This is your TL/DR (too long, didn’t read) summary post where excerpts are taken from the best of the best when it comes to Edmonton Oilers blogs. BLH gives you his two cents on the latest posts being published in the Oilogosphere! Including those from Lowetide.ca, The Athletic, Oilersnation, The Cult of Hockey, Copper N Blue, Oil on Whyte, and more!
The latest NHL news, rumors, and speculation comes from all of the internet’s top sites like Spector’s Hockey, The Fourth Period, NHL Trade Talk, The Hockey Writers, and The Daily Goal Horn just to name a few!
If you’re short on time but want to keep up with the day’s Oilers news, you’ve come to the right place!
Give us a follow on the socials!
- Youtube: Beer League Heroes Channel
- Twitter: @beerleagueheroe
- Instagram: @beerleagueheroes
- Facebook: Beer League Heroes
Lowetide
What Will Holland Do?
- G Mike Smith retires.
- RHD Tyson Barrie is traded to the Seattle Kraken for Toronto’s second-round selection.
- LW Warren Foegele, LHD Dmitri Samorukov and 2023 second-round pick traded to Minnesota for LHD Jacob Middleton and LW Tyson Jost
- G Braden Holtby, LW Mason Marchmant and RW Dominik Simon all signed as free agents.
- LHD Philip Broberg, LW Dylan Holloway and G Stuart Skinner are rookies.
BLH’s Thoughts: First and most pressing thought, there’s no beef on this proposed team aside from Middleton and Nurse. The 4th line is Jost, McLeod, and Ryan… The third line is Holloway, Nuge, and Simon.
You can’t go far in the playoffs without players with size and players who thrive in the muck. Look no further than Evander Kane’s impact in the playoffs this year. He completely neutralized Matthew Tkachuk and did what needed to be done with Nazem Kadri. Also, Tampa has been running Pat Maroon and Corey Perry on the same line this year and they’ve got Nick Paul contributing too. Nobody is going to mess around with Tampa’s stars knowing they’ll have to answer one way or another if they do.
So what about Zach Aston-Reese (230 hits last year, .60 GvA/60, 1.26 TkA/60, 2.80 bks/60) or Curtis Lazar (186 hits last year, .78 GvA/60, 1.21 TkA/60, 3.64bks/60) for roles in Edmonton’s bottom six?
Lazar’s relative 5v5 fancies are really really decent, his team drives scoring chances when he’s on the ice, but unfortunately the same can’t be said for actual goals but maybe that’s down to puck luck too because his PDO was .978.
With ZAR, his publicly available advanced analytics (relative, 5v5) are pretty shite. He was drowning in Pittsburgh and it didn’t get any better after his trade to Anaheim. The weird thing with him is he had a really good GF% (7.88/60 in 50 games with PIT last season) but all of the shot/chance metrics were horrid. What are we to make of that?
Another thing that might make Aston-Reese a potentially valuable player to target is that over the past three seasons he has spent the 2nd most TOI (250 minutes) on Pittsburgh’s PK. Lazar has 134 minutes on the kill with Boston over the last 87 games.
I’m just using those two players as examples of players that might shore up Edmonton’s defense in its bottom six a bit, you might have better players but I like these forwards because they block shots, their takeaways per 60 are better than their giveaways per 60 but a substantial margin, they hit, they fight, and these are the kinds of players you want to go to battle with in the post-season.
LT had Edmonton signing Holtby for $2M/yr, Marchment for $3M/yr, and Simon for 900k/yr and as much as I like all of those players, I don’t think they end up signing for anything close to that where ever they land.
I feel like with Dallas shipping out Ben Bishop’s contract to Buffalo that they’re positioning themselves to possibly keep Holtby and Klingberg. That’s just a surface level look at that though.
With Marchment, the Panthers need to keep him and I reckon they’ll pay to move Patric Hornqvist in order to re-sign Mush’s kid and Dominik Simon I’m kinda meh on I guess. I’d rather have Vlad Namestnikov because I think he’s a shifty little bugger and he’s not only a really nice offensive 3rd liner but he’s got some grit and character.
