The Calgary Flames continue to be one of the major talking points across the league, especially after Don Maloney’s recent interview. On the latest edition of the 32 Thoughts podcast with Elliotte Friedman, the NHL insider spent a ton of time breaking down the state of the Flames and what’s next for the troubled organization. Here’s a summary of the Flames heavy 32 Thoughts from this week.
Fan outrage is being monitored by the organization
To kick off the 32 Thoughts segment, Friedman talked about the viral interview with Don Maloney and the fan outrage that followed.
“One of the things that’s really difficult to figure out… is that I think a lot of these teams, they try to differentiate between what is social media noise and what their paying customers and sponsors really want. When something’s really hot on social media, how does this affect their business? And the thing that teams tell me the most is what you have to be able to do is understand is if the social media commentary is really a an expression by the ticket buying and the the the people who spend money on your team because those are the people ultimately you have to listen to.
The people who are spending money on your tickets, the people who are spending money on your sponsorship, and especially the people who are spending a lot of money on those things, or is it just a loud group of people, but at the end of the day, it doesn’t affect your bottom line.”
Oh boy. Flames fans certainly won’t like hearing this. Friedman makes it known that the Flames organization clearly knows about the fan outrage on social media recently, and they are actively monitoring it. His full quote makes one thing clear: the organization couldn’t care less about fan outrage as long as it doesn’t lead to lost revenue.
Nothing will change until ownership loses money
Fans getting upset online is one thing, but clearly if these same fans aren’t the ones buying tickets and merchandise, etc., then the organization simply won’t care. The bottom line has always been the number one factor that defines this organization, and Friedman seems to confirm it here.
“Teams like the Flames, they will sit there and they will say, “What does this mean really for our business? Like there were people going online saying tonight at the Flames game, you’re gonna and this is Saturday night, you’re going to see jerseys thrown on the ice, you’re going to see a booing crowd. We didn’t see any of that.
We saw a crowd that as the Flames played hard and won the game that was actually pretty excited. They got their money’s worth for the night. I was really watching for that on Saturday. Was that an angry crowd? And I didn’t see it.”
Again, Friedman drives home that the organization won’t be changing anything if the actual revenue and ticket sales at games don’t change. Fan outrage online was rampant on Saturday, and yet if you asked anyone at the Saddledome, it just felt like a normal game. That won’t help ownership change their mind on the direction of the team.
The Flames aren’t getting offers right now
Friedman then dove into the idea that ownership doesn’t want to tear things down right now, and point-blank stated they couldn’t even do that right now if they wanted to.
“There’s not a lot of great offers flowing right now. Like I I can tell you right now, even if the Flames wanted to trade Nazem Kadri, as of Saturday, there was no offer there that was making them say, “hm, maybe we should trade Nazem Kadri.” And the same case was for Blake Coleman. And the same case was for MacKenzie Weegar. The same case was for Rasmus Andersson. The same case was for anybody else on that team you might want to throw into that list. There was no trade offer.
There was no trade offer. Like even if the Flames wanted to tear it down to the studs, there wasn’t anything on their desk last week that was going to say, “Oh boy, if we reject this deal, we might really regret it in 5 years.””
That’s reassuring at the very least. Friedman is the most connected guy out there, so everything he says comes with very real sources behind it. Based on the above quote, the Flames aren’t exactly getting a lot of serious offers about their veterans right now anyway, so it’s not like they’re turning down big returns to avoid a rebuild. At least not yet.
The Flames won’t trade anyone unless they have to. Right now, none of the veterans want out.
Friedman goes on to confirm what we’ve all assumed: the Flames won’t trade veterans like Kadri unless they have no other choice.
Secondly, the other thing that I I said is that the Flames may not want to deal these guys, but what happens if the players say, “You know what? I want to go somewhere else.” Now, remember, Calgary went through that a couple years ago. They dealt Hanifin and they dealt Marstrom, and some of some of these players have long-term contracts like Kadri does. So eventually they might decide, hey, this isn’t right for me or I’m not ready to go through where we are now at 31st in the league.
Now, I want to stress that’s not happening right now. That’s not the case. They don’t have any trade requests in there from their veterans. Believe me, I checked on Saturday. None of their veterans are asking out right now as of Saturday. So, but if it changes, then Calgary might be forced to pivot.
Not surprising, but still disappointing. What we’ve long expected to be the case is all but confirmed with Friedman here. Until veteran players ask to leave Calgary, the organization won’t trade them. As of right now, Friedman confirms that no one on the team wants to leave, and therefore, no one will be traded.
If that changes and players start to ask to be traded, the organization will be forced to move them, just like Lindholm and Hanifin, etc.
The Flames don’t believe they can tank with Wolf
Friedman then mentioned that he’s heard from around the league that the Flames don’t believe they will ever be able to truly tank with Dustin Wolf on the roster.
“You know what another team told me about them, Kyle? Is they said that with Wolf, they don’t think they can be truly bad. I know it hasn’t been the ideal season that he would want. He started badly. He’s starting to come. With Wolf there, they don’t really think they can be truly awful because they just they think the beginning of this year was a blip as opposed to the real deal.
A blip. That’s what the organization currently thinks of the worst start in franchise history, according to Friedman. He seems to have it on good authority that the Flames are fully confident their rough start was nothing but a blip, and with Wolf bouncing bac,k they will once again be a playoff contender.
Craig Conroy will almost certainly be back
Among all the drama, it’s easy to forget Flames General Manager Craig Conroy does not have a contract past this season. Friedman doesn’t see any reason to be concerned.
“He’s in the last year of his deal and I I would be surprised if he was not extended. I think they are taking care of business in that front office and I think they will take care of him too. I would be surprised. I would be surprised if he does not get extended because I think they feel he’s doing a very good job.”
This isn’t all that surprising as Conroy was hand-picked by ownership from the beginning and has been their loyal follower since he was hired. There’s no reason not to bring him back at this point.
Andersson has had a change of heart
Despite most of the hockey world assuming Rasmus Andersson would be traded at some point, Friedman mentions that Andersson has had a change of heart and is once again open to remaining a Flame long term.
“One of the things I have heard about Andersson is he changes his mind staying or going like you and I change socks, which is like every six weeks. So like like last year at the end of the year he was like I don’t think I should come back. And he showed up at training camp and he was like I think I might want to stay but he’s got to find a deal that both sides are comfortable signing. And right now they’re not, they’re not even close from what I understand.”
I’ll say it again, signing a soon to be 30 year old Rasmus Andersson would be a gigantic mistake. Trade him now while his value is high and don’t look back. It sounds like both Andersson and the organization want him to stay, but they aren’t even close on money. Here’s hoping the two decide to part ways in what would be a good move for both sides.
