After the Dany Debacle, What's Next for The Oilers?

A new set of coaches...a new attitude? New players on the way?

After a season that disappointed their fans, and surprised many who had picked The Oil to return as a power in the West--only to be shocked by seeing them miss the playoffs with a late collapse--the Edmonton Oilers have said goodbye to long time coach Craig MacTavish.

The venerable Pat Quinn leads the team, assisted by former Rangers helmsman Tom Renney and holdover Kelly Buchberger.

Speculation as to whether the Oilers will seek to make improvements via trades and/or free agency has included rumours about Jaromir Jagr, Jay Bouwmeester and Jason Spezza.

With about $47MM in committed cap space (per NHLNumbers), including a contract with Dustin Penner that has yielded less than expected production, how much flexibility does Edmonton GM Steve Tambellini have?

Netminding also remains a source of chatter, with Dwayne Roloson, who carried the mail for the Oil last year, becoming a UFA. Jeff Drouin-Deslauriers looked very good when he played, but can he be the go-to goalie in slippery situations?

The Edmonton Journal talks about some of the possible moves in the offing in this article published today, May 28:

GREBISHKOV LIKELY TO RETURN ON OILERS' BLUE LINE
Nothing has been formally announced, but the Edmonton Oilers will lock up Russian defenceman Denis Grebeshkov, likely for three years at a shade more than $3 million a season.

Grebeshkov could be a prime candidate to man the blue-line for Russia's Olympic team in Vancouver in 2010 after winning two straight world championship gold medals.

QUINN HAS HIS INS
Oilers new head coach Pat Quinn doesn't have a lot of familiarity with the young Oilers players, but he does know farmhand Gilbert Brule. Brule played junior for the Vancouver Giants, where Quinn is a part-owner. Obviously, he has a feel for Jordan Eberle, too, after the youngster saved Canada's bacon with his dying-seconds game-tying goal to keep the Canadians' gold-medal hopes alive against the Russians in the world junior semifinal.

DAUM'S FUTURE UP IN AIR
Former Oilers assistant coach and scout Rob Daum still hasn't heard if he'll be retained as the coach of the Oilers' American Hockey League farm team in Springfield.

Daum was hired in the middle of the 2008-09 season to coach the struggling Falcons after Jeff Truitt was fired.

Oilers general manager Steve Tambellini said the AHL posting was his next order of business after his hire of Quinn and Tom Renney.

The Falcons hiring could be finalized before week's end.

SCHREMP A MAPLE LEAF?
Oilers farmhand Rob Schremp's contract is up and he's a Group 2 free agent. Do they re-sign the forward (seven goals, 42 points in Springfield) or bring a smile to his face and deal him to another club for, say, a good draft pick in June? The Leafs reportedly were interested during this past season.

PLANTE, KYTNAR POTENTIALS
The Oilers are working on signing Calgary Hitmen defenceman Alex Plante and Saskatoon Blades forward Milan Kytnar, their 2007 drafts, by June 15, otherwise they go back into the draft. Kytnar may play another year of junior hockey, but Plante, who had a strong season with the Hitmen, will be in Springfield next year. He'll sign a three-year, entry-level contract with bonuses.

AND ...
- Big winger Ryan Stone, who came over from Pittsburgh in the Mathieu Garon trade last season, had a fair year in Springfield.
"He's got to work on his footspeed, but there's some potential there (to play in the NHL)," said Daum.
- The Oilers will likely let about 10 of their farmhands go over the summer and won't re-sign them.
One of their better AHL players was a forward named Charles Linglet, who came from St Louis when they traded the disappointing Carl Corazzini during the season. His contract is up.
- Former University of Alberta Golden Bears goalie Aaron Sorochan will likely be invited to camp on a tryout. Some people think he's got the goods to play in the AHL and backup Devan Dubnyk.
- One of the AHL mysteries this past season: forward Slava Trukhno, who had a very good training camp, but slumped badly with only seven goals and 26 points in Springfield.
"Just one of those years, I think, but he's committed to doing things right," said Daum.
- Not sure why the Oilers felt they had to let video coach Brian Ross go. He has been good for the team and now they have to hire somebody else.
- Lost in all the recent Oilers coaching moves was a good man, Steve Knowles, who is leaving the public relations department.

