Unlike Bourque, no sign of Iginla seeking way out in pursuit of Cup
Not that ownership and management want to admit this season is lost. No chance of that, it would appear.
Instead, the Flames are starting to look a lot like the Maple Leafs, circa 2008, a mediocre team in possession of an aging star. For the Leafs, it was Mats Sundin. For the Flames, it’s Jarome Iginla.
The Leafs didn’t want to press Sundin to waive his no-trade, and Sundin didn’t want to leave before his contract expired. The Flames are either terrified to trade Iginla for fear of how their fan base might react, or they’re blindly loyal to the man after years of great service. Iginla, meanwhile, has given no indication he wants to leave. There’s some chatter of dealing goalie Miikka Kiprusoff, who was forced into the Boston game after Leland Irving was blitzed for six goals in 24:15, but like Iginla and nine other Flames, Kiprusoff has a no-trade clause in his contract. Calgary has almost $17 million per season wrapped up in the blueline foursome of Jay Bouwmeester, Mark Giordano, Cory Sarich and Anton Babchuk, a group which is at best above-average. Giordano is out with a long-term injury. Rene Bourque hasn’t made his contract look like a smart deal and just got suspended again, this time for five games for a truly dumb head shot on Washington’s Nicklas Backstrom. There are some prospects — Sven Bartschi, Michael Ferland, John Ramage, Max Reinhart — and keeping Curtis Glencross in the fold with a four-year deal last summer was an important move for the franchise. While Brian Burke offered the Leafs a sharp change of direction in the wake of the Sundin nondeparture and firing of John Ferguson Jr., Feaster has chosen to essentially keep the Flames going in the same direction they were under his predecessor Darryl Sutter. No house-cleaning. No big deals. Unsteady as she goes. Against arguably the finest Boston outfit since the early 1970s, the Flames had no chance and they played like it, managing few chances on Tuukka Rask in the Bruins net. Earlier in the day, their former franchise cornerstone, Dion Phaneuf was named a starter for this month’s all-star game, which again had to regurgitate memories of the disastrous results Calgary achieved through that deal with the Leafs. Time for an epiphany, an awakening. Time to stop hanging on and fall off the cliff already.
From Damien Cox’s blog, The Spin: We’ve seen this head fake from Anaheim GM Bob Murray before. So Leaf fans need not get too excited.
One moment earlier this season, you may remember, scoring winger Bobby Ryan was made available around the league for a possible trade, the next minute he wasn’t available and Murray had instead fired head coach Randy Carlyle and quickly replaced him with the Bruce Boudreau.
But before, not after, the Ducks loss to San Jose on Wednesday night, a frustrated Murray appeared to make it clear in an interview with Helene Elliott of the Los Angeles Times that not only Ryan, but also Hart Trophy winner Corey Perry and centre Ryan Getzlaf are all now available to the highest bidder.
And it’s Getzlaf, you have to believe, that would be a target for Maple Leafs’ GM Brian Burke.
While slumping badly this season, the 26-year-old Getzlaf is precisely the big, tough centre that Burke has coveted but been unable to land since taking over in Toronto. Burke knows the player well from Anaheim’s 2007 Cup championship.
Read more at thestar.com/cox
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