Big rumour day for the Oilers eh? I love waking up on the other side of the planet to rumors of trade! Gives me a bit more time to digest what’s being said online.
Here’s what I’ve read online so far:
Obviously, those are taken from within the Facebook groups but Gruninger (a former writer here at BLH) is quite good at reporting all Oilers-related things on Facebook and I guess this Trevor Boz character is said to have some “connections” but when I asked my own trusted sources, they said this:
“Oilers like Halak but they don’t feel he’s consistent enough for the 4.5 cap hit. Plus, Winnipeg is willing to retain salary. They like Hellebuyck and Hutchinson. Pavalec is believed to be done in Wpg. Edm is VERY interested.”
Halak is under contract for another year @$4.5M after this one, so unless the Isles are willing to take on some Mark Fayne or Benoit Pouliot… I don’t see this going down. That being said, the Oilers could do a whole lot worse than a Talbot/Halak tandem going into 2017/18.
It was Jim Matheson, I believe, who also threw out the idea of the Oilers looking at Pavalec too, no? So who is one to believe?
Pavalec is a UFA at season’s end and at the moment he’s not exactly lighting up the AHL with the Manitoba Moose (5W 4L 2T, 3.17 GAA, .906 SV%). Is this really a player that is considered an upgrade on Jonas Gustavsson?
What about giving Nick Ellis a shot to see how he does?
As for Duchene:
“Duchene is bigger and he can produce whether he’s bottom 6 or top 6. Oilers like him alot. Ebs body language says what everyone thinks. Of course hell say he wants to stay to appease the fans.”
Personally, I would never put a player like Duchene in the bottom 6 unless he was playing for an all-star team like Team Canada. This is a player who makes the same money as Eberle and has the speed to match McDavid. Plus have you seen what he can do in the corners? Best tight-turns in the game bar none AND he can play right-wing! Don’t forget about the goals… THE GOALS!!!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SsvF54YGvH0
This isn’t new news to me. I’ve been told that Brandon Davidson will be left exposed for the expansion draft, so if the Oilers can pick up a vital piece in the drive for the playoffs by trading him, so be it.
What that piece might be? All I know is that the Oilers are still on the search for a PP QB (preferably RH’d) and they’re not picky as to if that is a forward or a defenseman (We’ve talked about Cam Fowler and Michael Stone in the past). Also, as Bob Stauffer teased a couple of days ago on Oilers Now!, the Oilers are still looking to get bigger (Stauffer says it differently though, “I wouldn’t be surprised if…”).
Is that the writing on the wall for Jordan Eberle? There’d be a lot of “diehards” out there that would welcome that, eh?
What do you think about these latest rumors? Let us know in the comments below!
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As the Oilers roll along, here’s your end of the year update on the Oilers as a treat on this cheerful winter day…
(1) Injuries or the Lack Thereof..
Although the Oilers have had repeated injuries, it’s worth noting McDavid, Draisaitl, Lucic, Eberle, Maroon, RNH, Klefbom, Larsson have not missed a single game this year.
Sekera has missed one due to injury, Letestu and Kassian sat a couple, but overall, no “Top 6” forwards have missed time with injury, and other than Sekera’s flu, and Russell’s 6 missed games, no Top-4 defenders have either.
For once, the injuries have hit our depth (Nurse, Davidson, Gryba, Fayne, Pitlick, Pakarinen, Hendricks) rather than our key players. It’s a nice change of pace
(2) The Goaltending
Cam Talbot is trucking along with 33 of 36 games played, with a .919 save percentage on a league average of .914. This puts him on pace to start 75 games. Last year, no goalie in the league played more than 68.
Here’s hoping for 2017 that either Gustavsson can start to play a few, Ellis or LB can step up, or that management trades for a backup for the love of god before Talbot gets injured or starts to slip due to overuse.
