I’m having a hard time bringing myself to writing anything about the Edmonton Oilers. It really feels, on the basis of the first quarter’s returns, that this is going be year four of the rebuilding process, without getting any closer to having been rebuilt. Blogging about the team and being invested in it doesn’t buy you anything of course, but it’s difficult to maintain that investment when we’re dealing with a team that insists on making stupid moves year after year and then pretends to be surprised when things go to pot. I’m honestly feeling like I don’t have a lot to say about this team anymore - they aren’t even interesting, they just suck relentlessly, with little hope of any improvement in the future.
I don’t have any kids, but I imagine that the experience of watching a kid be exposed to and react to new things is not unlike the experience of having a new head coach who’s a quotable guy. The old guy, who had seen it all with this particular bunch of players, didn’t seem to have a sense of wonder about it all anymore; he just seemed bitter and cynical. Quinn at least still seems surprised by it all. It’s sort of fun watching the Oilers grind a new coach down. Hopefully he starts conspiring to steal Tambellini’s job soon - this team is desperate for something interesting to happen.
It’s Columbus tonight, with the Oilers facing a team that has a lot of the characteristics of the more interesting Oilers squads a few years ago (including several of the players). Short on money, they somehow seem to get the most out of every dollar, unlike the Oilers who are basically a sad empire in decline. Raffi Torres is out of the lineup tonight but I thought it’d be interesting to point out that he’s 73rd in ESG/G amongst the 406 guys with at least 160 GP since 2003-04.
The chart simply sorts players into bins by this measurement. Raffi is at 0.198 ESG/G. For what it’s worth, even in his last three injury plagued seasons, he’s producing at about the same level - 0.18 ESG/G.
We know that this measurement won’t favour Raffi - he tends to get less ES TOI than most goalscoring types but when you add in that he can play against the other side’s top six (a role Hitchcock seems to becoming more comfortable using him in this year) and that he’s a physical player…I just don’t understand the Oilers desire to be rid of the fellow. He has definable dimensions to his game. Can anyone tell me what a guy like Robert Nilsson brings to the rink?
Are there aspects of his game that are frustrating? Certainly, but it seems to me that in focusing on the things that he wasn’t, they overlooked the things that he did bring to the table. They’re now left with an awful lot of guys who don’t seem to have any dimensions to their game at all or who had some of the dimensions that Torres did when they were younger, but don’t anymore.
Torres is a free agent after this season. If he isn’t re-signed by Columbus and the price is right, bringing him back would be a step in the right direction. How a club basically gives him away and then ends up a year later with JF Jacques starting the season with their top line is a mystery to me.
I know the feeling. Why invest three hours of my life in watching the game tonight, when I have so little free time, and there are so many other ways to spend it? Sure, the game could turn out to be an exciting, well-played 4-3 OT nailbiter, but it’ll likely just be three hours of my finite life, gone forever. Even if the Oilers scrape together a rare good game, it’ll just be an aberration: a gem gleaming dully amidst four year’s worth of piled-up shit.
My dedication to the Oilers has turned to disinterest, and is rapidly approaching active complete uninterest. I enjoy this blog, though, and would hate to see you stop posting. More sociopolitical commentary and links would be very welcome. Hell, at this point links to Youtube videos of fat kids falling down would be about as good as reading about another Groundhog Day for the Oilers.
These are dark days indeed. Andy’s latest post is expresses even less hope.
I heard a radio interview with Tambellini yesterday, he said that the Oilers were a really good team before the injuries hit this year. Hrmmm. Quinn’s staff would have been tracking scoring chances, they surely know better. Plus by eye the Oilers were getting outplayed most games.
The underlying numbers through first nine games (6-2-1 record) at all of EV, PP and PK … they mirror the infamous Final Twenty Games of 07/08 in a frightening way. It would seem that Tambellini, like Lowe, likes to bet on recent shooting% and save%.
Howson was surely the brains behind the deals that resulted in the Oilers’ solid, if unspectacular, teams of 03/04 and 05/06.
Pat was speculating this summer that Quinn would be angling for the GM gig during his tenure as coach. That seemed a little far fetched to me at the time. Less so now.