I love the idea of getting Jacob Middleton but I have no idea why the Wild would trade him. Bill Guerin would be better off trading Kulikov or Goligoski or both but there is the fact that his advanced stats cratered like crazy in Minnesota compared to San Jose. That said, the Oilers lack cycle breakers with NHL experience and Middleton was really impressive when the Oilers played San Jose last year.
Yesterday on Oilers Now, Bob Stauffer and Elliotte Friedman conversed up on the future of Connor McDavid’s best friend, Dylan Strome. Apparently there are some whispers that Strome might not get qualified and if that’s the case (which would be dumb if it ends up being so), Stauffer mentioned he’d be very interested in seeing McDavid and his bff reuniting on Edmonton’s first line next year.
In LT’s comments section a user by the name of “Diablo” had an interesting thought,
- If Kane wins his arbitration case and has his contract reinstated (which IMO seems like the most likely outcome, as the reason for terminating his contract was very flimsy) … SJS basically has to trade him; there are simply too many burned bridges on both sides.
- But Kane has a NMC attached to that contract where he gets to name 3 teams that he would be willing to be traded to. So he names Edmonton and two other teams who would have zero interest adding him to their locker room and/or no ability to absorb his cap hit.
- Tell me that the following isn’t somewhat plausible: Kane for Kassian and Klefbom.
Kassian getting moved to a SoCal team wouldn’t shock me in the slightest. I believe he spends a bit of offseason time there each year. Klefbom isn’t coming back and moving his contract would help the Oilers from starting the year in LTIR. Could Holland get the Sharks to eat 50% too?
Now, I’m wondering how badly the Sharks feel towards Kane. Meaning, would they be happy to suspend him and ride out the remainder of the contract until he gave them more teams to deal with?
Edmonton Sun
Oilers Notes: Husso or Campbell as an unrestricted free agent in net for Oilers?
- Darcy Kuemper in Colorado is an restricted free agent, but he has that injury history.
- It’s no secret the Oilers have been watching Husso closely this season… Husso is only 27, but he played only 40 games last season. Can he play 50? He’s probably a $4.25-million free agent.
- Campbell played 49 games for Toronto. He’s looking for that one big payday which he never has had. He’s 30, so would you give him more than four years, at $5 million?
- John Gibson? Yeah but his numbers have dropped dramatically the last three seasons — mental fatigue on a bad team or a drop in ability, which means a deep dive into what it is.
- A different alternative would still be New York Islanders netminder Semyon Varlamov for one year at $5 million. He is a proven starter but he’s 34.
- Puljujarvi has arbitration rights this summer, so that complicates the signing process if they want him back. An arbitrator might feel Puljujarvi is a $2.5 million player. The Oilers, at this time, probably do not.
- Holland chased Russian free-agent Andrei Kuzmenko, the right-shot, 5-foot-11, 194-pound left-winger (67 points in 61 games with SKA St. Petersburg) when he was Detroit GM, so his current pursuit, along with the Canucks, is hardly a surprise.
- He’s a middle-of-the-lineup NHL possibility and he would be a one-year contract for less than $1 million.
BLH’s Thoughts: Kuemper’s injury history, that now includes an eye injury (yikes), is concerning.
Campbell intrigues me to an extent. I think he’s probably asking for too much though.
I do like Ville Husso and he’s a guy I’d probably take a chance on if the price was right and Mike Smith’s contract wasn’t on the books.
John Gibson doesn’t seem like the type that would be too keen on coming to Northern Alberta if he were to be traded. The Ducks probably have a better chance at sending him home to Pittsburgh and getting Tristan Jarry in return.
Semyon Varlamov has already vetoed a trade to Edmonton, so that’s not happening.
If Pulju at $2.5M is too much money for the Oilers, then what are they really doing? He’s a 40pt winger when injury ridden, what’s he going to be when he’s healthy?
Dan Milstein just watched one client hit the jackpot playing in Edmonton alongside Connor McDavid and Leon Draisaitl. He should expressing that point to Kuzmenko very strongly…
