Flames stay quiet in free-agency. That should be reassuring
The Calgary Flames have a plan, and they're sticking to it.
That plan does not involve handing out long-term contracts to veterans. Not in 2023, not in 2024 and not on Tuesday, when the NHL's free-agency market officially opened for 2025.
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The plan isn't simple, but it's easy enough to explain: The Flames are trying to stay in playoff contention while building through the draft. That's it. That's the plan, or the basic outline of it, at least.
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They'll keep their cap flexibility until they're ready to make a move. If the right player becomes available, sure, they'll have a go, but when the Los Angeles Kings are handing out sweetheart four year deals that pay Cody Ceci US$4.5-million annually the way they did Tuesday, there just aren't that many bargain deals and short-term contracts out there.
And so, the Flames were quiet on Tuesday. They didn't go out and spend money to try to make sure they got a few lucrative playoff pay-days for ownership next spring.
That should be reassuring.
They signed veteran blueliner Joel Hanley only hours before he was set to hit the market. He partnered well with MacKenzie Weegar and they were able to get him on a two-year deal.
They waved a grateful goodbye to backup goalie Dan Vladar, who signed with the Philadelphia Flyers. They'll need to find a replacement. Maybe that's Calgary Wranglers backstop Devin Cooley, or maybe it's Ivan Prosvetov, who they were heavily linked to on Tuesday.
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They also added Nick Cicek, too, but he's a 25-year-old defenceman who spent all of last year in Germany. He's probably not the move-the-needle type.
That was it.
Underwhelming? Anti-climatic? Maybe, but the Flames stuck to their plan.
And even people who aren't convinced the plan will work out must at least see that having one and sticking to it is better than the alternative.
'In free-agency, there is going to come a time when we are going to go out and identify guys and get guys because we're right there,' said Flames GM Craig Conroy. 'To do it right now just for the sake of doing it, because today is free-agency, just doesn't make sense. It's not part of the plan.
'You'd rather see a young guy get an opportunity in a spot than a veteran guy who has played maybe eight or 10 years in the league and he's a good player, but where's the upside going to be?'
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If there's frustration about the Flames' lack of activity in free-agency, it likely comes from fans who saw the team miss the playoffs with 96 points because of the NHL's tie-breaker format and want to see the team in the post-season as soon as possible.
There may also be frustration from the contingent who believe that the team is better off tanking and trying to get a generational talent with a pick at the very top of the draft.
The Flames are trying to thread the needle and stay competitive while getting younger. On Tuesday, they prioritized the 'getting younger' part.
Some patience is going to be required, but it's also probably fair to say they are a grand total of one year into their retool process, The 2023-24 season was spent trading away veterans. The 2024 Draft was where they took Zayne Parekh and Matvei Gridin in the first round and started laying the foundations for the next era.
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Add Cole Reschny and Cullen Potter in the first-round this year and factor-in the impressive talent they landed in later rounds, and you can begin to piece together a timeline for when the Flames can begin to be more active in free-agency and add veteran help.
Those young guys need to develop into productive NHLers and that's never a guarantee. But the Flames' hopes do largely lie with them.
'That's what we've told the young guys we've just drafted, when we're going to be good, they're going to be pushing and being good for us,' Conroy said. 'We want one of those guys to be the Johnny Gaudreau or Matthew Tkachuk or even Sam Bennett. We're going to need some of these young guys who maybe we haven't seen yet to come and be that guy.'
That's the long-term plan, and the Flames are sticking to it. What does it mean for next season, though? Will they regress or find a way to make the marginal gains they need to earn an invite to the post-season dance?
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The spectre of a Rasmus Andersson trade looms large over everything and makes it hard to predict how 2025-26 will go. The return Conroy nets from that deal will factor hugely into how competitive the Flames are next season.
We know he'll want young players and/or draft picks in return and won't go fishing for veteran help.
The teams below them in the playoffs should be better, too. The Vancouver Canucks can't possibly be the same tire-fire they were last year, right? The Anaheim Ducks should take a step and you'd expect the Utah Mammoth to push to improve, too.
If the Flames want a better finish next spring than they got this year, Conroy sees the team's youth as being the key. Not guys as young as Parekh or Gridin, but the players in their early-20s who have already established themselves as NHLers.
'I'm going to need (Joel) Farabee, I'm going to need (Morgan) Frost, (Connor) Zary, Matty Coronato,' Conroy explained. 'Guys like this have to come in and play better for us and give us more offence and they're going to have to take a step. If they do, that's going to be the difference for us. Those are the guys, with (Adam) Klapka and (Martin) Pospisil, those are the guys we need to rise and be better, but they're going to play more so that's going to give them that chance.
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'We need those guys to step up, if they're a 10 or 12 goal scorer this year they're going to need to get to 20 or 25. We need the five-goal scorer in Pospisil to go to 10. We may not do it with one guy, we don't have one guy who is going to do it, we don't have two guys, but by committee, that's how we're going to have to do it.'
And maybe one or two others will step up, too. The Flames are hoping they will
If there's one thing the team's lack of activity on Tuesday showed, it's that they're leaving the door open to young players coming into training camp and earning an NHL job. Sam Honzek did it last year, maybe Hunter Brzustewicz or Ilya Solovyov or Aydar Suniev can manage it this fall.
'You're going to see more opportunity for our guys and a better opportunity,' Conroy said. 'If I'm a young guy right now sitting at home thinking 'Huh, they haven't done much. I'm going to work even harder this summer because I want to make that team.' It sends a little bit of a message to our young guys.'
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