This officially marks the beginning of the Jay Feaster era in Calgary.
First off: the Glencross signing. I was on record as saying that anything over $2.3 million a season for Glencross would be a bad signing for two reasons. One: I truly believed he would test he free agent market and receive well over that and I was worried the Flames would try and match some ridiculous offer to keep him and subsequently get trapped in another bad contract. And two, because I really didn’t think the Flames could actually afford anything over that number given their strenuous cap situation.
I guess I was a little off in my assumptions.
The deal also includes a no-movement clause – something the Flames give out like mini Twix bars on all hallows eve, or so it would seem.
The addition of the no-movement clause gives Glencross a level of security for his young family and guarantees (sort of) that he isn’t leaving Calgary. The Flames are “cap-strapped” as it were and giving these NMC allows the overall dollar figure of these contracts to be lower, and was most definitely a big bargaining chip in the negotiating process.
Glencross took a home town discount, which is something I didn’t think he would do given his potential to make over $3 million a year on the open market. I admire him for that and I think a lot of fans will too. He realized he had a pretty good thing going on here and unlike when Conroy left for the big lights (signing a very similar 4-year, $10.3 million deal in 05’) of Hollywood following the lockout, Glencross decided it best to keep playing in a city he loved and playing for a team that he is familiar with.
The move puts the Flames salary payroll for the upcoming season at $55.8 million, roughly $3.6 million under the cap.
With Tanguay still left to be signed and only four defencemen under contract for the upcoming season, it’s pretty obvious that there are more moves to be made.
I like the signing, but I must say I am pretty surprised that a player put his ego aside and took less money than what he probably could have gotten had he exhausted his options. It’s a fair deal and one I don’t think the Flames will be regretting like the contract of one Matthew Stajan.
In one of the worst kept secrets in recent memory the Flames also named Jay Feaster the GM of the club, finally taking away the Acting title from his name. It was a move that most everybody saw coming from a mile away, and one that probably could have been done immediately following the firing of Sutter in late December.
Feaster will now be given his chance to put a stamp on this team. His drafting record is worse than that of his predecessor and his trading history isn’t fantastic, but for some reason I feel safer knowing Feaster is in charge rather than Darryl.
Not quite the lesser of two evils, but Feaster has to show the fans that he is able to dig this team out of the giant quagmire of garbage they find themselves in at the current moment.
There is a lot of excess waste on this team (See: Kotalik, Hagman, Ivanans, etc) and some contracts that may need to be dumped to make this team more flexible (See: Sarich, Stajan or maybe Regehr). The next thing on his agenda should be trying to sign Tanguay as he was a key contributor to the Flames offence and, more importantly, provided Jarome Iginla with someone legitimate to play with.
Mr. Feaster, the floor is yours.
Newman
twitter.com/TSRNewman
thesportsroundup@gmail.com
Agree? Disagree? We want to hear from you! Click below to comment
No comments:
Post a Comment