Confirmed with Link: [EDM/VAN] Oilers acquire Vasily Podkolzin for OTT 4th '25

[Drivesaitl]

Well IMO he is lacking skill and is a placeholder at best.

Yep. No end of people telling us Kostin had negligible value here despite him shooting well, hitting like a mule, fighting, scoring and being hard to play against.

Seems like this org always backs itself into needing 5-10 fill league minimum contracts and allergic to paying guys that can a do little more out there.

Mind you Kostin it appears didn't train the best in offseason. Focused more on fighting training and has gotten bigger, which is good for heavyweight division but no always for hockey. Guy is huge now. The bulk has taken some skating and game away. Looks like he'll be available again.

 

[Drivesaitl]

How was this guy drafted in the Top 10

A pretty classic scouting misfire. Pods has never shown anything like he should be a topten pick. His value was elevated on short sample on results in Ivan Hlinka tournament. Seems like scouts are even lazy now and base a lot on what takes place in a backyard.

Larionov was saying this guy was like Mark Messier. Um, yeah, oh, you mean a Mark Messier that doesn't fight, doesn't scare anybody, doesn't have a shot or pass, doesn't ever score.

The only comparable is they both played hockey, and have some speed.

Scouting like any human assessment is so so subject to bias. Larionov being an example of a coach that just plays favorites and wants certain player to succeed and spreads word around and is biased. Unfortunately in scouting and in NHL once a rumor goes around about a player it starts to be real whether accurate or fiction, whether good or bad. "Oh Larionov said this, wow!"

Canucks: Podkolzin draws comparison to the great Mark Messier

Rick Dhaliwal of TSN 1040 reported that the Russian junior coach Igor Larionov thinks that Vasili Podkolzin plays a very similar style to the great Mark

thecanuckway.com

Absolutely ridiculous.

Its also standard issue distortion. Soon as you see something stated like "high character" you know you're in for an opinion ride. Its not objective, its not fact, its not a basis in which to evaluate. But its done constantly and very little evaluation of whether comments are even objective.

Larionov had a lot of high praise for the young kid’s character and desire to get better. He sounded like a “proud father talking about his kid”

“He is too good. I really like his leadership, his determination, he is so hungry to get to the net, and he gives 100%. ”

So there we have it. pure distortion. Funny thing is in Vancouver fans were worried about the Mark Messier comparisons. They disliked the comments. lol Wonder what Mark himself thought.

Guy doesn't have top 6 skill. He's basically a skate fast and take the body kinda guy. Looks like an AHLer if we're all being honest with ourselves. There were probably better players that cleared through waivers.

Yeah. I'd said he's a bust. Already established as that in Vancouver. This is a guy you expect being cut on a PTO. Sadly its demonstration of how desperate the Oilers were to get some kind of energy guy. Which they had several of if they ever retained them. So that we get this instead and worse we have to wash the Canucks stink from our memory base.

 

[Soundwave]

I think he's a better player than Puljujarvi, but if you have no confidence in this league, you have basically nothing.

He's someone that needs a shot to go in off his ass or something so he can feel good about his game and then maybe you can see what he's got.

Unfortunately for him he got traded to a team that mired in a hilariously awful offensive slump to start the season, where even a 50 goal scorer is sitting on a goose egg.

Even in our worst decade of darkness years I don't think we ever shot the sub 6% shooting percentage we're sitting on right now.

 

[Pip]

I think for the most part he’s not playing poorly but you can’t be in the league if you don’t produce. I’ll excuse him a bit playing with Ryan/Janmark etc but up with Draisaitl you need to show more offensively. Not sure if he has it in him or not. Gets to good areas and one of the only effective forecheckers on the team but has no touch with the puck. I wonder if a couple went in for him if anything would change. Confidence is a strange thing.

That being said I’ve never been a fan of this player and he’s underwhelmed production-wise everywhere he’s gone. I still don’t hate the gamble for a 4th round pick and I’m fine giving him some runway here especially when we still have guys like Janmark and Brown looking far worse.

 

[CanadasTeam99]

He is not playing "poorly", but he isn't really doing anything either.

We have too many of these players, from the 1st line to the 4th.

 

[Oilhawks]

Too much hand-wringing about this guy. Came as advertised.

 

[Bryanbryoil]

Weird player analytically/eye test wise.

Analytically he ranks on the team..