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YOUR thoughts?

EJ Hradek and Robert Vollman grease the wheels of debate regarding the Oil's future plans.

BETTS COULD HEDGE OILERS' PK PROBLEM
Hard working Rangers F anchored Blueshirts' league-best unit
EJ Hradek, Robert Vollman/ESPN INSIDER, June 22, 2009

Plugging Holes - Edmonton Oilers


The Hole: Penalty killer

The Edmonton Oilers penalty killing was 77.5 percent, ranked 27th in the league. According to GVT calculations, that cost them more than 16 goals this season, only Toronto's penalty killing proved more costly.

The Fix: Sign F Blair Betts (UFA, Rangers)

Betts was part of the best penalty-killing unit in the league in New York last season. The Edmonton, Alberta, native's GVT ranked 10th in the NHL in penalty killing last season, and three of his 10 points last season were scored short-handed. Hopefully, Betts would help inspire the type of work ethic that brought the Oilers so close to the championship in 2006. You don't need big money to make a big difference. The Oilers would be wise to pick up a cost-effective, penalty-killing role player like Betts.

E.J.'s Take: I like it for several reasons. First, Betts is an Edmonton native. Second, he's very affordable. Third, Oilers' new associate coach Tom Renney knows Betts' game from their time together in New York.

There is one problem, though. Is Betts healthy? When we last saw him, he was being helped off the ice as a result of a dirty hit by Washington Capitals forward Donald Brashear. Betts has battled through several injuries throughout his career.

If he's healthy, I think he brings a lot of intangibles (faceoffs, penalty killing) that could help the Oilers.

Robert Vollman is a writer for Puck Prospectus. E.J. Hradek is a senior writer for ESPN The Magazine.

Note: A mainstay of Puck Prospectus's metrics is "Goals Versus Threshold" (GVT). The stat blends an array of offensive and defensive figures to measure the value, in terms of goals, a player contributes above what the marginal player would over the course of the season. A marginal player is one that could be replaced with a player of equivalent skill, e.g. from the minors. For instance, Evgeni Malkin had an offensive GVT of +18.9, a defensive GVT of +4.5 and a total GVT of +23.4 for the 2008-9 regular season, meaning that Malkin was worth 23.4 goals more than a marginal player over the course of the season, or worth about 0.3 additional goals per game. In the team context, GVT refers to performance above an NHL average team. For the regular season, the Detroit Red Wings had a +30.8 offensive GVT, a +15.1 defensive GVT, a -21.5 goaltending GVT, for a +24.4 total GVT. Therefore, at even strength, Detroit was 24.4 goals better than the average team

MSP gets Oiled...

The Oilers having once been trade partners for The Senators in the Dany Heatley Saga, the team has apparently moved on...a look at where they may be going.

OILERS FACE BUDGET ISSUES
Current budget issues leave Edmonton with little room to sign new players
Jim Matheson, The Edmonton Journal, August 11, 2009

If you're wondering why the Edmonton Oilers haven't filled an obvious hole and signed free-agent centre Blair Betts, it's all numbers.

Not Betts's numbers.

The team's salary cap numbers.

The Oilers had two centres -- Andrew Cogliano (37.2 per cent) and Sam Gagner (42 per cent)-- who struggled to win draws last season.

The team was 27th out of 30 NHL teams in penalty-killing in 2008-09, in large part because they overworked Shawn Horcoff in the faceoff circle. He was first in total faceoffs taken in the league last season. They had only one other player, the departed Kyle Brodziak, who could be counted on to win more draws than he lost.

The Oilers could certainly use Betts, a 29-year-old Edmonton product who was played a huge role on the NHL's best penalty-killing unit with the New York Rangers last season. He's also a big, energetic body--six-foot-three, 200 pounds--which is something the Oilers could use.

