Calgary Flames

As we barrel head-long into the off-season, the 2013 NHL Draft approaches rapidly. Estimations of what your Calgary Flames will do at the draft, in terms of picks, can be guided in terms of what they've said publicly on the subject and what they've done in the past. NEEDS and VALUESBased on GM Jay Feaster's public comments, the Flames have identified their specific needs: size and grit, centers and a physical presence on their blueline. They won't necessarily try to fill those gaps just at the draft, but those thoughts are in the back of their mind.We can filter that needs assessment with the draft tendencies/value the club has established under the new regime. Jay Feaster has been at the helm of the Flames through two drafts and has made 12 selections, the last seven at the recommendation of John Weisbrod, who heads all scouting.The Flames have chosen two goalies, four defensemen and six forwards. By source league, that's four from the USHL, five from the WHL, one from the QMJHL, one from Finland and one from Quebec prep school. There's some evidence of the club varying its sources a bit and trying not to select too many of the same “type” of player.Based on interviews and conversations with Flames management and scouts, the team values hockey sense the most, followed by character, skill and skating. In other words, if you think the game really well – or the scouts say you do – you're high on the Flames scouting list.BIG CENTERSI've mentioned Ottawa 67s pivot Sean Monahan recently. He's reasonably big, and arguably he's the best of the non “Big 6” (Jones, MacKinnon, Drouin, Lindolm, Barkov and Nichushkin). He was also a very strong player on a lousy team and would have been a very high pick even in the 2012 draft had he been eligible.But don't sleep on Edmonton Oil Kings Curtis Lazar, the London Knights Bo Horvat or Regina's Morgan Klimchuk. Horvat in particular has been a strong player on a great London Knights, and one that drives the club's offense. Lazar isn't as crucial to Edmonton's success, but has one of the best, most accurate shots in this draft class.GRITTY FORWARDSI will continue to tout Ryan Hartman of the Plymouth Whalers until the draft, as I think he's great.Andre Burakowsky of Malmo is a bit less gritty, but has arguably more skill. Corey Pronman (of the vaunted Hockey Prospectus) quoted a source in his analysis who pegged Burakowsky's “work ethic as equal to his skill level.” That's a good sign. Swedish forward Jacob de la Rose, of Leksand IF, is also said to be excellent as a physical, two-way player, but projects more as a second rounder.Another name to keep in mind is Adam Erne out of the Quebec Remparts. The Flames have seen quite a bit of him (via scouting Ryan Culkin), and he's said to be big, fast and physically strong. He'll be available in the mid-to-late first round.BIG DEFENDERSThis is where this first round shines. There are a lot of big, physical defenders available in this year's draft.Rasmus Ristolainen is arguably the best. He's Finnish and has played in the SM-Liiga all season against grown-ass men, as a 17-year-old, and done quite well. Another high-level defender is Darnell Nurse, of the OHL's Sault Ste. Marie Greyhounds. He's big, physical and is Donovan McNabb's nephew. And both of his parents are athletes, too. Nurse is roundly considered the best defender available after Seth Jones.Outside of those two, standouts include London's huge Nikita Zadorov, Kelowna's Madison Bowey, Everett's Mirco Mueller and a pair of USHL blueliners – Steven Santini of the U.S. National Development Team and Ian McCoshen of the Waterloo Blackhawks. Both players are committed to join Johnny Gaudreau and Bill Arnold at Boston College for the 2013-14 season, so they are no doubt on the Flames radar.HIGH SCHOOL KIDSI'd be remiss if I didn't mention two key things about high school kids.First, there's a few decent lowly-ranked, long-term project type high school prospects out of Minnesota that stand out in the Ce

