The trade dust has settled and a few more pieces have been added to the convoluted puzzle that is the current Calgary Flames. The forward problem was partially taken care of when Disting Boyd was traded away to the Nashville Predators for a lowly fourth round pick. Calgary is short on picks, and they are also short on NHL caliber players chosen from drafts in the past. With Dion Phaneuf and Dustin Boyd gone, there are no currently Flames on the roster that Sutter successfully drafted. That’s not entirely true as we’ve called up Mikael Backlund so that would be one.


In another surprising move Calgary picked up even more salary on the D-line (I thought we traded Phaneuf to get away from that) by trading for veteran Steve Staois from the Oilers. It’s rare to see these two teams involved in a trade; the last time was Lombardi / Stoll draft swap. Staois will join the team and won’t likely play tonight. Going the other way was Aaron Johnson AND a draft pick (there goes another one).

Your thoughts on the Flames trades? I think the team is certainly better but we’re going to run into salary problems yet again this year if players go down with injuries.