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Oilers sweep 4 straight against the East.


yave1964

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Last night Pekka Rinne stuck it to the Oilers and beat them 4-1 to stop a 4 game winning streak for the Oilers.

Previous to that, the Oilers had won 4 straight against the Eastern conference.

They defeated the Lightning, Capitals, Canes and Canadiens by a combined 15-7 score over a very nice week.

So far they are 4-0 against the East versus 0-5-1 against the Western conference where they have been outscored by a total of 30-12.

And these are not against the elite Western teams save one against the Kings, they have lost, mostly blown out by the Canucks (twice) Calgary, Nashville and the Coyotes. AKA the bottom feeders in the West.

So in other words, the Oilers have gushed oil against the worst teams in the West but swept the East, including Eastern conference contenders Tampa and Montreal by a combined score of 6-2.

Says about all you gotta say about how good the West is in comparison to the East when the Oilers look like Gods against the East and like slugs against Calgary and Phoenix.

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Not so sure the Oilers fortunes says much about West vs East (though clearly, the West  right now have better overall teams), but more about the styles the Oil have faced.

 

Like any fast, skating teams, the Oilers prefer not to get hit, beat up or roughed up along the way.

The Eastern teams they faced and beat were not the most physical one would find in the East. Those three teams, like Edmonton, prefer to skate and play north-south...something that really, the Oil does very well.

 

The teams that crunched them? Nasvhille, Calgary, Arizona, Vancouver...well, those have a tendency to play a more grinding style, especially the Flames and Preds and to a degree the Yotes. Vancouver can play either a rush game or a grinder....seen them do both.

And Edmonton STILL has a hard time dealing with that type of style.

 

Bottom line, sure, the Oil are going to HAVE to do better against those teams, because, after all, they are divisional and conference opponents, but I'd hardly use the Oilers as some sort of measuring stick to gauge East vs. West matchups.

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  • 2 weeks later...

@yave1964   Scrivins is playing some nice net for them right now. His rebound control seems to be much improved and his reflexes look nice so far.

After sweeping the Sabres and Rangers over the weekend the Oilers are now 6-2 against the East and 0-6-1 against the West. Just plain strange. TFG above had her theory, mine is it might be a sign of the apocalypse, lol.
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You suck long enough and draft high you HAVE to get better......don't you?

 

In theory...yes...

 

However, what the Oil seems to have been doing is drafting the same "type" of player all along...albeit they ARE very skilled players....without much regard to the meat n potatoes type guys that basically allow the top tier talent to shine through.

 

This has led to many to believe that someone in either Oiler management or ownership doesn't quite "get it" when it comes to putting together a contender.

 

ANY jokester with a bad record can draft the 'best' player on a draft board year after year....but it takes a real architect with a savvy hockey mind and championship chops to understand that the best talent in the world doesn't mean a whole lot unless you have the means to let it do it's thing...and that usually means getting the right complimentary players, the right philosophy for the team, the right coaching staff, and getting the team a definite identity and plan of development in ALL phases and STICK TO IT!

Edmonton simply has failed to surround their really talented players with others that, while not as talented as far as pure hockey skill, still are necessary to make the team a success.

 

One other thing, and I could be wrong on this but I believe it to be the case nonetheless:

Edmonton seems to operate as if they are in a 'vacuum'.

 

What I mean by that is, they draft players who are good, decide, "hey, if we have the fastest, most skilled players, we should just simply be good right?"

Well, I wonder if they take into account what their RIVALS are doing as most teams trying to build or rebuild take note of what their more successful contemporaries are doing and take pages out of their books while still molding the team uniquely their own.

 

Hence why I think the Oil have such a hard time against their Western rivals while doing bettter against Eastern ones....their playstyle and personnel, as is currently constructed, is better suited for the more open, run n gun, smaller to mid bodied sized guys you tend to find more in East teams as opposed to the heavy, defense oriented, checking teams you find in the West.

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TFG: I'm not trying to distill your post down to a bullet point which may or may not accurately reflect your opinion, but is it your suggestion that the Oilers should have gone to the podium with the chance to pick the best available player out of all draft-aged kids, and choose a "meat n potatoes type"? Picking number is your opportunity to choose a player who can chart the future of your entire franchise. In rare years, it's your chance to draft a generational talent; an all-time great.

 

The Oilers have needed high end goaltending since Curtis Joseph left town, but drafting a goalie with that top spot would have been idiotic. Hell, even a 1st rounder on a goalie equals immense risk. They need a #1 defenseman, but taking one with the 1st pick, again, is extremely risky, as young defensemen aren't nearly as projectable as are young forwards. Also, and let's be very fair: each year the Oilers had the top pick, they went with the consensus #1 choice out there, like practically every club would have done.

 

I'm not going to defend their record over the years, but let's go with the point you clearly make: that they have never addressed the need for complimentary players. This is a very fair statement to make regarding the Steve Tambellini years (he tried, but badly missed the mark), but that's clearly changed since Craig MacTavish took over the team.

