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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The Athletic
With Zack Kassian’s injury, will Colton Sceviour be signed? How the Oilers’ season-opening roster might shake out
- …you never know with head injuries, and with the season right around the corner, Kassian’s status could force or entice management to head down a few different paths.
Option 1: Put Kassian on IR and sign Sceviour
- For this to work, the Oilers would have to be prepared to put goaltender Alex Stalock (myocarditis) on LTIR.
- Assuming Sceviour would be signed for a league-minimum $750,000 salary, the Oilers could have Kassian and Josh Archibald (also myocarditis) on IR and waive Kyle Turris and William Lagesson to set their season-opening roster of 13 forwards, eight defencemen and two goalies.
- To get even closer to maximizing their pool, they could waive Sceviour — or another league-minimum player like Brendan Perlini or Tyler Benson — and replace him with someone on an entry-level deal with a slightly higher cap hit.
Option 2: Put Kassian on IR and don’t sign Sceviour
- Everything from the first option applies here except in Sceviour’s place is someone making equal or less money.
- Lagesson makes $725,000, less than the 2021-22 league minimum. Keeping him on the season-opening roster in place of another, more expensive player would be creating a smaller LTIR pool.
Option 3: Don’t put Kassian on IR and sign Sceviour
- Keeping Kassian on the active roster likely means Stalock’s season-opening placement is on IR rather than LTIR, too. The Oilers would want to exceed the $81.5 million salary cap by as close to $4.167 million (Klefbom’s cap hit) as possible.
- Lagesson would be on waivers, and so would at least one forward.
- But another forward must be dropped from the roster under this scenario. As with the previous examples, that player would logically be Turris.
Option 4: Don’t put Kassian on IR and don’t sign Sceviour
- Everything from Option 3 applies except some players who would have been on the outs can stay on the roster.
- Only one of Lagesson, Perlini, Benson and McLeod would need to be waived or demoted. Lagesson would make the most sense because of the surplus of defencemen and because keeping him on the roster decreases the LTIR pool by $25,000 compared with losing Perlini or Benson.
- Turris would still have to be waived. Again, he’d be in line for a call-up once Broberg is demoted. Stalock and Archibald could go on LTIR then, too.
Option 5: Avoid waiving Turris
- One way is to keep Kassian on the active roster, not sign Sceviour, waive one of Benson or Perlini (or even Shore) and Lagesson and temporarily demote McLeod. However, doing this would give the Oilers a 22-man roster and leave them more than $467,000 short of maximizing their LTIR pool.
- Regardless of how you cut it, that’s a lot of money not to be able to access. Waiving Turris — and seeing whether they can recall him later — appears to be the best course of action for the Oilers unless another player is acquired.
BLH’s Thoughts: “unless another player is acquired.”… Key phrase to keep in mind considering Bob Stauffer’s Brett Connolly (CHI) trade scenario he threw out this week.
The most likely scenario is the 3rd one where Kassian stays off of the IR and sceviour is signed I believe. Kyle Turris started camp off like a bat out of Hell, but it tailed off a bit as the preseason games wore on and the quality of competition got better.
Preseason report:
Skinner: .938 sv%
Koskinen: .933 sv%
Smith: .965 sv%— Mathew Panchyshyn (@mathewjdp) October 10, 2021
Oilersnation
How much of Jesse Puljujarvi’s emergence is a surprise?
- On Oilers Now (during the October 6 show with insider John Shannon, at the 2:43 timestamp), when discussing how Puljujarvi is beginning to look like an impact player, host Bob Stauffer asked John Shannon if he saw this coming or not. Shannon responded with, “If anybody does, they’re lying.”
- Even dating back to the 2017-18 season, Puljujarvi excelled when he was given a chance to play beside McDavid. With Puljujarvi and McDavid on the ice together, the Oilers controlled 63% of the goals, 59% of the expected goals, and 61% of the high danger chances.
