Tag Archives: Jiri Hudler

Beer League Hero, Edmonton Oilers, International, NHL, Prospects, Rumors

Sunday Ramblings and A Czech Worth Cashing

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Evening y’all! It’s morning over here in the land of stinky tofu and bubble tea, so I get the advantage of reading the day’s posts regarding the Edmonton Oilers (or otherwise interesting comings and goings) and commenting on them. To which I’ll do exactly just that!

WHO TO WATCH AT THE 2016 IVAN HLINKA MEMORIAL CUP 

  • This is the annual preview of the u18 tournament that our good buddy from Draftgeek.ca, Brayden Sullivan, does up for us. This year’s is especially amazing because Justin Froese from Future Considerations has decided to give us a hand! These are two great up-and-coming hockey minds covering NHL prospects folks!
  • Joseph Veleno (CAN), Klim Kostin (RUS), Ostap Safin (CZE), Timothy Liljegren (SWE), Michael Pastujov (USA), Nico Hischier (SWI), and Ukko-Pekka Luukkonen (FIN) are all potential future Edmonton Oilers who’ll look to make waves at this year’s tourney! Click the blue link above to read more on them!

CRUEL SUMMER by Lowetide

  • L1: Lucic—McDavid—Eberle
  • L2: Pouliot—Nuge—Draisaitl
  • L3: Maroon—??—??
  • L4: ??—Letestu—Kassian
  • D1: Klefbom—Larsson
  • D2: Sekera—Fayne
  • D3: ??—Davidson
  • G1: Talbot
  • G2: ??

Five question marks. Too many. Seriously. Connor McDavid is a fantastic talent and I do think the defense and goaltending will be better, but why have the Oilers done so little work on the 3 and 4 lines? Comes the answer: Jesse Puljujarvi! I honestly believe Nail Yakupov on the 1 line is a strong option, doubt the Oilers feel that way.

Folks, it isn’t enough, by plenty. It is August, and the only conclusion a reasonable person can reach is that the city of Edmonton is doomed to another winter of cheering for a losing team. At least the seats are nicer and the sight lines for goals against will be clearer.

So LT is a bit bothered by the moves and/or lack thereof from the Oilers. I don’t blame him one bit. I would however cut Chiarelli some slack though. PC has, in fact, changed the fabric of this team in two off-seasons and the days of the soft but skilled forward are soon to be forgotten (once Yak has been dealt that is).

Speaking of Yak, I believe there’s still a way to salvage him and it would be in the vein or the Derek Roy experiment a couple of seasons back. Enter Jiri Hudler.

The 32-yr old Czech is still without a team. Now at this point in the off-season the players that haven’t been signed are either SOL or have handshake agreements with teams but are waiting for those teams to make moves to open up some room under their caps.

But is Hudler not nearly a perfect match for this Oilers team?

  • He’s a veteran of nearly 700 NHL games.
  • He’s a centre (left-handed albeit).
  • He won a Stanley Cup with Detroit in 2008.
  • Was a Lady Byng Trophy winner in 2014/15 for Most Gentlemanly player.
    • Accepted the award in his socks… LOLs
  • Is a high-percentage shooter with career average of 15.1%.

  • According to stats.hockeyanalysis.com, Hudler’s impact on his most common linemates (Hudler played over 400 min 5×5 w/Gaudreau and Monahan) was very positive.

  • I think price point could be somewhat of a concern. Hudler made $4M last season but his production fell off nearly 30 points as well.
    • He did much better in his time with FLA though (6g, 5a, 11pts in 19gp w/ only 2 goals coming on the PP).

So if the Oilers added Hudler at say $3M per year for 2 years, that would fill in the 3C spot and give Yak a skilled veteran centre to try to get his act together with. And Hudler’s skill set is not that far off of Roy’s.

Now you’d have:

L1: Lucic—McDavid—Eberle
L2: Pouliot—Nuge—Draisaitl
L3: Maroon—Hudler—Yakupov
L4: ??—Letestu—Kassian

The only issue might be Hendricks on that 4th line but if that line is only getting 6 or 7 minutes of 5×5 TOI per game, how much of an impact might they really have apart from those players getting more minutes on the PK. I think that Iiro Pakarinen, Tyler Pitlick, Jujhar Khaira, or possibly Drake Caggiula could fit that role adequately.

Then again, maybe it’s time to stop sinking money into the rehabilitation of Nail Yakupov’s career but I fear that the Oilers will do what they’ve always done with their high-profile 1st rounders and start Puljujarvi in the majors. I mean that scenario works if it’s Pulju instead of Yak as well.

I’m not as concerned about the defense as Lowetide, maybe I should be if LT is, because there’s depth there; unfortunately its young depth. Inexperienced depth. So we can only hope that the defense stays relatively healthy this year or that someone comes in via free agency as the team is on the brink of having said depth at nearly every position. But they’ll be going into next year by the skin of their asses and if that dirty pirate we call the “injury bug” sails back to port, there could be trouble.

