Constructive Criticism of Peter Chiarelli

[t0nedeff]

He failed completely. Vanek has 5 goals now with Vancouver on a bargain contract and Chia was whistling away with his hands in his pockets come free agency. He had options to atleast bring some players with a history of atleast producing in this league and he did shit and now we are where we are because of it.

 

[Spawn]

^

We'd have been better off if he had actually done nothing in the summer. This team with Eberle and Pou in place of Strome and Jokinen is above .500 this season imo.

 

[Soundwave]

^

We'd have been better off if he had actually done nothing in the summer. This team with Eberle and Pou in place of Strome and Jokinen is above .500 this season imo.

They'd be over the cap if they kept both so at least one had to go.

I don't think they'd be over .500 either. While both players are doing well in new environments I don't think they'd be doing the same thing here.

I think probably you'd have 4 goals from Ebs (more than the 2 Strome has) and maybe 1 or 2 from Poo ... but that still puts us near the bottom in NHL scoring.

What the team needs is an actual player on the 2nd or 3rd line that drives offensive opportunities consistently and creates offence by forcing the other team to defend hard and also delivering goals at key moments that the team needs them thus relieving pressure from the McDavid line.

You need a Taylor Hall or you need a Kailer Yamamoto to blossom into that type of player for this team to work the way it is constructed IMO.

You need a player on that second line that can carry and push that line, someone who "defines" the line, we don't have that player right now.

 

[Hopelesslucicfan]

^

We'd have been better off if he had actually done nothing in the summer. This team with Eberle and Pou in place of Strome and Jokinen is above .500 this season imo.

Agreed. Even avoiding re signing McDavid First could have made Drai accept a lower dollar figure as he wouldn’t be compared to McDavid.

Chia seems to be an awful evaluator of talent, and seems to think he’s smarter than the rest of the league going into this season the way he did.

Either way, I’m over this clown. He hasn’t done anything for us that literally anyone with a half a brain couldn’t have done, except maybe maroon.

Talbot was a favour from slats, Drai was already here, McDavid was a no brainer, he signed McDavid and Drai to whatever they wanted, etc.

Going into last off-season I was so excited, knowing we almost made the conference finals and just needed to fill a few holes, and had full faith in chia. Well now it’s time to be showing the nhl that we’re a real cup contender with those holes filled, but instead we managed to get a lot worse.

Anyone could have seen scoring and D being an issue this coming season, which means either chia was aware and did nothing, or wasn’t aware at all, which would make him an awful gm either way.

 

[CantHaveTkachev]

^

We'd have been better off if he had actually done nothing in the summer. This team with Eberle and Pou in place of Strome and Jokinen is above .500 this season imo.

Could we even afford that team though considering Drai's major bump in salary?

 

[Spawn]

They'd be over the cap if they kept both so at least one had to go.

I don't think they'd be over .500 either. While both players are doing well in new environments I don't think they'd be doing the same thing here.

I think probably you'd have 4 goals from Ebs (more than the 2 Strome has) and maybe 1 or 2 from Poo ... but that still puts us near the bottom in NHL scoring.

What the team needs is an actual player on the 2nd or 3rd line that drives offensive opportunities consistently and creates offence by forcing the other team to defend hard and also delivering goals at key moments that the team needs them thus relieving pressure from the McDavid line.

You need a Taylor Hall or you need a Kailer Yamamoto to blossom into that type of player for this team to work the way it is constructed IMO.

You need a player on that second line that can carry and push that line, someone who "defines" the line, we don't have that player right now.

We wouldn't be over the cap. We'd face potential overages for next season, but that could have been solved by attaching a pick to dump Fayne which would have saved as much as the Poo buyout and would have had the added benefit of not sewering 3 extra years of dead cap.

As for eberle and poo not performing as well here as they are now? They both performed as well as they are now for the majority of their time in edmonton. Both had down years, but there is no reason to think they couldn't have rebounded if given another season. The tired "he wouldn't be that good here" excuse is just used so people don't have to face the reality that these moves are actually just bad.

 

[Soundwave]

We wouldn't be over the cap. We'd face potential overages for next season, but that could have been solved by attaching a pick to dump Fayne which would have saved as much as the Poo buyout and would have had the added benefit of not sewering 3 extra years of dead cap.

As for eberle and poo not performing as well here as they are now? They both performed as well as they are now for the majority of their time in edmonton. Both had down years, but there is no reason to think they couldn't have rebounded if given another season. The tired "he wouldn't be that good here" excuse is just used so people don't have to face the reality that these moves are actually just bad.

Maybe. In fairness Pouliot was really, really, really, bad last year. He's playing with fire under his ass because his NHL career depends on it, but I have some doubts he'd be doing the same here with the cushy comfort of several more years guaranteed at $4 mill per.

