Feaster famine

It is a theme we’ve been hearing around the National Hockey League since that summertime rant about his rivals in Edmonton.

Flames general manager Jay Feaster says he’s not going with the full rebuild in Calgary. Instead, he’s going to make these Calgary Flames back into a Stanley Cup contender without subjecting fans to a prolonged stint at the bottom of the standings.

In short, Feaster would take the Flames north without first going south.

Complicating matters with the fan base, just 300 kilometres north the Edmonton Oilers have already gone the "scorched earth" route. They executed the classic double-last-place rebuilding project and emerged with two No. 1 overall draft picks and a future that, even the thickest Flames fan must admit, looks mighty enticing.

But Feaster is a fine personnel man, for whom we have great respect. There is not a unanimous feeling among NHL observers that Feaster’s plan will work. But most of the hockey press has stepped back for now, deferring to Feaster while he executes his plan.

So far, he’s nicely dumped salary without dipping into his stock of veteran stars like Jarome Iginla or Miikka Kiprusoff. He has retained Mark Giordano, his best defenceman, and — thus far, anyhow — hasn’t parted with his next most valuable forward asset in Rene Bourque.

But then the Vancouver Canucks walked into the Saddledome and smoked the Flames 5-1 on Tuesday night. Calgary is in 14th place in the West, which isn’t a big deal this early in the season. But thus far into Feaster’s soft rebuild, it is as hard to spot the fast-track progress as it was for Calgary’s captain to spot positives after the thrashing by Vancouver.

"Right now I don’t see a ton," Iginla said. "It’s a game we’ll go over. We made mistakes, and we’ll try to learn from it… but we totally got outplayed tonight. They deserved that game.

"We’ve been building up, getting better... unfortunately tonight was a big letdown for us, and I know it was for our fans too."

We’ve watched Brian Burke try the soft rebuild in Toronto, where the Leafs GM flatly stated he didn’t have the patience for what Edmonton is doing. And Burke’s team is thriving through the first month of the 2011-12 season, but, it must be said, the Maple Leafs haven’t had a lick of success up ‘til now. Same thing with Edmonton.

Last season Calgary turned its season around -- but it took the firing of GM Daryl Sutter to kick-start that run. Feaster doesn’t want that, the same way he doesn’t want to spend the next four seasons finishing in the high 20s in the NHL, then get fired and watch as some other GM takes his work and wins with it.

Word is out that Feaster has been shopping Bourque, while lining up at the queue for Phoenix holdout Kyle Turris. Michael Backlund (broken finger) should be back soon, and rookie Roman Horak -- the only rookie in this Flames lineup -- has been a pleasant surprise.

Look, it’s only Nov. 2. No one is saying the Flames are cooked at 4-5-1.

But they are a slow-footed team in an ever-quickening league. If Feaster is going to hang on to Iginla, Kiprusoff, Giordano, plus his draft picks and decent prospects, we challenge you to look down Calgary’s roster for names that could return valuable pieces to Feaster’s project.

These are early days. And it must be said, we’re talking about two separate Calgary teams from last season: one that was 15-18-3 at Christmas, and another that charged to a final mark of 41-29-12, missing the playoffs by just four points.

Tuesday night in Calgary, Feaster looked down upon the former team. A tired-looking collection that, tossed into the ring against a true NHL power, looked to be in way over its head.

But we are just 10 games into Calgary’s season. Feaster and head coach Brent Sutter have plenty of time to pull off the same transformation of a year ago.

If, by March, he has furnished Iginla and Kiprusoff with a supporting cast that has them in the playoff hunt, we’ll tip our cap to the Flames GM.

If he hasn’t, and the early-season Flames of last year become the full-season Flames of 2011-12, we’ll be suggesting he back off the soft rebuild and give Iginla a chance to win a Cup elsewhere.

Because at age 34, a stubborn GM might be the last thing a great player like Iginla needs at this point in his career.

Mark Spector is the senior columnist on sportsnet.ca