- His numbers were obviously superior when alongside McDavid as opposed to without him. But the impressive thing to note here is that it also went the other way around; McDavid’s numbers improved when Puljujarvi was on the ice.
- One of the primary reasons McDavid performs so well with him is due to how Puljujarvi has always been an intelligent defensive player and excels in disrupting plays.
- McDavid benefits quite a lot from Puljujarvi helping to cover up his defensive mistakes, alongside his tenacious forechecking and constant engagement in puck battles.
- Their chemistry was not only evident in their on-ice stats, but also production-wise. Puljujarvi scored at a rate of 1.17 5v5 goals per hour with McDavid that season.
- In 2021, Puljujarvi’s goals per hour with McDavid was 1.09 (compared to 1.17 in 17-18), and the duo had a 55% goal share and a 55% expected goal share (compared to 62 GF% and 59 xGF% in 17-18).
- It was always premature to consider him a “bust” or give up on him, especially considering how young he was, the hip injuries that impacted his play in 18-19, and how he was consistently misplayed… That’s never going to be a comfortable environment for a young, developing player like him.
- Probably the biggest blemish from Todd McLellan during his tenure in Edmonton was his deployment of Puljujarvi. The chemistry and potential with McDavid were always there.
BLH’s Thoughts: None of his emergence is a surprise, but the local media is “happy to be wrong” these days after lambasting Puljujarvi once he decided to head back to Finland to play in the “beer leagues” over there. They should all be lining up, saying sorry, and shaking his hand when the media is allowed back in the dressing room, but instead they’ll end up asking him some shitty question about the fans hating on him and or something related to Jari Kurri or Esa Tikkanen.
Speaking of Tikk,
"Puljujärvi never really had what it takes to make it in #Oilers. He is a very skilled player but in Edmonton you just need to have something more." – Esa Tikkanen
Happy Birthday Tikk! Jesse had quite the birthday gift for you.
— BLH (Edmonton Oilers Enthusiast} (@BeerLeagueHeroe) January 25, 2021
Reckon Tik’s tune has changed since he said that?…
Calling the league he's in a senior/beer league is bogus, but it's a big, big step down. I don't think he's going to be a player in the NHL, Dusty. He's found his level and he'll make a good living there.
— Robin Brownlee (@Robin_Brownlee) November 1, 2019
“He’s playing Div III in Finland because the last coach only played him 20 games with McDavid. Lol.” https://t.co/IXqNFVdCnr
— Rob Tychkowski (@Rob_Tychkowski) February 26, 2020
One of Bob Stauffer’s favorite saying is, “Everybody has a democratic right to be wrong” or something to that effect. Well, the Edmonton media are enjoying that right to its full extent now and I’m guessing they will be for a long time…
Say what you will about Ken Holland, but none of this is possible without him and I’m very thankful he didn’t trade Jesse for pennies on the dollar.
With all that in mind, selfishly I would like to get a Puljujarvi Oilers jersey and I’m concerned about doing that because he’s going to have a helluva season here and there’s a good chance he’s going to get a very healthy raise. My hopes is that we don’t have to go down that uncomfortable path again…
Spector’s Hockey
THE ATHLETIC: In his latest mailbag segment, Eric Stephens was asked about the chances of the Anaheim Ducks trading John Gibson in the near future.
- At one time, Stephens said he was certain Gibson would be with the Ducks to start the 2022-23 season. “I’m not nearly as sure now.”
NEW YORK POST: Larry Brooks reports Alexandar Georgiev hopes to put last season’s disappointing performance behind him. The 25-year-old Ranger goalie was the subject of offseason trade speculation but he denied rumors claiming he asked to be traded.
THE ATHLETIC: Scott Powers expects the Chicago Blackhawks will place forward Alex Nylander on waivers. He cites a league source saying he’s heard the Arizona Coyotes might put in a claim if Nylander hits the waiver wire.
SPORTSNET: Eric Engels recently speculated the Montreal Canadiens could turn to waivers or trade to bolster their injury-depleted blueline.
