Back to the drawing board Chia.

[Stoneman89]

Sekera in no way is a Petry replacement. Petry was actually occasionally physical and able to win puck battles.

As for Sekera or nothing else Chia had all off season in which to come up with some other option to burn big money for. He selected Sekera. This is not to say that you know that no other option was ever possible.

Gordon scored 14 goals for us. He did his share and was a good player here. Better than Letestu in every measure.



Just a question BBO. Why did Nicholson allow the Petry trade? Seemed odd when it was readily apparent MacT was just placeholding. Why allow him to pull the deal on a trade?

Over 2 years. As much as I like Gordon, he's never scored more than 8 goals in a season, and will be hard pressed this year to even reach double digits in points. Still good on the faceoffs, but as a team I think we are getting better on the dot. I feel that Gordon is starting to track downwards and we moved him at a good time.

 

[Oilfan2]

You're forgetting all about the trash that the prior regime left though. Ference and Fayne have been garbage, and even though Nikitin and Sievens are playing in the AHL, they are still taking up valuable cap room, which we could have really used for more upgrades.

As to some of the additions above by Chia.

- I think in the grand plan, Reinhart was still considered a developing prospect that needed more time in the minors. Unfortunately, our lack of depth and injuries have derailed that plan until now.

- Talbot has not played well, or only in spurts, but I still see a turnaround for him. I doubt anyone saw Nilsson playing this well when we acquired him. A pretty good bet at backup, being forced to play more games than necessary while Talbot gets his act together. Meanwhile, the guys from last year aren't even in the league.

- Letestu could play better not doubt, but he IS outproducing Boyd Gordon. 2-3-5. Gordon has ONE ASSIST in 22 games. Even the much maligned Anton Lander is tied with him now.

- after a rough start, I think Sekera is coming on. Might have had something to do with a new conference, new coach, new system, and new partner. I wouldn't write him off just yet.

- have no problem with Korpi. Just as advertised. Good skater, plays physical, and has a bit of skill. Is only 2-1-3 so far, but was hurt by that concussion, and I thought he was playing well at the time.

I think a lot of our bottom 6 have been hurt by injuries to the group as a whole. Hendricks (arguably our best of the bunch) has missed a lot of time and had to play hurt in others, Klink has been gone most of the year, Korpi gone as mentioned, and lastly, Lander has not produced as expected, which has hurt everyones plus/minus. Not saying they can't be better, but I think they will as the season progresses. Pakirinin is still feeling his way through, but I feel he will be a solid addition to the bottom 6 as time goes on, and maybe the best of the bunch.

Yeah, that's all we need..more Chia upgrades like Letestu, Sekera, Korpi, Reinhart and Gryba. At least MacT's will be done after this season. Chia's 'upgrades' have sucked so far so if the Oil want improvement he's going to have do much better.

 

[Stoneman89]

I like what Chiarelli has done. He acquired the best goalie available in Talbot. He acquired the most sought after defenceman in Sekera. He acquired Letestu and Korpikoski who are 4th liners. Korpikoski was a 4th liner on Phoenix, so why did we expect anything else from him? He's fast, big, and good on the PK. Same with Letestu. Letestu is on pace to get the same amount of points he did last season. I figure Chiarelli felt at worst he will be our 4th line centre, and at best he could get back to his 2012 and 2013 ways where he was a 3rd line centre. Low risk.

Letestu is playing better than Gordon this year. I'd call that an upgrade. Korpikoski was another buy low option that could have paid off huge dividends. He is a serviceable 4th liner with potential to be a good 3rd liner.

Gryba is meh. He wasn't supposed to be anything more than a 3rd pairing guy, and he has done his role well enough. At times he's looked unbelievable and at other times, poor. 20 games in I think he's doing good adjusting to a new team.

Sekera was a big disappointed the first 10 games but is slowly putting it together. Chiarelli even said he's a good 2nd pairing guy and that's the going rate for 2nd line D these days. He has been playing well lately, I am happy with him.

Reinhart is young. I don't want to comment on him because of his age. He should pan out to be a solid solid player. Hamhuis lite.

Goalies are irrelevant in my opinion given our defensive situation.

I think Chiarelli has done well. Everyone knows this team still have garbage D and a terrible mix up front. Lots of work to be done still.

A 4th line of Hendricks-Letestu-Korpikoski would be great if we have a more skilled 3rd line with players like Andrew Shaw, Brad Marchand, etc. We lack skilled pests.

I think Pakarinin has a chance to be one of those creatures.

 

[Stoneman89]

Yeah, that's all we need..more Chia upgrades like Letestu, Sekera, Korpi, Reinhart and Gryba. At least MacT's will be done after this season. Chia's 'upgrades' have sucked so far so if the Oil want improvement he's going to have do much better.