Corsi: 1st
Shots For%: 1st
Goals For% Last
XGF%: 1st
PDO: Last
HDCF%: 2nd
TOI: 10th

So in most stats he is doing very very well, except the actual goals for and against totals and PDO.

So the question becomes is he playing really bad but getting good analytics due to a bit of chance and other linemates? Or is he just really unlucky/unskilled with the puck.
Need a bit more of a sample size for that.

Well IMO he is lacking skill and is a placeholder at best.

Yep. No end of people telling us Kostin had negligible value here despite him shooting well, hitting like a mule, fighting, scoring and being hard to play against.

Seems like this org always backs itself into needing 5-10 fill league minimum contracts and allergic to paying guys that can a do little more out there.

Mind you Kostin it appears didn't train the best in offseason. Focused more on fighting training and has gotten bigger, which is good for heavyweight division but no always for hockey. Guy is huge now. The bulk has taken some skating and game away. Looks like he'll be available again.

It's a damn shame that we couldn't have split the difference and signed Kostin to 2 years at $1.5 million AAV. Janmark is at $1.45 million, that contract is looking uglier by the day. AND he has a 10 team NTC. Brown's bonus last season is really screwing us. It would be nice if he started to really make up for that by outplaying his current contract.

 

[Bryanbryoil]

Too much hand-wringing about this guy. Came as advertised.

Too much meh in our bottom 6 IMO. The fact is that we targeted and traded a pick for this player. Someone identified him as a solution for the next 2 seasons. I'm not seeing it right now. That said I'd keep him up for the 4th line and send Janmark down for a bit since he would be very unlikely to be claimed and the whole bottom 6 could use a wakeup call.

 

[Oilhawks]

Too much meh in our bottom 6 IMO. The fact is that we targeted and traded a pick for this player. Someone identified him as a solution for the next 2 seasons. I'm not seeing it right now. That said I'd keep him up for the 4th line and send Janmark down for a bit since he would be very unlikely to be claimed and the whole bottom 6 could use a wakeup call.

I think they felt he was going to be a decent bet to be a bottom 6 player performing at league minimum, and so far I’d say that’s the case. I expected 15-20 points to be a good year from the player.

 

[Bryanbryoil]

I think they felt he was going to be a decent bet to be a bottom 6 player performing at league minimum, and so far I’d say that’s the case. I expected 15-20 points to be a good year from the player.

He's higher than league minimum IIRC. I think he's at $1 million AAV. That said unless he really thrives on the PK or starts chipping in more offensively he's just roster filler. I'd sooner have a shit kicker in his place if we are sacrificing offense on that spot.

 

[Drivesaitl]

He's higher than league minimum IIRC. I think he's at $1 million AAV. That said unless he really thrives on the PK or starts chipping in more offensively he's just roster filler. I'd sooner have a shit kicker in his place if we are sacrificing offense on that spot.

Being higher than league minimum AND had at asset cost is a concern. That the Oilers landed on this player while feeling others were no good is mysterious at best. How do you land on Podkolzin. The guy was a bust in Vancouver. Had clearly exited league and no successful attempts getting back.

This was a gamble. A desperate one as the Oilers probably realized they lost some energy youth and speed in lineup. This was a poor attempt to mitigate. It wasn't even a good probability attempt.

Podz is a player that was in our division. How did the Oilers not have this player sussed? Its laughable Nucks were able to get any asset back. This is a waiver player. A PTO disguised. Or will be by next season.

 

[bandwagonesque]

A pretty classic scouting misfire. Pods has never shown anything like he should be a topten pick. His value was elevated on short sample on results in Ivan Hlinka tournament. Seems like scouts are even lazy now and base a lot on what takes place in a backyard.

Larionov was saying this guy was like Mark Messier. Um, yeah, oh, you mean a Mark Messier that doesn't fight, doesn't scare anybody, doesn't have a shot or pass, doesn't ever score.

The only comparable is they both played hockey, and have some speed.

Scouting like any human assessment is so so subject to bias. Larionov being an example of a coach that just plays favorites and wants certain player to succeed and spreads word around and is biased. Unfortunately in scouting and in NHL once a rumor goes around about a player it starts to be real whether accurate or fiction, whether good or bad. "Oh Larionov said this, wow!"

