Edmonton Oilers Talk: At What Point Are Holland and Tippett No Longer Safe?

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!

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Edmonton Sun

OILERS NOTES

Oilers defenceman Duncan Keith, who has missed eight games, skated alongside partner Ceci at Monday’s practice. Tip-off he’s playing.
Goalie Mike Smith, out almost two months with a suspected ankle issue, practised hard Monday but will again watch.
Leafs winger Mitch Marner (shoulder) is out another month after colliding with teammate Jake Muzzin in practice.
Oilers defenceman Slater Koekkoek (sprained ankle) skated with the team for the first time. “For a while, we didn’t have enough defencemen, now we’ve got a plethora (at practice),” said Tippett.
The Leafs might have forward Ilya Mikheyev (broken thumb) playing his first game of the season. Defenceman Travis Dermott, who hurt the same shoulder in practice a week ago that he had surgery on in 2019, might return too.
With the Calgary Flames having six players test positive for COVID-19 after a Saturday home game against Carolina, and now two Hurricanes players, including Sebastian Aho, getting the same result after a Sunday game in Vancouver, where does that leave the Oilers, who, so far, have only had one positive case, Cody Ceci, before their home game against the Pittsburgh Penguins?

BLH’s Thoughts: Will it shock anybody if a few Oilers get hit with The ‘Vid before tomorrow’s game?

Mikheyev has been a pain in the ass for the Oilers because they’ve never had somebody in their bottom-six who could match his speed. Until now… Ryan McLeod can keep up with the lanky Russian no problem and I think maybe that’ll be a bit of a game changer.

Marner being out is a bit of a blessing in disguise because he usually does pretty well against the Oil. 17pts in 17gp is proof of that. Thanks Muzzin!

Oilersnation

Monday Mailbag – Where is the Oilers’ depth scoring?

What do you see as the silver linings to the Oilers’ difficulties we can hold onto?

“… they have shown that they can win despite having a pile of injuries, so that is one encouraging sign that’s come from all of this.” – Yaremchuk

Does Holland wait until the deadline to make a move, or do you see him being more proactive?

“I’d like to see him make a move sooner than later to bolster the lineup but I doubt it happens. He doesn’t exactly have a history of moving quickly.” – baggedmilk

Is the Oilers’ depth scoring as bad as the stats show or are there just too many players struggling to hit their potential?

“Many guys couldn’t score in a brothel with $500 in their pocket right now. They need some guys to find their touch, but they also aren’t blessed with a lot of offensive depth.” – Gregor

Do you think the team we have seen play over the last handful of games is the REAL Edmonton Oilers?

” The record they have now isn’t far off what I expected overall, but the huge swings in performance are a surprise.” – Brownlee

At what stage do you believe Tippett/Holland internally is no longer safe?

“By nature of their positions, Holland has a longer shelf life than Tippett. Missing the playoffs this season — I don’t see that happening — gets the coach fired.” – Brownlee

BLH’s Thoughts: A) Silver linings? Markus Niemelainen is one. Without this injury crisis he probably wouldn’t have been called up and now it’ll be hard to send him down.

B) Holland’s Proactivity? Nope… Not unless the call comes from on high to start making some waves. He plays the long game and that’s not conducive to the way a fan’s mindset is when the times get tough.

C) Everybody is squeezing their sticks a bit harder and the big boys are running on fumes. It’s going to take some ugly hockey to get those pucks headed in the right direction I’m thinking. Maybe a few more point shots and crease crashes? Just to change things up because if the defense thinks that is your gameplan, they’ll adjust to it, then you can go back to the original one with the old lanes show up again.

D) You’re never as good as you think you are nor are you as bad as they say you are… So, in Edmonton’s case, we wait for the middle ground to appear.

E) Holland’s safe. Tippett is on an expiring contract, so he’s the easiest to replace, but we also have to keep in mind that Ken Holland has never fired a coach either. He’s let their contracts run out, but never given a pink slip… So get comfortable with both unless the Oilers are a lottery team by the new year.

Spector’s Hockey

TVA SPORTS: Renaud Lavoie believes the Canadiens should shop goaltender Jake Allen and retain Brendan Gallagher.
- Patrick Lalime suggests shopping Jonathan Drouin and retaining Nick Suzuki.
- Felix Seguin proposed peddling Joel Armia and retaining Artturi Lehkonen.
- Guillaume Latendresse believes Jeff Petry should be moved and Ryan Poehling retained.

BLH’s Thoughts: Is there a world where you could see the Oilers acquiring Armia and Allen from the Habs? Would they be upgrades for Edmonton at net and in their bottom-six? I know for a fact that the club really liked Armia before he re-signed with Montreal.

I’d love them to grab Gallagher because he’s exactly the kind of winger they need in their top-six, but the price will be high for him. That said, if Holland is determined to show Connor and Leon he’s willing to go “all-in”, Gally is man to go for.