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Yesterday on Oilers Now (630CHED), host Bob Stauffer let the cat out of the bag a little bit with regards to the Edmonton Oilers’ plan when it comes to its goaltending for the upcoming season.
"I do believe the team would contemplate trading the 2022 first round draft choice in-season if they have goaltending challenges… It'd have to be a goalie who'd commit and sign here beyond next season." – Bob Stauffer (630CHED)#letsgooilers
— B.L.H. (Edmonton Oilers Enthusiast) (@BeerLeagueHeroe) August 4, 2021
“I do believe, and I’m not sure who the goalie is, but I do believe the team would contemplate trading the 2022 first round draft choice in-season if they have goaltending challenges. It’d have to be a goaltender that would commit and sign here beyond next season.”
So this tells me that they’re looking at a netminder who will be a free agent at the end of next season. That could be a UFA or possibly an RFA, but here’s a realistic list of both for your pleasure,
- Elvis Merzlikins, CBJ (UFA)
- Joonas Korpisalo, CBJ (UFA)
- Alexandr Georgiev, NYR (RFA)
That’s it. That’s the list because I can’t see the Avs not re-signing Darcy Kuemper and as cool as Marc-Andre Fleury would be, he’ll be 38 going into next season and as far as I know, the club wants a goalie that can grow with the current leadership core.
Now, there are younger RFA options like, Daniil Tarasov (CBJ), Jake Oettinger (DAL), Cayden Primeau (MTL), Ukko-Pekka Luukkonen (BUF), Kaapo Kahkonen (MIN), and Vitek Vanecek (WAS), I’m just not confident that those clubs would be willing to move them plus the Oilers have their own stable of young netminders working their way up the ladder.
“I know we were having a conversation about (Joonas) Korpisalo the other day and I said if the Oilers sent Koskinen for Korpisalo, it was my belief that there’d be an expectation from Columbus, “Well, if we’re going to buy you guys that cap space (and what some might think is a lateral move) you’re going to have to give us something for that cap space.”, and that might be how Columbus sees things, I don’t think that there’d be a lot of appetite for that on Edmonton’s end.”
Yeah, so we now know that the Blue Jackets were trying to squeeze Ken Holland for Dmitri Samorukov AND a 1st rounder in order to take on that cap space. Edmonton’s not doing that.
“Now Merzlikins, we’re having a different conversation because he’s the better of the two goalies. Now we’re talking, would you give up an asset? I think long-term, Columbus is going to try and sign Merzlikins to a contract extension.
I think this is the one we’re going to be keeping an eye on all year. Just to see how Columbus starts because in April, it was very clear that Merzlikins was irate at the direction his club was going as he went on a little bit of a rant saying he was “tired of losing.” and how things were getting “embarrassing”… So, I’m not sure he’ll be looking to re-sign long-term with the Blue Jackets unless he sees some promise and even to that end, if he wants to win, wouldn’t he have a better chance in Edmonton alongside the best player in the world?
As for Georgiev, it doesn’t sound like he’s well respected in his own locker room… So that makes you wonder about that incident with Tony DeAngelo to some extent.
Anyways, I like Elvis, who do you like? Let us know in the comments below