But the Oilers have 22 players who saw NHL action last season already signed and 14 of those are forwards. They still have to sign centre Gilbert Brule and defenceman Ladislav Smid.

They have a shade more than $55 million US committed this upcoming season.

About $2.5 million will likely be going to Smid and Brule when they sign shortly.

Brule will be given a shot at the fourth-line centre spot.

Smid is close to signing a two-year deal. That doesn't leave much wiggle-room under the $56.8-million cap ceiling, barring the Oilers moving out some questionable bodies like centre/winger Marc Pouliot, who has yet to get a regular spot after being drafted six years ago.

J. F. Jacques would be in that boat, too, but the team is painfully small up front. Team brass hope Jacques can finally show enough to be a contributor.

ON THE BENCH: The Oilers have signed farmhand Ryan Stone, who played on Springfield's top line last year. They will likely be signing Rob Schremp by the end of the week ... Oilers' European scout Frank Musil has moved his family to Burnaby, B. C., so his son, David, can play for the WHL's Vancouver Giants. He likely won't be as active overseas for a few years ... Oilers defenceman Tom Gilbert's new bachelor pad used to be where Mike Comrie once hung his hat, according to his Oilers blog. Gilbert, who will be at the U. S. Olympic orientation camp outside Chicago next Monday, has six TVs and they're all in the same room--in the basement ... Lubomir Visnovsky just finished the Slovakia's summer Olympic camp ... Oil Kings goalie Torrie Jung, who will likely be back as an overage junior this season, will be at Oilers camp on a look-see.

jmatheson@thejournal.canwest.com

Penner is running the show right now in Edmonton vs Heatley. I cant really complain about not having PEnner because Michalek is quickly becoming my fav player up front, but man, Penner is playing unreal... someone was pretty high on him here during the summer... but I digress, haha.

Anyways, good to see The Sharks playing like they should be along with Heatey. Good, not great. They are playing like they have accomplished something already, pretty typical and they will lose out in the 1st or 2nd round again.

Losing Hemsky for 5 months is going to hurt the Oil big time

Look good tonight. Bulin being out hurts way more. Not a big fan of Hemsky anyways and dont think it really matters all that much if he's out or not... they were losing with him.

Id probably wait to make that statement until they are not beating the first place team.

Even if The Oil dont win tonight, they dominated The Sharks tonight.

Also, who is this Pultony guy? Amazing game tonight and seems to have a lot of confidence right now, really impressed.

Ugh, Delorie sucks.

N4L wrote:Look good tonight. Bulin being out hurts way more. Not a big fan of Hemsky anyways and dont think it really matters all that much if he's out or not... they were losing with him.

Id probably wait to make that statement until they are not beating the first place team.

Regardless of tonights outcome losing Hemsky is going to hurt. Any team losing their top-star (debateable who the top-Oil is given Penner's play but still...) is going to suffer a bit.

Either way it'd be good to see the Oil grunt out the win tonight.

Id hardly call Hemsky a star. He's a nice player, that's about it. The guy hasnt done much in his NHL career to be honest.

N4L wrote:Also, who is this Pultony guy? Amazing game tonight and seems to have a lot of confidence right now, really impressed.

Ryan Poultny, if I remember correctly he came over in the Patrick Thoursen (?) and has been quitely producing in the Springfield.

Nice to see him finally hold a roster spot with the Oil, hopefully they keep him up for the year instead of Reddox

N4L wrote:Id hardly call Hemsky a star. He's a nice player, that's about it. The guy hasnt done much in his NHL career to be honest.

Oh I know, I meant star on his team.

By the Oilers roster standards, Hemsky is a star.

By Leaguewide standards he's a quality set-up guy.

Yikes, 5 months for Hemsky. I wonder if that puts the heat on Tambellini to go out and acquire someone high profile?

On a side note, why the hell can I not see my own avatar, but I can see everyone elses?????? Can anyone else see mine?