Calgary Flames MEGA THREAD 2007-2008 edition

[SilverGS]

Originally posted by z24_wheels


I thought his saves only looked spectacular because he had to recover a lot from poor positioning. /shrug

I am sure that there were some due to that but there were some where the D made a mistake and he had to make the good stop. There was one were a blues player was allowed to walk straight towards the net and tried to tuck it in while going cross crease but he stuck with him closed up the holes and made a good stop. The other the flames D allowed a cross-crease pass through and he stretched out with the glove hand to steal away an almost for sure goal. I don't think he was out of position for either of those two.

[Euro838]

Sad to say but isn't this the first time in how many years that the flames have been shut out?

[Nissanaddict]

http://my.break.com/content/view.aspx?ContentID=406418 Now on a lighter note, I bring you Dion Phaneuf singing Journey.

[TeamBestBud]

2 things:

1. Dion playing forward fulltime. yeah i no. wtf.


2. The same as always Olli Jokinen trade rumours along with patrick marleau or alex kovalev. kovalev no, marleau jokinen yes.

[Aleks]

What a hit by Dion wow!

[spyce]

yea...that hit by phaneuf was awesome
the only positive out of the loss

[SuPhistiKatEd]

Not really...

I thought McE made some pretty darn good saves and kept us somewhat in the game.

You must admit though, Detroit is a great team. I think Keenan has all the pieces, it's just a matter of putting them all together to solve the puzzle.

[max_boost]

Detroit is just sofa king good and surprise surprise, they killed the Flames, AGAIN.

I'm starting to get really worried. No secondary scoring from Langks and Juice. Warrener out with an injury. Kipper getting pulled again. Is Kipper's play going to improve? Has he lost a step? I'm just relying on what I'm reading since I can't watch all the games.

BUT,

WTF is going on?

[DelSoln]

Originally posted by TeamBestBud

2. The same as always Olli Jokinen trade rumours along with patrick marleau or alex kovalev. kovalev no, marleau jokinen yes.

Where are you getting this? It wouldn't make sense to move Kovalev from the Habs perspective.

[Quizzes]

Rumour was Alex Tanguay for Alex Kovalev, straight up.
If I was Montreal, and that deal was on the table, I'd snatch it up right away.

I think getting Olli will always be in the back of Sutter's mind. Maybe he'll settle for Marleau if Olli decides to be king of FLA. Marleau's pretty much playing himself off the SJ lineup, all of whom are underachieving this year except for Thornton.

As for Langs and Juice... the writing's on the wall as far as Sutter's priorities are concerned. Everyone knows he's gonna wanna lock up Dion long-term for about $4-5M per, if not more. That leaves little cap room to resign the aforementioned duo.

[Nissanaddict]

Tanguay for Kovalev. If I were Montreal, I'd do that in heartbeat if it were a real offer. My views on how this rumour became were posted earlier, AND self-quoted.

Olli Jokinen or Marleau? I'd LOVE Jokinen here. A solid 80-90 point centre with wings not nearly as talented as Iggy and Tanguay? Yes please. Will it happen? Doubt it. The way Florida is built, I don't think shipping off the captain is even near an option. Marleau....ehh....no thanks. He's having an awful season. While I hate to bring it down to one fact, a lot of Flames are having an awful season, and having a mid-season awakening doesn't seem to be in anyone's agenda right now. I'd wait till the deadline to pull off the big trade for once if there's a shot at a good run this year, and take someone from a shitty team who's playing great in late February/early March.

As far as 20 & 22, basically yeah. The only way the Flames can keep one (or both if he's REAL crafty) is by replacing the following UFAs

Conroy: Currently cap hit of over 2.4 a year: Pay cut, or replace with Boyd, or another inexpensive young guy (wouldn't mind that so much)
Warrener: 2.4 a year as well cap hit
Yelle: 1.6ish I think
Nolan: Dump him, throw Prust or somebody in his place

He'd have to give those 3 paycuts. All of them..big paycuts, or replacce them with much cheaper guys, unless Lanks and Cranks continue to struggle, and take lower salaries to stick around. I like both of those guys potential. Unfortunately, like most of the team, they fail to show it 100% of the time, which they should.
It's quite frustrating how Playfair was given up on so early as a head. While I don't hate Keenan, I never hated Jim either (I even told him that when I saw him buying putters at Canadian Tire after the first round). He got more out of Huselius than anybody ever did, ditto on Langkow. The guys looked like they had a BLAST playing together, and played hard for him. If they gave him another year, he may have even gotten the defence back in sync.
Either way, the Flames can outplay a team for 10-40 minutes a game, and lose almost every time due to a general lack of finish lately. Add to that the constant forcing of Conroy on line 1 over Lombardi/Langkow (while people say you have to "earn" the ice time, Conroy's "earned" 3rd line minutes, and both of the aforementioned have played very well on the first line anytime they were thrown up there, and though you say playing with top talent makes you look good, why was Nylander such a shat pick in my pool?) While I like Conroy, if he was traded, I wouldn't mind. He fits on this team. Just not on the first line. 1 stupid penalty a game doesn't help either. Boyd and Nystrom can stay. Mark Smith is about as useful as poutine is to fix heart problems. Godard? Plays hockey very well for a goon. Nilson? Took a paycut, but doesn't mean he has to play worse. Hopefully he does better upon his return (soon to be). We'll see how Tim Ramholt plays possibly tomorrow (the guy got called up today). While I'd take Kobasew and Ference over him ANYday (and even just Ference, and ALMOST just Kobasew if he stays on his current goal pace) I still can't wait for Primeau to come back. I think he's quite under-rated in the eyes of Flames fans.