Canucks: Podkolzin draws comparison to the great Mark Messier

Rick Dhaliwal of TSN 1040 reported that the Russian junior coach Igor Larionov thinks that Vasili Podkolzin plays a very similar style to the great Mark

thecanuckway.com

Absolutely ridiculous.

Its also standard issue distortion. Soon as you see something stated like "high character" you know you're in for an opinion ride. Its not objective, its not fact, its not a basis in which to evaluate. But its done constantly and very little evaluation of whether comments are even objective.

Larionov had a lot of high praise for the young kid’s character and desire to get better. He sounded like a “proud father talking about his kid”

“He is too good. I really like his leadership, his determination, he is so hungry to get to the net, and he gives 100%. ”

So there we have it. pure distortion. Funny thing is in Vancouver fans were worried about the Mark Messier comparisons. They disliked the comments. lol Wonder what Mark himself thought.


Yeah. I'd said he's a bust. Already established as that in Vancouver. This is a guy you expect being cut on a PTO. Sadly its demonstration of how desperate the Oilers were to get some kind of energy guy. Which they had several of if they ever retained them. So that we get this instead and worse we have to wash the Canucks stink from our memory base.

The Larionov angle is contrary to everything we learned at the time about how Podkolzin was scouted. Judd Brackett went out of his way to say the scouting staff was unanimous on Podkolzin being the right pick there. Podkolzin was also mocked higher than 10th by nearly everyone.

 

[Arpeggio]

At least he tries to do something positive when he isn't scoring. More than I can say for four other veteran players in the bottom six right now.

 

[Drivesaitl]

The Larionov angle is contrary to everything we learned at the time about how Podkolzin was scouted. Judd Brackett went out of his way to say the scouting staff was unanimous on Podkolzin being the right pick there. Podkolzin was also mocked higher than 10th by nearly everyone.

Not sure how you say its Contrary. Larionov was just one that was sending up Podkolzin and the scouting bought it. I dare say analytics did too. I suspect it was another analytics type draft putting him that high. Whether rest of scouting had him there arguably supports my point that part of scouting is hearsay and rumor based. I say this because I see conjecture in so many scouting reports. People may be good at assessing hockey but they sure aren't very good about expressing actual objective thoughts in their evaluations.

Any look at Pods skills or lack of them other than skating and I don't know how he went so high. His shot is awful. Weirdest shot mechanics seen here since Puljujarvi.

 

[rboomercat90]

Yep. No end of people telling us Kostin had negligible value here despite him shooting well, hitting like a mule, fighting, scoring and being hard to play against.

Seems like this org always backs itself into needing 5-10 fill league minimum contracts and allergic to paying guys that can a do little more out there.

Mind you Kostin it appears didn't train the best in offseason. Focused more on fighting training and has gotten bigger, which is good for heavyweight division but no always for hockey. Guy is huge now. The bulk has taken some skating and game away. Looks like he'll be available again.

The Kostin hate on this board after he left was bizarre. He’s exactly the type of player this team needs and aside from Kane hasn’t had the last two seasons.

 

[Drivesaitl]

The Kostin hate on this board after he left was bizarre. He’s exactly the type of player this team needs and aside from Kane hasn’t had the last two seasons.

Its standard dynamic here apparently to dislike players that are no longer here and expect everybody incoming to be better. Pretty pronounced distortion.

Some of it could be people not knowing what its like on a bench to have a Kane or Kostin riding shotgun. You love having those guys on your side. Now we got none of those guys. We got rabbit punching Perry and Nurse when he feels like it.

The other thing is people feeling Kostin, a player that worked hard to be where he was and nothing gifted in life to take a discount here instead of taking the financial security of a 2yr and 4M. He took this and the Oilers felt like not even making an offer. For some reason people blamed Kostin for choosing financial security in what he knows to be a very uncertain NHL.

 

[Behind Enemy Lines]

Its standard dynamic here apparently to dislike players that are no longer here and expect everybody incoming to be better. Pretty pronounced distortion.

Some of it could be people not knowing what its like on a bench to have a Kane or Kostin riding shotgun. You love having those guys on your side. Now we got none of those guys. We got rabbit punching Perry and Nurse when he feels like it.

The other thing is people feeling Kostin, a player that worked hard to be where he was and nothing gifted in life to take a discount here instead of taking the financial security of a 2yr and 4M. He took this and the Oilers felt like not even making an offer. For some reason people blamed Kostin for choosing financial security in what he knows to be a very uncertain NHL.