(3) Scoring
RNH is starting to pick it up since he’s been used as a hybrid winger-center alongside Draisaitl, so here’s our end of the year pro-rated scoring and rating (based purely on points) for the Top-6:
McDavid: 93 points (Up, although Crosby make take the scoring title)
Draisaitl: 71 points (Up, hard to knock those totals from your 2C unless you’re Pittsburgh)
Lucic: 55 points (Even, on pace to put up exactly what he usually does)
Eberle: 55 points (Down, this is still some underperforming on his part, but he’s been stepping up lately, so he might go back to even)
Maroon: 39 (Even, this isn’t his point per game pace of last year, but 40 points out of your 2nd line winger is ok performance)
RNH: 39 (Down, this is not a $6mil a year performance level, but he’s been doing better since being put on a line with Drai, here’s hoping he continues trending to even and can break 50 for the year)
Amusing note: Both 1st line wingers have the same points, both 2nd line wingers have the same points…
(4) The Russell Question..
First point: Sekera is the best D on this team this year, and his 17 points in 36 (this is better than RNH and Maroon) make that clear. Let’s just leave that there.
Should the Oilers sign Russell now? I know people love him, so let’s look at all the numbers, stats and not stats.
Russell was an offensive defender in the past, with numbers in the .32-.43 range. There’s a definite slide there we should note, it may indicate he’s starting to lose a step offensively, as the opportunities to score are there with this club.
ATOI: Russell is 2nd on the team at 21:29, Sekera leads with 21:44, Klefbom has 21:23, Larsson 20:10.
So he’s holding his weight here, good enough.
Blocks: Yep, still leads the club with 89, then Larsson with 69 and Sekera with 61.
Hits: Larsson actually leads our club by a large margin with 113, then Gryba with 76, Nurse with 60… Russell’s not doing much on this front. But for everyone saying we need Gryba or Nurse so we have someone physical on the back end, well, pay more attention to Larsson, he’s hammering someone over 3 times per game, he IS our physical defender.
So, without getting into fancy stats, we can see Russell is good shot-blocker, not overly physical, but logs solid ice time, even if he isn’t doing much offensively with it.
Ok. Now, I know a lot of people don’t trust stats, so let me put these in perspective…
3rd pairing guys who get sheltered usage tend to have high stat numbers for CORSI (see why Schultz looks so good). So, we see Davidson, Benning, Gryba and Nurse looking good here, and they should, they have the most sheltered usage. Klefbom, who spent time on the 3rd pairing, also seems pretty even.
Now, we know Sekera, Larsson and Russell play the hard minutes. Sekera, no matter how we use him, manages to more or less break even, hard to knock him at all, and his offense helps him.
So, let’s compare the most similar two guys, Larsson and Russell. Both are used for heavy defensive minutes, have played together as partners and are used together on the PK, and both have similar offensive totals.
Larsson: -2.6 and -2.3 for stats. Russell: -7.3 and -4.9 for stats.
Look, I know people hate stats, and talk about how good the Oilers look when Russell is there. I get it. But, I’m just going to say part of this is due to the fact the Oilers have had some VERY bad defenders in the past.
We started the year with Davidson on the shelf, so we used Nurse, Benning and Gryba on the 3rd pairing, and have continued that since Nurse went on the shelf right before Davidson got back. Davidson might be ok on a 2nd pairing, none of the rest of these guys are. So Russell looks really good compared to us using a 3rd pairing guy there.
However, Russell is not that good of a defender. He just isn’t. There’s a reason he was still unsigned. He is an average 2nd pairing defender, and his performance on the Oilers really hasn’t been that good by any number beyond shot blocking. The fact is he’s an average 2nd pairing guy who looks really good here because we haven’t been using even “average” guys until PC took over.
What does this mean? It means you do not worry about signing him right now. If he signs somewhere else in the off-season, you know what, he’s replaceable, because PC is actually a competent NHL GM and he can find someone on the same level. Also, the Oilers need someone with more offensive potential on that 2RHD slot, there’s no secret, our D scoring is still below average and would be ugly without Sekera pulling the unit together.
If we’re going to protect 4 D, you protect Davidson and not Russell, the guy you didn’t need to sign.
