**The more I think about it, the more negative I get about the Jeff Friesen signing. At least it's only a one-year deal. The reports have his salary at either $1.3M or $1.6M; I'm going to assume that this difference is due to some incentive clause, which I suppose begs the questions:

1. What milestones is he rewarded for passing?
2. (this question applies even if the premise is flawed) What is expected/hoped from him, or rather, what would constitute a successful year for Friesen?

I've been going over his numbers, and I just don't see the upside. His career high in points was 63, all the way back in 97/98. His high in a year starting with a "2" is 51, back in 02/03 (he also had 10 goals for the Devils in the playoffs that season, which is the absolute most recent bit of data that shows he might be offensively talented).

But forget all that; last season's numbers are much, much worse. In his defense, he went from the Devils to the Caps to the Ducks, with at least one trip through waivers: certainly not ideal conditions for a guy to excel. But:

• At even strength last season, Friesen had 9 points in 546mins of TOI. That's less than 1pt/60, which is unbelievably dismal. The lowest Flames forwards, none of whom were expected to contribute really anything offensively, were Nilson, Yelle, McCarty, and Richie: all between 1.0 and 1.1ESP/60.
• On the powerplay, Friesen had 2 points in 133mins of TOI. Yeah, that's 0.9PPP/60. By way of comparison, Iginla, Huselius, Langkow, Phaneuf, and Ference were all between 4 and 6PPP/60. Even Stephane Yelle had 4PPP in his 60mins of powerplay time.
• He was a Minus player for a good Ducks team in both the regular season and the playoffs.

What to say? He'd better be a hell of a guy in the dressing room, because statistically, he's a poor man's Shean Donovan (never thought I'd use that phrase!).

**To follow up a bit, Yes, I'm happy to see that the Flames have moved Jim Playfair into the Head Coaching position. He's got a lot of pressure on him, but I think he's well-equipped to handle it. He's a smart guy; he has HC experience (in the AHL) and NHL experience (as the Flames AC for 2-1/2 seasons); and he knows the team.

I also have warm feelings about his judgement. This is all from memory, so correct me if I'm wrong, but: when the Flames fired Greg Gilbert, they didn't have a replacement ready to go, and wanted to put an interim coach in place (which ended up being Al Macneil). At the time, Playfair was the HC of the Saint John Flames, and Ken King/Craig Button offered him the job -- with the Interim tag.

A lot of guys would jump at any opportunity to become an NHL HC, even though the circumstances are both lousy and tenuous (Therrien and Torchetti being the most recent examples), because they never know when another opportunity might come up. But Playfair said No. He essentially told the Flames that he would accept the Head Coaching job c/w a suitable contract and committment, but that he wasn't going to do it on a caretaker basis.

Objectively this seems like a wise decision (more obviously so in retrospect), but it takes some stones. That might have been the only offer he ever got to coach an NHL team, but he declined it because the situation wasn't right for him (and the team) to be successful. I'm real, real glad it worked out for him.

(Footnote: yes, JP is the first former Oiler player to be the Head Coach of the Flames).

**The chatter on the radio about Coach Playfair's promotion included pretty much unanimous agreement that this spells the end of the era of the single coach/GM. They may be right, but the discussion was weird: they were basically saying that oh, now that there's a salary cap, there's a lot more work for the GM. I don't get this.

Surely the "new" work created by the cap (say, more number crunching, financial & statistical projections etc.) is the first thing delegated by any GM, not just one who's also the coach. Surely the GM's roles of supervisor, leader, and decision-maker are substantially the same as they've always been.

The element of truth, I suppose, would be that with more roster turnover, summers are busier with more decision-making. NHL Head Coach is a fairly consuming job; even if you assume that during the season you can do both jobs by delegating the right tasks from both, you need a vacation at some point.

From my own perspective on the Flames, the reason I'm glad the job is being split up is for the checks & balances. As I discussed at length in May, the Sauve situation was made much worse by Darryl Sutter's dual role. If a comparable situation comes up next January, the coach has a GM who can tell him, "You screwed up! Go kiss and make up, and if a good deal presents itself, I'll make it."

**Yes, Tie Domi was in Calgary over the weekend. I am assuming for my own mental health that it was to watch the chuckwagon races and spend a day in Banff, and will entertain no rumours or suggestions to the contrary. Now I'm going to end this post, so I can cross my fingers and leave them that way until he signs with the Penguins or somebody.

Go Flames.