I don't mind losing both of them, what I've been advocating for since the summer was signing Vanek. That dude can wire the freaking puck still, I think here he'd actually have even more goals than he does in Vancouver. The entire PP would run through him as the finisher.

 

[McNuge]

Agreed. Even avoiding re signing McDavid First could have made Drai accept a lower dollar figure as he wouldn’t be compared to McDavid.

Chia seems to be an awful evaluator of talent, and seems to think he’s smarter than the rest of the league going into this season the way he did.

Either way, I’m over this clown. He hasn’t done anything for us that literally anyone with a half a brain couldn’t have done, except maybe maroon.

Talbot was a favour from slats, Drai was already here, McDavid was a no brainer, he signed McDavid and Drai to whatever they wanted, etc.

Going into last off-season I was so excited, knowing we almost made the conference finals and just needed to fill a few holes, and had full faith in chia. Well now it’s time to be showing the nhl that we’re a real cup contender with those holes filled, but instead we managed to get a lot worse.

Anyone could have seen scoring and D being an issue this coming season, which means either chia was aware and did nothing, or wasn’t aware at all, which would make him an awful gm either way.

Chia already said that he was trying with Drai's camp for a long time but they wanted McDavid signed first. With McDavid signed (to a pretty much blank cheque) it gives Drai's camp leverage. No way was be signing for for almost half of McDavid's contract. There was no way to sign Drai before McDavid, his agent isn't that dumb.

 

[Little Fury]

What the team needs is an actual player on the 2nd or 3rd line that drives offensive opportunities consistently and creates offence by forcing the other team to defend hard and also delivering goals at key moments that the team needs them thus relieving pressure from the McDavid line.

You need a Taylor Hall or you need a Kailer Yamamoto to blossom into that type of player for this team to work the way it is constructed IMO.

You need a player on that second line that can carry and push that line, someone who "defines" the line, we don't have that player right now.

Yeah but a player like that would cost you at least $8.5 M a year.

 

[Oilfan2]

Chia already said that he was trying with Drai's camp for a long time but they wanted McDavid signed first. With McDavid signed (to a pretty much blank cheque) it gives Drai's camp leverage. No way was be signing for for almost half of McDavid's contract. There was no way to sign Drai before McDavid, his agent isn't that dumb.

I may be wrong but that doesn't sound right to me...McD didn't need to be signed..we still had a year left. Drai, on the other hand, had to be signed this season. Chia could have played hard ball with him and his agent as they were under no obligation to sign Conner first.

Would Drai have sat out the season waiting? That part I have no idea on....

 

[McNuge]

I may be wrong but that doesn't sound right to me...McD didn't need to be signed..we still had a year left. Drai, on the other hand, had to be signed this season. Chia could have played hard ball with him and his agent as they were under no obligation to sign Conner first.

Would Drai have sat out the season waiting? That part I have no idea on....

Yes we did have a year a left, but there is a reason why these types of high end players get signed as soon as possible. The GM needs to know how much cap he has to work with for the second best player on the team. Just like Eichel was signed this year, and Matthews will be signed this July, before Marner or Nylander.

Also Johansson's and Kuz's contracts were the baseline for Drai. But, he is younger than both and outperformed both last year, in the regular season and the playoffs. 8m per was the minimum he was getting. So 500k more than that is not a big deal. You also avoid burning bridges with young players. Remember the whole JG to Philly situation after he signed his contract?

Also if you don't sign McDavid this past off season then his cap would go up as he was taking a certain percentage of the cap regardless. So it's really a neutral situation imo. You either pay Drai 8.5 or you pay McDavid more than 12.5 if he signs next year.

You also face the possibility of McDavid's camp using offer sheets to drive the price up next year.

 

[hallhopkinseberle]

Peter needs to go, seems like he is making the wrong move every time he makes a big move. It's hurting the Oilers long-term potential.

Maroon-McDavid-Drastaitl
Hall-Nuge-Pulujarvi
Slepyshev/Drake-Barzal-Strome
Slepyshev/Drake-Letestu-Kassian

Klefbom-Demers
Sekera-Carlo
Nurse-Benning

 

[space321]

Draisaitl and McDavid's contracts are fine. Star players need and should be paid. It's Lucic and Russell's contracts that are straight up stupid.

 

[oXo Cube]

Draisaitl and McDavid's contracts are fine. Star players need and should be paid. It's Lucic and Russell's contracts that are straight up stupid.

Basically this.

It's perfectly fine to carry expensive contracts if the players are earning them. It's when you have players significantly underperforming relative to their salary that you run into problems.

Although I think we will escape Lucic with the LTIR approach before too long.

 

[PinSeeker]

Reinhart trade was god awful from the start. Eberle for Strome made sense and still does, Eberle would not have produced what he is producing here. Strome has been about what I expected. Also helps next year.
Russell signing was a big risk, so far not looking great. Lucic notoriously starts slow, let's evaluate come February.
RW depth still an issue as is depth dman with Sekera out, which everyone knew all summer, and I do not feel Chia did enough, but I am not ready to run him out of town just yet.

