The off-season is typically used for National Hockey League clubs to make
tweaks to their roster and re-sign their organization';s restricted free
agents. Generally-speaking, negotiations become more tense and contentious as
the cap hits involved grow - more important players demand larger cap hits, but
 their contracts also make the margin for error razor-thin.Calgary Flames
defenseman Brett Kulak (Sergei Belski-USA TODAY Sports)

Because of the rather small cap hits involved, the Calgary Flames';
negotiations with third pairing defenseman Brett Kulak weren';t expected to be
particularly important or contentious. But for a few reasons, these
negotiations raised in stakes all the way to salary arbitration.A Development
Success Story

The Flames have had success in the draft in recent years, but much of their
success has been in the early rounds. Sean Monahan, Sam Bennett and Matthew
Tkachuk went directly to the NHL after being drafted, which has in some ways
inflated the club';s developmental success rate. Kulak is one of the first
recent examples of the Flames drafting and developing a useful depth player.

A fourth round selection in the 2012 NHL Draft, Kulak played three seasons with
 the Vancouver Giants. When he went pro in 2014-15, a log-jam in the Flames';
affiliate in Adirondack pushed him to their ECHL team, the Colorado Eagles. He
played well in the ECHL, earned a promotion to the AHL, and even got a game in
at the end of the NHL season. The next few seasons saw him pushing for
additional NHL time, increasing his big-league games to 8 in 2015-16, 21 in
2016-17 and 71 in 2017-18.

After being useful depth for the Flames on the farm, he crept into full-time
duty last season and pushed Matt Bartkowski to the press box. He seemed primed
for a raise from his league-minimum $650,000 contract, but probably not a
substantial one given his modest NHL sample size and low offensive production.
Instead, he found himself put on waivers and in the midst of a surprisingly
contentious battle of wills with Flames management.Bellwether Negotiation

The Flames did not have a great season in 2017-18, as that';s seemingly crept
into negotiations with their restricted free agents as general manager Brad
Treliving shared with Postmedia';s Kristen Anderson.

...we didn't have a good year and missed the playoffs and there were
consequences. People lost their jobs and their lives were turned around. We
shouldn't all be sitting here thinking we need to triple our salaries. That's
not the way it works here."

- Kristen Anderson (@KdotAnderson) July 25, 2018

Kulak';s arbitration hearing was the first of five the Flames had scheduled.
The other depth bodies up for new deals at the time included bottom six
forwards Mark Jankowski and Garnet Hathaway and backup netminder David Rittich.
 A hard-line stance with Kulak - their arbitration offer was another
league-minimum contract - was likely as much about setting a tone for future
negotiations as it was keeping costs for a depth defender down.Many Mouths to
Feed

The Flames disappointed last season for several reasons, and Treliving
attempted to address those areas by adding key bodies in key roles - such as
James Neal, Elias Lindholm, Derek Ryan and the still-unsigned RFA Noah Hanifin.
 Spending assets and contracts on these bodies have tightened things for the
Flames cap-wise heading into the dog days of summer. They have many mouths to
feed and have chosen to feed their core, long-term pieces. In order to do that,
 they have to keep costs down elsewhere in the lineup and playing hardball with
 Kulak is one of the ways Treliving';s chosen to do so.

While Kulak was one of the first useful depth players drafted and developed by
the Flames in recent years, the club';s development skills have progressed
since then and they have several inexpensive depth options in their system on
defense and at forward. Between belt-tightening and an increased supply of
inexpensive depth options, players like Kulak may suddenly become expendable if
 they become too expensive.

The post Kulak';s Contentious New Flames Contract appeared first on The Hockey
Writers.

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