Are the oilers just a poorly built team?

[Bertuzzzi44]

Chiarelli and McClellan are idiots. They had a good thing and messed it up. If Hall doesn’t mesh well with your skilled players, then put Hall on another line, heck Pittsburgh put Kessel on the 3rd line with 2 speedy grinders and they had 3 good scoring lines and won a couple of cups. Feel bad for McDavid.

 

[haveandare]

One must imagine McSisyphus happy.

lol never thought I'd see an apt Camus reference on here, nice work

 

[Captain Mountain]

Bergevin is terrible but he has succeeded much better than Chiarelli at finding supporting pieces: both GMs have made terrible signings of depth defensemen, but Bergevin has done much much better at finding depth forwards and backup goalies.

Bergevin has generally been very good at finding depth. He's not terrible at drafting either (not great, but he's got some good picks outside the first round). He's just terrible at negotiating contracts and pro scouting and his confidence is obviously easy to exploit.

 

[Helistin]

Oilers should bring back Kevin Lowe to hockey operations from the token chairman duties. I'm sure he could tear down Oilers a little more. Plus the guy has the best anecdotes about how Bob Essensa was a fine goalie.

 

[GOilers88]

They have some nice pieces. Obviously McDavid. Nurse looks good, Bouchard will be a real player. But I think they are still a few pieces away.

IMO I would rebuild around McDavid-Nurse and the kids. Move Drai/Talbot/Puljujarvi for picks, tank out 1-2 years and try to land some big UFAs.

You can't sell off again and waste another 2-4 years of McDavid. If he goes six to seven years without a team around him, he will certainly be gone.

 

[Luminiferous]

Posting something that idiotic is a bigger disgrace.

Nah. Move along.

 

[LABound]

It's 2018-19 get some young guys with new ideas in the front office.

I could be way off but the impression I get from interviews ,videos, scouting, behind the scenes stuff maybe the old guard should step back thier vision and old school beliefs are not working out on any level.

They have been gifted 1ov again and again thrown away picks, made obsene trades and signings ....the raw data speaks for itself...

they are out of touch with the modern game.

All I can picture is Lowe McTavish and Chia sitting around in polyester suits with rotary phones I bet there is not one front office executive under 50 years old.

how much forward thinking can develop in that enviorment . They probually still look in the sports section to get game results.

It's probually way to comfortable there because they are Legends of old ....

Someone needs to shake that tree .

It's not the 80s.

It's mind Boggling.

 

[KingsFan7824]

I think they got both lucky and unlucky. If they had drafted McDavid in 2010, and Hall in 2015, that would've been better from a team building standpoint. Hall to McDavid is a 5 year gap. That's a pretty long time. Malkin and Crosby were back to back. Kane and Toews. Ovechkin and Backstrom was 2 years. Kopitar and Doughty was 3. Even Toronto, it's a year or two between their biggest building blocks. Chiarelli aside, if McDavid had the big contract locked in, and Hall was only now in his first year of a big contract, I feel like it might've been a little different. So many moving parts with that though.

I just think the timing of the McDavid pick ends up being weird. To get him 5 years after you start rebuilding, with a new GM 5 years after you start rebuilding, it's rebuilding the rebuild in some way, and then maybe they got ahead of themselves while wanting to win with McDavid is on his ELC like Pittsburgh and Chicago did, and everything ends up being off.

 

[Bounces R Way]

Poorly is putting it rather mildly. League trends toward speed and skill, Chiarelli decides he wants big and stupid. They have two impact players and have been rebuilding for 11 years.

Like.. How is that even possible?

 

[Avsboy]

If you just compare the team I follow, the Avs, to Edmonton you can clearly see that Edmonton has failed to surround their core with depth via signing, trade or drafting. Why trade Hall? If you trade Hall, get lots of good young pieces like Sakic did with Duchene and RoR - the latter of whom was already a fantastic draft choice for his spot, on top of gems like Rantanen and Barrie. Edmonton has also made some bad draft choices and haven’t attracted much FA talent to the team.

 

[JPeeper]

Yes, Chia is the worst GM in the league and it isn't even close. At least Benning can sort of draft and Bergevin, even though getting fleeced in the PK trade got back a good player in Weber. Hall for Larsson was just tragic.