1. Whither the Canucks?So they gave the ol' heave-ho to poor Alain Vigneault today, who was victimized mainly by injury but also his own general manager's inability to do his job properly. Isn't that always the way?Cory Schneider was and should have been the Canucks' starter this season and he acquitted himself well enough when he was healthy. The problem was, when the Sharks swept the Canucks out of the first round after a fairly underwhelming run to the top of the Northwest Division for the last time, Schneider wasn't healthy and Roberto Luongo didn't steal the games he played in such a way that it made Vigneault look good.The thing I always say when coaches get fired in situations like this is that the guy they choose to replace him needs to be better than the guy they let go. How many coaches out there are better than Vigneault? Canucks fans are breathing a little easier today because they for some reason found the old coach's job to be somewhat underwhelming, but now they have to wait for Mike Gillis, who couldn't even correctly read the trade market for a 30-plus-year-old goalie with a ponderous almost immovable contract. Obviously no GM is ever going to fire himself and one gets the feeling that if whoever they bring in next doesn't work out — and barring a huge roster overhaul, he probably won't, given the new divisional competition the Canucks will face next season — it's gonna be Gillis packing up his office this time next spring.2. What does this mean for the Flames?Of course, the Canucks theoretically taking a step back, which could very well happen, might not have a massive impact on Calgary's chances for making the postseason any time soon. The Canucks are, as things stand right now, maybe the third-best team in the division, which will still probably guarantee them a playoff spot most years (this assumes the Ducks regress to where they should have been this year, and that the Oilers don't take a huge step forward under Craig MacTavish in his first year).The Flames, meanwhile, remain indisputably the worst in the division if not the entire Western Conference, which is fine by me; one cannot imagine that they get anywhere near one of the two "wild card" spots for teams finishing outside the top three in their divisions. I'd put it LA, San Jose and Vancouver coming out of the Pacific and Chicago, St. Louis and Minnesota from the Central as locks, and two of Anaheim, Nashville, Edmonton and Dallas. Probably. Winnipeg is better than Calgary, so too is Phoenix, and I'd say it's arguable that they're worse or at least as bad as Colorado.Basically what this means for the Flames is nothing. The Canucks will, unless they totally blow it up, which they won't because Gillis wants to keep his job, still dominate the Flames both over the course of the season and in their head-to-head matchups. Oh well, I guess.3. Other teams are doing itOne thing I've noticed in the last couple of days or so is that teams are doing a bit of housekeeping in re-signing guys who play marginal roles. Rob Klinkhammer and Eric Boulton and so forth. It occured to me today that the Flames have a guy like that on the roster as well, who is a pending unrestricted free agent and who could be someone they're interested in re-signing.That guy is obviously Brian McGrattan.The Flames have made no secret of the fact that their goal this summer is to become "tougher to play against" because the fact that Mikael Backlund won't fight anyone is the reason every team in the league ran them the hell over all season long. McGrattan, in their eyes, fits that bill: a guy who sucks at the hockey-playing aspects of playing hockey but who is all too happy to try to fight all comers in the eight seconds of ice time gets per shift before good players come over the boards and he does the closest thing he can to scurrying off so someone can take his place.The same may be true of Steve Begin, too, but I don't know I'm just spitballing here. Certainly, it seems well within th

No NHL Draft-eligible player has won the Canadian Hockey League player of the year award since 2008, but that could change when the CHL announces its award winners for the 2012-13 season. Halifax Mooseheads left wing Jonathan Drouin, No. 3 on N...

Chase De Leo's goal early in the third period snapped a 1-1 tie and the Portland Winterhawks closed round-robin play at the 2013 MasterCard Memorial Cup by beating the host Saskatoon Blades 4-2 on Wednesday at Credit Union Centre. Ty Rattie and...

