
** NHLRumors.com transcription
Dreger: “Well, now they’re modified sellers and and probably if you’re looking at Calgary, more so that’s because you know ownership as always would and should have some influence.
So the Calgary Flames are still trying to figure out what they are. Are they a playoff worthy team? If so, do you keep one or two own rentals and push one out via trade and recruit some assets?
Do you take bigger bite. I mean, you’re talking about impactful players in Calgary, right? You know, you look on their blue line you’ve got Noah Hanifin who’s a big minute guy. You’ve got Chris Tanev. And there’s conversations happening with Hanifin, you know on the extension front. Up front, you’ve got Elias Lindholm who, you know, he’ll be top of class when the market opens on available NHL centers.
We keep speculating but those are teams, you know, just to name a couple that are still very much in the mix who are going to have to make a tough decision. And I suspect that they’ll do that no later than mid February.
Host: “Is Calgary the toughest read for the reasons you outlined. But also it wasn’t that long ago, we’re like ‘oh, (Mark) Scheifele’s gone, (Connor) Hellebuyck’s gone. Like that’s not gonna, that’s the way it’s gonna go in Winnipeg. And they ended up extending and look at the season they’re having. Like, just any anything can happen, right? We think things are gonna go in a certain direction but hold on.
Dreger: “Yep. Fair point and it causes all sorts of consternation when you go through a Winnipeg had to go through and clearly it could not have gone better for the Winnipeg Jets. But they played it perfectly, right? They didn’t burn any bridges. They kept conversations going with Scheifele and Hellebuyck’s representatives. They kept it amicable and they kept the environment healthy, but they did it well also researching you know what it takes to do a proper rebuild in the National Hockey League.
And Lloyd, we’ve talked about this, I mean look in Detroit. Detroit’s a pretty good team right now. We can see that, you know, they turn the corner, in the process of turning that corner. What is this like 7, 8, 9 years of a rebuild? I mean, Kenny Holland started the rebuild in Detroit and Yzerman has taken over.
But can a smaller market like Winnipeg afford to go through that and the answer is a hard no. That Mark Scheifele, or ah Mark Chipman. I guess he could be an owner one day but in this case, Mark Chipman. You know, he did that work. He put in his time and researched and talked to those teams about how difficult it is.
So I don’t think Calgary would have to go through that but if you’re selling all the pieces that we’ve already talked about, do you think Nazem Kadri wants to stay in Calgary with his long term deal? There’s been, already there’s been speculation around Jacob Markstrom.
You know, well, if you don’t have a goalie that you know, you can lean on, then those key players, younger players don’t want to stick around. So it gets pretty complicated in a hurry. It’s gonna be fascinating to see what Craig Conroy and the Flames do.
