Burke hopes trade toughens Flames
Something has become very clear to Brian Burke about the Calgary Flames of late.
“I don’t like the way we’ve been pushed around,” the team’s acting general manager said Monday night after a weekend which saw his team shut out 2-0 at home by both the Edmonton Oilers and the Vancouver Canucks. “I don’t think that’s any secret.
“And having one guy that’ll answer the bell? That’s not enough in our league.”
Referring to winger Brian McGrattan, Burke noted that when the Flames’ tough guy was ejected on Sunday and received a five-minute misconduct for elbowing and another five-minute misconduct for fighting, there wasn’t much room to breathe on the ice.
So, on Monday afternoon, the Flames struck a deal with the Carolina Hurricanes that acquired rightwinger Kevin Westgarth in exchange for the Flames’ 2008 first-round draft pick Greg Nemisz, who was playing with the American Hockey League Abbotsford Heat.
Westgarth, a Princeton graduate in his fifth National Hockey League season, is six-foot-four and weighs 234 pounds.
According to hockeyfights.com, he’s been in 26 regular season NHL scraps (13 in pre-season) and 66 dustups in the AHL. In 133 career NHL games with Los Angeles and Carolina (including 12 appearances this year), he recorded 202 penalty minutes along with three goals and six assists.
“I’ve liked him since he played college hockey ... I liked him in the American League,” said Burke, who added Westgarth will report to the Flames immediately and he expects he’ll be in uniform Tuesday against the visiting Philadelphia Flyers.
“What he brings is what we desperately need: Size and toughness.”
Sunday’s contest, in which the Flames were held scoreless for the second straight game, merely proved a point.
“After Grats got tossed out of the game, we don’t have a whole lot of size and toughness left,” Burke said. “That’s not the impetus for the deal, we’ve been working on the deal for a while. But, to me, it’s time for this team to get bigger, and I think this will help our smaller players. Everybody, including our defence corps. We’ve got some smaller defencemen.
“It takes a lot of heat off the defence, and the forwards sure take less of a pounding this way. I think fear and toughness are both contagious.”
The undrafted Westgarth signed with the Los Angeles Kings organization in 2007 and was with the group until the end of the 2012 season (and, as such, also has his name engraved on the 2012 Stanley Cup). He was traded to the Hurricanes during last year’s lockout. He’ll cost the Flames a salary-cap hit of $725,000 US and is an unrestricted free agent this summer.
In Carolina, the 29-year-old native of Amherstburg, Ont., was a representative of the NHL Players Association and sat next Burke during the collective bargaining talks, meaning he also brings a leadership component.
“His preparation, attention to detail, and an obvious intellect and leadership skills were screaming at me ... this is a veteran guy with leadership skills,” Burke said.
Monday’s deal means the end of Nemisz’s days as a Flame. The 23-year-old former Windsor Spitfire was Calgary’s 25th overall pick in 2008 and has been with the Abbotsford Heat since the 2010-11 season. He played six games as a call-up with the Flames in his rookie season and another nine in 2011-12, but the writing was on the wall when he failed to make the club again this year.
“In terms of Greg — and I told Greg this — obviously things haven’t worked out for him here,” Burke said. “And a change of scenery might be just what he needs. He’s a great kid, he’s worked hard, we have no issues with him at all and I wish him luck.
“They asked for Greg to be in the deal and we tried to talk them into some other options but they said no so I decided we would do it.”
When asked if this was the start of deals to come, Burke said: “We’re open for business.”
However, he did praise his current players for their work ethic and commitment — two essential building blocks to improve.
“This group works like dogs and I’m proud of that,” Burke said. “And, second, they stick with the game plan. We get behind (during a game) and no one tries to do things themselves.
“Those are two critical building blocks as we get better. The team can’t advance unless they have those two building blocks, which we do.
“That’s a credit to (head coach) Bob Hartley.”