You’ll regret posting this when JF Jacques is the next Brendan Morrow. You just can’t take at-bats away from that kind of talent and that’s why Torres had to go.
Torres is the kind of guy a roster needs, maybe not the exact prototype, but in the mold. If you replace the Torres-types with the Jacques and Cogliano-types all you have are your three best forwards taking an overwhelming amount of defensive zone draws and your worst forwards doing nothing with their slightly sheltered ice time. That just leads to idiots running into the bathroom just to return two minutes later with slightly rosy cheeks to wax poetic about how great Cogliano or Stortini are.
You know what we oughta do? Trade Hemsky and Horcoff; I hear Eberle and MPS are just about ready to play. It’ll be just like Chicago!
WRT the Torres trade, the one positive is that Gilbert Brule looks like an NHL’er. He’s starting a lot in his own end with lousy teammates (the Brodziak role from a year ago) and he’s outperformed Brodziak to date. A pleasant surprise, one of the few.
So that doesn’t bother me.
It’s the countless unforced errors - letting Reasoner and Hejda walk for nothing when they were dirt cheap and happy to be in Edmonton -that kill me.
I was okay with Torres being sent to Columbus because I thought he was going to be replaced by a cheaper useful part.
I’ve learned my lesson.
Vic:
Tambellini said that? Dear god, does he even listen to his coaching staff?
I remember during that 6-2-1 run, when everyone was talking about how successful the team was, but after every game Pat Quinn would gripe about defence and getting outshot, the sole voice of reason around the team.
It was something I found encouraging, because if he’s saying that to the media he’s undoubtedly even more candid with the GM. Apparently it fell on deaf ears.
quain:
That’s a real problem, and I haven’t seen it mentioned elsewhere. A guy like Hemsky is starting his shifts with the other team in solid possession, or a D zone draw, far too often imo. A lot of the time the best they can do is break the pattern of abuse and get the play going forward … then by the time their shift comes up again, it’s usually badness to start again.
As I was looking at 0708 … some other mad stuff.
Starting after the PIT debacle, then the Stoll/Torres benching in the next one. … Stoll/Torres get Thoresen up from the minors as their RW, and MacTavish throws them to the wolves. Pretty much every shift against the other teams big guns if he game is still within reach, and an absurd number of own zone draws. Sub Reasoner in for Torres after he gets hurt, but it’s the same movie.
And Horcoff gets the best linemates and weaker opp, and on a team that doesn’t generate all that many offensive zone draws … he’s on the ice for way more than his share of them.
And it turns out that if you give Horcoff Nylander-type ice time he’ll put up Nylander-type points. That’s all well and good if you’re planning on trading him in the summer. If you’re planning to sign him to a long term deal in the summer … not so smart.
jonathon:
Regarding the pattern of getting outshot … I think you were the one that busted out the MacTavish quote from MacTavish from October ‘08.
Something very much along the lines of (but surely not exact words):
By my memory ONLY: “Of course we’re concerned about it. Good teams don’t get outplayed territorially, and the shots are an indicator of that.”
I’m guessing that Tambellini didn’t want to hear it then either.
And that’s encouraging verbage from Quinn, I haven’t caught many of his pressers.
Vic:
The Horcoff deal killed me. He had another year on his deal, he’s coming off shoulder surgury, and off one of his best offensive years built slightly on luck and substantially on context… and you pay him then and there?
I don’t know if Lowe never bothered to tell MacT to bury him or if MacT cared more about getting his guy a paycheck, but somebody screwed up. And this is coming from a guy who, at this point, cares more about Horcoff having a good season than the prospects of this sad sack team. And, really, with how they manage this team, fuck ‘em, I’m glad a guy like Horcoff milked ‘em… better than Nylander doing it.
The really hilarious follow-up is that, at least at ES, Horcoff was substantially more useful in 2008, but his counting numbers sucked so he got buried by people.
Great thoughts here guys. Not encouraging in the least, but great thoughts.
Remember those days just after Katz had bought the team and we were all looking forward to not having to have such a low payroll? When our great ability to find decent players on cheap contracts would make Edmonton the premiere franchise of the NHL?
