It has been a long time since Flames fans have had a prospect like Sven Baertschi. He really is the best forward prospect in a long, long time. In fact I can not think off the top of my head a player who came in with the kind of expectation and excitement he is generating.

The team is at a transition point. There is a mood in the air that a changing of the guard is imminent. That a new generation of young Flames players is potentially coming in. Gone is the old mold of grinding Alberta born players in favor of a faster, more skilled and even more European composition.

Without any sort of embellishment, Sven has performed this year the way one would expect a lottery pick in the top five would perform. He faces all the challenges rookies face, the long grind of the NHL season, the higher level of game and it will be interesting.

Here is a little video of his more recent play, plus some interviews.

Plus to revisit his draft day and his comments on the transition to the North American game and what being drafted means to Swiss hockey.

There has been a long standing discrimination in the hockey media.

It promotes a double standard between European players and North American (NA) players. It is rife with cliches that European players are not as tough, that they lack heart, that they don't have the fortitude of NA players and especially Canadian players.

It is of course a bunch of bunk for the most part. Jonathan Willis of the Nations Network pulls out both barrels on the argument here and here. The majority in the more sophisticated realm of hockey commentary agree with him and you will find no shortage of articles in this vein.

The biased view is fed by the mainstream media and commentators like Don Cherry, who for some reason or another, like to pull the card whenever a European player is struggling, floating or simply not playing well.

One of the positive aspects of Jay Feaster and Co is that he is changing the old Don Cherry / Darryl Sutter anti-European bias in the Calgary Flames. Since Feaster has taken the GM position we have seen the Flames acquire several Europeans. In no particular order Roman Horak, Markus Granlund, Sven of course, Karri Ramo and now Roman Cervenka.

The debate is going to have more relevancy in upcoming years for the Flames and I am going to explain why it is not as black and white as Don Cherry and Jonathan Willis like to make it.

There is a factor with European players, an additional risk they have that NA players do not. Don Cherry and his cohorts like to knock them for the wrong reasons but the notion of risk in acquiring them is real and should be considered at least to some limited degree.

It is the immigrant experience all European players have to go through.

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With the Abbotsford Heat officially eliminated from the AHL Calder Cup playoffs, I thought now would be a good time to take a closer look at another Flames prospect who continues to work his way up in the organization: Max Reinhart.

After being chosen in the third round of the 2010 NHL Entry Draft by the Flames, the 20-year-old Reinhart has continued to put up impressive, though not gaudy numbers over the course of the past two WHL seasons.

Reinhart put together another steady season with the Kootenay Ice in 2011-12, scoring 28 times and adding 50 assists for 78 points in 61 games (a pace of 1.28 PPG) in what may have been his last junior season depending on how many over-agers the Ice have kicking around next year.

Reinhart's regular season points broke down as such:

EV Goals: 19

Assists: 27

EV Points: 46

PPG: 6

PPA: 22

PPP: 28

SHG: 3

SH Assists: 1

Total Special Teams Points: 32

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So who predicted this match-up?

Darryl Sutter has lead the Kings through the first two rounds in pretty convincing fashion. Taking down the Canucks (4-1) and sweeping the Blues (4-0). It appears the Flames of 2004 are being drawn into present day talk for comparison to both the Coyotes and Kings playoff surge.

Jim Playfair is anxious to make the comparison here.

SBNation's Bruce Ciskie is just as anxious to compare the Kings to the Flames of 2004 here.

Get back to me when you have a hockey celebration a mile long with thousands of people - New Orleans Mardi Gras style (minus the beads and plus the Flames sweaters). Where are the Green Hardhats? Where is the epic chants in the streets with thousands of people?

On one hand it is a compliment that the Flames 2004 run is still remembered by others out there. It did get splashed around the world as a spontaneous public celebration with some unique aspects *smile*.

But for Flames fans the memory of 2004 has definitely started to fade, it will always be a fond memory but with the realization setting in that the run led to a lot of poor hockey management decisions and a mindset that persisted for many years that the Flames were close to a Cup, instead of just a team that went on a great Cinderella run, well looking back that premature promotion of Darryl Sutter was really a historically bad decision.

Nonetheless, does the comparison have merit?

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Hello, this is a feature that will go through what the Flames players, prospects, and personnel have been up to in the past week. Things actually happened over the past 7 days, so there's a 1000 words after the jump for you to "enjoy."

I'm in Las Vegas this week, and I am prepared to lose money. Too much money.

In an attempt to relate those last couple of sentences to hockey somehow, I'd like to bring up someone we called the Riverboat Gambler a few times during his tenure in Calgary - Darryl Sutter. To me, it seems as though there's been a lot of revisionist history when it comes to Darryl's tenure as coach here, what with his recent success as coach of the Kings.

Sutter is, and really always has been, a guy who's had an amazing goalie cover up the problems his team has. Nabokov in San Jose, Kiprusoff in Calgary and now Quick in Los Angeles - all guys who were/are overworked by Sutter. Now, the Kings aren't done yet so I won't make any definitive statements regarding them, but in Calgary Sutter coached a team who couldn't defend or score, a team that got hot at the right time and rode an amazing goaltending performance to the Stanley Cup finals (seriously, the '04 team was soooooo bad) and a team that was 27th in the league in producing goals. Not exactly a sterling resume, in my opinion.

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When news of the Cervenka signing first broke, the type of contract was unknown.

Was it a regular FA signing, with 3.775 million paid or was it an ELC with the Cap Hit tied into performance bonuses? It has become clear that it is a ELC (entry level contract) and any remaining doubt on the deal has evaporated completely.

This is a big check mark in the Feaster "Win" column.

This deal has absolutely no down side for the Flames. It is only one year, so if Cervenka busts out the Flames move on with no impact to the future. It brings in a potential top 6 C with scoring skill and has the potential for high reward. Even the most fanatical haters of Flames management are silenced on this one.

This is the best part of the signing to me, the first concrete evidence that change has truly come and the usually huff, puff and fluff from Flames management may be finally over.

"Intellectual honesty" on the state of the team has gone from rhetoric to action, finally. Astute analysts, hockey writers and knowledgable fans have recognized for many years the trajectory of the team and Flames management's consistent denial about it. The failure to do anything substantial to correct the situation has been a source of significant frustration for knowledgable fans who care about their team.

Those days may finally be over. The first move of the off-season and an early one at that, is a good sign. Whether or not Feaster and Co are going to take the next step and move one of the two big blue chips is something that is by no means off the table this off-season.

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(ed. note: this was originally posted at SBN's Winnipeg Jets site, Arctic Ice Hockey.)

On Wednesday, the Calgary Flames announced that they signed Roman Cervenka, formerly of the KHL's Omsk Avangard, to a one year, $3.775M contract. Cervenka led his team in scoring in both 2010-2011 and 2011-2012 and led the KHL in goals in 2010-2011, but this deal has been met with a fair amount of skepticism. The biggest (and only major) reason, as far as I can tell, is the cap hit.

Critics of the deal are quick to point out that $3.775M is a lot of money for a guy who has a grand total of 0 NHL games under his belt. I think we all need to take a step back and settle down though. The contract is well worth it and after the jump I'll explain why.

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