My $0.02

 

[NoDust33]

Draisaitl and McDavid's contracts are fine. Star players need and should be paid. It's Lucic and Russell's contracts that are straight up stupid.

The Lucic and Russell contracts are not the issue, this team right now needs more nhl players, not less of them. I can understand the Eberle trade, and why it was done. What I have trouble understanding is why there wasn't more of an attempt to bring in a few cheap veteran players. Vrbata, Marchessault, even letting Pitlick walk, it seems like there could have been an opportunity, with all the shuffling of nhl rosters, to have added some decent players for cheap. Jokinen was a good addition, Strome would have been a nice fit at 3C for 2.5 mil. But because the oilers are severely limited in how they can deploy their lineup, it just keeps compounding and as a result guys like Cags, Slepy, Jokinen, Strome are all having a tough time finding their rhythm.

The trades were not bad trades in my opinion if you view them in a bigger context. However, I just don't understand the thought process of going into the season with such a limited roster, no competition, and no options. Can anyone shed some light on what the thought process here was?

 

[NoDust33]

Reinhart trade was god awful from the start. Eberle for Strome made sense and still does, Eberle would not have produced what he is producing here. Strome has been about what I expected. Also helps next year.
Russell signing was a big risk, so far not looking great. Lucic notoriously starts slow, let's evaluate come February.
RW depth still an issue as is depth dman with Sekera out, which everyone knew all summer, and I do not feel Chia did enough, but I am not ready to run him out of town just yet.

My $0.02

I can agree with what you are saying, but what options did the oil have if they didn't sign Russell? I can get a feel for what was the thought process with the D, but up front, there were and are so many question marks. I have liked Chiarelli's moves cause he has made some tough ones to fix the situation this team was in. Brought in some cheap options to replace Sekera, not working great so far but I can understand the process.

But I agree, the holes up front were glaring and I think there could have been more done at virtually zero risk to fix it.

 

[Little Fury]

Reinhart trade was god awful from the start. Eberle for Strome made sense and still does, Eberle would not have produced what he is producing here. Strome has been about what I expected. Also helps next year.

If the only defence you can make of the deal is a counterfactual, that's not a defence at all.

 

[NoDust33]

If the only defence you can make of the deal is a counterfactual, that's not a defence at all.

I have to disagree. What's factual is Eberle's production and usage with the oilers was in a decline under Todd. You could argue that he wasn't being used properly, whatever you want. But the fact is I find it highly unlikely he was going to produce like he is now under a coach who was losing confidence in him.

 

[Little Fury]

I have to disagree. What's factual is Eberle's production and usage with the oilers was in a decline under Todd. You could argue that he wasn't being used properly, whatever you want. But the fact is I find it highly unlikely he was going to produce like he is now under a coach who was losing confidence in him.

He might not have produced at a 65 point pace here, but I expect he'd be in the 55-60 point range as per usual. And as it stands, we could use a player like that.

 

[CantHaveTkachev]

He might not have produced at a 65 point pace here, but I expect he'd be in the 55-60 point range as per usual. And as it stands, we could use a player like that.

too bad we ran him outta town:

http://hfboards.mandatory.com/threads/eberle-must-go.2150003/page-42

 

[Ol' Jase]

If the only defence you can make of the deal is a counterfactual, that's not a defence at all.

If you think that Eberle belonged on this team after his playoff performance, I’d wager you didn’t watch a minute of the playoffs.

 

[Blue Line Turnover]

My only criticism is the lack of an explanation for some of the transactions that have occurred. Glen Sather openly admitted that he was doing the Oil a favour with the Talbot trade. Have the Oilers management been doing the same for NYI in hopes of attempting to resuscitate the 80s Oiler-Islanders rivalry?
If you had asked any Oilers' fan months before the Reinhart trade, "hey, do you think that it would be hypothetically possible that, in a few years' time, Griffin Reinhart could possibly be waived by an expansion team and that not a single team would attempt to claim him?". I guarantee you that the overwhelmingly majority of fans would say, "yes." So how can you justify that trade from the perspective of a team of highly educated professionals whose sole purpose is to make this organization better?

 

[harpoon]

If you think that Eberle belonged on this team after his playoff performance, I’d wager you didn’t watch a minute of the playoffs.

If you think this team today, right now, couldn't use Eberle, I'd wager you haven't watched a minute of the season to date.

 

[LTIR]

He might not have produced at a 65 point pace here, but I expect he'd be in the 55-60 point range as per usual. And as it stands, we could use a player like that.

no guarantees here.. Eberle could very well be a healthy scratch in Edmonton. Just not a McLellan player who seemed lost after the Hall trade. Having said that, Chia should have gotten a lot more in return for him.