Is Our Best Shot At Winning With McDrai Gone?

[94 Oil Drops]

Before I screw off and enjoy my summer, I figured this might be an interesting discussion to have. I figure we blew it for a couple of reasons:

1) All our toughest competition has been eliminated and the path would have been wide opened for us if we got past Vegas. The Avs will be healthy and the Kings are likely going to be upgraded.

2) We need to sign Bouchard and will have to lose some of our depth to make that possible. The roster will most certainly be worse than this year (or at least on paper) because we will have no cap. Unless a massive is made at some point I just don't see how we can win a cup before the contracts of Connor & Leon expire.

Thoughts?

Click to read more...

 

[KeithIsActuallyBad]

Yup. If we got past Vegas there's no doubt in my mind we make the Finals. Colorado was the only team I was afraid of and when they got bounced I thought we could make a deep run.

The cap is f***ed and Holland (or his possible replacement) will have to pull some miracles to get us the space needed to upgrade the roster yet again.

 

[CantHaveTkachev]

clearly

best to just skip next year entirely

 

[Arpeggio]

No. I don't believe the roster will be worse next year. At least it shouldn't be.

The Oilers have guys coming up that should be improvements on what they already have. Broberg should get more minutes, and will be twice the defenceman that Ceci is. Holloway should step up and be a middle six guy next season. Lavoie will get a shot, and could be a scorer in the NHL. Kostin should get top-six minutes in my opinion, and is being seriously slept on as a potential impact player.

They just need these support guys to develop and make an impact.

 

[Perfect_Drug]

We blew our best chance so far.

Next year Skinner Bouchard, Desharnais, and Broberg will all be a year older, and better. SKinner/Desharnais/Broberg were obviously our weak links.


We still have a couple of bullets in this gun.


I'm a bit wary of Woody as a coach now. Using our elimination playoff games as a development tool.

 

[oXo Cube]

The core pieces are still in place to take a few more real shots. We're officially at the point where the clock is ticking though.

There is enough room left to maneuver that we can shore up the right side of the defense this summer. Probably locked into our goaltending duo though and that's going to be a major concern for next season.

 

[5 14 6 1]

Nope. Reload and go again next year. We have two more years with Drai, we have some young players maturing. A full season with Ekholm-Bouch pair, hopefully an upgrade on Ceci/Yamamoto and we go again. Entire "core" is locked up for 2-3 years minimum. A few shots left yet.

 

[McOilers97]

Full season with Ekholm, a much better season from Campbell, returning all the impact players from the current team. They'll be really good again next season - the key will just be to have more of the guys healthy and firing come playoff time, and Woodcroft to make the right adjustments (ie: not sticking to one goalie if it just isn't working).

 

[Canovin]

If we defeated Vegas, the teams left are Seattle/Dallas, Carolina and Florida. It doesn't get much easier than that. Yes our best chance with McDrai at winning the cup is gone by Woodcroft being straight up stupid. We can still win a cup in the future but the chances are much slimmer

 

[North Cole]

Lmao no.

- Colorado has Mack at 13m next year and landeskog might be done as a player.
- Seattle is way over their heads on some fairy dust goaltending and binge shooting
- Vegas is 11m over the cap lmfao. They're also very old.
- LAs best additions are UFA, who knows where they will sign. Still coached by Tmac
- Boston is way over the cap
- Wild are in cap hell
- Van is still quietly mediocre with shit cap hits and Rick T.
- Calgary is in no man's land looking for a new front office and coach. Inmates are clearly running the prison over there banding together to get the coach fired.
- wpg is largely the same as CGY but the locker room is 50million roentgen. Their only path forward is buying out wheeler and moving on from core pieces, ticking time bomb.

The list goes on. There's a lot of very flawed teams out there, we will be contending for the remainder of McDrai. Beyond if they decide to re sign.

 

[Soundwave]

Lmao no.

