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Armchair GM, Around the Oilogosphere, Beer League Hero, Edmonton Oilers, NHL, Prospects, Rumors, Trades

Around the Oilogosphere – April 26th Edition – Oilers Getting Geared up for Filthy Bruce? Looking for Hendrix v2.0, Draft Lottery Scenarios, and NEW NHL Trade Rumors!

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COACHING

Are we at the point to where it’s safe to say that the Oilers will be hiring Trent Yawney as one of the new assistant coaches for next season? I’d put the odds in favor of yes just simply due to his previous working/playing relationship with current head coach Todd McLellan.

But I’ve got a new theory I want to throw out there. I believe it was Bob Stauffer throwing out Paul MacLean’s name recently in a minor rant on the status of the Oilers’ head coaching evaluation. If I’m not mistaken BS was mentioning hiring assistant coaches who’ve had experience as head coaches in the past (Like Yawney with the Blackhawks and MacLean with the Senators) and this triggered a thought in my head and it has something to do with this article’s featured image.

Paul MacLean worked with Todd McLellan in Detroit under Mike Babcock, Trent Yawney worked under Todd McLellan for 3 seasons in San Jose alongside Jay Woodcroft. So we can establish a connection there.

But there’s another connection.

Yawney and MacLean both worked under Bruce Boudreau in Anaheim for 1 season during the 2015/16 season. The Ducks were 1st in the Pacific and 3rd in the Western Conference. They lost out in the 1st round that year to the Predators.

Minnesota recently fired their GM and generally, a new GM wants to hire his own coach. Is Boudreau on thin ice in Minny? Could he be let go in favor of somebody with fresh ideas?

Would the Oilers hire MacLean and Yawney this year as safety guards in case the season got off to a slow start? Meaning if the Oilers wanted to fire Todd McLellan they’d have two qualified coaches already on the bench to take over and maybe Boudreau doesn’t get his pink slip this year but next, then he just slides on over to Edmonton and into a familiar working environment.

Stauffer has been talking about Boudreau as of recent on Oilers Now…

GETTING SOME GLUE INTO THE LINEUP

This from Darren Dreger during his appearance on a Buffalo WGR 550 show called, The Instigators,

You look at the Edmonton Oilers and how they missed a glue guy in that dressing room like Matty Hendricks.

I see Matt Calvert being somewhat similar in terms of what he brings. He’s healthier, so physically speaking he’s going to be able to contribute on a higher level than maybe Matt Hendricks can.

There’s going to be a strong market for Matt Calvert. He’s going to get paid. He’s going to get a decent increase in his salary. And if he’s not good enough for John Tortorella, off the top of my head I can probably name 15 teams that would have an interest in the type of game that Matt Calvert brings to the table.

Now those are 3 separate quotes from the same appearance but I ordered them in the way displayed on purpose.

Matt Calvert is a player that the Oilers should absolutely stay away from. He’s never healthy for one (averages about 50-55 games a year), he’s only good for about 25 pts a year for two, and if he’s getting more than Zack Kassian, that’s a problem, for three.

Dreger compares him to Hendricks and that’s madness in my opinion.

From a points perspective, maybe Hendricks and Calvert are in the same ballpark but nowhere else are they comparable on the ice…

We know that Matt Hendricks is a guy that’ll go through a brick wall for his teammates and often tries, right. I think part of Aaron Ekblad is still stuck behind the net from that time he wall-papered him in Edmonton. Hendrick’s 123 hits in 60 games whilst averaging just over 9 minutes a game puts Calvert to shame. The Columbus Blue Jacket was getting a bit more than 13 minutes TOI/gp this season and could only manage 61 hits and 24pts in 69 games. Calvert had 1 fight this year, Hendricks had 5.

I can’t speak to what Calvert is like off the ice but that’s only half the battle. You can be a good guy in the dressing room (good guy, tries hard) but if you want guys to follow your lead, you have to show it on the ice too and I’ve never heard Matt Calvert’s name in the same sentence as the words “glue guy” until now.

