Around the Oilogosphere – April 24th Edition – Mikko Koskinen, Oilers/Hurricanes Trade Proposal, and Rumblings on the Oilers Coaching Front!

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It looks like the Oilers are going to have some openings in their top 13 as latest reports (unconfirmed) have one of their better penalty-killers heading and one of their more promising youngsters heading to the KHL for next season.

#Edmonton Oilers F Iiro Pakarinen leaves Alberta and #NHL. His new team is Metallurg Magnitogorsk in #KHL. https://t.co/jUssDRZMBU

— Pekka Jalonen (@PekkaJalonen) April 23, 2018

Some #KHL rumours today (nothing official on any of these):
G Mikko Koskinen from SKA St. Petersburg to New York Islanders.
F Anton Slepyshev from Edmonton Oilers to CSKA Moscow.
D Roman Savchenko from Barys Astana to unknown.

— Patrick C (@ChunkletsHockey) April 11, 2018

I’m sad to see both players moving on (if the reports are indeed true) but I understand why the club would prefer to. Pakarinen was an excellent foot soldier and worked his ass off on the PK but his AHL offense didn’t translate to the NHL often enough. I always wondered why they wouldn’t use him on that left-wall during the PP. He had a cannon of a shot.

Same goes for Anton Slepyshev. He could blast the biscuit when given the chance but he never was given it. I think in Slepy’s case, he was so inconsistent too. He’d show you what he had every 6 or 7 games but only flashes in the others. I imagine he’s another player who feels let down by the coaching staff after performing so well with Draisaitl and Lucic during the playoffs in 2017.

But the players have to take some responsibility for this past season’s performance and this is one way the GM keeps the team accountable I guess. It also gives him the ability to bring in some new blood to spice things up.

I wonder if the Columbus Blue Jackets will look to shake the roster up a bit this off-season. Maybe a player like Boone Jenner becomes available.

Speaking of shaking loose, the Anaheim Ducks let go long-time assistant coach Trent Yawney. A bit of a shocker but something had to happen in Anaheim after their 1st round bowing out to the San Jose Sharks.

Yawney had been with the Ducks for 7 years and it was in the last 4 years he was in charge of their defense and penalty killing. In that time the Anaheim Ducks had THE BEST penalty kill in the NHL. Numero uno! The Oilers had the 27th best.

He also oversaw the development of key dmen like Cam Fowler, Hampus Lindholm, Sami Vatanen, Josh Manson, Brandon Montour, and to a lesser extent Shea Theodore.

Trent Yawney has an excellent track record of developing young defenceman.
My guess is that he will be a coach that multiple organizations look at. https://t.co/XhG9vyrA9K

— Bob Stauffer (@Bob_Stauffer) April 23, 2018

Yawney is a former teammate of Oilers Head Coach Todd McLellan in Saskatoon, spent 3 years as AC with McLellan in SJ.
Yawney has been an NHL and AHL HC and oversaw a Ducks PK unit that has been top 5 last 3 seasons.
He checks off a lot off boxes here! https://t.co/uR1CKSqnQ2

— Bob Stauffer (@Bob_Stauffer) April 23, 2018

Bob’s right. Yawney does check off a lot of boxes. I hope the Oilers do indeed go after Trent Yawney as an assistant coach to replace Jim Johnson.

Will Jay Woodcroft get replaced is the next question though? It was his PP that ate shite all year whereas the PK improved after McLellan took over. People on the Twitter machine have been throwing out Glen Gulutzan’s name to replace Woody but I’m not for that. Calgary’s PP was pretty horrid in his two seasons with the club but John Shannon said on Oilers Now today that he’d be a good fit for the Oilers and is an excellent communicator.

Either way, the Oilers should bring in someone new to run their PP. Over the last four seasons, it’s ranked 22nd in the NHL and that’s not good enough with the playing personnel on hand.

If that means bringing in Manny Viveiros from Swift Current of the WHL, so be it. If that means overpaying Todd Nelson to come back, so be it. Lastly, IF that means backing up a Brinks truck to Pascal Vincent’s house to get him to leave the Manitoba Moose (Winnipeg Jets AHL affiliate), so be it.

Get. Er. Done Boys!

Just a quick one on Mikko Koskinen.

Jason Gregor and Bob Stauffer are saying that the reported $2.5M per year for two years number that was thrown out by KHL insider and Hockeybuzz writer Aivis Kalniņš is incorrect.

I agree that the number sounds way too high. I’d heard he was making like 1.3M Euros per year but I can’t confirm that. I guess the conversion would make that close to $2M CDN. But anything over $2M would be very risky in my opinion.

This is all predicated on the Finnish goalie signing in Edmonton of course but we don’t know how Koskinen will perform on the smaller ice. He hasn’t played on it since his days in the Islanders organization… So Edmonton should treat lightly here.

I wrote about Koskinen yesterday here.