- Colorado has Mack at 13m next year and landeskog might be done as a player.
- Seattle is way over their heads on some fairy dust goaltending and binge shooting
- Vegas is 11m over the cap lmfao. They're also very old.
- LAs best additions are UFA, who knows where they will sign. Still coached by Tmac
- Boston is way over the cap
- Wild are in cap hell
- Van is still quietly mediocre with shit cap hits and Rick T.
- Calgary is in no man's land looking for a new front office and coach. Inmates are clearly running the prison over there banding together to get the coach fired.
- wpg is largely the same as CGY but the locker room is 50milliom roentgen. Their only path forward is buying out wheeler and moving on from core pieces, ticking time bomb.

The list goes on. There's a lot of very flawed teams out there, we will be contending for the remainder of McDrai. Beyond if they decide to re sign.

Colorado and Vegas are probably still problems for the Oilers next year and LA plays us balls to the wall.

That said if you need every favorable match up to get anywhere, odds are you aren't that good to begin with.

 

[McFlash97]

It won't get any easier. Soon it will also be the Bedard era. clock is ticking. McDavid has given his ultimatum. You have 1 more season Edmonton. Then it's back to being the joke of the league.

 

[North Cole]

Colorado and Vegas are probably still problems for the Oilers next year and LA plays us balls to the wall.

That said if you need every favorable match up to get anywhere, odds are you aren't that good to begin with.

There's always going to be problems, it's not easy to win a cup but Colorado is a far cry from the super team they won with and will not be improving much. Vegas has to take a step back just based on cap and who knows how many good years stone has left. He's already heavily deteriorated from what he was 2 years ago and back surgeries aren't helping.

LA plays us hard but similar boat as Vegas. If they dont get actual contributions from young guys it's going to get bad quickly. Kopitar already looks like he got hit a by a bus after one 6 game series. These dudes have a lot of miles on them and if Korpisalo leaves they have the worst starting goalie in the league.

Personally I don't think we need favorable matches, I think the team just didn't execute when the chips were down. In the playoffs that happens. We need to stop backing into playoff series, it's important to bank the first game for when the inevitable dud shows up. That's the key for next year for me, we've had 4 playoffs in a row. Time for the guys to start showing the professional side of the business and becoming consistent.

 

[Lay Z Boy GM]

If Holland can’t clear cap and retool then yes this was our best chance.

We have one more shot imo. If Draisaitl is sick of this shit and doesn’t wanna resign then we only have him next year, we’d have to trade him after that and McDavid probably follows if that happens. It’s basically the Leafs situation next year if we disappoint again.

Holland has to clear some bad contracts and try again

 

[Soundwave]

There's always going to be problems, it's not easy to win a cup but Colorado is a far cry from the super team they won with and will not be improving much. Vegas has to take a step back just based on cap and who knows how many good years stone has left. He's already heavily deteriorated from what he was 2 years ago and back surgeries aren't helping.

LA plays us hard but similar boat as Vegas. If they dont get actual contributions from young guys it's going to get bad quickly. Kopitar already looks like he got hit a by a bus after one 6 game series. These dudes have a lot of miles on them and if Korpisalo leaves they have the worst starting goalie in the league.

Personally I don't think we need favorable matches, I think the team just didn't execute when the chips were down. In the playoffs that happens. We need to stop backing into playoff series, it's important to bank the first game for when the inevitable dud shows up. That's the key for next year for me, we've had 4 playoffs in a row. Time for the guys to start showing the professional side of the business and becoming consistent.

I think the problems the Oilers have is the defensive system is poor (tons of blown coverage constantly, tons of bad decisions, tons of times where they could get a puck out but fail, tons of instances where they just give up a GA immediately after scoring, etc. etc. etc.). Honestly there was like no improvement in the defensive system from last playoffs to this playoffs.

Nurse is a terrible playoff performer, this year he didn't have the injury excuse.

Also the Oilers better hope that Kane + Hyman + RNH performance in this year's post season is the norm, because that's just right back to the 2020/2021 era where McDavid/ Draisaitl had to do everything and that's not going to get it done.

You can win 1-2 rounds, but I think 3 gets very hard if you don't play a complete game and you have this many playoff liabilities (Nurse, Nuge, Skinner-Campbell, Desharnais, hate to say it but Kane if that's his playoff game now, it's a problem etc. etc.).