He’s simply not gritty enough. He doesn’t block enough shots. He doesn’t do enough of the little things and the more I think about it, it sounds like Dreger is doing Calvert a favor by putting his name out there in the same vein as Hendricks to try and drive up some interest…

Besides, the Oilers have Drake Caggiula, who in my mind is already on his way to becoming a grittier Matt Calvert-type anyhow. The Drake had 12 goals, 20 pts and was 2nd on the team in hits with 147.

But if the Oilers WERE looking to add some energy to their bottom 6 via the UFA market to push the skilled guys up the line-up, what about these fellas? Not only are they cheap but they’re fast skaters and disciplined.

Tim Schaller – C/W – (BOS) – 12g, 10a, 132 hits and played 82 games this year. (775k)
Tommy Wingels – W – (BOS/CHI) – 179 hits but only 45 PIMs w/17pts. (750k)
Lance Bouma – W – (CHI) – 132 hits in 53gp and only 36 PIMs. ($1M)

If you want to move the price point up a bit, there are players like Jay Beagle (would be great for the PK), Antoine Roussel (mega-pest!), and Blake Comeau (another great character option for the PK).

Personally, I don’t have any problems with the Oilers NOT adding an energy player to the bottom 6 of their lineup and I don’t think that hitting necessarily means energy either. Watching Tampa Bay and seeing their speedy forwards zip up and down the lineup also adds energy.

At the moment, this is how the Oilers bottom six appears:

Lucic-Strome-Puljujarvi
Caggiula-Khaira-Kassian

Slepy I don’t think is returning so I didn’t pencil him in there.

What I think we’ll see come opening night is this bottom six:

Khaira-Strome-Aberg
Caggiula-New Guy-Kassian

You know Lucic and Puljujarvi are moving up. I’m not 100% on Aberg and I would like to see Kassian in that 3LW role because I think he’s got the skill to play there but not the trust from the coach. But that 4th line has the real potential to be your traditional buzzsaw line, right? Lots of grit and speed there.

If the Oilers could sign/trade for a player or two, I’d like them to emulate the Vegas franchise a bit there and go for speed, tenacity, and experience.

My options: Derek Ryan or Jay Beagle. Both affordable, RH’d, and experienced. And if I had my way, I’d sign them both and sort things out after. Maybe move Strome to the wing and make Aberg the 13th forward.

OILERS NEWS

Kris Russell no longer welcome in Edmonton? Huh?! – it’s the age of the Twitter mob, and if a dedicated mob of zealots makes a big enough and angry enough noise, it can quite easily down out the more reasonable majority.

What a Draft Lottery win would do for the Edmonton Oilers – No organization has been gifted more No. 1 overall picks for Edmonton, and it is fair to question the culture that this has produced.

What to expect when you’re expecting to win the draft lottery – Here’s Lowetide’s latest mock if the Oilers finish No. 9.

Will Edmonton Oilers retain Todd McLellan as coach? It’s not a sure thing after the meltdown of 2017-18 – Is Todd McLellan a bad coach, or is he a good coach who had a bad year?

Oilers Goaltending Depth Chart for 2018-19 – The recent rumors around the Edmonton Oilers potentially signing Mikko Koskinen brings forward some interesting questions about the goaltending depth chart heading into 2018-19.

NHL RUMORS

Central Division Offseason Primer: No. of Contracts, Cap Hit, Draft Picks, UFAs and RFAs

Dreger | There will be strong market for Calvert

NHL Rumors: Minnesota Wild and the St. Louis Blues

NHL Rumors: John Tavares – Isles, Leafs, Sharks, Knights and Avs

Friedman looks ahead to NHL draft lottery

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Around the Oilogosphere, Beer League Hero, Edmonton Oilers, NHL, Podcast, Rumors, Trades

Around the Oilogosphere – April 24th Edition – Mikko Koskinen, Oilers/Hurricanes Trade Proposal, and Rumblings on the Oilers Coaching Front!