Last time we looked at Mikael Backlund and TJ Brodie's emergent seasons in 48-games for the 2013 Flames. Today we'll check out how some of the older players on the team contributed in positive ways. Matt Stajan Matty Franchise's 23 points was five more than he had last season in just 43 games, but Stajan was also thrust into an increased role this year, facing the third toughest quality of competition amongst Flames forwards who played 30+ games, as well as more responsibility defensively. Stajan had the toughest zone start ratio of any regular Flames forward, starting in the offensive zone on just 42% of his shifts at even strength. On special teams, he played an average of 1:57 per game on the PK and just 0:15 on the powerplay. All 23 of his points came at even strength. Stajan was rotated around the Flames' lineup a fair bit last season as Bob Hartley tried to find line combinations that would work for his team that just could not seem to string two wins together, and at one point he was the only natural centre in the Flames' lineup and as such was heavily relied upon in the faceoff circle, where he won just less than half of his draws. Is he worth $3.5M for another season? Probably not, but if Stajan can replicate his 2013 play over the course of an 82-game season, I won't complain about him being on the roster next year on a Flames team that will likely be running in place for the time being. Curtis Glencross and Lee Stempniak The man we call Scoreface continued to defy the rules of regression this season as he led the Flames with 15 goals in 40 games and shot 16.3% His circumstances weren't exactly as tough as the likes of Stajan, Stempniak and Backlundd--Glencross had the most favourable offensive zone start of all regular Flames forwards at 49.3% and did not face the opposition's best as regularly as Backlund and Stempniak did, and he was plagued by inconsistency in the last month of the season before being injured by a knee-on-knee hit on April 19th. Nonetheless he remains a useful player who can take over a game when his emotions don't get the better of him, the type of player which the Flames will need going forward while he still has some good years left. Staying healthy will be crucial for him, however. Lee Stempniak was a workhorse this past season. The 30-year-old forward played in all situations against the second-toughest competition of all regular Flames forwards at even strength. He also had the second-toughest zone start of all Calgary forwards, starting in the offensive zone on just 43.5% of his shifts. That he did all of this while managing to tie Mike Cammalleri for first in scoring on the team with 32 points is fairly impressive--and with only 12 PIMS in 47 games. Other than the kids and perhaps Glencross, Stempniak is one of the few Flames forwards who will provide full value for the $2.5M he will make next season at this point in his career. Mike Cammalleri Cammalleri remains one of the most offensively talented players on the Flames roster, and he comes with a hefty price tag to match. The 30-year-old shot 17.2% with 19 points in 28 games after being traded to the Flames in February of 2012, and was in line for a slight decline in 2013, but he was still above average in the shortened season. HIs 13 goals were second on the team to Glencross' 15 and his 32 points co-led the team in total scoring with Stempniak. His five powerplay goals tied him with Jiri Hudler as the most dangerous player with the man advantage, and his 15 PP points made up 47% of his scoring. Cammy was deployed against easier competition than the likes of Backlund and Stempniak, but his zone start was the same as Backlund's--45.4%. The Flames' lack of multiple truly dominant scoring threats who can also drive possession to play alongside a player like Cammalleri combined with his sub-50% zone start, Cammy's on-ice possession numbers also suffered--he also finished his shifts in the offensive zone less than 50% of the ti

And then there were nine.One day after Kent updated us all on what is truly a grim goaltending situation for your Calgary Flames, young Daniel Taylor of Plymouth, a broth of a lad, packed up his pads and shipped off far away overseas.No, Danny is not joining the British Armed Forces in an ongoing fight for Democracy (or whatever it is they do, I'm horribly ignorant when it comes to worldly matters). Nay, he has, as it turns out, inked himself a deal to go play in the SEL with Färjestad BK.According to a press release via the team's website (WARNING: SWEDISH!), Taylor will duke it out with incumbent puckstopper Fredrik Pettersson-Wentzel for ALL THE MINUTES next season in Scandinavia. Hilariously, if you translate the page into English, it does make it seem like Danny Taylor is the greatest goalie in the history of the world, who does everything with poise and grace, and that's pretty adorable. In all seriousness, I'm happy for Danny. He seems like a solid dude, and I'd like to see good things happen for him over in Europe.Because really, it's not like those good things were ever going to happen here.Of course, I would be remiss if I didn't mention the REAL reason why this is such a glorious opportunity for Danny, as it should be noted that everything Färjestad is (read: pretty damn good at hockey) is because of their superhero boss and former Flames God, Mr. Hakan Looooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooobbbbbb. So I guess you could say I'm a little bit jealous.#taylortheimpalerBy now we're all pretty aware of who Danny Taylor was to the Flames (minus the fact that the above hashtag I created never caught on, which means you're all monsters), so I won't go into detail, but I'll lay out the broader scope of the whole thing: We know he was one of two goaltenders inked to pro tryout offers with the Abbottsford Heat, moves made necessary when, uh, Flames-Goalie-Of-The-Future-Leland-Irving (*sigh*) was being peddled back and forth between the Mainland and Calgary because Henrik Karlsson had a pretty good nickname and nothing else. We know that when Irving was returned to Abby during the lockout this season, he had lost most of his starting minutes to Taylor and fellow PTO brother Barry Brust (who is the greatest, and I will always say so) Taylor, who more or less was the "starting" goalie of the three, had a pretty decent showing with the Heat, putting up a .922 SV% in 40 games, decent numbers considering he was on what amounted to a pretty middling AHL squad who ended up missing the playoffs (d'awww, baby Flames want to be like daddy Flames). This was more or less a repeat of the season prior when Irving was testing the limits of his Aeroplan card, as when he was sent back down, it was widely believed Taylor was playing the better hockey at the time, sporting a .927 SV% and earning the role of starter during what was a brief playoff run for the Heat. Danny was not terrible, but not exactly "Early Fred Brathwaite" when the Flames signed him on to the big club, when it turned out that Irving and Joey MacDonald, shockingly enough, would not be a viable substitute between the pipes for an ailing Miikka Kiprusoff. (We'll call his performance "Lemelinesque"). He earned his first career NHL win and had a .912 SV% over those two games, which means nothing to the team, but is likely a pretty big deal to him. I know there was mild support out there for Taylor to be given more starts while Kiprusoff was in sick bay, and maybe that's fair, but on this team, this season, it really would not have made much of a difference. This team was cursed. Taylor is also now 7 years into his pro career, in which he has largely been a journeyman in inferior to NHL leagues, so when you look at the catalog of his whole career, it seems unlikely that he would ever broach the minor successes he's achieved this past season. Earning an NHL win is something most of us never get, and now he's done it, and hey, maybe that's enough. He's likely nev

