The Oilers have one known curse to date, the Calder Curse. No matter how good a rookie is for the Edmonton Oilers, he just can’t seem to convince the eastern media that he’s worth the award. We could go through them individually from Gretzky to Fuhr to Arnott to Nuge to McDavid but that’s another blog for another time. Hopefully, The Sports Forecaster is right and Puljujarvi wins it this year.
But I want to talk about a different curse. It’s the Curse of the First… Overall pick that is.
The reason that the Oilers couldn’t get more for Hall is not because Peter Chiarelli is bad at making big trades involving star players, it’s because nobody in the NHL wanted to do the Oilers any favours after they draft first overall FOUR BLOODY TIMES. You could argue that it’s no fault of the Oilers, they were simply a product of the system put in place to prevent such things. But it’s my belief that they will continue to get shafted in trades unless they admit shame and lose trades that involve a high-profile member of the team OR they start winning.
I’m hoping for the latter but wouldn’t surprise me if they rid themselves of Nuge and Yak in an attempt to distance themselves from that era of the team’s history.
MATT BENNING
The Oilers signed the six-foot, two-hundred pound plus blue liner out of Northeastern to a 2-year deal today. He’s a rugged defender out of St.Alberta who can make a first pass and, here’s the key folks, he shoots right-handed. So now the Oilers depth on the right side looks as such:
Adam Larsson
Mark Fayne
Matt Benning
I believe the word underwhelming comes to mind and the problem is the Oilers won’t be able to do much due to the Curse of the First but I’m hearing that Mark Fayne has been training like a madman this summer and is coming to camp with a chip on his shoulder. He’s heard your words and he’s going to shove them up your ass… lol… I’m not really sure if that will happen or not but reading that sentence makes me laugh because, well, just envision Mark Fayne saying it.
Back to Benning…
Matt Benning is NOT a PP QB. He’s Andrew Ference to a lesser extent. Bob Stauffer reckons he’ll get a chance with the Oilers this upcoming season but you can bet, if he does, it won’t be because he’s better than Griffin Reinhart, Brandon Davidson or Jordan Oesterle.
I reckon Benning was signed simply for defensive depth on the AHL team. I can’t see him coming up for any reason in the next 2 years apart from injury call-up. He’s at best a no.4 dman in the AHL right now and it’s best he plays his way up the ladder at this point. If he surprises, great! But let’s keep expectations low.
You know what would be a solid expectation for him, top pairing minutes in Norfolk (ECHL).
His NHLe is 14 points. The same as Dillon Simpson, and three back of Joey LaLeggia… Someone on Twitter said he’s a right-handed David Musil…
Speaking of David Musil… I’ve heard inconsistent play is all that’s keeping him out of the NHL and what might send him to the ECHL.
Why not just sign Eric Gryba and get this over with. He’s a true NHL player that, from what I’ve been told, is turning other teams down because he wants to sign in Edmonton… Are the Oilers really going to tell Eric Gryba to “show them his dedication” before giving him a deal?
Last little tidbit, the Oilers are looking at a rugged right-handed centre who hasn’t been able to crack the lineup of his NHL club to date. He’s been fairly productive at the AHL level and he’s not eligible for waivers but his team doesn’t want to lose him for nothing and are looking for some depth on the back-end.
You don’t sign Gryba when Rundblad is probably a better answer.
Well The problem with Runblad is his lack of defense. He’s good on the offense though. One Swedish writer said to me that he’d be the Erik Karlsson of the SHL if he played there.
Put him with Davidson on the third pair, and give him power play time. He should be fine in a third pairing role, and Davidson should be able to provide some cover in the d zone. Both he and Davidson can move the puck.
Klefbom – Larsson
Sekera – Fayne
Davidson – Rundblad
Gryba’s bad at everything Fayne is bad at. Can’t have them both.
PS – the Facebook pop up whenever you read a page is seriously annoying. On a tablet, it takes you back to the top of the article, which I am usually a third done when the fucking thing pops up.
Hey sorry about the Facebook Pop-up guys. I had it set to 30 sec after a reader arrives at the page for some reason. So yeah, naturally after you’ve been through the article somewhat it’ll come up and send you back to the top. My bad guys. But can you tell me something? Did you click ‘like’? I’m curious if it stops coming up after you’ve clicked like or not.
Thank you for the feedback GCW!
No, it pisses me off so I just click the X to close the dialogue box. It does not return.