 

There were issues regarding the team being small, easy to push off the puck, having poor possession ability, and not being willing go to "the tough spots", so he aquired for David Perron, Benoit Pouliot, Teddy Purcell. All have brought those abilities with them. There were issues with having a line which could take tough defensive zone starts and get the puck out of the Oilers end, so MacTavish acquired Boyd Gordon, Matt Hendricks and Jesse Joenssu, all addressing need: faceoff skill, size, and ability to get the puck out of the zone. As a group, 90% of their shifts have started in EDM territory, and when the whistle blows again, 40% of the time, it's been with the opposing goalie freezing the puck. There were issues with having a defensive pair who could take tough assignments. Out went guys with hobbling injuries, career minor leaguers, etc, and in was brought a legit man for the job: Mark Fayne. He's been in the shut-down quadrant his entire career, and brought numbers the entire time. His pairing with Marincin has been excellent and very difficult.

 

I could see your point if all the team had continued to do was go after small players with no defensive ability or willingness to play a 200 ft game, but they haven't done that.

 

The Oilers sit in the middle of the pack in the categories which are most predictive of winning: Corsi and Fenwick, and are at the bottom of one which reverts heavily to the mean: PDO, a basic but good way of measuring puck luck. These are big improvements over the last number of years, and are reflective of the personnel changes which were made to address them. Even with Ben Scrivens literally tossing away 3 wins and one in which Fasth did the same, they're 6-8-1.

 

East/West thing....... There may be something to that, but out of the Western games they've played, the only one in which they were clearly slaughtered was against the Kings, while Hall, Eberle and Petry were out. Other than that, the Corsi and Fenwick were either badly in their favor (vs Calgary) or around saw-off range (their games against the Canucks).

 

The process has been improved, and I'm FAR more concerned with that than short term results.

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@JR Ewing

 

It's all good, JR.

I would always defer to a more knowledgeable fan of a given team, such as yourself on the Oilers, so just keep in mind that my opinions are those of a general hockey fan and outsider to the particular Oilers franchise.

 

That said, no I wasn't inferring the Oilers should not pick the best player available, but rather that it just seemed like the franchise were content to just pick, pick, pick high, and that everything else would just "fall into place".

What about after the first or second rounds? Who in the organization has REALLY done their homework and gone, "hey, that guy available in the 4th or 5th round....we need a guy like that".

 

Or, make some trades or signings for established NHL'ers who could provide some insulation for the newly acquired young players the team plans on using right away at the NHL level.

 

But two things you pointed out, that are very true.....the MacTavish era looks to be moving in a better direction than the Tambellini one AND the Oilers do need a reliable, consistent goaltender to see things through as well.

Believe me, I am not one of those people who want to dump on a team like the Oilers, Flames, Hurricanes, etc, just because they have been bad teams for a while now.

In fact, on this very site, I started a thread that suggested that a team like the Flames, and yes, your Oilers, possibly had things going in the right direction as soon as THIS season.

 

Look here...  

http://www.hockeyforums.net/index.php/topic/62842-battle-for-alberta-relevantbut-how-soon/

 

Now, I did start that thread before even the pre-season began so much of what is on there is speculation based on how the seasons ended last year and how each team's off season had gone to that point.

Which reminds me, I should probably bump that thread and update it, as both the Oilers and Flames now have much more to talk about with regards to their play this season and their renewed relevant rivalry.

 

But just to be clear, no I wasn't suggesting the Oilers or anyone else should go to the podium and select a projected 3rd liner simply because "the Oilers need guys like that".....but I was hinting at the fact that the organization didn't seem to put much stock into those types of players and get them quick enough (whether through trades, FA signings, or lower draft rounds) to be able to help their young players right away is all.

It's what other teams that have gone from worst to first seemed to have done...draft good players, then immediately get them 'protection' if you will (and no, not talking about goons), so that their transition to the NHL level is as smooth as possible and that they be allowed to do what they do best while the 'meat n potatoes' guys take care of other things so the star players don't have to as much.

My apologies if I was not clear on that.

 

Again though, as you pointed out, and I trust your insight on the team you follow is much greater than mine, the team HAS done things recently that could bode well for them.

By the same token though, the Oilers are still losing many games and losing them in fashions not unlike teams of Oilers recent past.

So until they more consistently buck that trend, I am afraid most fans won't view them in too much of a different light.

 

Believe me, I know what it's like....my Tampa Bay Lightning are good now and have a promising foreseeable future, but it wasn't too long ago when people scoffed at the team and had them labeled as bottom feeders, even during the times when, as a fan, I saw some things that an outsider fan or general hockey fan didn't about the team.

But it wasn't until the Bolts SHOWED everyone, via the front office, coaching AND on the ice, that they were for real that people started viewing them as such.....I believe your Oilers are going through that same thing right now.

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@TropicalFruitGirl26

 

I would say the Oilers have had the misfortune of getting the top pick when the consensus top pick just wasn't great. Hall is a very good player. He's no Crosby. RNH has skill, he's no Stamkos. Yakupov, well the verdict is still out but he's no OV or Malkin. Swap those 3 sets of players and voila, the Oilers are a good team. 

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