- pic via resolute, wikimedia commons For the first time in a decade, the Flames are entering the off-season without really knowing who their starter will be in October. Miikka Kiprusoff hasn't officially retired yet, but even if the 37 year old puckstopper decides he wants to play out the final season of his deal it would make sense for the club to use their compliance buy-out this summer to make his onerous $5.83M cap hit disappear.Even if Kipper somehow sticks around, the Flames should be looking for its next starter this coming season - Calgary's mission is primarily exploratory next season, so it wouldn't benefit the org to stick to the tried and true even if it is an option.So if not Kipper, then who? Here's how Calgary's crease depth chart looks heading into the draft and free agency:1.) Karri RamoThe former Lightning draft pick can't be signed by the Flames until July 5th, but is a good bet to be inked by Feaster and company as soon as possible. Ramo will be 27 on July 1 and is coming off his 4th straight season as a starter in the KHL for Avangard Omsk. Ramo struggled to find his footing in the NHL as a youngster, but has emerged as a legitimate tender across the pond in his mid-20s. His SV% has been north of .920 in each of his last three seasons, culminating in a career best .929 save in 44 games this year. That was the 8th best SV% in the league this season, or 5th best if you narrow the field to goalies who played more than 20 games.Ramo's save rate over his last three seasons (or 3,423 shots) works out to .926, which is a healthy number in the second best league in the world. Unfortunately we don't have enough information to decipher a good KHL-NHL translation factor for goalies, so it's anyone's guess if Ramo will be able to maintain those sort of rates in North America. That said, Ray Emery and Sergei Bobrovsky are two recent examples of guys who played well in Russia (.926 and .932 in a limited sample) and then went on to post similar save stats in the NHL afterwards.Ramo is the favorite right now to be the Flames starter next year. There's little doubt he'll get a long look, whatever else happens.2.) Joey MacDonaldA career back-up who has bounced around various teams and the AHL over the course of his career, MacDonald gamely held the fort for the Flames down the stretch in Calgary, causing the team to re-up him for one more year. MacDonald is a veteran and...that's really all you can say about him. His career SV% in the NHL is .903. His save percentage for the Flames this season was .902. These are replacement level rates at best.There's no reason to think he'll improve on that all of sudden or grab the reigns as the club's putative starter. MacDonald is established enough that he won't cause mass panic on the ice or in the front office should the starter go down to injury, but he's also not the guy who will provide real redundancy in the depth chart if a guy like Ramo proves to be inadequate.It's a 50/50 bet whether MacDonald ends up as the Flames back-up or in the AHL next season. His one year deal is below the new CBA cut-off for retained cap dollars, meaning if he goes down to the farm his dollars won't count towards the Flames cap number. He will likely be considered the favorite as option B unless another guy can outplay him and take the job.3.) Reto BerraThe biggest wildcard is the 26-year old out of Switzerland. Berra is coming off a very big world championships, managing a .967 SV% in four games. His save rate in thw Swiss elite league for Biel was less impressive at .906, but it's hard to know how that relates to the NHL.Berra has spent his entire career across the pond, so is a totally untested commodity at this level. Sometimes those goalies turn out to be buried treasures who can immediately step in and make a difference (see: Jonas Hiller). And sometimes they fizzle out completely (see: Jonas Gustavsson).As such, Berra could end up anywhere between battling for the starters role with Ramo to f