[TeamBestBud]

Originally posted by DelSoln


Where are you getting this? It wouldn't make sense to move Kovalev from the Habs perspective.

http://www.tsn.ca/fantasy_news/colum...len/?ID=223504

[Quizzes]

Originally posted by Nissanaddict
Conroy: Currently cap hit of over 2.4 a year: Pay cut, or replace with Boyd, or another inexpensive young guy (wouldn't mind that so much)
Warrener: 2.4 a year as well cap hit
Yelle: 1.6ish I think
Nolan: Dump him, throw Prust or somebody in his place

I couldn't agree more... At least Nolan's starting to show more intensity... Conroy has no finish whatsoever... Yelle is not the defensive specialist he once was.... Warrener gets injured every 20 games.

I like the kids in Boyd and Nystrom. I hope Ramholt can inject that kinda energy in the lineup. Goddard has surprised me thus far. We all know he's not an offensive juggernaut, but he cycles the puck pretty well.

Flames DESPERATELY NEED Kipper to make at least one good save a game - like he used to. I'm not jumping off the Kipper bandwagon just yet, but the team needs to have more confidence in him in order to play their game. He has not shown any of that, and it's more than a quarter through the season.

[SilverGS]

I like the energy the young kids bring to the team. We seem to have to many guys over 30 and that energy the flames use to have in 04 just isn't there anymore.

One consistent thing from the cup run was the energy and fight and grit that almost everyone played with all the time even though the talent pool wasn't as good on paper. Now that we have the talent there are too many times where we get lackluster efforts from a few players which ends up affecting everyone else.

The team just seemed to give up after Detroit went up 5-3 after showing that they can play with the Red Wings.

Defense wise we are just not clicking. Too many defensive mistakes. Although they are playing better than before we always seem to make 2 or 3 huge defensive mistakes that end up in our net.

I agree on Kipper. I still think he is our goalie but he is definitely slumping compared to before. When those defensive mistakes occur we need to count on him to make some game savers like he used to but so far he has not made those type of saves. I would say a lot of the goals are difficult to stop but that is why we gave him a long term big contract. The Canucks would not be nearly where they are the last couple of years if not for Luongo heroics on a regular basis. Kipper can do it we have seen it he just needs to get there again.

[mac_82]

MacInnis passes torch to Iginla - Calgary Herald

Al MacInnis sends his best regards. "By all means, congratulations Jarome,'' said MacInnis on Tuesday, during a stopover on the way to Buffalo. "He's passing me already, huh? Geez. Doesn't seem possible. Not this soon. I knew it was going to happen, eventually. But give me a break. I guess time just flies by and it sort of sneaks up on you. "Makes you feel kind of old.''

Tonight, Jarome Iginla's first shift against the Anaheim Ducks pushes him past MacInnis, arguably the all-time greatest Calgary Flame, atop the franchise's regular-season games-played list, at 804. Iginla is also beginning to creep up on the second-placed MacInnis in career Flame points, too. He's at 694, MacInnis at 822. The franchise leader is Theo Fleury, 830.

"I was proud to have that (games-played) record,'' said MacInnis, a teammate of Iginla's on only one occasion - at the Salt Lake City Olympics, helping Canada end a 50-year gold-medal drought. "And I don't know if this makes it easier to give it up, but to have someone like Jarome pass you kind of softens the blow. You can't find a single person to say a bad thing about him. He's been a great player. Consistent. Durable. He's in such great shape, he could play a lot more years at a high, high level and break all the records.

"He's represented the Flames and the city of Calgary so well over the years. A very classy person. Maybe not since the Lanny McDonald days has the franchise had a symbol like Jarome.''

Iginla signed a five-year extension over the summer, tying him contractually to the Flames until the end of the 2012-2013 season. Many people believe the contract will mean he finishes his career here in Calgary.

"I'd hope so,'' said MacInnis.
"Jarome Iginla and the Calgary Flames are synonymous.
"I know I can't see him wearing any other uniform.''

[spyce]

Really hope kipper picks up his game
Im excited to see Ramholt up.

We're finally getting a little youth plugged in!

[Quizzes]

It'll be great to see Iggy finish and end his career here in Calgary. Not many teams have that sort of player, and if they did, they'll most likely be a candidate for the hall of fame.

As for the youth movement... I love it. The veterans need to know they could lose their jobs if they under perform, and there are quite a few on this Flames lineup (especially on the blueline).

[89s1]

hrmmm, shitty game again.

imo that wasnt a goal tho.

the puck was on a 45 degree angle, and only the bottom of it was past the goal line to show white ice. from the top, it was clearly still out.

lets hope we dont lose!

COME BACK GUYS

[spyce]

sorta reminds ya of that gelina goal back in 04...
i guess we really DID win the cup

[89s1]

sucks that giggy had such a good game.