No? Me either… :*(
Yeah, on the 05/06 team they had terrific forward depth as their best quality imo. After that the key guys were Smyth, Pronger amd Horcoff. I remember commenting on this blog during the playoff run that the bookies would make Smyth a 25 cent guy if he went down to injury, and Pronger and Horcoff 20 cent guys. All big numbers.
Then they move out Pronger for no immediate help, and don’t spend the saved money on veteran help. The EIG raises ticket prices a whack (about 20 or 25% iirc) and Laforge is telling anyone who will listen that the EIG are still hurting financially and throwing the $39 million player budget number around. And certainly they don’t have the cash for an AHL affiliate, even a shared one!
Then they don’t sign Smyth, sign the “good citizens” to inflated long term deals. Smyth gets moved at the deadline in ‘07.
It smacked of complete rebuild. A low budget team taking a shitkicking to full houses and picking high in the draft for a few years. The veteran leaders all quality players who may not like the losing, but would know damn well they were being paid handsomely for the task.
The next obvious step was to jettison Horcoff in the summer.
Instead they end up with new ownership and a desire to spend, a last minute change in budget that leaves Lowe looking like a lunatic in July. And Howson had left for Columbus a couple of weeks earlier.
What a cf.
That should read:
“Instead they end up with new ownership looming, from a bidder promising to spend to the cap, and a sudden desire to spend more on player payroll”
Well, I was in a good mood until I read this…
There was a lot of love for Raffi from the numbers guys when that dealt went down and the only reservation I had about keeping him was he looked like a guy who was gonna get hurt every year.
Otherwise, he’d chip in with 15-20 goals, he could wear down opposing D and he was also a bonafide tough min guy.
Brule is nothing in return?
…I heard the same radio interview as Vic yesterday and nearly drove into oncoming traffic.
Now granted at the time the Oil were just learning a new system and perhaps Tamby was taking that into consideration, but he framed the statement in terms of results and he must’ve had some idea that they were unsustainable.
And then we have no idea how much of Tamby’s comments are covering his butt in the trade world.
The last thing you want to do is send a public message stating we suck and need to improve by trade since every GM out there is going to bend you over the barrel.
The one good thing about this team is that they’ve been decent at the draft table and occasionally good at trading for young players. (As long as we can forget about Lupul and Nilsson, key parts of big trades that have killed us. Killed us.) If they can keep it up at the draft long enough, success will force it’s way on to management.
It does hurt to watch in the mean time, though.
MPS looks probable. Suppose one of Nash, Eberle, Hartikainen, and the rest will probably make it a s decent roster player too. Gagner and Cogs are nice pieces even if one needs to be moved for a different kind of player to balance the lines.
We’ve added some nice young players too: Gilbert, Grebs, Penner, Smid, and even Hemsky aren’t in their prime yet. That’s something to look forward to. I like all those guys.
Surely a couple of the AHL’ers will have some value. May even be a sleeper in there. Brule and Chorney have showed some things. Stone is interesting. Most will fall away, of course, but if you can find a couple diamonds in the rough to go with the blue chips (I mix metaphors like a Vitamax), you’ve got a team.
Will still have to sign cheap vet FA’s, though.
—
Vic’s brief explanation of the fall of the club is absolutely right on. I had thought something similar but not quite as intuitive.
Vic:
I remember the quote you mean, and by memory that’s pretty close. I’ve caught most of Quinn’s pressers this year and he sounds a ton like MacTavish did. It’s been a very rare game this year where he sounds remotely pleased with his team.
Not that it seems to matter.
I don’t think we can get on Lowe too much for the 94 trade because 12’s worked out pretty well and the Oilers were right to deal away Smyth for an ultra durable guy like Sheldon Souray.
Plus, Kevin Lowe didn’t know the cap was going up and it’s not like we can expect him to keep up with all these things.
I woke up one morning and said to myself, “Holy cow! We’ve got a lot of marginal NHL players!”
Dennis
It is beyond reasonable to think that Lowe didn’t know the cap was going up. The teams are updated several times a year on the state of leaguewide HRR, this for escrow purposes. So EVERYONE in the NHL has a damn good idea what the cap will be next season.