 

[Oilers]

No, but we do have a long off-season checklist.
- We need to trade out of Yamo and Ceci.
- outside of the obvious re signings I really hope we bring back Bjugstad and Derek Ryan.

 

[RandomGuy79]

It won't get any easier. Soon it will also be the Bedard era. clock is ticking. McDavid has given his ultimatum. You have 1 more season Edmonton. Then it's back to being the joke of the league.

Source?

 

[Mav3rick07]

You're not winning a Cup with that many rookies.

Hopefully next year is our best chance.

 

[gordonhught]

It won't get any easier. Soon it will also be the Bedard era. clock is ticking. McDavid has given his ultimatum. You have 1 more season Edmonton. Then it's back to being the joke of the league.

What are you talking about? What ultimatum?

are you guessing or do you have this on good authority?

 

[Cagey B]

next year is the end all..... No cup you'd have to think both leon and connor are gone. With a win maybe theres a chance of resigning.

 

[Canovin]

Same time next year. We will say Skinner has a sophomore slump. Bouchard is overpaid. Nurse sucks cause his partner. RNH and his disappearing act.

Lmao no.

- Colorado has Mack at 13m next year and landeskog might be done as a player.
- Seattle is way over their heads on some fairy dust goaltending and binge shooting
- Vegas is 11m over the cap lmfao. They're also very old.
- LAs best additions are UFA, who knows where they will sign. Still coached by Tmac
- Boston is way over the cap
- Wild are in cap hell
- Van is still quietly mediocre with shit cap hits and Rick T.
- Calgary is in no man's land looking for a new front office and coach. Inmates are clearly running the prison over there banding together to get the coach fired.
- wpg is largely the same as CGY but the locker room is 50million roentgen. Their only path forward is buying out wheeler and moving on from core pieces, ticking time bomb.

The list goes on. There's a lot of very flawed teams out there, we will be contending for the remainder of McDrai. Beyond if they decide to re sign.

You're forgetting the up and coming teams. Devils, Rangers, Sens, Sabres, a healthy Canes are going to give the leagues major problems.

 

[independent observer]

Before I screw off and enjoy my summer, I figured this might be an interesting discussion to have. I figure we blew it for a couple of reasons:

1) All our toughest competition has been eliminated and the path would have been wide opened for us if we got past Vegas. The Avs will be healthy and the Kings are likely going to be upgraded.

2) We need to sign Bouchard and will have to lose some of our depth to make that possible. The roster will most certainly be worse than this year (or at least on paper) because we will have no cap. Unless a massive is made at some point I just don't see how we can win a cup before the contracts of Connor & Leon expire.

Thoughts?

I wouldn‘t say so… a lot depends on how the young players on cheap contracts develop.

If Broberg, maybe Vinny if he stays, Holloway, Bourgault and Lavoie progress the depth doesn‘t have to be worse.

I guess a lot will depend on the goaltending next playoffs… as it showed again, it‘s the most important position come playoff time.

I also think more balanced minute allocation could help… because just ride 2 players cannot be the recipe for sustained success in the postseason.

 

[McFlash97]

What are you talking about? What ultimatum?

are you guessing or do you have this on good authority?

The little post game comment at the end. He looks fed up. Being good at reading body language. Dead giveaway. He is pretty much on his last leg here.

 

[gordonhught]

The little post game comment at the end. He looks fed up. Being good at reading body language. Dead giveaway. He is pretty much on his last leg here.

Tell me what my body language is saying.

 

[North Cole]

Same time next year. We will say Skinner has a sophomore slump. Bouchard is overpaid. Nurse sucks cause his partner. RNH and his disappearing act.


You're forgetting the up and coming teams. Devils, Rangers, Sens, Sabres, a healthy Canes are going to give the leagues major problems.

Sure but most of those teams are out east, we only need to worry about one and with any luck they've all killer each other by the time the SCF rolls around.

Devils and Canes are scary. No offense to Sens and Sabres fans but need to actually see them become a staple in the playoffs before worrying abou them. We're four years into post season contention and can't even realiably escape the division, not that worried about bubble teams in the East. If they follow anything like our trajectory we won't see them for 4+ years