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It looks like the Oilers are going to have some openings in their top 13 as latest reports (unconfirmed) have one of their better penalty-killers heading and one of their more promising youngsters heading to the KHL for next season.

I’m sad to see both players moving on (if the reports are indeed true) but I understand why the club would prefer to. Pakarinen was an excellent foot soldier and worked his ass off on the PK but his AHL offense didn’t translate to the NHL often enough. I always wondered why they wouldn’t use him on that left-wall during the PP. He had a cannon of a shot.

Same goes for Anton Slepyshev. He could blast the biscuit when given the chance but he never was given it. I think in Slepy’s case, he was so inconsistent too. He’d show you what he had every 6 or 7 games but only flashes in the others. I imagine he’s another player who feels let down by the coaching staff after performing so well with Draisaitl and Lucic during the playoffs in 2017.

But the players have to take some responsibility for this past season’s performance and this is one way the GM keeps the team accountable I guess. It also gives him the ability to bring in some new blood to spice things up.

I wonder if the Columbus Blue Jackets will look to shake the roster up a bit this off-season. Maybe a player like Boone Jenner becomes available.

Speaking of shaking loose, the Anaheim Ducks let go long-time assistant coach Trent Yawney. A bit of a shocker but something had to happen in Anaheim after their 1st round bowing out to the San Jose Sharks.

Yawney had been with the Ducks for 7 years and it was in the last 4 years he was in charge of their defense and penalty killing. In that time the Anaheim Ducks had THE BEST penalty kill in the NHL. Numero uno! The Oilers had the 27th best.

He also oversaw the development of key dmen like Cam Fowler, Hampus Lindholm, Sami Vatanen, Josh Manson, Brandon Montour, and to a lesser extent Shea Theodore.

Bob’s right. Yawney does check off a lot of boxes. I hope the Oilers do indeed go after Trent Yawney as an assistant coach to replace Jim Johnson.

Will Jay Woodcroft get replaced is the next question though? It was his PP that ate shite all year whereas the PK improved after McLellan took over. People on the Twitter machine have been throwing out Glen Gulutzan’s name to replace Woody but I’m not for that. Calgary’s PP was pretty horrid in his two seasons with the club but John Shannon said on Oilers Now today that he’d be a good fit for the Oilers and is an excellent communicator.

Either way, the Oilers should bring in someone new to run their PP. Over the last four seasons, it’s ranked 22nd in the NHL and that’s not good enough with the playing personnel on hand.

If that means bringing in Manny Viveiros from Swift Current of the WHL, so be it. If that means overpaying Todd Nelson to come back, so be it. Lastly, IF that means backing up a Brinks truck to Pascal Vincent’s house to get him to leave the Manitoba Moose (Winnipeg Jets AHL affiliate), so be it.

Get. Er. Done Boys!

Just a quick one on Mikko Koskinen.

Jason Gregor and Bob Stauffer are saying that the reported $2.5M per year for two years number that was thrown out by KHL insider and Hockeybuzz writer Aivis Kalniņš is incorrect.

I agree that the number sounds way too high. I’d heard he was making like 1.3M Euros per year but I can’t confirm that. I guess the conversion would make that close to $2M CDN. But anything over $2M would be very risky in my opinion.

This is all predicated on the Finnish goalie signing in Edmonton of course but we don’t know how Koskinen will perform on the smaller ice. He hasn’t played on it since his days in the Islanders organization… So Edmonton should treat lightly here.

I wrote about Koskinen yesterday here.

OILERS NEWS

Who are Peter Chiarelli and Todd McLellan considering for the new Edmonton Oilers bench coach positions

Mikko Koskinen: Good signing or Overpayment?

Four-year Oiler Iiro Pakarinen reported heading for KHL

Oilers & Hurricanes Could Be Perfect Trade Partners

Oilers’ Forward Options for the Draft

Oilers Defense Options for the Draft

2018-19 Oilers: Piecing Together Roster

RFA Profile: Drake Caggiula is still carving out a niche

After heavy hockey sinks like a stone in Pacific, Peter Chiarelli looks to salvage the good ship Oilers

How much more development can Edmonton Oilers expect from Tyler Benson?

