Definitely not, I know the wound is fresh from the most recent playoffs but when you look at the season as a whole I wouldn’t say we were a top contender. Remember we were struggling for a playoffs spot at Christmas.
Ekholm definitely helps the team and going into next year there should be some pretty high expectations but we need the consistency all season. Main keys to success next year will be:
1) Better and more consistent goaltending. Hopefully Campbell can bounce back and Skinner improves his consistency
2) We desperately need some young guys to actually become something in the NHL. Internally drafted depth is absolutely killing us right now. An ELC player coming in as a 60 point player would be massive
7 millions on upgrades over Yamamoto and Ceci? Thats small margins. Let Bjugstaf take Yamamotos spot. And use 5 millions instead on a RD upgrade that is a great fit.Nope. Reload and go again next year. We have two more years with Drai, we have some young players maturing. A full season with Ekholm-Bouch pair, hopefully an upgrade on Ceci/Yamamoto and we go again. Entire "core" is locked up for 2-3 years minimum. A few shots left yet.
NHL isnt taht easy.An Oiler ELC player? Scoring 60 points? Not a top 10 pick?
Bedard era soon? I think Chicago needs 2 or 3 more first picks plus 5 years or more to complete a rebuild. Chicago has more holes than the oilers when the oilers drafted Mcdavid.It won't get any easier. Soon it will also be the Bedard era. clock is ticking. McDavid has given his ultimatum. You have 1 more season Edmonton. Then it's back to being the joke of the league.
I don't think anyone believes that the players are killing the teams chances. The point was, the combined salary hit of McDrai after/if they both re-sign could prove to be extremely prohibitive with regards to affording the ancillary players that we need in order to go the distance in the playoffs.Yes, the two best forwards in hockey are killing the team's chance of winning!!
If only we could go back to the glory days of 2010 when the club's top scoring forwards were Penner, Gagner, Brulé, Horcoff, O'Sullivan, and Potulny.
I agree entirely. Now is the time to be bold and move nuge when he's got his 100 pts recency bias. Guy will never be able to stat pad like that again on a pp.As long as we rely on Skinner and Woodcroft's questionable decision making, we will be looking at the same result. Also RNH is pretty much a waisted roster space in the playoffs. Just not good enough and too perimeter. Gets pushed off the puck. Teams like Vegas and teams that attack just push him off the puck. You need impact players at depth positions. Players who can drive play and get in on the forecheck, tip pucks, battle for rebounds. RNH is none of this.
A lot has to go right in order to win a Cup, including pure luck. In 2019 basically all the contenders were gone early, opening a path for the Blues to win it all. Even during the miracle run of 2006, things probably would've been different had Dallas been in the way.I think some of you are very misguided in thinking there’s an easy path to a cup finals. Selling Dallas very short here, even Seattle. Let alone getting past either Carolina or Florida.
Look at what the Canes have done without basically an entire top line. There are no easy outs in the post season, regardless of whether people consider some teams weak and/or easy matchups.
Really surprised parts of this fanbase hasn’t learned that over the last few years.
The multi time Presidents Trophy winning Caps teams are a great example of how hard it is to win a cup, even with a loaded roster and a good goaltender.
And Dallas was pretty much on par as well.Vegas and Carolina were better than the Oilers this year
Before I screw off and enjoy my summer, I figured this might be an interesting discussion to have. I figure we blew it for a couple of reasons:
1) All our toughest competition has been eliminated and the path would have been wide opened for us if we got past Vegas. The Avs will be healthy and the Kings are likely going to be upgraded.
2) We need to sign Bouchard and will have to lose some of our depth to make that possible. The roster will most certainly be worse than this year (or at least on paper) because we will have no cap. Unless a massive is made at some point I just don't see how we can win a cup before the contracts of Connor & Leon expire.
No guarantee the Avs will be healthy, and Kopitar and Doughty will be another year along.Thoughts?
Yah no one said they weren’t really good teams. Boston and the Champs getting knocked out in the first round opened up a lighter path to the cup. Or do you disagree with that?I love how everyone keeps saying it was wide open because of upsets in the first round. There were literally only two upsets in the first round, and only one in the second round based on regular season results. The only team left that didn't finish with 108 points or more is Florida who is 12 months removed from a Presidents Trophy and a top 10 all time season.
The four remaining teams are all still really good teams.
This isn't like 2006 where the lower ranked team won every series in the first round in the West leading to a 6 vs 8 Western Final. These are good teams. Even Seattle was a 100 point team finishing 12th overall and 9 points back of the team they "upset".