He's had a summer and 22 games, trying to clean up 10 years of damage. Might want to give him a slightly longer leash.

And all of MacT's garbage will NOT be gone this year unless minor miracles happen. We are stuck with both Ference and Fayne for another year beyond this one either as players or dregs on the cap, unless someone is dumb enough to take them.

 

[Oilfan2]

He's had a summer and 22 games, trying to clean up 10 years of damage. Might want to give him a slightly longer leash.

Of course he has more time.

I was referring to the moves he made and if he had more cap space at the time, based on what he did, I'm afraid we'd have even more lousy players.

With MacT's 'problems' coming off the cap right away, he needs to make sure he does better this time around.

 

[Oilfan2]

He's had a summer and 22 games, trying to clean up 10 years of damage. Might want to give him a slightly longer leash.

And all of MacT's garbage will NOT be gone this year unless minor miracles happen. We are stuck with both Ference and Fayne for another year beyond this one either as players or dregs on the cap, unless someone is dumb enough to take them.[/QUOTE]

Ninja edit....Fayne will be fine as a bottom pairing and Ference will be bought out. No issues..

 

[McDeathbyCheerios*]

Chia landed the goalie and defender a lot of teams were in on and wanting.

You can't blame Chia for Sekera starting slow, a lot of teams wanted Sekera and he came here.

He moves out Marincin and replaced him with Gryba which is an improvement.

Letetsu has looked worse then he is due to our amount of injuries and him having to often okay higher in the lineup.

He isn't a world beater but he does is job well.

When healthy Korpi is a great 4th liner and an average 3rd liner. Sucks he got a concussion early.

Talbot has been worse then we thought he would be but you can't blame Chia for it. Lots of teams wanted him to.

What Chia did I don't have a problem with, the biggest problem I see is we still don't have good middle 6 vets or good top 4 vets.

That also being said, who in their mind could of predicted that Lander, Fayne, Eberle and RNH would have an oddly bad year? I don't think any of us really could of.

I'll have a problem with Chia if he doesn't do anything in the next year to fix the glaring holes.

 

[McDeathbyCheerios*]

Of course he has more time.

I was referring to the moves he made and if he had more cap space at the time, based on what he did, I'm afraid we'd have even more lousy players.

With MacT's 'problems' coming off the cap right away, he needs to make sure he does better this time around.

He did what he could with the cap space be had. You have literally zero faith in the guy for players he brought in who haven't even been our worst players.

 

[BoldNewLettuce]

I'm not sure how to interpret your stats.

Sekera is clearly a better player than Gryba.

I won't make too many excuses for Sekera....I havn't really been disappointed in him but he hasn't been able to make a difference unfortunately.

It seems as though you are harping on guys who are failing in their roles and since we don't have a top pair defender I'd argue every one of our D are failing in that department. We have Klefbom who is probably a decent #2 defender most nights but he is pretty inexperienced, Schultz has been injured but probably can't fill that role at the best of times. Sekera is a decent hockey player but, like Schultz, you can't put him out there in every situation. Nurse is way too green right now, he has world class skills and good character but you can tell he doesn't know when he should make a certain play or not.

I'd say Gryba and Korpi have been decent in their roles or at least they look capable of filling them. I'll give you Korpikoski though since his forecheck and PK havn't necessarily lit the World on fire. I also don't think Gryba should be a regular but he's been a good veteran D as far as bottom pairs go for the most part.

Reinhart hasn't been great but I'm not even sure what his role was supposed to be. Shut-down pair? He should be in the minors and develop a two-way game and gain some speed.

Letestu seems to think his role is just to win a faceoff. I hate this. I'm hoping his game will show some different elements as the desperation of this situation sinks through his thick meaty brow.

Nilsson was supposed to push Talbot not run away with the starting job. So I'd say that is Talbot's failure.

In summary;

guys who failed at their roles;
top d; we don't have one.
Letestu
Talbot
(Eberle)
(Nugent Hopkins)
(Fayne)
(Ference)

guys who are playing above their roles;
Sekera
Reinhart
Nilsson
Klefbom
Schultz
Nurse

 

[Raoul Duke]

The Gordon, Korpi, Letestu chain of events was bad. I don't like the carryover salary on Korpi and Letestu isn't an upgrade.
Overpaid for Reinhart, but he's young, there's time. This deal reeks of old boys club influence.
Sekera hasn't lived up to expectations but was widely viewed as a good signing at the time. Might still turn out.
Gryba (for Marincin, essentially) is ok.
Goaltending isn't great but is still an upgrade on last year's nightmare. Talbot was sought after and looked like a good bet. He can still get back on track and make the trade look good. Nilsson was a good find.
McLellan was a good hire. Nice to see some improved systems play. (Generally, not the last 2 games)
He definitely hasn't hit it out of the park but I wouldn't say he's been terrible. I really think the idea was to make minimal moves, take this season and see how the group responded to McLellan, let bad contracts run out, then make moves accordingly.
I'm sure he expected to be better and that's a problem based on the D going in.
From here on he should know what's what and reform the team into one that can compete.
Hopefully he's up to it.