This is not to say the Oilers won’t bring Russell back. If there’s no better 2RHD options (and there may not be), then great, go ahead. But you don’t hamstring the team and lose Davidson just to bring back an average defender, it’s not necessary.
(5) Player Development
Ok, so right now we’ve got three lines we can write in with pen…
Lucic-McDavid-Eberle
Maroon-Draisaitl-RNH
Hendricks-Letestu-Kassian
That leaves us with one line that’s a major question mark, this one:
Pouliot-Caggiula-Puljujarvi
Now, none of these are overly physical guys, they’re all skill guys, not defensive experts. So, how are they performing skill wise?
Pouliot: .22ppg – ok, this is in the toilet compared to his last two seasons with the Oilers, and 14:40 ice time…
Puljujarvi: .32ppg and 11:42 ice time. Nothing great for scoring, but hard to develop with that ice time…
Caggiula: 41.8% on faceoffs, .26ppg, 13:04 ice time. Nothing much going on here either..
What I’m going to say is this. This entire line should just be sent to the AHL. Yes, this is an indictment on Pouliot, but for Caggiula and Puljujarvi, these are guys who are expected to be Top-6 caliber, and 20 minutes a night ripping up the AHL are far more beneficial to them than being our de-facto 4th line. Let them go there, along with Pouliot (if he’s claimed on waivers, great), and get some time there…
So, who do we replace them with then?…
Slepyshev-Lander-Beck is who
We’re looking at a 10-13min 4th line for usage. None of these guys are projected to be a top-6 NHL forward, but they’re ideal for 4th line usage, and most importantly, when sent to the AHL they did their job without complaining, and did it well.
The LW: Slepyshev, 6’2 187lbs, had 4 in 15 at the NHL level, and has 7 in 6 since he was sent down. Slepy had a -2 CORSI, and .27ppg in his 15 NHL games, this is just fine for a 4LW.
The C: Lander, 6’0 184lbs, had 3 in 16 at the NHL level, and has 16 in 11 since he was sent down. In his 16 games this year he was 57.1% on faceoffs, his CORSI was nasty (-9.1%) but that’s a factor of his extreme defensive usage like Letestu (30% ozone start only), and he put up .19ppg in that usage.
The RW: Beck, 6’2 203lbs, has 0 in 3 NHL games but he’s had an average of 5 minutes ice time.. He tore up the AHL as its leading scorer with 30 in 19 games, and has handled 4th line minutes for the Predators before.
Am I saying Slepy-Lander-Beck is a better line than Pouliot-Caggiula-Puljujarvi? No, I’m not. What I am saying is they’ll win more faceoffs and probably give us the same level of performance, maybe even a little bit more because they have more NHL experience and may gel together on a “cast-offs” line.
What I’m saying is using Caggiula and Puljujarvi here is a waste of development, they’d be far better served getting 20mins+ a night tearing the AHL to shreds, and “The Replacements” can do the same job at least as good without harming anyone’s development.
Plus we save a year of Puljujarvi’s UFA status keeping him under 40 games, and we save a few bucks of cap space sending Pouliot down.
(6) Last But Not Least: The Oilers and the Playoffs…
Yes, it looks like the Oilers might make it, and have a solid chance at it.
So, do they go for rentals..
We know they could use a veteran depth forward, preferably a right-shot C for the bottom-6, and maybe a 2RHD with powerplay ability. And clearly a backup goalie.
The answer is: Only if they really figure they have a shot at the West final, or if the prices are cheap.
I’d say a reasonable compromise would be something like Vrbata and Stone from Arizona at the deadline, and Miller from Vancouver. But I wouldn’t overpay for any, and all are true rentals, pending UFAs.
Happy 2017 folks, from the only group of people who are happy about 2016, Oilers fans!
**Thanks to Micah for this post! He’s not on the Twitter machine but you can catch him in the Oilers Facebook groups with his updates quite often.**
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The Oilers are off to a great start, second in the Pacific Division and 5 points clear of a playoff spot but is this anything more than a McDavid fueled hot start?