- pic via Resolute, wikimedia commons Although we focus a lot on corsi/possession analysis here at FN when it comes to assessing players and teams, there are obviously othe metrics to take into account when evaluating talent/impact. One of those things which we don't talk about too much is penalty differential, or the difference between a players penalties taken and drawn.Like all measures of performance, there's some randomness in penalties - sometimes the refs let 'em play and sometimes the zebras call everything. Sometimes a guy flips the puck over the glass by accident and sometimes the officials simply tag the wrong guy on a play. That said, the same folks tend to lead to lead the league every year in penalties drawn (and taken), give or take a name, so there's a talent (as well as a circumstance) component to this measure.Behindthenet.ca tracks penalties taken and drawn per hour of even strength ice time here. Sven Baertschi, Dennis Wideman, Mikael Backlund and Roman Horak lead the way while Mark Giordano, Alex Tanguay and Derek Smith pull up the rear.We can go one step further and investigate what impact penalty differential has on wins for the team. According to some work done by Tom Tango recently, a penalty is worth about +/- 0.027 wins to an NHL team on average*:The average NHL team scores an average of .606 PPG and allows .065 SHG, for a net of +.541 goals. They have 3.32 PP opportunities, therefore, per PP Opp, the net effect is +.163 goals. To convert goals to win is roughly 6 goals per win. So, that +.163 goals translates as .027 wins. That is, when a referee calls a penalty, he’s basically shifting the win expectancy by .027 wins.*(of course, in particular, some penalties can cost or win a game depending on timing of the infraction and if the team on the man advantage scores. Say, a hooking call in overtime, for example.)Meaning, for every extra penalty a player draws, he's adding about 0.163 goals to a club's goal differential. That would be a higher number for clubs with especially potent PP's and lower for teams that shoot blanks, but let's work with the average to keep things simple.Penalty Differential and WinsAnyways, here's how things worked out for Flames players this year. The table features guys who played at least 100 minutes at ES and forecasts their penalty differential rates and win effect over an 82 game season. table.tableizer-table { border: 1px solid #CCC; font-family: ; font-size: 12px; } .tableizer-table td { padding: 4px; margin: 3px; border: 1px solid #ccc; } .tableizer-table th { background-color: #8C1010; color: #FFF; font-weight: bold; } Player GP Ptake Pdraw diff/60 Time on ice Total diff wins diff/82 goals/82 wins/82 Sven Baertschi 20 0.5 1.6 1.1 234:09:00 4 0.12 18 2.87 0.47 Dennis Wideman 46 0.1 0.6 0.5 890:40:00 7 0.20 13 2.16 0.36 Mikael Backlund 32 0.7 1 0.3 426:39:00 2 0.06 5 0.89 0.15 Roman Horak 20 0.2 0.5 0.3 252:21:00 1 0.03 5 0.84 0.14 Brian McGrattan 19 0.4 0.8 0.4 136:23:00 1 0.02 4 0.64 0.11 Lee Stempniak 47 0.4 0.6 0.2 671:55:00 2

Halifax Mooseheads goalie Zachary Fucale is considered the best player available at his position for the 2013 NHL Draft, and for good reason. "When I first saw Zach play, I saw NHL written all over him; there's not a doubt in my mind," NHL Cent...

Portland Winterhawks coach Travis Green must have felt a bit of déjà vu watching his team Monday night at the MasterCard Memorial Cup. For the second straight game he saw a multi-goal lead evaporate, but the first-year coach -- promoted to the ...