Post-Game Talk: Oilers dig a self-inflicted grave

[McAsuno]

I’ve been on this rollercoaster ride many times.

People losing their shit after one game remind me of people who have been on the same amusement park ride 100 times and always act as if it’s their first time.

It’s going to be ok.

I don't think the sky's falling from one single game, but I can understand the frustration of fans who at least have fair expectations upon this team that made it to the SCF and only losing by a goal in G7 last season. Team just looked lethargic and lacking energy last night. It's not great that the panthers came out guns blazing and destroyed the bruins in their 1st game either. The Oilers cannot afford another early terrible start and have to clinch home ice advantage at the earliest point. Then they can mainly just rest their stars and have them energized and ready to go for G1 in the playoffs.

Anyways, beat the blackhawks. Enough said.

 

[Drivesaitl]

Mental. It's been a calendar year now of him refusing to shoot the puck, it's not injury.

For whatever reason he decided to follow up his career year, a 64 goal season on the back of an aggressive shooting approach, by out of nowhere pretty much treating shooting as his last possible choice. It's ineffective, it limits his impact, it hurts the team, and it has to stop.

Sure. But all the top scorers for Winnipeg, the top line, the top production guys for the Jets were all silent till the game was out of reach. Their third line scored 3 goals, the game settling goals, and caused the result. When do we get that?

Scheifele and others squandered every chance they got. Didn't matter at all. They got support down the lineup. We gots fossils like Perry, Ryan, Janmark, Brown, even Henrique came up lame. Team is way too old and our bottomsix is frankly ancient. Thats where the energy in a lineup is supposed to come from.

 

[Oilhawks]

Do people actually think having Ceci would have made the difference last night? Lmao

Apparently. It's mind boggling. Ceci turned into Chris Pronger since he got traded, I guess.

 

[K1984]

Sure. But all the top scorers for Winnipeg, the top line, the top production guys for the Jets were all silent till the game was out of reach. Their third line scored 3 goals, the game settling goals, and caused the result. When do we get that?

Scheifele and others squandered every chance they got. Didn't matter at all. They got support down the lineup. We gots fossils like Perry, Ryan, Janmark, Brown, even Henrique came up lame. Team is way too old and our bottomsix is frankly ancient. Thats where the energy in a lineup is supposed to come from.

I'd be listening if it was a one off. The not shooting phenomenon is a year old now.

McDavid's line was our worst last night. I thought the 3rd and 4th were more or less ok. That can't happen.

 

[Drivesaitl]

How did FLA kick Bostons a** game 1? They have been 2 2 finals in a row lol.

I do agree with people that it is a mental hurdle. Imagine going to game 7 and losing by 1 goal and then having to start this gauntlet all over again.

I panicked last year. I won't this year. I know they will turn it around, but they are not cup favourites to me. I can't believe how many media picked them .

If we somehow upgrade on SKinner and get a solid #4 dman, I will consider us cup contenders

I was gutted after the SC game 7 loss. As a fan gutted. Can't imagine how soul sucking that was for the players. I don't even have to guess which is harder, losing the final in a sweep or 5 games or coming all the way back only to lose it all on one goal. The amount of energy and intensity a team has to spend to get all the way there coming out of the West is enormous. You don't just rebound from that as the players will state. Its real hard to rebound. Its the way it is in top echelon sports. Rebounding from being on the cusp of winning it all is enormously tough.

 

[McShogun99]

Skinner is the 37th highest paid goalie.
He performs like a 20-30th best goalie.

Goalies tend to be what they are at 24/25. I can't recall many improving very drastically.

If you want an improvement in net we need a $7m goalie.

We need a reliable goalie to tandem with Skinner. That should be the second biggest need on the team behind a partner for Nurse.

 

[McAsuno]

I'd be listening if it was a one off. The not shooting phenomenon is a year old now.

McDavid's line was our worst last night. I thought the 3rd and 4th were more or less ok. That can't happen.

There was a sequence when McDavid did his usual thing with his speed while the puck was on his stick as he was driving to the net, but instead of going for a shot, he passed it. I love Connor, but for petes sake, be selfish and shoot the damn puck.

 

[The Head Crusher]

Well that was ugly

 

[Jimmi McJenkins]

that makes sense, emberson came from a team that plays pond hockey at 50% of the speed of the oilers. he will adjust quickly

I totally agree, I wonder if he can handle above the bottom-pair going forward, but I expect him to be be better, but he was quite bad last night.

The team was bad, Dermott had moments, but Emberson stood out to me.

