An interesting tidbit out of the Flames’ development camp: they’ve hired a mental development coach (Dave Paskevich).
I’m not sure if this was Darryl Sutter’s call, or if it was made for Sutter, but it indicates that someone in the organization thinks that the Calgary flaws aren’t necessarily talent-related.
Earlier this month, I suggested Sutter was revisiting [...]

Of all of yesterday’s free agent signings, Calgary’s were easily the most perplexing.
GM Darryl Sutter basically re-signed some of the Flames’ more notoriously poor signings, giving deals to Olli Jokinen (2 years/$6 million) and Alex Tanguay (1 year/$1.7 million).
Jokinen was traded out of Calgary last season, so basically Sutter took on some bad Ranger contracts [...]

In graduate school I took a management course where we had to read canonical leadership books (most of which seemed to come from the 1960s and 70s).
I read THE PETER PRINCIPLE, which maintains that every employee within an organization rises to their level of incompetence. It sounds cynical, but the logic is that someone is [...]

Do you know how you know the NHL season is winding down?
Sure, you have the final round of the playoffs about to start.
But you also have Ottawa stuck with a player they maybe/possibly don’t want.
This year, it’s Jason Spezza, whose contract and one-way offensive style make him pretty much unmoveable. Apparently, many GMs see him [...]

Photo from fOTOGLIF
George Johnson is not messing around this morning, calling for the Calgary Flames, officially out of the playoffs, to be blown-up.
Johnson is serious. He says he suspects Jarome Iginla will be moved during the off-season and calls the season Darryl Sutter’s failure.
I get that Johnson is upset but it’s tough to autopsy a [...]

Photo from fOTOGLIF
I continue to be shocked by the performance of Calgary coach Brent Sutter.
He was masterful with the Devils last season.
Now, working almost a whole season with a relatively talented Flames’ team, the Flames look like they’re going to miss the playoffs.
Not helping things is last night’s huge loss to the Islanders.
Sutter is presiding [...]

The Rangers completed their trade for Olli Jokinen this morning, giving up the underperforming Christopher Higgins and Ales Kotalik for Calgary’s Jokinen and Brandon Prust.
Kotalik was strange for the Rangers. Brought in as a powerplay specialist, he became such a defensive liability, he found himself a consistent scratch, despite a booming shot. Also, presumably brought [...]

I’ve been shocked by the struggles of the Calgary Flames, both because they seemed like a solid enough team and because coach Brent Sutter did a fantastic job in New Jersey last year.
But lately, I’m wondering if he really did as good a job as we think.
A large part of the Flames struggles has been [...]

Just some quick weekend notes:

Larry Brooks and Tim Panaccio aren’t happy about the Gretzky backlash. Both feel his time as a player buys him some goodwill with the public. I’ve been curious about the backlash and think a lot of it has to do with economics. Gretzky never seemed to put much work into coaching, [...]

Last night’s Calgary-Islanders might have been the game of late 2008. It was like some kind of movie.
You had Dion Phaneuf’s massive open-ice hit on Islander Kyle Okposo (Okposo has a mild concussion).

The one bright spot for the Islanders was that Okposo’s teammates immediately came to his defense, attempting to fight Phaneuf the whole [...]