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The Oilers post free agency frenzy....


yave1964

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mrqgLUyKcFNUFyPwWRDPA-g.jpgLooking at the Oilers roster post draft and post free agent frenzy....

IN:

McDavid: Superstar first team center in the making

Talbot: one of the best backups in the game now has his own club

Korpikoski Underrated two way player

Letestu P/K killer extraordinaire

Reinhart Former number 4 draft pick still trying to grain traction

Sekera Overpaid but talented puck mover

Gryba Hard hitting defensively responsible blueliner

 

Other Potential rookies:

 

Nurse

Draisatl

Klefbom

Andrew Miller

Yakimov

 

 

 This is a team that will not even resemble the club of last year, not at all. Counting rookies who made appearances but were far from regulars the team could be fifty percent different that last season with a new coach in Todd McLellan who has been successful at the NHL level as well.

 

 The biggest winners among the returnees is difficult to say, RNH can drop to the number two center with less pressure, Hal and Eberle have potentially the next Sid Crosby (or Better) setting them up, Yakupov on the second line has RNH and less pressure, and Schultz no longer has the pressure to be the number one, getting to drop to the number three and the second power play.

 Scrivens was retained, he did a more than adequate job and deserves to be retained as the backup.

Could it all blow up? Of course, they are afterall the Oilers. But the truth is, I think that very few if any teams had a better team that the Oilers. Maybe not a playoff club this year but certainly not a team that you want to play night in and night out, and with a bright future.

 

 Lots of new parts,

 

 

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I think that's a pretty good take on the team.

 

The other additions:

Peter Chiarelli - an imperfect GM (like all) but has a good record, and isn't so hesitant to make moves like Tambellini and MacTavish were.

Todd McLellan - an excellent coach with an excellent reputation and an excellent record. The Oilers needed this just as badly. There's no way to tell how much of the team's regression was due to coaching, management, etc. One thing is for sure: Tom Renney and Ralph Krueger had better records with worse teams than Dallas Eakins.

 

 

-The defense looks a lot more difficult to play against. People around here know that I liked Jeff Petry and Martin Marincin, and they're now gone. However, one clear knock against the Oilers blueline is that they were really easy to play against.

 

Schultz - physically weak for an NHL defenseman, and simply does not engage forwards.

Marincin - a stringbean who also did engage physically at all. I think he's a marvelous poke checker, good with angles, etc, but is also the opposite of physical.

Ference - engages, but is very small for an NHL defenseman, particularly in the west.

 

I'm not obsessed with size and toughness on an NHL roster, but it's not something you can ignore. When half of your blueline is either completey disinterested in engaging or completely ineffective at it, you're going to hae a difficult time defending.

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  I think it's safe to say the final 7 the Oilers keep on defense will be their best defensive unit for quite some time. Throw in Cam Talbot, maybe the best goalie they have had it quite a while. That's two pretty big substantial things what will go from a weakness to a strength. If the scoring comes throught decently, they could be in the playoff mix next year...and we still don't know how to quantify the impact that McDavid will have....they could be a legit team next year. Hall has never had a center that can keep up with him speed wise, those two are gonna create so many odd man rushes it's gonna be sick.

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  • 3 weeks later...

Both Klefbom and Darnell are two good defencemen that I believe could have a great feature in Edmonton! Klefbom good skater and loads of other good qualities.

Welcome to the forum!

 

Nurse is the guy that has my attention!

Interested in seeing Sekera on the oil too. TMac started trying to get Dmen to jump into the play, but then seemed to hold them back the past few years. For the sharks at least.

 

He has a lot of bad habits to break out of players there. But the oil are on the right track

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