Flames Game Night

Why can't Alex Tanguay get any respect? Seriously, why? Bruce Dowbiggin doesn't like him for his own subjective reasons, but yesterday's column, "Sundin a Flame?", is nevertheless horse-pucky.

It's clear that unless first-liners Jarome Iginla and sidekick Kristian Huselius provide prodigious offence, the Flames simply will not score enough to win the Stanley Cup.

First of all, the Flames are 2nd in the WC in scoring and 3rd in 5v5 scoring. Secondly, in the 2004 playoffs, Iginla, Conroy, & Gelinas were +13, +12, and +10 respectively. Lombardi and Saprykin were next best among forwards at +1. That big line had 27 goals; the rest of the forwards had 30. The search for consistent secondary scoring is one that is almost always destined to fail, and it's somewhat of a nebulous, self-rebutting concept to boot (any secondary scorer who starts producing more gets labelled a primary scorer soon enough). And does anyone remember the 2006 Olympics?

There is an object lesson to be learned from Canada's consecutive 2-0 losses. When your NHL team has trouble scoring over a short stretch [in this case, one freakin' game against the Coyotes], there is always a temptation to attribute it to lack of secondary scoring, or If We Just Had One More Decent Playmaking Centre This Wouldn't Happen. If you resist this temptation next time it happens, then you have learned the lesson.

Thirdly, if the idea is nevertheless to improve your scoring, shouldn't any deal actually hold the promise of doing so? Back to Dowbiggin:

But [for Sundin] Calgary could offer a selection of Alex Tanguay (he's still just 27), Lombardi, Adam Pardy, Matt Keatley and first- or second-round picks to Toronto. It's still a steep price, but with a shot at the Cup in this CBA climate, you have to roll the dice.

Forget Pardy, Keetley, and the picks: is there any reason to think Sundin could replace the contributions of both Tanguay and Lombardi, let alone exceed them? How many points can you expect Sundin to score? I'm not trying to be obtuse here at all. How do you fill in the blank: This trade would be a Win, in the short-term, offensive context only, if Sundin averaged ___ points per game as a Flame. Or, if the Flames averaged ___ goals per game after his arrival.

But of course the context can't just be offensive: Tanguay and Lombardi are the Flames' top 2 penalty-killers at the moment, and good two-way forwards. And Bruce is throwing in a couple of decent prospects and picks as well.

Plus you have to get Tanguay's whopper contract off the books (the Leafs can afford it) to afford Dion Phaneuf and Huselius and others due for contracts.

Fourthly, why is it that the 27-year-old Tanguay's long, productive record is always shrugged off with, "yeah, but he played with Sakic, Hedjuk, Iginla...", but the 28-year-old Huselius, who has never in his career been particularly effective at EV until the past ~20 games with Iginla, is suddenly an indispensable part of the Flames' future? There's been little or no difference between Iginla's production with Huselius and with Tanguay. If Tanguay's $5.25M/yrcontract is a whopper, what does Dowbiggin expect Huselius to sign for?

It says here that any makeable deal involving Tanguay would make the Flames worse in the short, rolling-the-dice term, not better. The only way trading him would be remotely defensible is to clear '08/09 cap room for Phaneuf's new deal, and I stress remotely. Huselius is a very good player, especially on the power play, but the Flames can't afford his next contract.

The Islanders are in town tonight (7PM MT, RSN West), and it's even money that the Flames win with a significant contribution from someone besides #12 & #20. I'll take Calgary 3 (Iginla, Eriksson, Nolan) Islanders 2 (Satan x2) in a game that's not as close as the score indicates. Go Flames.