The wildcard is the NHLPA opinion on whether the inflator should be 5% or something else. But with the economy booming in early ‘07 … nobody expected less than a 5% bump surely. And he was off by much, much more than that based on the $10 million or so he suddenly was trying to spend. Did Lowe really think that the NHL revenues were contracting in spectacular fashion?
He may not be a genius, but surely he isn’t a clinical idiot. His brother is a medical doctor, no? IQs of siblings are rarely a mile apart. I suspect that was just Oilerspeak for “the EIG upped the player budget at the last minute once they realized that everyone in town (except Terry Jones) had figured out that they’d been blowing smoke up our asses regarding the Oiler’s finances. This in light of the Katz offer. That bastard!”
In a later interview Lowe was more open about this.
It would be better if the problems of the Oilers were as simple as “Lowe is a complete fool!”. I wish that were the case, but I just don’t see the issue being so minor.
spOILer:
I’m well past giving the benefit of the doubt to Tambellini.
Clearly you’re at the bargaining stage of the Kubler-Ross grief cycle
Lain is justing inching out of DENIAL now. Dennis and Quain are stuck in ANGER. kris is in BARGAINING with you. Mike W is in DEPRESSION. And today Tyler has moved from TESTING to ACCEPTANCE, where Pete was waiting for him.
sigh.
Nice to see everyone moving forward.
Vic,
I think Dennis was being sarcastic.
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Quain,
Horcoff, Hemsky, Penner, Vis., Souray, Gilbert and Gagner are marginal? No.
Cogliano, Grebs, Smid? No.
That’s 5 good D, a serious first line, and two good, though flawed, error prone youngsters.
Our problem is the depth.
O’Sullivan, Moreau, Nilsson, Pisani, Pouliot, Comrie, Staios, Strudwick and the Falcons are either too injured, too young, too inconsistent, too crappy (crap prone?), or too Moreau-esque to get us into the playoffs.
There’s reason to dismay for now since we’re not making the easy trades and signings, but there’s a lot of good on the roster and in the pipeline.
It’s the injuries.
Vic,
We’re fine. It’s the flu.
Maybe we don’t suck.I’ll give it a few more games. If they’re okay by the 35 game mark, it’s all good.
I hate Tambellini.
Who wants to watch games anymore. Blah.
Well, it’s okay that we’re the Isles.
Maybe I’ll cheer for the Avalanche.
Quain/Kris:
Nice.
I don’t think the problem is so much marginal players (although that’s there - Jacques, Stone and Brule were all cast higher than they’d proven capable of out of TC) as it is that this team gambles on the high side every time. Prendergast talking about Springfield last year was one example (Trukhno and Schremp a sure bet for 50 goals? Really?) but it’s all over the NHL roster:
Gagner as a second line centre
Cogliano as whatever the hell he is
Penner as a first line LW
Brule as a third line C
Khabibulin as a #1 G
Deslauriers as a #2 G
and so on…
The Oilers always seem to toss a young guy into a role that, if everything breaks right, he’ll be ready for, rather than casting him one spot back and bringing in a veteran to start with.
As for depth, honestly I think Reddox, Potulny and Chorney have been exceptional considering their resumes and what they’ve been asked to do, but there’s no way they can keep their heads above water in a heavy checking role (the first two) or as an every day NHL defenceman (Chorney).
But we all know the Oilers couldn’t sign anybody; they had too many contracts and it’s way more important to keep Robert Nilsson and Steve MacIntyre and develop Bryan Pitton than it is to bring in a veteran presence.
Geez guys, try being a Toronto Maple leaf fan…now THAT’S pain LOL
Oy veh! My head!
The problem with Torres, as near as I can recall, was that he was inconsistent and starting to become “injury-prone.” He’d have stretches where he looked like Messier, and stretches where he looked like a less-capable Patrick O’Sullivan. Plus, I got the impression from some of those late-season pressers that MacTavish was tired of trying to keep him motivated/confident/interested/whatever.
Weren’t there also rumours about his extracurriculars?
Morris Merow– Isn’t it comforting to know that as upset as the Oilers fans are now we Leaf fans get to watch a significantly worse team, with precious decent prospects, and no high draft picks for several years to come?
Such joy they bring to us.