Anyways, let me know what you think about Jiri Hudler or the Ivan Hlinka Memorial in the comments below!

Ciao!

Click on the pic and grab a new 16-bit Fighting Looch tee!

Dig skateboarding? Click the pic and grab this new “Thrasher Magazine” inspired tee!
Click the pic and grab a 16-bit McDavid tee for the summer!

 

Kris Hansen

BLH Edmonton Oilers Weekly Recap Feb 21st-Feb 28th

Alright, lets just get this out of the way first: the Oilers continued to stink as they went 0-3-0. They had good efforts against the Anaheim Ducks and Los Angeles Kings but were absolutely putrid in the game against Ottawa.

It’s tough to give stars of the week when the entire team sucked, but there are some glimmers of hope.

Edmonton Oilers Three Stars:

3. Jordan Eberle. Eberle had two goals in three games this week, considering how the Oilers are once again, finding it hard to score goals, it’s a nice change to see Eberle stepping up. Sure, he looked lazy on some defensive plays, but Eberle is the best pure goal scorer on the team. He looks good with Connor McDavid. While I think that he’s the most likely to be dealt, I’m see why people are so leery of trading away number 14.

2. Cam Talbot. After posting, and while concerning, sub .900 save percentages in three games straight, Talbot was strong in games against Anaheim and Los Angeles, giving the Oilers a chance to win in those games. Sometimes you need the goalie to stand on his head and Talbot was doing that despite the losses. In the last three games, he averaged .920 save percentage.

1.Brandon Davidson. Hey, Upper Deck. Why does Brandon Davidson not have a Young Gun Rookie Card? Besides Connor McDavid, Davidson has been the best Oiler rookie. He’s so damn calm in his own zone and had an impressive hit against Jake Muzzin of the Los Angeles Kings. He’s a shining example of a rightfully questionable development system: a 6th round pick in 2010 who’s fought cancer, you can’t help but cheer for the young man. There are rumblings that people want him to get a contract extension, but who knows about the price this point.

Edmonton Oilers Trade Rumors and News.

It’s that time of the season, one of my favorites: TRADE DEADLINE SEASON!

First we had Anders Nilsson go to St Louis for a 2016 5th round pick and goaltending prospect Niklas Lundstrom 

Then we had Teddy Purcell go to Florida for a 2016 3rd round draft pick. 

Finally, yesterday we had the end of the Justin Schultz era as he was dealt to Pittsburgh for a 3rd round draft pick (Oilers retained 50% of the contract cost)

Also, yesterday Peter Chiarelli had a Press Conference yesterday regarding the trades. I did a post at our friendly neighbors, theoilersrig, recaping the conference. 

Rumor wise: The Oilers are interested in Florida Panthers Left Winger, Brandon Pirri.

Also, there was a great article about Wayne Gretzky commenting on Connor McDavid being ready to be the next Edmonton Oilers Captain.

Around the NHL:

Hold on to your butts, because there were plenty of trades these last couple days. 

One of the biggest trade chips, Andrew Ladd was moved to Chicago for Marko Dano, a 2016 first rounder and a conditional 3rd rounder. Also included to Chicago was Matt Fraser and Jay Harrison. 

Chicago wasn’t finished. They flipped Rob Scuderi to Los Angeles for Christian Ehrhoff. and then traded Phillip Danault and a 2018 2nd round pick to Montreal for Dale Weise and Tomas Fleischmann.

San Jose made a spalsh by acquiring James Reimer and Jeremy Morin from the Toronto Maple Leafs for Alex Stalock, Ben Smith and a conditional 4th round pick in 2018. This was the second trade in the week between the two teams as Toronto moved Roman Polak and Nick Spalling to San Jose for two second round picks (in 2017 and 2018) and Raffi Torres.  

The Panthers made three moves as well: First they acquired Jiri Hudler for a 2016 2nd round pick and a 2018 4th round pick, picked up Teddy Purcell for a 2016 third round pick and Jakub Kindl for a 6th round pick in 2017.

The Penguins as mentioned above, acquired Justin Schultz from the Edmonton Oilers for a third round pick in 2016.

The Sabres and Senators had a blockbuster minor league deal as Ottawa acquired Jason akeson, Phil Varone and Jerome Leduc for Alex Guptill, Eric O’Dell, Cole Schneider and Michael Sdao.

Highlights

Blake Wheeler was interviewed about the trade of their captain, Andrew Ladd

 

Here were the top NHL moments from last night

Rakell scored a beauty against the Oilers on Friday night.

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

 

The Week Ahead:

The Oilers have three games, including one tonight at 7:30 against the New York Islanders.

Next they have a three game road trip including the first McDavid vs Eichel showdown in Buffalo on Tuesday, A visit to Philadelphia on Thursday and finally facing the Blue Jackets on Friday.

And of course, tomorrow is the NHL tradedeadline. I know I’ll be glued for updates.

That’s the week that was, follow me on Twitter for some really stunning insight (okay, maybe some insight, not truly stunning). Have a great week guys!