 

[Replacement*]

Roy isn't even in the league right now and would also be bleeding GA. Gordon is a defensive and faceoff upgrade on Letestu for $1.2 million more and he's a black hole on offense. Petry and Sekera are in the same conversation as players IMO, if you had your way we'd have neither because Petry was already out the door so it was Sekera or no one else in his place.

Derek Roy at least helped provide some offensive run support for this club and produced well and helped Yak to produce well. He showed leadership on and off the ice in speaking with yak and helping him focus on his game.

Another of Chias brainfart decisions was to have Lander be a starting Center on this club instead of a veteran. You know, 1 point Lander that has killed any offensive production he has been associated with and has been terrible all over the ice.

Lander could in someway be considered as one of of Chias personnel decisions here. He chose this player and Letestu over retaining either of Roy or Gordon.

Letestu is the one vet Center on this club. He's horrible.

 

[KeithIsActuallyBad]

The same Lander that was probably our best forward in the preseason

 

[Stoneman89]

He's had a summer and 22 games, trying to clean up 10 years of damage. Might want to give him a slightly longer leash.

And all of MacT's garbage will NOT be gone this year unless minor miracles happen. We are stuck with both Ference and Fayne for another year beyond this one either as players or dregs on the cap, unless someone is dumb enough to take them.[/QUOTE]

Ninja edit....Fayne will be fine as a bottom pairing and Ference will be bought out. No issues..

Yes, there are issues. Fayne remains a soft giveaway machine, no matter where you try to hide him. And buying guys out does not magically remove their cap hit. It merely gets spread out over a period of years, affecting future space.

 

[duul]

Derek Roy at least helped provide some offensive run support for this club and produced well and helped Yak to produce well. He showed leadership on and off the ice in speaking with yak and helping him focus on his game.

Another of Chias brainfart decisions was to have Lander be a starting Center on this club instead of a veteran. You know, 1 point Lander that has killed any offensive production he has been associated with and has been terrible all over the ice.

Lander could in someway be considered as one of of Chias personnel decisions here. He chose this player and Letestu over retaining either of Roy or Gordon.

Letestu is the one vet Center on this club. He's horrible.

Your infatuation with Roy is unbelievable. Chiarelli did not want to run a top 9 completely filled with snowflakes like Roy and Yak. He thought Lander would be grit, intensity, and put up more points than he has. Lander looked unbelievable in the preseason but has flunked during the season.

I don't blame Chia either. No team wins significant amounts of games running 3 "scoring" lines.

 

[Oilfan2]

Yes, there are issues. Fayne remains a soft giveaway machine, no matter where you try to hide him. And buying guys out does not magically remove their cap hit. It merely gets spread out over a period of years, affecting future space.

If $2.3m is the difference between a winning and losing season, we're ****** anyway...

 

[Stoneman89]

Derek Roy at least helped provide some offensive run support for this club and produced well and helped Yak to produce well. He showed leadership on and off the ice in speaking with yak and helping him focus on his game.

Another of Chias brainfart decisions was to have Lander be a starting Center on this club instead of a veteran. You know, 1 point Lander that has killed any offensive production he has been associated with and has been terrible all over the ice.

Lander could in someway be considered as one of of Chias personnel decisions here. He chose this player and Letestu over retaining either of Roy or Gordon.

Letestu is the one vet Center on this club. He's horrible.

The fact that Roy isn't even in the league anymore speaks volumes about any kind of value he may have. And Yak needs to learn to play without holding onto to other peoples hands.
As for Lander, saying he's been terrible at everything is wrong. The guy has been terrific on the dot. He's also drawn a whack of penalties. His one large downfall is lack of offensive production. Gordon has done nothing in that regard this year, and he's coming on to 33 years old. His downward trend is in full swing.

 

[Replacement*]

Over 2 years. As much as I like Gordon, he's never scored more than 8 goals in a season, and will be hard pressed this year to even reach double digits in points. Still good on the faceoffs, but as a team I think we are getting better on the dot. I feel that Gordon is starting to track downwards and we moved him at a good time.

nobody on this club in bottomsix is likely to score 6, or 8 goals this season.

Could be that Boyd is starting to track downward but as far down as Letestu who doesn't hit, doesn't win as many faceoffs, isn't particularly good at anything?

Gordon was at least hard to play against once in awhile and was a physically strong player who could go and even fought on occasion. Letestu is such a soft player.

 

[Stoneman89]

If $2.3m is the difference between a winning and losing season, we're ****** anyway...

