Backlund is a good player but I thought he was by far the lowest priority of their UFA's. He was the most easily replaced. Hanfin and Lindholm should be top priority.

I don't hate this for Calgary but I don't love it. I thought they should have traded or let Backlund walk and use that cap space to get a bit younger.

At least it's only 2 years and he is a very serviceable player.

I hope they can extend Hanfin and Lindholm soon. Those are the 2 very big ones.

It depends on how you look at things. From a logical POV Lindholm and Hanifin are higher priority due to age. But from a team leader POV this is huge, one of the biggest things stressed about under Sutter was the lack of a captain. Backlund was the only one who more or less stood up to Sutter but since he wasn't captain he could only do so much.

Now that he's re-signed he will absolutely ve given the C. On top of that it shows his commitment to the team is genuine and and as a the team leader others are more likely to follow suit. I would say Hanifin staying is still up in the air but there's a pretty decent chance we see a Lindholm extension in the next couple weeks.

It's also worth noting that despite his age Backlund finished 2nd in the fitness testing again, Dube's finished 1st the last 3 years and before that Gio got it like 5 years in a row, but Backlund was always ~top 3

Backlund is only 34. He’ll be 36 in two years.

Sorry off subject.Sending love and good wishes to Chris Snow wife Kelsie and family.Strength and peace be with you.

lmfao, I don't think he was trying to say he was 45...

Totally okay. Me and a bunch of others on Twitter have started a # to honor him. If you want to join, all you have to do is tweet #putsnowintherafters(and if we see it we will retweet and like it a bunch) obviously you don't have to, but I think it would be nice if the Flames honored him in some way!

🙄

Im not on twitter but you are right.The Flames should and i know they will honor him.Very brave wife.I hope she knows shes not alone.

Looks like they named him C. I retract my prior priority comment. Clearly Backlund has a lot more value than I gave him credit for,.

I view it similar to Jordan Staal. The difference is Staal was already captain so extending him was less of a priority a year ago. Calgary really needs a team leader and the players talked about it in ad nasium this summer.

Finally, don't have to see any more of Caniac's terrible Backlund offers.