Well Oilers fans a second round of cuts is coming. By the time Monday morning rolls around we should see a vastly different looking group of players vying for a spot on the Oilers NHL roster and with that the Bakersfield Condors should start to take more shape.
Of course this is all hearsay and we won’t truly know until the cuts are announced but I’ve seen some chatter online regard specific names that are on their way down to Bakersfield. Hat tip to KD.
The rumored names:
- Forwards: Greg Chase, Ryan Hamilton, Kale Kessy, Jujhar Khaira, Mitch Moroz, Tyler Pitlick, Kyle Platzer, Bogdan Yakimov
- Defence: Martin Gernat, Brad Hunt, Joey LaLeggia, David Musil, Jordan Oesterle, Dillon Simpson
- Goaltenders: Eetu Laurikainen, Laurent Brossoit
All of these players were long shots to make the Oilers this year apart from Tyler Pitlick but his training camp has not been amazing. It’s been pretty piss poor to be honest. He looks slower than he used to and more timid. I mean he’s probably afraid of getting hurt again but this hockey not lawn bowling.
So this leaves us with a small group of players looking to move from Group B to Group A, the players that Head Coach Todd McLellan was alluding to earlier in the week. This small batch of prospects include Anton Slepyshev, Iiro Pakarinen, Andrew Miller, Brandon Davidson, and Darnell Nurse. There are
At the moment the depth chart is looking like this (Players in red are what I consider the players that are fighting for a spot on the team):
Pouliot – Nugent-Hopkins – Eberle
Hall – McDavid – Purcell
Draisaitl – Lander – Yakupov
Hendricks – Letestu – Korpikoski
Klinkhammer – Miller – Gazdic
Slepyshev – – Pakarinen
Sekera – Fayne
Klefbom – Schultz
Reinhart – Gryba
Nikitin – Ference
Davidson – Nurse
Cam Talbot
Ben Scrivens
Anders Nilsson
The forwards look pretty set. I reckon Klinkhammer is out of a job with the arrival of Draisaitl and Korpikoski and Gazdic will be kept around for “special occasions”. I don’t see Anton Slepyshev or Iiro Pakarinen making the opening night roster unless Yakupov or Purcell are injured. So for me they’re on the “A” list of call-ups if an injury does happen.
On defence we’ve got quite a different story going down. Griffin Reinhart and Eric Gryba are looking pretty darn good for a 3rd pairing shut down duo. Nikita Nikitin, despite making the one pass the other team didn’t intercept, and Andrew Ference are not looking like a great pairing. In fact I think one or both should be shipped out to Boston as I wrote here.
Brandon Davidson from what I recall had a good night in Winnipeg but I can’t see it being enough to stay with the team unless two other dmen are moved. Darnell Nurse seems to be hitting a bit of a wall here and there are still a few wrinkles in his game that will keep him from making the Oilers on opening night. He has all the physical tools but from what I’ve seen I reckon he rushes the puck a bit too much and finds himself around the other team’s goal line a bit too much. Look the kid is going to be an Edmonton Oiler soon enough but at this point in time I see him marinating in Bakersfield for a little while until Chiarelli can get the D sorted a bit better.
Speaking of Darnell Nurse, have you seen Ryan Robinson’s new Oilers Vlog!
That guy sure has a lot of Oilers swag but I can guarantee you that he doesn’t have this new 16-bit Moog shirt that was just released!
Thanks for reading everyone and let me know how you feel about the rumored cuts coming up in the comments section below!
Take Care!
BLH
