420since1974

I'm going to guess Rinaldo for his energy and grit, though Ward might move Ryan to Backlund's line and have Jankowski take his place between Lucic and Dube on the 4th line.

I'm not unhappy about the return, it was probably the best that could be expected due to his current play. I feel that Frolik was a very good free agent signing and performed quite well for 3 of the 4.5 seasons that he had been with the Flames. Crossing my fingers that the scouts find a gem with the early 4th round San Jose draft pick.

Merry Christmas! I hope that 2020 is all that you wish for.

To me, defeating the Leafs is always nearly as satisfying as beating the Oilers. Obviously, the Flames 3 quick goals at the start of the 3rd period were crucial to the win, but I was also very impressed by the PK killing off the 5 on 3 soon afterwards. Tonight, I was most impressed by Andersson, Backlund, Gaudreau, Giordano, and Rittich. Honorable mention to Mangiapane who seemed to be everywhere on the ice, but just couldn't pop one in the net.

Many of the Oiler fans that were on the team's official message board have moved to: http://the-omb.proboards.com/#category-3 They went this route because many of them did not want to go to the HF boards.

It makes my ears bleed.

In that scenario, one would hope that it may drive down the cost of UFAs, but there always seems to be a fair number of GMs who will overpay. It is definitely an interesting thought for debate, personally I'm not sure which way it would go.

I wonder what the total costs are for a team from the day that they draft a player until the end of their ELC. Those costs may include the value of the draft pick itself, plus the scouting, development, insurance, travel, and legal costs incurred during the length of the ELC. I would hazard a guess that except for the Top players, the costs are higher than the value of the player during his first contract. NHL teams definitely need some security (RFA rights) on their investment, but whether that needs to be 7 seasons/27 years old is up for debate. IMO, It would be quite tough to keep any roster together if every player gained UFA rights immediately after their ELC.

At worst, it is a trade of two bad contracts with the Flames saving $7M and potentially receiving a 3rd round draft pick. In real money: 4 years of Lucic for Calgary = $16M. 4 years of Neal for Edmonton = $23M + 3M retained on Lucic. IMO, there was no place for Neal in Calgary's Top 6 and Lucic should fit in fine in the Flames Bottom 6.

The advanced and counting stats aren't actually that far apart for these two over the last two seasons. If you look at the last two seasons at 5v5:Counting Stats:Neal:GP: 134G: 22 A: 20P: 42Shots: 264Shooting Percentage: 8.33%Hits: 88Lucic:GP: 161G: 11A: 28P: 39Shots: 185Shooting Percentage: 5.95%Hits: 492Advanced Stats:Neal:CF%: 50.5%CF%: -1.76%HDCF%: 47.4%GF%: 46.4%xGF%: 48.1%xGF% Rel: -4.69%PDO: .992Offensive Zone Start: 59.5%LucicCF%: 50.9%CF% Rel:2.09%HDCF%: 50.8%GF%: 47.1%xGF%: 51.2%XGF% Rel: 2.3%PDO: .992Offensive Zone Start: 49.8%

In my mind, the ideal way to make Cap Space to re-sign the RFAs would be to trade Frolik and Stone for draft picks. Second choice would be to trade them for prospects.