What actually happened?

[yukoner88]

People must have short memories. The EIG micromanaged everything Lowe did. This was the first thing Lowe talked about after Katz bought the team. He now had the freedom to run the team as he saw fit. Didn't have to check in with the board every time he wanted to make a move. Ironically, that's when the team really started to fall apart. To me it shows how terrible he was as an executive. The team was able to stay competitive with EIG baby sitting him. It sank into oblivion when he was allowed to run it himself.

If I remember correctly, this is why Sather left for New York instead of retiring an Oiler. He found the EIG to be a pain in the ass to deal with and left as soon as his contract was up.

 

[PossessedHockeyCard*]

Whenever I think of the lost decade (past 10 yrs), i think of many faces, but for me, and to the disagreement of many, the one that stands amongst them all:

 

[joestevens29]

Didn't we fluke to get in? I remember a long slap shot from our zone, with someone forcing a faceoff that lead to a FO late in the game to tie it.


That and Lowe got extremely lucky and acquired a lot of key players at the right time, at a decent price too.

 

[CornKicker]

Pronger trade demand had a trickle effect on a lot of guys not re-signing. The team was built around a lot of guys on rental/last year of their contracts (Samsonov, Peca, Spacek). The team invested heavily in players like Horcoff and Pisani who got overpaid based off short samples of great play. As time went on more players got dealt who were underperforming/not going to re-sign. The team was no powerhouse even in the 2006 run. They were a team that caught fire and clicked at the right time carried by an elite #1D in Pronger and a hot clutch goaltender in Roloson. We had no real #1C. We had no real superstar forward. Just a bunch of guys who worked their ***** off and had enough skill and chemistry to come together as a group.

Pronger demanding a trade was the beginning of the end for the team. As I said slowly guys either left or were shipped out and the team did a horrible job in drafting and in identifying prospect talent when they did trade away roster players for futures.

All in all the team lacked high end talent to begin with, and without Pronger just couldn't cut it and the cupboards were pretty barren to begin with. They tried to fill those holes through desperate moves like offer sheets but it proved no use so they had to hit rock bottom accumulating high 1st round picks to start building any sort of high end talent within the organization as Edmonton was not very high on any high profile free agents list either.

all of this is true,

but a piece that gets overlooked a lot was the time when the oilers disbanded their own AHL affiliate and ended up sharing a team with MTL/Pitt and it resulted in role players and 3/4th line guy not being developed from within. by the time we rolled around to getting taylor hall the team was so void of role players that we were forced to try and acquire them via free agency. thats where the belangers came from.

 

[CornKicker]

A part of that could also be due to the lack of a farm team 10 years or so ago. If the high draft picks were brought into a stable developed core, they may have fared better.



He did build it though. Lets give credit where credit is due. He built and then dismantled a SC finalist team. I think maybe becasue he built it so quickly, he thought it was easier than it was. At the time, Lowe was thought to be one of the best GMs in the league. Maybe that went to his head, or maybe its the same thing with some young players, in that if you get early success, you dont realize how hard you have to work to sustain it.

yes exactly.

 

[joestevens29]

all of this is true,

but a piece that gets overlooked a lot was the time when the oilers disbanded their own AHL affiliate and ended up sharing a team with MTL/Pitt and it resulted in role players and 3/4th line guy not being developed from within. by the time we rolled around to getting taylor hall the team was so void of role players that we were forced to try and acquire them via free agency. thats where the belangers came from.

Belanger was really a special case. Not sure why he ended up being so horrid.

I don't think finding those forwards was much of an issue. We just didn't try very hard. Never tried to get guys on bad contracts with a year left that could've been a vet presence either.

Main issue was not addressing the defense and trading guys away that could still be valuable in a lessor role.

 

[rboomercat90]

all of this is true,

but a piece that gets overlooked a lot was the time when the oilers disbanded their own AHL affiliate and ended up sharing a team with MTL/Pitt and it resulted in role players and 3/4th line guy not being developed from within. by the time we rolled around to getting taylor hall the team was so void of role players that we were forced to try and acquire them via free agency. thats where the belangers came from.

It wasn't just the role players that weren't getting developed. Nobody was. Our prospects were low priority for the teams we shared with. We didn't have spots for our goalies. JDD and even Dubnyk were srcrewed over badly from that. I still remember Lowe trying to bull **** everbody by telling the media that a farm team wasn't all that important to development. that was probably the point I stopped trusting him.

As a side note- Claude Julien was the head coach of our farm team in Hamilton just before we started to split it with the Habs( not that you could call it a split as Montreal controlled it). Sure would have been nice to have kept him in our organization.

 

[Cawz]

oh Lowe deserves tons of credit for building a Stanley Cup contending team...bringing in Eric Brewer, Anson Carter were great moves pre-salary cap...he kept the team competitive and playoff worthy for a long time (Comrie fiasco being his initial poor move)

that 2005-06 team was a damn good team and would've won the division if we had Roloson from the beginning of the season...and getting Spacek and Samsonov was a stroke of genius

but something happened after Pronger wanted out....and he desperately wanted to capture the big name "magic" that the fanbase felt after acquiring Pronger

I think Pronger wanting out broke his brain, bruised his ego and logic and good decisions went out the window

Yup. It was like he had to use limited funds to find good players before the cap, and then once the cap came in and we could spend with the rest of the teams, he stopped evaluating talent properly and just started trying to throw big money at a big name.

Its kinda like an artist or musician or athlete who had to hustle and bustle and work hard to make a name for themselves, then they get discovered and sign a huge contract, only to find their art or music or game doesnt reach that same level anymore since they are getting paid regardless. Its kind of ironic that the Oilers, the poster-child for needing a salary cap in the pre-cap days, have actually faltered more than all other teams under the cap.

 

[joestevens29]

It wasn't just the role players that weren't getting developed. Nobody was. Our prospects were low priority for the teams we shared with. We didn't have spots for our goalies. JDD and even Dubnyk were srcrewed over badly from that. I still remember Lowe trying to bull **** everbody by telling the media that a farm team wasn't all that important to development. that was probably the point I stopped trusting him.

As a side note- Claude Julien was the head coach of our farm team in Hamilton just before we started to split it with the Habs( not that you could call it a split as Montreal controlled it). Sure would have been nice to have kept him in our organization.

What was he going to do? Call out the hand that feeds?

 

[AM]

The race is not to the fastest, nor the fight to the strongest, but time and chance happeneth to them all.

Then after we totally lost traction, the Canadian dollar rise along with the club trying to tank to get cheap high end talent.

Its hard to get beyond that.