How you can be rebuilding for 10 years and only have McDavid, Draisaitl (who is overrated), and RNH is embarrassing.

 

[Blitzkrug]

Poorly is putting it rather mildly. League trends toward speed and skill, Chiarelli decides he wants big and stupid. They have two impact players and have been rebuilding for 11 years.

Like.. How is that even possible?

The Oilers have impact players. They just happen to be playing in Newark and Brooklyn.

Hall for Larsson was dumb on paper, but it at least had a small amount of logic to it. Trade winger for high potential defenseman, and then use the freed up money to get another winger. the Strome for Eberle deal however, was completely indefensible. Trade a winger (who admittedly came off a pretty blah year) for a crappier, more fragile winger who never even had a career high near Eberle. Good job.

 

[LeafFever]

Yes. Chia stripped them of speed and depth.

 

[Bleedred]

How long before loser Todd is sacked and Gulutzan takes over?

McLellan sucks. LOL @ all the sympathizers he had when he coached the Sharks.

 

[Captain Mountain]

Poorly is putting it rather mildly. League trends toward speed and skill, Chiarelli decides he wants big and stupid. They have two impact players and have been rebuilding for 11 years.

Like.. How is that even possible?

Look at Milbury's worst trades. Now look at Chiarelli's in Edmonton. Chiarelli isn't there yet, but his bottom 3 are definitely competitive.

 

[JPeeper]

How long before loser Todd is sacked and Gulutzan takes over?

McLellan sucks. LOL @ all the sympathizers he had when he coached the Sharks.

Will lol once McLellan is fired and Gully takes over. It will be the same thing if not worse.

 

[bukwas]

A hot seat as it should be. Not much patience to be had at the moment.

Absolutely.
They have the means to run a high quality organization from top to bottom yet struggle like a cash strapped team.
If i were Katz i'd clean out the ivory tower gang completely and bring in people who will install an attitude of hard work and pride. How is he not sick and tired of the failure after this long? I'd have pulled every single hair out of my head years ago. It could be that Katz is just too complacent which would be the worst case scenario as he's the only one involved with the organization who is impossible to replace.

 

[Critical13]

They need a complete overhaul, again. This current team isn't as bad as it's played, but it also should be much, much better.

The scouting in particular needs to be revamped. Every club has to fill it's depth with guys picked 2nd-7th round.

 

[EdmFlyersfan]

Oilers fans should start to throw their jersey's on the ice after last game's display...if they truly want change. The local media hype (during the pre-season) got fans excited for no reason (again); how many more top draft picks can a team have to become respectable?

The biggest problem is that the Owner loves the 80's Oilers and has them throughout the organization (so he can have dinners with them) and could care less about the on-ice product.

Most of the roster is trash outside 4-5 players.

 

[MinimaMoralia]

It’s an absolute tragedy. And won’t stop. They bring in Brodziak to be the rock in the bottom six, healthy scratch in game two.
They bring in Manny Viveiros ostensibly to help with the PP, he almost instantly seems to have disappeared and now the PP is all Gulutzan’s. Y’now, the guy with the 28th ranked PP last season.

Just an unceasing series of mind-boggling decisions.

 

[Its a Trap]

...yes

 

[hatterson]

Look at Milbury's worst trades. Now look at Chiarelli's in Edmonton. Chiarelli isn't there yet, but his bottom 3 are definitely competitive.

He traded Taylor Hall, Phil Kessel, and Tyler Seguin for a combined Adam Larsson, Dougie Hamilton, Loui Eriksson, and spare parts. That's definitely on part with Millbury.

 

[Deficient Mode]

He traded Taylor Hall, Phil Kessel, and Tyler Seguin for a combined Adam Larsson, Dougie Hamilton, Loui Eriksson, and spare parts. That's definitely on part with Millbury.

Don't forget Blake Wheeler.

 

[OilCanada92]

The Oilers' are now the only pointless team in the league.

Not that I expect it to turn around but keep in mind they went to Europe so they haven't played many games. They've only played 2 games. I'd rather be 0-2-0 than 1-4-0.

 

[Battle Lin]

they are great down the middle line 1, 2 and 3...but after that, the wingers are the worst in the nhl, the D is in the 20-30 range, and talbot is playing mediocre but the overall team and depth infront of him also is not good enough