A good indicator of whether a team as a whole is over achieving is to look at a larger sample size than wins or team +/-. The largest data set available is the team’s Corsi For %. This indicates whether a team has possession of the puck more than their opponents. The Oilers rank 11th in the NHL in CF% and 3rd in the Pacific Division. This shows that the Oilers are not winning games by luck, there is real improvement over the teams 48.9% 2015-16 season which ranked 12th worst in the NHL.
Among smaller but also reliable data sets the Oilers also show well with:
–51.16% Fenwick For % (11th NHL) ,
–51.91% Goals For % (12th NHL)
–50.87% Shots For % (10th NHL) and
–50.1% Scoring Chances For%
There are only 7 teams in the NHL to have a positive number in every category listed above and the Oilers are one of them. Combine these with the fact that the Oilers have an average shooting percentage and average save percentage and you have a team that is performing well across the board without running hot, unsustainable goaltending or lucky shooting.
Individually let’s start with the new captain McDavid, he’s co-leader for the scoring race in the NHL and providing consistent, elite offense with a rotating set of wingers. He’s been excellent as expected and his contribution to the Oilers position in the standings shouldn’t and won’t be ignored. Past the obvious impact of the captain is there room for optimism?
The Oilers latest winning streak is a great example, it has come at a time where the offense has not been coming in piles for McDavid. Despite this, the team has been able to come from behind to tie and win games, pushing teams around and grinding out wins along the way when finesse alone isn’t cutting it. There is real depth to this team (including defensively) and it is really showing of late.
Leon Draisaitl has been fantastic despite playing a lot of minutes with 3rd line quality wingers, putting up 1st line quality stats.
Patrick Maroon has continued to show himself to be a capable top 6 winger on the score sheet.
Milan Lucic, despite his detractors, has been putting up good numbers and is 3rd on the team in scoring.
Mark Letestu has proven me entirely wrong as a capable power play specialist along with killing penalties and centering a 4th line that is a 5 on 5 force.
Zack Kassian continues to Kass and if he were to find a little luck from the officials might have 12-15 points from a depth role.
Matthew Benning has been fantastic, building on the Brandon Davidson happy surprise of 15-16 and giving the Oilers a very usable right shot defender.
Adam Larsson is a capable right shot 1st pairing defender.
Darnell Nurse had been very good prior to injury and has a complete skill set to go along with a maturing positional understanding of the game.
Andrej Sekera has been everything the Oilers thought they were getting when they signed him; capable and reliable in all situations.
Oscar Klefbom has been up and down but is coming off of a major period of long-term recovery and has proven every bit capable as a top 4 defender.
Cam Talbot has been a legitimate starting goaltender providing dependable regular starts.
Contributing further to that depth are a few players that have yet to contribute to full effect this season that we know have the potential to do more should the performance of others slide. The entire unit recently used for long stretches as a top line of Ryan Nugent-Hopkins, Benoit Pouliot and Jordan Eberle are underperforming based on their abilities and could very well have a rebound in 2017.
Jesse Puljuajrvi is a highly talented rookie that has been in and out of the lineup. He is the youngest player in the NHL, was and was regarded in his draft year as a better prospect than Leon Draisaitl was and was in the conversation around this time last year to unseat Auston Matthews as the #1 pick. Arguably his rookie season has been as or more successful than Draisaitl’s was and he has the potential to break out as early as the second half of this season.
The Oilers are legitimately outplaying their opponents more often than not and although as Oiler fans are all too aware key injuries can derail a season (as they can any teams) there is no reason to believe that the team is anything but for real.
Refreshed and recharged the Edmonton Oilers defeated the Tampa Bay Lightning 3-2 in the shootout at Rogers Place on Saturday night following their first three-day break of the season. It was a much needed win after dropping a 3-2 decision to the Columbus Blue Jackets last Tuesday. The Oilers were spent by the time the time the Jackets rolled into town and went about business, knocking off a team that had played five games in the previous seven days.
