Neal has said in interviews that he prefers playing RW because of that reason.
the negatives about Neal are a bit overblown imo. He accumulated a big minus, but he was being tried in a lot of situations. Tippett probably loved him a bit too much because he likes the idea of a good veteran in the top six. As Neal's role gets more refined, his weaknesses won't show so much. He probably ends up as a good third liner with less minutes than before but a PP push
I picked buy-out IMO we got the best out of Neal that we could, he got better linemates than he deserved and a big offensive zone push, yet he's scoring at a 4th liners pace 5 on 5 while being poor defensively and providing no utility outside of a net front presence on the PP. With respect to the PP IMO he got some puck luck early and was burying everything and then has been much worse of late, I think his more recent play is a closer reflection of what to expect next season, not only cause of what I'm seeing in his play, but cause it lines up with his PP production in the 2 years prior to this season. Neal much like Lucic in his 1st year here seems to be producing on the PP at a rate higher than I think he can sustain and when that collapses all we have left is an underwhelming and expensive 4th line player.
The Seattle option would still leave him on the team for a year which I don't want and it still requires a bribe, the swap him for another overpaid player option, I looked around I'm not sure anything lines up that works for both teams, Turris is a little tempting, but we'd be taking one more year of bad contract. With the way things are right now, the best non buy-out option might be bribing New Jersey to take him, they have a ton of cap and could use more futures. Anyways, buy-out is the sure fire option and the one I picked, we should do our due diligence to explore other options, but I'm guessing the final decision will be what I picked, we can put the $3.83M cap savings to good use elsewhere.
If cup is seriously a goal for this franchise, buyouts need to stop. It ruins your cap management. As inflation hits the league in player contracts and increases in the cap having money tied up in buyouts basically keeps the team behind the 8 ball continously.
If we can't get good value during this years offseason for Puljujarvi and he stays in Europe playing well...
Package Puljujarvi and even maybe a late pick for Seattle to take Neal. Two birds one stone and really getting Neal and Puljujärvi is solid for an expansion club.
It's not buy-outs that need to stop it's bad contracts that need to stop, a buy-out is nothing more than a tool in GM's toolbox an overabundance of buy-outs obviously eats into your cap significantly, but you have to make a case by case evaluation on what the best choice is in every given circumstance, sometimes it's the right choice and sometimes it's the wrong choice, but it should never be eliminated as a potential choice altogether just cause you think it may have been used too excessively in the past.If cup is seriously a goal for this franchise, buyouts need to stop. It ruins your cap management. As inflation hits the league in player contracts and increases in the cap having money tied up in buyouts basically keeps the team behind the 8 ball continously.
If we can't get good value during this years offseason for Puljujarvi and he stays in Europe playing well...
Package Puljujarvi and even maybe a late pick for Seattle to take Neal. Two birds one stone and really getting Neal and Puljujärvi is solid for an expansion club.
Yeah, he got beat up in November, but he's actually been really good at 5v5 since then.
Since Dec. 1st:
CF%: 51.55 (1st among Oilers forwards)
SCF%: 55.96 (1st)
HDCF%: 53.68 (2nd)
xGF%: 54.41 (1st)
He did that mostly playing with McDavid and Kass, I believe.
...and playing with a broken big toe.
That's the first that I've hear what the actual injury was. I thought that he seemed slower as the season went on. Hopefully he comes back quicker and ready to kick some ass!
I mean I guess you would, but it's probably more to do with doing workouts and practicing without pain, which can be a while with something like a broken toe.You would think the broken toe would be healed by now, as it has been 2 months already. The high ankle sprain on the other hand..... that might be a few more weeks, or tomorrow, lol. Never seem to know with high ankle sprains.
That's what the implication in this thread seems to suggest, which would explain a lot.I wonder if Neal's injury problems were affecting his play long before he went on IR. He looked fine for the first month or 2 and then really slowed down.
That's the first that I've hear what the actual injury was. I thought that he seemed slower as the season went on. Hopefully he comes back quicker and ready to kick some ass!
I wonder if Neal's injury problems were affecting his play long before he went on IR. He looked fine for the first month or 2 and then really slowed down.