 

[russ99]

I'm so interested to see all the Dermott stuff. I didn't think he was great, he had a few tough reads, but he played largely ok, and looked like he can play at the NHL level.

Emberson was very rough, imo, he looked overwhelmed by the play and the pace. I expect him to be better, but I pull Emberson out long before Dermott.

Dermott is going to have to do a lot to show me he’s a viable option when the Oilers don’t have the puck. He does have good offensive instincts, maybe play him at forward? Jk.

 

[Drivesaitl]

I'd be listening if it was a one off. The not shooting phenomenon is a year old now.

McDavid's line was our worst last night. I thought the 3rd and 4th were more or less ok. That can't happen.

I don't disagree. He needs to be shooting the puck and him not doing that takes away from the club and results. I wonder sometimes though if the top players on the club sometimes lay back a bit taking it easy and wondering if anybody else ever picks up the slack. On this roster they can keep waiting. Unfortunately our third line was awful. I expected our 2nd line would be. But the third line is supposed to be having a resurrection season. Its what they're here for is to make amends. Henrique played well last season, the other two need to improve immensely on their last seasons. They didn't get much.

Jeff Skinner is so bad in a topsix. Even when playing in the east he gets erased and knocked off the puck. All plays end with him. People wanted this guy?

Another side note that Podkolzin is a flat out bust. What an unhelpful offseason. What player did we obtain that is useful? How many did we lose that were playing a part? Add Kane as missing all season and the club is going to find it much harder.

 

[russ99]

Sure. But all the top scorers for Winnipeg, the top line, the top production guys for the Jets were all silent till the game was out of reach. Their third line scored 3 goals, the game settling goals, and caused the result. When do we get that?

Scheifele and others squandered every chance they got. Didn't matter at all. They got support down the lineup. We gots fossils like Perry, Ryan, Janmark, Brown, even Henrique came up lame. Team is way too old and our bottomsix is frankly ancient. Thats where the energy in a lineup is supposed to come from.

Funny, most of those goals were against our top six forwards, who also didn’t score. Would be more interesting seeing the top six give more support to the iffy defenseman group and on and off goalie than expect the bottom six to be scoring a ton.

 

[Echodek]

Skinner is the 37th highest paid goalie.
He performs like a 20-30th best goalie.

Goalies tend to be what they are at 24/25. I can't recall many improving very drastically.

If you want an improvement in net we need a $7m goalie.

The Oilers can’t afford an elite goaltender. The most we can afford is average, which is what we have.

 

[Drivesaitl]

Tony
I think the issue is that we expect (and probably rightly so for an upper echelon player) to carry the play and act as a quarterback in their own end and to compensate for lesser players. More often than not with Nurse, he doesn’t do any of that and, in fact, it’s even hard to know which player is the “lesser of the two” Dman when he’s on the ice. More is expected of him. He can’t run from that.

The whole Nurse clan have underperformed. Darnell and his sistas. I remember all the hype about all of them. They've all been crash and burn. Kia Nurse became awful with the Womens Basketball national side. terrible Olympic performance again. Maybe Sarah is holding up the family now, I dunno, you can't pay me to watch womens hockey.

Maybe the Nurse clan have some trouble bringing it and are just entitled.

 

[Oilslick941611]

Jeff Skinner looks like a guy who was bought out.
Emberson looks like a guy with 30 games of experience in the NHl with zero expectations having to play with an adventure of a partner.
Our top guys did no lead by example in the slightest.
Dermotts bad.
Stuart Skinner was absolutely awful.
Third line looks good defensively but massive lack of hands on that line.
4th line looked alright.

Yup. Could have used ceci last night.

 

[McHelpus]

One thing about the defense, they handled the puck awfully last night. So many fumbles, missed shots, unforced turnovers.

The forwards are way to small.

 

[Drivesaitl]

Funny, most of those goals were against our top six forwards, who also didn’t score. Would be more interesting seeing the top six give more support to the iffy defenseman group and on and off goalie than expect the bottom six to be scoring a ton.

I think we seldom have to complain about the top players here getting it done. Thats the history of this club throughout the McDrai arc. Again look at Scheifele yesterday. He was flubbing any chance he got. Didn't matter, rest of team down the lineup was getting it done and a third line with 3 goals. Other than Henrique we have nothing in our bottomsix.

Also you watched last season and playoffs. The topsix were spending the entire year making up for normal Skinner in net and a relatively weak D squad. Gets tiring doing your job and everybody elses. For Skinner and this D to have a good game requires superman efforts from our topsix doing all the work in ownzone.