Playoff teams take advantage of a beaten down opponent. Now, there are no easy games in the NHL, but when you are facing a worn down team on the second-half of back-to-backs with some key injuries (i.e. Steven Stamkos and Nikita Kucherov), you need to win that game. And the Oilers did just that, improving to 16-12-5 for 37 points on the year and moved into a tie for second place in the Pacific Division with the Anaheim Ducks.
If the Oilers are going to become a playoff team this year, they need to win those types of games on a consistent basis. They had a great opportunity to put some points in the bank in late November with four straight games against three lowest seeded teams in the NHL; the Colorado Avalanche, a home-and-home with the Arizona Coyotes and the Toronto Maple Leafs. Most Oilers fans expected the team to go 3-1-0, possibly even 4-0-0 during that stretch. Instead, they posted a disappointing 1-2-1 record, including consecutive losses to the Coyotes.
Edmonton doesn’t exactly have an easy road ahead for the rest of this month or through January and February. But if the Oilers can keep pace in the playoff hunt over the next two months, then they really have a chance to do some damage is in March when they play 11 of 13 games at home. Whether it’s a team that is below them in the standings or battling injuries like the Lightning the other night, the Oilers have to find a way to get two points.
This is still a “growth team” as Head Coach Todd McLellan likes to say, and there will be bumps in the road. The Oilers are not going come away with two points in every “winnable game” this year, but if they beat the bottom feeders on a semi-regular basis, it will take some of the pressure off games like tonight when they take on the St. Louis Blues (17-11-4) on the road.
Thank you for reading my blog! Feel free to leave a comment below or connect with me on Twitter @EricJFriesen.
Ryan Mantha is a 20 year old 6’5″ 225lb right-handed shooting defenseman for the Niagara Ice Dogs and speculation has it that the Oilers could be looking to sign the Ice Dogs captain.
Now as Oilers fans, we all know that these rumors come from all sorts of nooks and crannies, and this one just happened to spurn on that boards over at Hockey’s Future. You know me, anything to get the inside scoop on something Oilers-related, right?
Anyways, I guess the tipping point was Mantha following the Oilers on Twitter today… Thanks to my friend David for pointing this out to me 🙂
Let’s talk a bit more about the nephew of former NHL defenseman, Moe Mantha.
RYAN MANTHA
Date of birth: 6/18/1996 Place of birth: Clarkston, Michigan Ht: 6’5″ Wt: 225 lbs Shoots: Right Position: D
Ryan Mantha was originally drafted by the New York Rangers in the 2014 draft in the 4th round (104th overall). He wasn’t signed and went back into the draft but subsequently wasn’t picked and is now a free agent to sign where he pleases. This season he attended the Buffalo Sabres training camp but couldn’t catch on and was released back to junior to play for Niagara of the Ontario Hockey League.
As you can see, his production has gone up exponentially for the Ice Dogs this year. At nearly a point-per-game, Mantha is showing an offensive element that was previously untapped. Here’s what is being said about him online:
Mantha has good bloodlines and impressive size. Handles the puck well and makes a strong breakout pass. Uses his reach and strength to defend. He needs to work on his transition and overall mobility as well as improve his physical play as he comes off as somewhat soft. (November 2013)
Mantha does play the game smart though. He is poised with the puck and is great at finding open teammates up the ice. He has a strong outlet pass from his own zone. His skating has been somewhat of an issue, but nothing a little determination won’t fix. He has a blast from the point. Mantha also has great reach, as would be expected since he’s 6’5″.
Has been man-sized since he was 16, and was converted to a dman due to his size and temperament. Has a big hard shot, and is good at getting the puck to his mates. He will need more lateral ability to close better, but he does a fine job of clearing the front and protecting teammates. Was named to the USA Developmental team playing in the Ivan Hlinka Tournament. Was named to the U.S. World Junior A roster for the Junior A Challenge.
So there you have it, I don’t know if there’s any substance to the HFBoards speculation (there often isn’t) but this is an intriguing player and one that the Oilers need in their system. Chiarelli has had some pretty good luck signing players out of college (Benning, Caggiula, Ellis), why not try an overager out of the OHL?
