Flames Sign Nazem Kadri
The Calgary Flames are making moves! Brad Treliving may deserve a statue at this point. Calgary entered the offseason with Johnny Gaudreau passing on more money to leave elsewhere and Matthew Tkachuk refusing to sign an extension. The Flames exit the offseason with Jonathan Huberdeau, MacKenzie Weegar, and Nazem Kadri!!! WOW.
Kevin Weekes at ESPN was the first to report the news:
The Flames rid themselves of Monahan and sign Kadri. That swap will cost the Flames just $625K in additional cap space. It’s hard to hate that move. Kadri is coming off a career high season. When you play for the champion Colorado Avalanche, certainly that had something to do with his 87 point season from a year ago. Kadri’s previous career high was 61 points back with Toronto in 2016-17.
It’s hard to blame Kadri for leaving Colorado. Yes, he could have stayed but it would have been for significantly less than the $7 million AAV over seven years that Kadri just got with Calgary. The Islanders were also in the mix for his services but weren’t able to come away with the prize.
Monahan is a bit of an interesting case. Four years ago Monahan pocked 34 goals and hasn’t been the same guy since. Injury has something to do with it. Still, for Calgary, there was no time to wait for Monahan to rediscover his form. Kadri is a perfect tough guy replacement for the things Tkachuk left behind. The Flames are really in the mix here. As for Montreal, Monahan is only on a one year contract so the gamble does make sense.