 

[Jimmi McJenkins]

Dermott is going to have to do a lot to show me he’s a viable option when the Oilers don’t have the puck. He does have good offensive instincts, maybe play him at forward? Jk.

He's clearly a bottom pairing guy and I don't mind those instincts as well.

 

[mcdingdong]

The sour tone in here is a bit much imo. We have a good team. We will be fine. I get the comments about our slow starts historically but I really don't understand wanting to fire players into the sun after one game - particularly players who just got here. Player movement is tough on the players and their families, and they almost always take some time to acclimate. Wake me up for game 83.

 

[CantHaveTkachev]

Apparently. It's mind boggling. Ceci turned into Chris Pronger since he got traded, I guess.

we traded for a worse player in Emberson..sure he has room to grow but Grier didn't have a problem moving him out of SJ

 

[Drivesaitl]

We need a reliable goalie to tandem with Skinner. That should be the second biggest need on the team behind a partner for Nurse.

Pickard>Skinner. It isn't the tandem thats the problem its that we have no starter. I'd be giving Pickard half the games.

 

[jesusbuiltmyhotrod]

This is the most puzzling team I have every followed, they look awful at times, like one of or the worst team in the NHL, but then look like a serious cup contender...at some point it's not all the coaches we have had....

The whole team sucked but our goaltending needs to be better..gee where have I said this before? Get a damn goalie.

Apparently. It's mind boggling. Ceci turned into Chris Pronger since he got traded, I guess.

This place is bi-polar..all last year Ceci wa sa whipping boy..one bad game and people saying we should have kept him lol. Ceci was not the issue last night.

The sour tone in here is a bit much imo. We have a good team. We will be fine. I get the comments about our slow starts historically but I really don't understand wanting to fire players into the sun after one game - particularly players who just got here. Player movement is tough on the players and their families, and they almost always take some time to acclimate. Wake me up for game 83.

The hyperbole, silly overreactions are what people here do, it's a mental illness lol.

 

[jesusbuiltmyhotrod]

I don't disagree. He needs to be shooting the puck and him not doing that takes away from the club and results. I wonder sometimes though if the top players on the club sometimes lay back a bit taking it easy and wondering if anybody else ever picks up the slack. On this roster they can keep waiting. Unfortunately our third line was awful. I expected our 2nd line would be. But the third line is supposed to be having a resurrection season. Its what they're here for is to make amends. Henrique played well last season, the other two need to improve immensely on their last seasons. They didn't get much.

Jeff Skinner is so bad in a topsix. Even when playing in the east he gets erased and knocked off the puck. All plays end with him. People wanted this guy?

Another side note that Podkolzin is a flat out bust. What an unhelpful offseason. What player did we obtain that is useful? How many did we lose that were playing a part? Add Kane as missing all season and the club is going to find it much harder.

Mcdavid is one of the best players ever but his refusal to shoot in dangerous places is simply mind boggling and infuriating, he has an elite shot to boot.,

 

[KeithIsActuallyBad]

This is the most puzzling team I have every followed, they look awful at times, like one of or the worst team in the NHL, but then look like a serious cup contender...at some point it's not all the coaches we have had....

There's a distinct mentality that seems to permeate throughout the organization, that they're entitled to win or should with minimal effort. They frequently have to be reminded that they're not invincible. They got absolutely humbled early in the season last year and had to work their asses off just to get back to respectability. Last night was extremely reminiscent of the Vancouver game from last year where they got embarrassed. They just came off a playoff run where they fell one game short of the ultimate prize and they sure as hell didn't look motivated to rectify that. There was really no excuse for that performance yesterday. They better be ready to go and focused against the Blackhawks. Losing to the Jets is one thing, losing to the Blackhawks is another.

 

[CrazyJoeDavola]

Sure. But all the top scorers for Winnipeg, the top line, the top production guys for the Jets were all silent till the game was out of reach. Their third line scored 3 goals, the game settling goals, and caused the result. When do we get that?

Scheifele and others squandered every chance they got. Didn't matter at all. They got support down the lineup. We gots fossils like Perry, Ryan, Janmark, Brown, even Henrique came up lame. Team is way too old and our bottomsix is frankly ancient. Thats where the energy in a lineup is supposed to come from.

It's time we stop saying bottom 6 and start saying our entire lineup is ancient, old, and slow, All of our fwd and D lines. Older, slower, softer. Outside of McD.