When Calgary brought Morgan Frost in at the end of January 2024, the deal looked like the kind of move that could reshape the middle of the lineup. Craig Conroy sent Andrei Kuzmenko, Jakob Pelletier, a second-round pick and a seventh-round pick to the Philadelphia Flyers and got Joel Farabee and Frost back, with Frost appearing to be the real prize for the Flames.
Now, after 114 games in Calgary through the end of the 2025-26 season, the question is still hanging there: what exactly is Frost supposed to be for this team?
That’s the issue. Some players make themselves obvious.
Mikael Backlund has a role that is easy to define - hard minutes, two-way work, tough matchups, the kind of centre you trust to keep the puck out of your net more than you expect him to pile up the goals. Frost has never settled into something that clean with the Flames.
What he has done is produce in stretches, and he’s done it while winning face-offs at a solid clip. But the way Calgary has used him tells part of the story too. He’s spent much of his time in sheltered situations, with favorable offensive deployment and strong linemates around him.
Split his Flames tenure into three parts and the pattern gets clearer.
From his arrival to April 2025, Frost played 32 games and posted 3 goals and 12 points, along with a minus-6 rating. He won 50.5% of his face-offs, had a 48.7% expected goals for rate and started 57.5% of his shifts in the offensive zone.
From October 2025 to February 2026, the production jumped. Over 61 games, he scored 13 goals and 29 points, finished minus-16, won 55.3% of his face-offs, posted a 49.2% expected goals for rate and saw 65.0% offensive zone face-offs.
Then came March and April 2026: 21 games, 9 goals, 14 points, an even rating, 60.3% face-off wins, 46.0% expected goals for and 69.1% offensive zone face-offs.
The face-off work has been steady. The rest of the picture points to a player who has needed a lot of help to be effective.
Frost has been skating with a mix that has included Matt Coronato, Matvei Gridin and Jonathan Huberdeau, and he’s been getting some of the most favorable zone starts on the roster. Once Nazem Kadri was traded and Frost became the de facto first-line centre, he kept putting up numbers, but his underlying results slipped a bit as the matchups got tougher.
So yes, Frost is a good NHL forward. But he hasn’t yet forced his way into the category of player Calgary can simply unleash in any situation and expect a difference-making shift. He hasn’t established himself as the guy to lean on for the biggest goals, or the guy you send out when the Flames need to protect a lead and close a game down.
Complicating things further, Calgary has loaded up on young centres since January 2025. The list includes Cole Reschny, Cullen Potter, Theo Stockselius, Yan Matveiko, Jonathan Castagna, Max Curran, Tyson Gross and Jack Hextall.
There’s no guarantee any of them ends up ahead of Frost at the NHL level. But when ice time is limited, teams eventually have to decide who they’re actually trying to sort out.
That’s where Calgary is now. Frost has value.
He’s useful. He’s good.
But the Flames are getting close to the point where they have to decide whether this is a long-term fit or just a temporary one.
And with Frost entering the final year of his current season and potentially able to become an unrestricted free agent at the end of the year, that decision is only getting sharper.
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It is the kind of housekeeping move that rarely draws much attention outside the organization, but these jobs matter once the pace picks up and players start filtering in for camp. The staff shuffle also adds another layer of experience around the Flames' development group, with Seymour stepping into a role tied to player growth and skills work while the club gets its camp infrastructure in place. [Read more 🡒]