NHL RUMORS

NHL Rumors: Edmonton Oilers and the St. Louis Blues

NHL Rumors: Anaheim Ducks – Need To Get Younger, Faster … Do They Look To Trade Corey Perry?

NHL Rumors: New Jersey Devils and the Philadelphia Flyers

NHL Rumors: The Montreal Canadiens Need At Center

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Around the Oilogosphere, Beer League Hero, Edmonton Oilers, NHL, NHL Entry Draft, Prospects, Rumors

Around the Oilogosphere – April 21st Edition – Oilers Coaching Rumors, 2018 NHL Draft Coverage, and Is Drew Doughty Available?

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Now that Glen Gulatzan has been fired by the Calgary Flames, the Oilers can finally complete their NHL all-star team of coaches by adding him to Todd McLellan’s staff. Right? I mean depending on what Barry Trotz, Bruce Boudreau, Alain Vigneault, and Darryl Sutter are doing, the Oilers should probably pass on that potential and scoop up the uber-successful Glen Gulatzan before anything…

I know my boys at the Oilers Live Podcast through their support behind Bill Peters and I’m simply not convinced with him. I mean he hasn’t had a whole lot to work with in Carolina but I still feel like that roster should’ve performed better than it did but most likely it was sabotaged by shite goaltending and potentially a GM that was happy to sit on his hands more often than not.

Tell ya what. If Trotz and Boudreau lose their jobs then they should be immediately considered for the Head coaching position in Edmonton. They are two of the most successful regular season coaches in the history of the NHL. Not only that but if they hire Barry Trotz, that most likely means you get the goalie whisperer, Mitch Korn as well. And if they hire Filthy Bruce, it’s almost a certainty that the team will ascend to becoming a perennial playoff team. Albeit, Stanley Cup not guaranteed.

That said, those were probably the same feelings we had when the Oilers hired Todd McLellan because he had a helluva good history with the Sharks.

Another idea might be to hire Todd Nelson AND Rocky Thompson, two coaches who are probably not going to graduate to head coach in either of their organizations. Detroit in Nelson’s case and Las Vegas/St.Louis in Thompson’s.

Funny thing with those two is they worked together on the same coaching staff in Oklahoma City for the Oilers when they coached the Barons. Gerry Fleming was the other asst. coach.

But Thompson and Nelson are both lauded for their communication skills (something that Trotz has troubles with on the bench according to Alan May) and working with young players. Perhaps it’s time to go away from the experienced NHL coach and cash in on some of these blue-chip coaches that are just waiting for their chance to run an NHL squad.

Changes have to be made though, the disconnect between Todd McLellan and Peter Chiarelli couldn’t get any wider. The fact that McLellan couldn’t get a grip on his special teams and line combinations for nearly the entire season, that he possibly alienated his star players and goaltender 5 games into the year, and the exit meetings w/ players revealed “lack of commitment” on the ice.

If Jared Bednar can take his 40pt team, a team that is far less talented than the Oilers, to the playoffs and McLellan can’t figure out how to get a team’s PP out of the gutter with the best player in the league on his team…

He gone.

One last thing before we get to the links.

In your esteemed opinion, did Milan Lucic forget how to play hockey after Christmas or did the NHL somehow speed up on December 26th?

The reason I ask those two questions is that if you feel the answer to both or either of them is ‘Yes’, you might need to re-visit how you analyze players and you might want to ask yourself if your problem is more to do with Chiarelli and the Larsson trade than Lucic himself.

Cory Schneider, New Jersey’s $6M starting goaltender, went winless from Christmas until the 1st round of the playoffs this year… I feel like that’s a million times worse than the slump Milan Lucic went on but maybe the game simply passed Schneider by and lucky for the Devils they had Keith Kincaid to ride into the playoffs on.

OILERS NEWS

Coaching:

Cult of Hockey – Who are Peter Chiarelli and Todd McLellan considering for the new Edmonton Oilers bench coach positions – With Todd McLellan all but guaranteed to be back as head coach of the Edmonton Oilers, in 2018-19, the task of the General Manager and his Head Coach now turns to the matter of who will flank Mclellan.

