It’s been two years since Craig Conroy was named the GM of the Calgary Flames. His time with the team has certainly been filled with ups and downs, as he’s made his fair share of strong and questionable moves so far. As he enters his third season as GM, Flames fans will be excited to see how he continues facilitating his vision of hopefully turning the Flames into Stanley Cup contenders.
In today’s article, I’ll be sharing my list of some of Conroy’s best and worst moves as Flames GM. These include trades, signings, or other moves that stand out to me the most, so if I miss any from either category, feel free to mention them in the comments below.
Best: Flames capitalize strongly on Elias Lindholm’s trade value
Conroy began his tenure as Flames’ GM in a tough spot. The team was expected to be in the playoff hunt after a disappointing 2022-2023 season. When they went on to underperform severely at the beginning of the 2023-24 season, the noise regarding a rebuild got louder.
The Flames had multiple pending UFAs on the team, and their futures were up in the air. As the team continued struggling, it became well known that many of these players didn’t have the desire to re-sign in Calgary. Among those players was Elias Lindholm. Lindholm was part of the biggest sell-off in the Flames’ franchise history, as the Flames would ship him off to the Vancouver Canucks in February.
The return the Flames got for him was massive. In exchange for Lindholm, the team received Andrei Kuzmenko, a 2024 first-round pick, prospects Hunter Brzustewicz and Joni Jurmo, and a conditional 2024 fourth-round pick. The moment the return was announced, Flames fans saw it as an instant win.
Since then, the trade has aged well for the team. Lindholm would only end up being a rental for the Canucks. As for the Flames, they ended up with promising pieces for the future, as Brzustewicz is a defenseman Flames fans are quite high on. They used the first rounder to select forward Matvei Gridin, another prospect who excites fans quite a bit. As for the fourth, the Flames traded it for picks to move down in the 2024 Draft to select forwards Luke Misa and Eric Jamieson. Kuzmenko would also be a prominent player for them, but he was traded the following season. In general, the Lindholm trade was a slam dunk by Conroy, as the team has added significant assets to their futures cupboards from it.
Worst: The Flames weren’t so lucky with Hanifin
Now moving on to a trade where Conroy wasn’t so lucky. Among the pending UFAs the Flames had was Noah Hanifin, who also seemed like he was heading out of town sooner rather than later. Flames fans were hoping that with Hanifin being a top-four defenceman in his prime, a return in a trade would be significant, just like the Lindholm deal.
Sadly, Flames fans would be hugely disappointed as the team would not get a return even near that. Hanifin was traded to the Vegas Golden Knights in exchange for Daniil Miromanov, a conditional 2025 third-round pick and a conditional 2025 first-round pick. The return was hugely disappointing, considering the Flames were also retaining 50% of Hanifin’s salary.
Part of it was not exactly Conroy’s fault. Hanifin’s camp essentially handcuffed the Flames, expressing interest in only a small number of teams where Hanifin would sign an extension. Oh, and Hanifin did end up extending in Vegas, which makes the Flames’ return that much disappointing.
As expected, the trade hasn’t aged the best for the Flames since then. Miromanov has pretty much been a non-factor for the team, and the Flames used the third to draft goaltender Kirill Zarubin. The only true value the Flames got was the first, which converted to 2026 and is unprotected. We’ll see what the Flames do with that pick, but it’s safe to say that many fans consider this trade one of the weakest moves in the Conroy era so far.
Best: The Jacob Markstrom trade
The 2023-24 season was filled with endless drama. Flames starter Jacob Markstrom would end up getting involved in trade rumors of his own, suggesting that he was almost traded to the New Jersey Devils near the deadline. He would end up getting moved to the Devils anyway in the offseason, and the trade proved to age strongly for the Flames.
The team received defenceman Kevin Bahl and a 2025 first-round pick that was top-10 protected. Although the trade seemed underwhelming at the time, it’s safe to say that it’s far from underwhelming now. Bahl has since blossomed into a strong top-four defenceman, carving out a role for himself on the Flames’ blueline for years to come, given how he’s only 25.
As for the first, the Flames would use it to select Cole Reschny in this year’s draft. He’s a centre and currently a top-five prospect within the Flames system. Getting a return of Bahl and Reschny for a 34-year-old Markstrom is not too shabby.
The most important aspect, though, was the Flames making room for Dustin Wolf to emerge as the team’s full-time starter. The entire argument that Markstrom should act as a mentor for Wolf was proven to be flawed. Conroy got significant value out of a goalie in his mid-30s, something that doesn’t happen all the time.
Worst: Yegor Sharangovich’s extension
Now hear me out: this is a player who I’m still somewhat high on. But Yegor Sharangovich’s play last season didn’t even come close to justifying his new contract. Sharangovich, after scoring a career high of 31 goals and 59 points in 2023-24, was rewarded with a five-year extension carrying an AAV of $5.75 million per year.
Sharangovich this past season struggled mightily in following up his production. He scored only 17 goals and 32 points in 73 games. While he did start the season injured, he was not the same player and lacked the offensive passion he had before. His new contract hasn’t even kicked in yet, as it’ll begin this season.
Can Sharangovich bounce back? He can. However, if he doesn’t, his contract will look quite bad, and it’ll likely be a liability in the future. He’ll be a player whom I’m going to keep an eye on.
Best: Waiver claims
This is an underrated move by Conroy, which I don’t see getting talked about enough. The waiver claims he’s made as GM so far have been excellent.
Conroy has claimed players such as AJ Greer, Joel Hanley and Brayden Pachal all through waivers. Two of those guys are pretty significant pieces of the Flames’ blueline right now. They’ve also all been effective players. Within the waiver wire, value does exist, and Conroy so far has made the most of it. GMs who know how to utilize the waiver wire effectively get points in my books.
Honourable mentions
As previously said, there’s probably way more moves and attributes from Conroy that I can list. For the best moves, his drafting after 2023 has been first-class, most notably drafting Zayne Parekh ninth overall in 2024 and the work he’s done in the later rounds.
As for the worst, this isn’t necessarily a specific move but more like an attribute of Conroy that is not so favourable. For example, the process of trading players simply because they’re nearing UFA status isn’t all that effective. Besides Markstrom, most of the players Conroy has traded were pretty much all pending UFAs, essentially forcing a move to occur. There hasn’t been an urgency for Conroy to move players for other reasons, hence why the current Rasmus Andersson situation is still a storyline with this team.
