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Calgary Flames' rookie Johnny Gaudreau speaks to the media as team members show up for season-end activities in Calgary on Monday, April 14, 2014. Known as "Johnny Hockey" in an homage to Cleveland Browns quarterback Johnny Manziel and the "Johnny Football" brand, the slick Calgary Flames prospect is already turning heads because of his moves, and his moniker.Larry MacDougal/The Canadian Press

Their off-season moves were largely designed to reshape the Calgary Flames into the image of a traditional Brian Burke team. They wanted testosterone, belligerence, fire-breathing behemoths if possible – and this accounts for why Brandon Bollig came over from the Chicago Blackhawks and Deryk Engelland was signed away from the Pittsburgh Penguins. The real irony heading into Flames training camp is that the player under greatest scrutiny also happens to be the smallest guy in the organization – Johnny Gaudreau.

He's also known as Johnny Hockey because he dominated NCAA play at Boston College the past two years in the same way Johnny Manziel did as the quarterback for Texas A&M.Gaudreau passed up his senior year at BC to turn pro last spring; he made his Flames debut in during their final regular-season game and promptly contributed his first NHL goal.

Ever since, the scrutiny on him has been fierce and focused. One could argue that he's the most hyped prospect to enter the Flames organization since Dion Phaneuf in 2003. What makes Gaudreau so intriguing is his uncanny ability to make something out of nothing. Example: During the annual Western Canada NHL prospects tournament, Gaudreau scored a dipsy-doodling, highlight-reel goal that has been replayed on TSN every day all week, endlessly winning play-of-the-day honours in their fan poll.

Gaudreau looks as if he could score goals in a broom closet, the way he backs off defencemen with his speed and then burns them with his shiftiness, a necessary skill in today's NHL, where defenders close the gaps so fast that few goals are scored on the rush any more.

Training camp will ultimately determine if Gaudreau is NHL ready, or needs time in the AHL to adjust to the professional ranks.

On the plus side is his age. He turned 21 back in August, which makes him 14 months older than last year's rookie sensation, Sean Monahan, who scored 22 goals as a teenager in the NHL.

But the difference is that while Monahan is 6 foot 2 and growing, Gaudreau is so small that his size is a matter of some conjecture. The NHL's 2014 Official Guide and Record Book lists him at 5 foot 7, 150 pounds. The Flames' training camp roster bumped him up to 5 foot 9, 150.

Whatever the truth happens to be, it doesn't change the fact that Gaudreau is an anomaly, one of the few players of his size getting a legitimate look just because he is so dynamic offensively.

Even with the new regime in place, Calgary has long had a reputation for being kind to the smaller underdog. The Flames' second all-time scoring leader, Theo Fleury, was also listed at 5 foot 7 throughout his career, but was probably shorter than that. Joey Mullen, at 5 foot 9, won a Stanley Cup here; and Martin St. Louis, 5 foot 8, got his start in Calgary, the only team that would take a chance on him as a free agent coming out of college.

St. Louis had the misfortune of graduating from the University of Vermont in 1997, back in the NHL's dead-puck era, when holding and hooking dominated the game and smaller players rarely got a look, no matter how talented.

It has changed since then – a little anyway – and Calgary got Gaudreau with the 104th overall pick in 2011, when Jay Feaster ran the team as general manager. Last year, the Flames had only two players score more than 20 goals – Monahan and Mike Cammalleri – and Cammalleri, all 5 foot 9 of him, took his talents to New Jersey.

Cammalleri's departure left the Flames with a crying need for a sniper, but Flames general manager Brad Treliving insists that the team will not force-feed players into the lineup until they are deemed to be NHL-ready. Mullen spent time in the minors back at the start of his career and it didn't hurt him at all.

Besides, while Calgary is anxious to continue its rebuild, deep down the Flames know the turnaround cannot realistically occur until the likes of Monahan and 2014 No. 1 draft choice Sam Bennett drift closer to their primes.

In the meantime, the Johnny Hockey watch is on. The path has been previously blazed; and now it's up to him to see if he can venture down the same road as Fleury and Mullen and St. Louis. If nothing else, based on all those YouTube highlights, the journey looks as if it'll be fascinating to watch.

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