While I do agree that the long string of injuries throughout the roster so far has certainly not helped this team reach it's "optimum" level this season... I also think that it's naive to think the team would have had NO injures either.
Every team gets injuries and deals with them and unfortunately it seems the Oilers have more than their fair share of injuries to deal with almost every single season.
I know a lot have been saying it's constant bad luck to have the team consistently having to deal with injuries to key players... but it's also part of an org's strength to be able to have the depth to at least somewhat be able to fill those holes with reasonable replacements until those better players come back.
This team may not be the worst team in the NHL (when healthy)... but they do arguably have some of the worst depth in the NHL to be able to compensate when key players go down... and every year that lack of depth (combined with the teams overall mediocrity) seems to always sink this team into a near-basement finish in the West and bottom 5 in the NHL.
Let's assume the Oilers going forward will continue to have above average rates of man games lost to injury... do we accept that they can keep using that as an excuse for bottom 5 finishes... or should this org actually try and develop/acquire better depth?
well, they have to be better at everything. in the Lowe era, they were poor at almost every hockey aspect of the business.
One thing I hope they have finally admitted (tho, there is no sign that they have) is that they are not this highly talented team they, and many observers, think they are.
They have 3 high-end players: McDavid, Hall and it appears Draisaitl. Nurse and Klefbom may be close, probably 2nd tier players. that is no more than most teams
After that, they have some good players like Sekera and RNH, and then a bunch of mediocre, borderline NHL, and straight up AHL/KHL/Swiss league players.
Until they admit this, we are hooped.