Cult of Hockey – Glen Gulutzan to the Edmonton Oilers as an assistant coach? – You can’t have enough strong coaches and it would be excellent for the Oilers to have a coach or two who was capable of leading an NHL team as an asst. coach on the team. So why not Gulutzan?

Edmonton Sun – Edmonton Oilers’ assistant coach likely returning to his former post at the University of Alberta – The ball’s in Oilers GM Peter Chiarelli’s court after end-of-season exit meetings with Herbers and the other assistant coaches as to whether any or all are rehired. If Chiarelli and McLellan want him back, he may choose to stay.

The Draft:

Oilersnation – Love the D – Would you rather have a veteran in their late twenties on the verge of passing through their prime or an 18-year old that you could have under control for close to a decade?

The Hockey Writers – Oilers Options at the 2018 NHL Draft – The NHL Draft Lottery takes place a little over a week from now and the Edmonton Oilers have the ninth-best odds (five percent) of winning the thing. For argument’s sake, let’s say the Oilers are picking ninth. Do they trade the pick? Do they keep it and add a piece for the future? What should the Oilers do with their 2018 first round pick?

NHL RUMORS

Friedman eyes potential offseason NHL changes

McKenzie | Carlson has been bargain for Capitals

NHL Rumors: Los Angeles Kings – Muzzin, Doughty and the Need for Offense and Speed

NHL Rumors: Coaches – Rangers, Stars, Flames, and Hurricanes

NHL Rumors: Dallas Stars and the New York Rangers

NHL Rumors: Vancouver Canucks – Ben Hutton and Sven Baertschi

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Around the Oilogosphere – April 17th Edition – Bode Wilde, Cheering for Hall? Drafting a Smurf, and More News on Ilya Kovalchuk!

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On Lowetide’s show yesterday he had an outstanding prospects scout by the name of Simon Boisvert on and they talked about some of the potential players that the Oilers could select from if they end up keeping the 1st round pick at the draft this year.

Lowetide asked Boisvert for a few candidates that the Oilers might have a choice from and the first name that Boisvert said was Bode Wilde.

Simon Boisvert had this to say about Wilde:

I think he is a superb skater. He’s a defenseman. He has a good build and carries the puck, he has a good shot. This is a guy who can play on the powerplay. So to me, that would be a very very good pick for the Oilers.

Position: Defenseman
Shoots: Right
Height / Weight: 6’2, 195 lbs
Born: January 24th, 2000 | Birmingham, MI
Nation: United States

An American defenseman who played for the u18 USNTDP this season with other top prospects like Oliver Wahlstrom and Joel Farabee as well as the player expected to go 1st overall in 2019, Jack Hughes. Wilde scored 11 goals and added 25 assists this season in 53 games.

Strengths: Outstanding shooter, very physical in front of the net, excellent vision, poise, and skating.

Weaknesses: A bit chaotic, takes chances, poor gap control, inconsistent, tends to go for the big hit more often than should.

NHL Comparison – A smaller version of Dustin Byfuglien

He is ranked more in the 14-20 range by most draft prognosticators and I feel like while Wilde has some very tasty looking strengths to his game, the knock on him is his defensive play in his own zone and his inconsistency.

Taking him at #9 overall would be a tad early. Especially if Quinn Hughes, Adam Boqvist, Noah Dobson, Evan Bouchard, Joel Farabee, or Joe Veleno were available. I’d have zero problems if the Oilers traded down to get him though because he’s definitely got the physical tools to play the game. The defensive limitations can be ironed out with time and good coaching. That said, where there is high risk, there’s usually potential for high reward.

Wilde is committed to Michigan for next season.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r9fqw0mcqMI

OILERS NEWS

Plan C – Is McLellan really willing or able to find the best and brightest to be an assistant coach at the most important position? One that might have a different vision and philosophy as he does? One that could possibly take over as head coach if we get off to another slow start next year? One that could take his job and get the team in a better direction, thus making him look more incompetent that he looks now?

