Why is there talk of Ken Holland leaving the Oilers after this season?

[WetcoastOrca]

Looking at the Oilers D last night once you get past Eckholm and Bouchard is a fire able offense in itself.
Nurse, Kulak, Desharnais and Broberg.
Add that to the goaltending fissco with a $5 million goalie not even playing in the NHL and it’s surprising Holland was allowed to run out his contract.

 

[CycloneSweep]

Looking at the Oilers D last night once you get past Eckholm and Bouchard is a fire able offense in itself.
Nurse, Kulak, Desharnais and Broberg.
Add that to the goaltending fissco with a $5 million goalie not even playing in the NHL and it’s surprising Holland was allowed to run out his contract.

Hey now, Kulak is an excellent 4/5 defender. He is a big reason the team is even in the finals. He has slowly but surely been taking minutes from Nurse to the benefit of the whole team.

 

[Oilslick941611]

Win the cup first. Does the GM that brought Peca and Pronger in for the '06 run get free drinks for being a runner up in the cup final?

if Lowe didn't ruin his reputation during 2007-2011 he probably does. Being a Player who won, a GM who got got game 7, your damn right, but after that cup final Lowe and MacT just completely wrecked their reputations. " I know a thing or two about winning" Tier 1 Tier 2 fans"

 

[Pavels Dog]

Sure but it's even harder to find when you give a 5-year deal to a 30 year-old goaltender who's had one season in his career where he was the starter.

The fact that your comment could apply to like 10 different GMs in the last few years shows my point.

 

[Lazlo Hollyfeld]

The fact that your comment could apply to like 10 different GMs in the last few years shows my point.

The Oilers were in win-now mode with the best player on the planet and after relying on the corpse of Mike Smith turned around and gave a 5-year $5 million deal to an unproven goalie.

Care to list those 10 who did something remotely similar?

Kuemper's the only one who comes to mind that's close. The Wings signing Husso (for 3 years) or the Sens signing Korpisalo (for $4 million) to rebuilding teams is not nearly the same thing.

 

[CupofOil]

Looking at the Oilers D last night once you get past Eckholm and Bouchard is a fire able offense in itself.
Nurse, Kulak, Desharnais and Broberg.
Add that to the goaltending fissco with a $5 million goalie not even playing in the NHL and it’s surprising Holland was allowed to run out his contract.

Uh, Kulak has been good all playoffs, all 3 playoffs he's been with the Oilers actually, and Broberg has been excellent since being inserted into the lineup. The Oilers didn't lose 2 games against the Panthers because of their defense, they lost because they scored 1 goal in 2 games including a no show from their top players.

Their defense has actually been quite good under Knoblauch/Coffey outside of Nurse who seems to be lost. It's the inconsistent goaltending and non-existent 3rd line that have been their biggest issues. Against the Panthers, offense from everybody really has been the biggest issue.

 

[Connor McConnor]

Ekholm, RNH, and Hyman have been excellent moves.

Campbell and Nurse have been horrific.

The rest are pretty so so. I do admit that it’s tough to fully judge his tenure because Chiarelli might be the worst GM in pro sports

 

[MessierII]

Look at the trades Zito has made and what Holland was blessed with.
Holland was handed mcdavid and Draisaitl on amazing contracts. He had Bouchard nuge handed to him.

Hyman wanted to come here. Holland didn't beat 8 other GMs or something. Ironically if Holland was a good gm he would have done a sign and trade deal with dubas like dubas wanted for 8 years at a lower cap hit.

Every year he has some Zach Kassian disaster he needs to get out of.

He hasn't addressed the goaltending and rhd man for nurse.

Awful at writing contracts and drafting. There are errors of omission as well as errors of commission.

Basically this team was ready to be here with or without Holland.

Zito didn’t inherit Barkov, Ekblad, Bobrovsky, Huberdeau and Weegar?

 

[McVespa99]

Looking at the Oilers D last night once you get past Eckholm and Bouchard is a fire able offense in itself.
Nurse, Kulak, Desharnais and Broberg.
Add that to the goaltending fissco with a $5 million goalie not even playing in the NHL and it’s surprising Holland was allowed to run out his contract.

Waaay off base as usual Orca. And those are the Dmen that beat your team....

 

[Bjornar Moxnes]

Looking at the Oilers D last night once you get past Eckholm and Bouchard is a fire able offense in itself.
Nurse, Kulak, Desharnais and Broberg.
Add that to the goaltending fissco with a $5 million goalie not even playing in the NHL and it’s surprising Holland was allowed to run out his contract.

Nurse is awful and so is Ceci. Desharnais is a fine 6th D and Kulak is an exrtremely underrated dman who is excellent on the bottom pairing and is solid on the 2nd pairing if paired with the right partner. Broberg has a lot of potential. Oilers D is definitely not a strength, but it's nowhere near as bad as people put it right now.

 

[Pavel10]

Zito didn’t inherit Barkov, Ekblad, Bobrovsky, Huberdeau and Weegar?

Yeah and he flipped half the guys you listed in trades he clearly won. Plus he wavier wired players, he's signed contract buyouts. He got reclamation projects.

It's an insult to GMs everywhere to compare Zito and Holland's work on the Panthers and oilers. It's not even close. It's comparing mcdavid and huberdeau.

 

[Brookbank]

Sure he has not been the most perfect GM (extending Nurse for too much money, Campbell signing). But he has made the Hyman signing and Ekholm trade that has put the Oilers in position to win the Stanley Cup. Is it because Oilers CEO Jeff Jackson wants his own guy or has Ken Holland decided he want out of being a GM and retiring?

Because he left Skinner in net. He had one job the last 2-3 years

 

[Pavels Dog]

Because he left Skinner in net. He had one job the last 2-3 years

And it's so easy to fix too.

Just look at this list of teams that acquired reliable, consistent goaltending via trade or UFA in the last 2-3 years:

 

[JianYang]

Nurse is awful and so is Ceci. Desharnais is a fine 6th D and Kulak is an exrtremely underrated dman who is excellent on the bottom pairing and is solid on the 2nd pairing if paired with the right partner. Broberg has a lot of potential. Oilers D is definitely not a strength, but it's nowhere near as bad as people put it right now.

Your first sentence says it all. Two "awful" dmen is alot to mask.

Ekholm is getting around the age where his ability can slip quickly as well.

 

[Dhockey16]

If that was remotely true then it would have happened years ago. The Oilers are the in the finals because we have the 4 leading scorers (McDavid, Draisaitl, Bouchard, Nuge), to go along with the top goal scorer (Hyman), one of the best couple shutdown dmen in the league (Ekholm), an elite PP and PK, depth at all positions, etc.

The failure to address goaltending is a huge blight on Holland's tenure as GM.

 

[UpHere]

the goalie has got us to within 2 wins of the Cup... in his second year - goalie is fine