Even Johnny Gaudreau's parents thought he'd stay with the Flames
Even Jane and Guy Gaudreau expected their son to sign with the Calgary Flames.
The parents of Johnny Gaudreau thought the NHL’s second-leading scorer from last season would return to the friendly confines of the Saddledome this summer, the pair said while on the Raising a Champion podcast Monday.
“It’s funny because I went to work that day, the day of free agency, because prior to that we thought that John was definitely staying with Calgary,” Jane said. “I know Calgary fans don’t believe that, some of them, but up until the 12th hour we thought that he was staying with Calgary.
“It was the night before, and when I tell you he was a wreck, he was so upset. He didn’t know what to do. A lot of things happened. Just a lot of different things that day. That’s when he decided ‘maybe I will do free agency,’ and I was like ‘oh wow, dad’s like eight hours away.’ The next day he said ‘can you stay home from work’ and ‘this is going to be a big decision.'”
The 29-year-old shocked the Flames and the hockey world alike when he decided to test free agency last minute before signing a seven-year, $68.25 million contract with the Columbus Blue Jackets.
The decision to leave Calgary came at the 11th hour, when Johnny notified the Flames he’d be sneaking a peek at the free agent process — something he later told Emily Kaplan of ESPN, “if I had to do free agency again, I don’t know if I would’ve done it.”
“When I tell you it was a stressful day, it was unbelievably a stressful day,” Jane said. “It was nothing how I thought it was going to be. We thought he was going to Calgary and everything was going to be fine, and even when he decided ‘I’m still not sure… I’m not saying I’m not going to Calgary but I just want to test free agency,’ you know, and it wasn’t until… about six o’clock at night the night before.
“He was thinking ‘I’d like to be back home, I’d like to be closer to my family, and also to Meredith’s family’ but at the same time, the people in Calgary for the most part, especially the fans and a lot of the people in the organization, were so good to him. It was a hard decision.”
It may not have had to come to that for Gaudreau.
The Flames pitched an offer to him the previous summer.
“The summer before, had they offered him a contract even remotely close, he said this would’ve been a non-issue, ‘I would’ve been in Calgary for eight more years,'” Jane said. “For whatever reason, I don’t know the politics of that world, but I guess maybe they didn’t feel they were ready to offer him a contract like that.”
Johnny was coming off a 19-goal, 49-point season over 56 games with the Flames in 2020-21, a far cry from his NHL career-high 115 points (40 goals, 75 assists) he’d register in the campaign leading up to hitting free agency.
The numbers offered, understandably, were different season over season.
“It was a joke,” Guy said. “He was really, really embarrassed. I’m not going to say what it was, but he was really embarrassed.
“They finally came up with an offer and I thought that’s where he’s going to go. I know he wanted to play [at] home, but I was up there and he said ‘dad, I want to go to free agency.’
“What? It was a surprise to me.”
That kickstarted a whirlwind for the Gaudreaus, eventually landing with the Blue Jackets in a summer hockey stunner.
“He was just really, really confused,” Jane said. “That’s a big, big decision.
“I said, ‘listen John… everything works out for a reason.’ And he loves Columbus. He’s happy. He loves the town. It’s a great place for him and his wife to raise a family. We’re just really, really proud of him. He really thought about ‘let me think about just not myself and how easy it would be to stay in Calgary and play there… let me think about the family I’m going to have and my wife and her family.'”
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