Edmonton Oilers’ top affiliate Bakersfield Condors wind up another underwhelming season – What’s the value of a productive farm system? A modern fan of the Edmonton Oilers could be forgiven a terse answer like “I have no idea” or “I can’t recall”, but it actually isn’t all that long since the NHL club had enjoyed a steady pipeline of emerging talent.

Monday Mailbag – Chiarelli’s summer to-do list – It was a busy week in Oilers land so this edition of the mailbag could get spicy.

Will the Edmonton Oilers take a highly-rated Smurf d-man in the draft? – But the NHL is said to be moving towards smaller, faster and more skilled players, which means it’s more likely that a smaller d-man will be taken high in the draft this year, just as two Smurf d-men, Miro Heiskanen, 5-11, 182, and Cale Makar, 5-10, 175, were taken third and fourth overall last year.

Cheer for Taylor Hall in the playoffs? Not this Oiler fan, not in this lifetime – Hall is no longer an Oiler. In fact, he made it clear he didn’t cheer for the Oilers last year in the playoffs, which is a sentiment I perfectly understand. Why would he root for the Oilers? And, likewise, why would I root for him now?

NHL Rumors: Edmonton Oilers – Some Potential Changes To Watch For This Offseason

NHL NEWS

NHL Rumors: New York Islanders and the Chicago Blackhawks

NHL Rumors: Arizona Coyotes – Top-Six Need, Ekman-Larsson and Pending UFAs

NHL Rumors: Kovalchuk, Canucks and UFAs, Islanders and Tavares

NHL Rumors: Montreal Canadiens and the Calgary Flames

NHL Rumors: New York Rangers – Stevens, Montgomery, Kovalchuk and Grabner

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Around the Oilogosphere, Beer League Hero, Edmonton Oilers, NHL, Rumors

Around the Oilogosphere – April 15th Edition – Rattie Signs! 10 Things to Watch This Summer, Who’s Calling the Shots with the Oilers? NHL Rumors galore!

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Have you been enjoying these Oilers-less playoffs so far? I know that it’s hard to watch this year when our team is out of it but I’ve been impressed with the Vegas/Los Angeles series so far and I’ve been having a helluva time watching Tampa manhandle Hall’s devils.

Now, if you read my tweets you’d probably think I hate Taylor Hall. I don’t. I think that he’s a supreme talent and very entertaining to watch, I just don’t want to see his teams win. And I think that goes the same for Jordan Eberle and the Isles even though they could possibly be the most exciting team in the league to watch (for now). It’s great that they are having individual success but I simply won’t be cheering for them to win and why should I?

See, I’ve come to the conclusion that it’s less about the players and their teams and it’s more about the Oilers fans who bitch and moan every single day about the Oilers trading away Hall and Eberle and sh*t on their own team that they apparently love. I simply don’t get the crying over spilled milk aspect of Oilers fandom.

If Taylor Hall does win the Hart this year I hope he gives Devils’ goalie Keith Kincaid the majority of the credit because without Kincaid’s ridiculously good performances at the end of the regular season, Hall could’ve scored twice as much and the Devils wouldn’t have made it into the playoffs.

Did Todd Have a Hand in The Trades? 

What if Todd McLellan had more to do with trading Taylor Hall and Jordan Eberle that you think? Think about it. It wasn’t Chiarelli that moved Hall, Eberle, Yakupov, etc off of McDavid’s wing…

If that indeed was the case, that McLellan gave the green light on trading those players, would you still view him as the good ‘ol western Canada boy that takes responsibility for his team’s record?

*Side note: Just because you say you’re sorry and take responsibility for something doesn’t make it any less bad that it happened. We heard McLellan take responsibility so many times during the year that, for me at least, it lost its luster. That being said, I think he can pull things back together and I’m willing to give him that chance.