Becoming clear that young players with options will choose financial security over team considerations. Kostin loved his time in Edmonton to the point of coming back in playoffs to watch with his old jersey on. I've never seen anything like that. But careers are finite and earning potential is limited. We saw two others opt for fresh start opportunities over murky roles on a Cup Final team. The market placed new valuation on them that facilitated it. It's easy to say what players should do without a financial stake in the situation.

Podkolzen is a good second chance bet for a low risk acquisition cost and a salary equivalency of a free agent day 1 signing Josh Brown. Been saying he likely resets as a fast forecheck energy bottom sixer with limited hockey sense. But the Kane injury gives some runway to see if any of his latent draft potential might squeeze out. Think end of year though he's Line 3 RW with Henrique and E. Kane (unless Kane pushes to top 6W).

 

[McDNicks17]

The Kostin hate on this board after he left was bizarre. He’s exactly the type of player this team needs and aside from Kane hasn’t had the last two seasons.

The hate players get is usually equal to how much the other side overhypes them. Most people just didn't want him at $2M while others called those people crazy because he's an irreplaceable 20 goal scoring 4th liner.

I think every single person on the board would have been happy with Kostin on a deal like Pod's, but unfortunately he wanted to chase a raise.

 

[Drivesaitl]

Becoming clear that young players with options will choose financial security over team considerations. Kostin loved his time in Edmonton to the point of coming back in playoffs to watch with his old jersey on. I've never seen anything like that. But careers are finite and earning potential is limited. We saw two others opt for fresh start opportunities over murky roles on a Cup Final team. The market placed new valuation on them that facilitated it. It's easy to say what players should do without a financial stake in the situation.

Podkolzen is a good second chance bet for a low risk acquisition cost and a salary equivalency of a free agent day 1 signing Josh Brown. Been saying he likely resets as a fast forecheck energy bottom sixer with limited hockey sense. But the Kane injury gives some runway to see if any of his latent draft potential might squeeze out. Think end of year though he's Line 3 RW with Henrique and E. Kane (unless Kane pushes to top 6W).

pods is a bust. He's a bust that skates and hits. But that isn't close to enough to be given NHL contract or for us to have had to give up asset.

 

[Soundwave]

The Oilers should be taking flyers on former 1st round picks that are available for cheap all the time.

Given again that they've essentially wasted almost a decade of drafting, they should take chances on players like this.

It won't work out every time, but if you hit even once it's like basically getting a free 1st. We should bring back Kostin later in the season too (just have to find a 3rd team to retain a few hundred K since San Jose cannot).

Florida has made hay with plenty of reclamation projects. Not every one works, like it doesn't look like Adam Boqvist is panning out there, but you should still keep trying.

If he was available I'd take a flyer on Alex Nylander too, stuff like that.

 

[Canovin]

If the Oilers start paying guys like Kostin double what they're worth, we get overpaid guys like Nurse. Soon to be Stuart Skinner and maybe Bouchard

It's honestly better to have underperforming guys at low cost than underperforming guys at high cost that's unmovable

 

[WEMCHUD]

I think he's a better player than Puljujarvi, but if you have no confidence in this league, you have basically nothing.

He's someone that needs a shot to go in off his ass or something so he can feel good about his game and then maybe you can see what he's got.

Unfortunately for him he got traded to a team that mired in a hilariously awful offensive slump to start the season, where even a 50 goal scorer is sitting on a goose egg.

Even in our worst decade of darkness years I don't think we ever shot the sub 6% shooting percentage we're sitting on right now.

By what metrics is he a better player than Jesse? .33 career ppg vs .24. 36 points vs 26 points for best season. 5 points vs 1 point this season. +5 for career vs -7. But ya the second player is the better one...

 

[fancy dan]

da hell wrong with you all. Pod is waaaaay down the list of oilers i'd be complaining about this year. honest hockey player.

 

[BarDownBobo]

https://x.com/i/web/status/1850743307640418631

Just going to leave this little highlight package here. Podz is doing a lot of good things on the ice, results just haven’t been there but the same can be said for the rest of the team. I also think it’s worth noting since everyone wants to make the Kostin comparison that Klim only had 1 point in his first 10 games as an Oiler, along with 4 in his first 17 games before really settling into things here.

 

[Oilhawks]

Nice fight and assist tonight