2.3 million is not the difference between winning and losing. But tack on 3.2, 4.0, 4.5 and 3.5 and that is having an effect this year. In a couple years, the bell will toll for McD, Nurse and Drai, and we'll need all the room we can get.

 

[Replacement*]

The fact that Roy isn't even in the league anymore speaks volumes about any kind of value he may have. And Yak needs to learn to play without holding onto to other peoples hands.
As for Lander, saying he's been terrible at everything is wrong. The guy has been terrific on the dot. He's also drawn a whack of penalties. His one large downfall is lack of offensive production. Gordon has done nothing in that regard this year, and he's coming on to 33 years old. His downward trend is in full swing.

Lander shouldn't be in the league period.

Wasn't aware of the penalties lander has drawn. I guess that's something. its not enough.

This is lander in prime of life, lol. An AHL player. Only on this team would he be getting this kind of role for which he is obviously lacking.

Lander has also been a sieve defensively. produces nill, gets scored against regularly in bottomsix rotation. poor player.

Downward trend? Lets hope not. i'd hate to think Anton gets worse than this.

 

[Stoneman89]

nobody on this club in bottomsix is likely to score 6, or 8 goals this season.

Could be that Boyd is starting to track downward but as far down as Letestu who doesn't hit, doesn't win as many faceoffs, isn't particularly good at anything?

Gordon was at least hard to play against once in awhile and was a physically strong player who could go and even fought on occasion. Letestu is such a soft player.

I really don't recall Gordon as very physical, if at all, and certainly do not recall any fights he had. He worked his arse off, and was good on the dot, I'll give him that. But he is a black hole in the offensive zone.
As to the assertion that no one will score 6 goals on our bottom six, I'll take that bet, considering Pakarinen is halfway there, and Korpi and Letesu a third of the way with almost 3/4 of the schedule left to go.

 

[Replacement*]

Your infatuation with Roy is unbelievable. Chiarelli did not want to run a top 9 completely filled with snowflakes like Roy and Yak. He thought Lander would be grit, intensity, and put up more points than he has. Lander looked unbelievable in the preseason but has flunked during the season.

I don't blame Chia either. No team wins significant amounts of games running 3 "scoring" lines.

Letestu is the absolute definition of a snowflake. Gets drilled in every other game, doesn't once go at a player, hit a player, or defend himself or linemates in any way. The guy is completely buttersoft. Yak is physical player that will actually spar, get in scrums, and hit people out there.

Lander? Grit? lmao.

You don't blame Chia for his starting an NHL season with 3 very young Centers +Letestu? While letting 2 vet Centers walk?

Oh wait, we got Korpi (the worst junk player on this team) for Gordon, I should be thankful.

 

[BoldNewLettuce]

I really don't recall Gordon as very physical, if at all, and certainly do not recall any fights he had. He worked his arse off, and was good on the dot, I'll give him that. But he is a black hole in the offensive zone.
As to the assertion that no one will score 6 goals on our bottom six, I'll take that bet, considering Pakarinen is halfway there, and Korpi and Letesu a third of the way with almost 3/4 of the schedule left to go.

sounds like an avatar bet where replacement must use an avatar of the 1st bottom 6 player who reaches 6 goals.

simple, yet elegant in design.

Go Mark Letestu!

 

[Replacement*]

I really don't recall Gordon as very physical, if at all, and certainly do not recall any fights he had. He worked his arse off, and was good on the dot, I'll give him that. But he is a black hole in the offensive zone.
As to the assertion that no one will score 6 goals on our bottom six, I'll take that bet, considering Pakarinen is halfway there, and Korpi and Letesu a third of the way with almost 3/4 of the schedule left to go.

Just last season. Not picking his spots either, Roussel is a fighter, Gordon lost the fight, but he stood up to a toughguy.



Gordon actually hits as well. Can throw decent checks. Certainly a lot stronger than Letesu

 

[Replacement*]

I really don't recall Gordon as very physical, if at all, and certainly do not recall any fights he had. He worked his arse off, and was good on the dot, I'll give him that. But he is a black hole in the offensive zone.
As to the assertion that no one will score 6 goals on our bottom six, I'll take that bet, considering Pakarinen is halfway there, and Korpi and Letesu a third of the way with almost 3/4 of the schedule left to go.

Go 8 and I'll take the bet. In fairness to me I'm going Gordon vs ANY Oilers bottomsix player. So take the higher number that Gordon got here, that's fair considering we're comparing his total to several players..

If you want to pick one specific player, other than Pacman who I actually like, i'll be fine with going with 6,

 

[NewBoysClub97*]

I'm not worried about any deal Chia makes.We are a last placed team and have stunk it up year after year. I could wake up after a 5 day nap and see a brand new 23 man roster and 100% turnover with McDavid still coming back and I wouldn't be angry lol.