Front Office Clusterf*ck

I was listening to the Jason Gregor Show the other day and Jason Strudwick was talking about the recent Mark Spector article that ripped into the old Oilers and their “Red Wine Summits”. And he had a theory that that article was a message being sent by Peter Chiarelli to those above him to back off.

I can buy into what Strudwick is saying here. I think that in Boston Chiarelli had a huge problem with Neely, Sinden, and Sweeney trying to run his show which ultimately led to him dealing Tyler Seguin and I believe he tried to secure his power within the club by demanding he be the president of hockey operations and the general manager when he was brought on by the Oilers.

This will not end well, pro-Chiarelli and anti-Chiarelli fans can agree. If there is some sort of Royal Rumble going on within the power structure of the Oilers management/ownership/coaching staff, it’s only to get worse from here unless somebody goes because you can’t have a GM who’s been promised full autonomy in his contract being undermined by the coach and the cronies upstairs.

The Assistants

Speaking of coaches going places. Bob Stauffer pontificated recently on Jay Woodcroft being sent to Bakersfield to coach that team after they let Gerry Fleming go and there’s been lots of talk about Ian Herbers either going back to the University of Alberta to coach or to the AHL. Dean Millard, on Twitter, said that he got a DM from a man in the know that told him that Jim Johnson will be guy Todd McLellan chooses to sacrifice…

So that’s all three assistant coaches gone (possibly) which could lead the Oilers to hire a guy like Dave Tippett and/or Manny Viveiros and I think eventually that would allow the Oilers to move Tippett right into the head coaching role with Edmonton decided the time was right.

With Tippett, the Oilers would get a defense-first coach and that’s something I think the team needs. They’ve got to get away from trying to recreate the Oilers of the 80’s and create their own identity. And Manny Viveiros would run the PP (This past season he had the Swift Current Broncos PP running at a 29% clip).

There’s no guarantee that an excellent coach like Tippett would even consider an associate coaching position with the Oilers but we’ve seen it before with Lindy Ruff and Davis Payne.

This is a great article on Dave Tippett’s coaching style. Worthy of a few of your minutes in my opinion.

Oilers News

Edmonton Sun – Edmonton Oilers: 10 things to watch this off-season – What should we be watching up to the NHL draft, in free-agency and in training camp? Who’s going, who’s coming in? Here are 10 things to watch for before next season.

The Cult Of Hockey – Edmonton Oilers need a few value contracts, and they may have just signed one in Ty Rattie’s one-year extension -They are an essential aspect of the Salary Cap Era, where there are only so many “big dollars” to go around, and the cracks need to be filled with small ones.

The Cult Of Hockey – Coaching changes are imminent behind the Edmonton Oilers bench – I strongly believe that Todd McLellan will be back behind the bench, to begin 2018-19, but that the men standing in suits around him will look very different.

The Cult Of Hockey –  Palace intrigue at Oilers HQ grows over future of Todd McLellan and others – It looks like the Oilers will go down one of two roads, either getting rid of one or more assistant coaches or getting rid of Todd McLellan and all the asst. coaches presumably.

The Hockey Writers – Oilers Must Avoid Panic Move – Chiarelli’s trading track record is there for all to see and when we combine it with the pressure of the moment, the situation has “panic move” written all over it.

The Hockey Writers – Takeaways From Chiarelli’s Press Conference – Heading into the NHL Draft Lottery on Apr. 28, the Oilers hold the ninth-best odds and have a five percent chance of winning the lottery. Regardless, there are going to be fans clamoring for Chiarelli to be fired this summer. It’s not going to happen.

Oilersnation – Who is calling the shots? – We know that’s going to happen. What I’m wondering, regardless of who publicly pulls the trigger, is who is actually calling the shots?

NHL RUMORS

NHL Rumors: Edmonton Oilers – Chiarelli, Rattie, Nugent-Hopkins, Defensive Needs and Potential Targets

NHL Rumors: Dallas Stars and the Florida Panthers

NHL Rumors: Montreal Canadiens and Buffalo Sabres

NHL Rumors: Ilya Kovalchuk – No Agreement In Place With The Rangers, But He Could End Up There

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