Devon Toews - new acquisition by the Calgary Flames

The Calgary Flames have had a busy offseason so far with the recent signing of many Restricted Free Agents and one important trade.

There were some rumblings that the Calgary Flames were shopping the market for a top 4 defenceman. GM Belanger was in talks with a few GMs and one deal might be announced very soon. ***Update : A deal was reached late last night between the Calgary Flames and the Winnipeg Jets where we see Devon Toews going to Calgary along with a 2026 3rd round pick for the Ottawa 1st pick in 2025 (27th overall), young defenceman Kevin Bahl and Luke Evangelista. “The main point of this deal was to get stalwart defenceman Devon Toews signed to a 5 year deal in our opinion. He will step right away and be our #1 defenceman playing alongside Kaiden Guhle or Josh Manson for the time being. His arrival will solidify our defensive core which lacked stability and depth last season. We wanted to have at least one pick in the first round this season and trading away the 27th overall pick in a somewhat weaker draft is acceptable. We have a team filled with younger players and we felt that trading away 1 or 2 was acceptable for our future. Kevin Bahl and Luke Evangelista will be missed.

Filip Gustavsson was the main free agent signing in Calgary signing a huge 8 year contract at 7.85m. “We are looking to compete right now and Filip will be relied upon to play around 55 to 60 games while proving that he was worth the big contract” said GM Belanger

Owen Tippett was the 2nd main free agent signed this offseason. He also signed an 8 year contract but at 6.75m per season. Owen will need to step up and aim for his first 30 goals season as he’s going to have more ice time playing on our 1st line with Chandler Stephenson and Kent Johnson.

Cole Perfetti was signed to a bridge contract of 4.25m for 2 seasons. He will likely get a big salary bump if he continues his upwards trend.   Perfetti will also get increased ice time on the 2nd scoring line while playing with Mason McTavish and Juraj Slafkovsky.

UFA Josh Manson signed a decent 4.3m contract for 3 seasons. He will bring stability to the Calgary defensive core.

Alex Turcotte, Arber Xhekaj, Alexander Holtz, Cole Koepke and Nikolas Matinpalo have also signed short term contracts and will likely have increased roles this next season.   

Cutter Gauthier will be brought up slowly but surely with his amazing potential. Calgary is an up and coming team that will be competing soon, but probably not for another season. There is no rush to force young guys like Gauthier to play on the first two lines right now.

There is currently a strong rumor that Jakub Vrana might have played his last game in the RHL has he’s been gathering interest from Linköping HC in Sweden.

Calgary management will hopefully be able to attract a couple of depth free agents to bolster their lineup as the off-season continues…