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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Lowetide.ca
- I’ve been thinking about Ryan Nugent-Hopkins and chemistry. It seems to me that most agree that Connor McDavid and Jesse Puljujarvi are a good duo and Leon Draisaitl-Kailer Yamamoto has been magic for some time. Zach Hyman has joined the band and perhaps he can slide in there somewhere.
BLH’s Thoughts: For what it’s worth, Yamamoto and Draisaitl were magic for 392 minutes in the 2019/20 season. Ever since then, Yamo’s been a drag on Leon in nearly every publicly available advanced metric aside from GF%, therefore it’s abundantly clear to me that Yamamoto is completely dependent on Draisaitl for any sort of offense he can muster up, which at the moment is f*ck all. Maybe it’s time to get Killer in a more suitable role before anything good about him shrivels up and turns to dust…
You’ll need to click the link above and head over to LT’s site to read the rest of his post but basically the point he was getting across is that at 5v5 Edmonton’s big boys (97, 13, 56, 29) score well when they play with him but RNH only scores well when he’s with Leon and Killer…
Zack Kassian also scores better with Nuge than both Pulju and Yamamoto, so this leads me to wonder if a third line of Hyman, Nuge, and Kassian would move the needle somewhat?
The Score
McDavid calls for best-on-best tourney after NHL’s Olympic opt-out
- “They pushed the Summer Olympics back one year, maybe that happens again this year,” McDavid said while meeting with the media, according to Oilers beat reporter Tony Brar. “Obviously it’s not looking that way, I think we do need to find a way to get a best-on-best tournament done at some point here.
- TSN’s Pierre LeBrun reported on “Insider Trading” earlier this month that there won’t be a World Cup of Hockey in February as there isn’t enough time to plan for an event of that scale.
BLH’s Thoughts: I agree with Connor here. The NHL does need to find a way to get a best-on-best tournament going, but unfortunately that’s going to be a tough ask with The ‘Vid spiking again. Maybe in the summer of ’22 they could try and organize one somewhere in the States where folks seem to be pretty lax about COVID. Perhaps by then the powers that be will have a better grasp on Omicron or the next variant and its impact on the public health system. If it’s deemed that we’re over the hump and the most dangerous part of this experience is over, you’d like to think that the world could start getting back to some semblance of normality.
Spector’s Hockey
- Luke Fox believes the Toronto Maple Leafs will find a way to re-sign goaltender Jack Campbell as one of his three bold predictions for the club in 2022. Doing so, however, could mean attempting to trade or buy out Petr Mrazek or moving someone like Jake Muzzin or Alex Kerfoot.
- EDMONTON JOURNAL: Jim Matheson recently speculated the Oilers could make a strong play for winger Phil Kessel if the Arizona Coyotes would retain half of his salary. He cited Kessel’s two Stanley Cups playing with stars in Pittsburgh.
- SPORTSNET: Mark Spector suggested the Oilers could attempt to trade goaltender Mikko Koskinen by the trade deadline if Mike Smith returns to action and plays well in the New Year. If not, they could put Smith on LTIR and ride it out with Koskinen and Stuart Skinner.
- SPORTSNET: Iain MacIntyre suggested Brock Boeser could be the Vancouver Canucks’ most vulnerable core player as part of his three bold 2022 predictions… MacIntyre points out they can’t afford that figure ($7.5M) as a launch point on a new contract if they also hope to re-sign Bo Horvat and J.T. Miller in 2023 and Elias Pettersson in 2024. “Something has to give. Or someone has to go”.
BLH’s Thoughts: Kessel would be an excellent candidate to put on Leon’s wing but am I not wrong in thinking Philly Hot Dog has some sort of trade protection? If I am, why in the world would he go to Edmonton if Vegas is right there and I’m sure I heard that’s where he wanted to go in the summer…
Edmonton better get movin’ on this trade stuff because Vegas is going to beat them to both Evander Kane and Phil Kessel before the season is out…
