Made a booold off-season plan for the Oilers. I’m fully aware that this will never ever happen, but thought it was fun.
Pros:
-Stacked offensively with some balance. McDavid, Draisaitl and Hall drive a line each. The third line is risky, but if Puljujarvi comes back with some new shine it could work. Haas is a smart and defensively sound player, Hall has elite skill, and Puljujarvi has all the tools; can he put it together and become a decent middle-six goal scoring player? Could flip Nuge and Ennis if you want the DRY line back together, but McDavid needs some skill on his wings.
-The defense is best in many years. Ekman-Larsson could very well bounce back into an undisputable top defenseman in a better environment, I’d even bet on it. He and Larsson have played extremely well together for the Swedish national team.
-Koskinen and Khudobin could likely perform well enough if they play ~ 40 games each.
Cons:
-Still no true 3rd line center. Could it work despite this considering the skill level of the third line? Is McLeod ready to be a defensively responsible 4th line center? Otherwise you have Richardson or someone equal who could be good enough.
-Cap, cap, cap....
It works in the 2 coming seasons. You let Larsson walk next year and use his money for Yamamoto and Nuges’ extensions. You’ll have to fill out the extra forwards and some defensemen with cheap contracts. Maybe it works with replacement level players considering the quality of the rest of the group?
The real cap hell will come the 2022 off-season when many good young players need extensions. Impossible to keep everyone without letting one/some of the core players leave.
-Money distribution. Salary wise, this roster is very very top-heavy. Is it really possible to achieve balance in the long-term with your 5 best players making 42.5 M$? Doubtful, look at Toronto for instance. Maybe the need for balance isn’t as large though with a top defenseman like Ekman-Larsson and four top offensive guys + cheap, young talent on the roster? Certainly risky.
-You’ll either lose a good current asset in the Expansion draft or spend valuable futures to avoid it.
Signings:
Puljujarvi 2 yrs @ 1.2M
Hall 5 yrs @ 7M
Bear 3 yrs @ 3M
Khudobin 1 or 2 yrs @ 3M
Lagesson 1 yr @ 800K
Richardson 1 yr @ 900 K
Ennis 1 yr @ 1M
Still have a little over 1M in cap space for bonus purposes.
Trades:
Admittedly, I haven’t looked to much into the other teams cap situations, but the trades including Chiasson, Russell, Athanasiou, Khaira and Benning are more to be seen as examples. I’d be prepared to add more significant assets to move Russell and Chiasson with a roster this good. Russell would definitely not waive for Detroit, but once again it’s only example. I’m sure some team would acquire him and his salary if a mid-level asset is included. Maybe there are no takers for Athanasiou and Benning at their qualifying offers due to the flat cap. In that case: let them walk. It sucks, but with a roster like this, we’re still good enough to contend in my opinion.
What are your thoughts on all of this? Once again, I’m not expecting to see this happen, but it was a fun (and time-consuming!) exercise.