Edmonton Oilers – Page 4 – Faxes from Uncle Dale

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Game #41 – Oilers vs. Hawks: Spotlight – An Overworked Cam And Magic Talbot

By Sam Fels January 7, 2018 1781 0

We make a lot of fun of Peter Chiarelli here… so let’s do it some more! One aspect of building a team these days that seems to get overlooked is a backup goalie. Teams really need to have one that they can trust with 20-25 starts, or get them out of a stretch if a starter were to get hurt, because the days of goalies being able to carry 75 starts and then four rounds of playoff wins are behind us. Quite simply, teams need to find a backup goalie who can “take the ball.”

The Oilers have ignored this, and now may have something of a multi-year problem on their hands. Unless the acquisition of Al “Some Guy In Bensenville Beat Him Like A Rented Goalie At Rat” Montoya works out gangbusters.

Cam Talbot started 73 games last year. And he was pretty good, with a .927 at evens and a .919 overall. Certainly better than the Oilers have gotten in net for a long time. But those 73 starts clearly took a toll, as Talbot’s SV% has dropped to .905 this year and .922 at evens, with his shorthanded mark falling off a cliff that fell off another cliff, from .874 last year to .800 this year.

It’s not a new phenomena, and some goalies have been able to handle that kind of workload for a few years. Talbot’s 73 starts were the 14th highest total in the past 10 years. The most were Martin Brodeur’s matching 77 starts in ’07-’08 and then ’09-’10. In the middle of those, Brodeur got hurt and missed 40 games, and he never approached a .920 SV% again. Then again, Brodeur was already in his mid-30s at this point, where Talbot is only 30 now.

Evgeni Nabokov started 71 games in ’09-’10 for the Sharks at 34 and was never the same. Ryan Miller made 76 appearances at 24 and was able to have excellent seasons after, but never made more than 69 appearances again after that. Mikka Kiprusoff made more than 70 appearances for the first time at age 29, much like Talbot, and again at 30, and then was terrible for two seasons before regaining form at 33, all while making 70+ appearances. Marty Turco made his first 70+ appearance season at 28, and then was awful the next season before rebounding for a couple more. Cam Ward made his only 70+ appearance season in 2011, and he’s never been the same.

Jonas Hiller, much like Talbot, took a while to wrestle a full-time starting gig of his own. He got it in ’11-’12 with the Ducks, made 73 starts at 29. He never started more than 50 games again and had only one more season of an above-average save-percentage after that. On the other side, Braden Holtby made 73 appearances three seasons ago, and then won a Vezina the next season. Jonathan Quick made 70+ appearances in 2015 at 29, missed all of last year, and is now once again have a plus-season.

So it goes both ways, but clearly handing someone around 30 that many starts when they haven’t consistently done it comes with great risk. And it’s just not something Cup-winners have done of late. Matt Murray played 49 games last year, and the year before that was a late-season call-up. Corey Crawford has never started more than 60 games. Jonathan Quick played 49 and 69 games in the Kings’ two Cup years. Tim Thomas played 57 games. Antti Niemi didn’t even become the starter until March. Marc-Andre Fleury made 57 starts.

The Oilers almost certainly don’t have to worry about this this year, as getting into the playoffs is going to be a minor miracle. But this is clearly something they’re going to need to figure out for next year.

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Game #41 – Oilers vs. Hawks: Q&A With Bagged Milk From OilersNation

By Sam Fels January 7, 2018 1800 0

BaggedMilk is one of the freaks, very cold freaks, at OilersNation.com. Follow him on Twitter @SBMBaggedMilk. We asked him the same questions as we asked Scott Lewis last week.

Let’s start with something nice and simple. Why do the Oilers blow chunks?

How much time do you have? The biggest problem (and it’s not close) is that their special teams are a complete and utter disaster. Their PK is on pace to be historically bad, and their power play would be about as effective if they all laid down on the ice and cried for two minutes. Neither of those things make any sense either because their special teams were decent last year, but that’s where we’re at. Happy day.

It seems like the Oilers are finally letting Draisaitl play center full-time. How do they solve their winger crisis?

Find a better GM that actually knows what he’s doing in terms of evaluating NHL talent? Can I say that? I mean, the guy traded away virtually all of the scoring wingers on the roster to lay down bets on unproven players, so I don’t know how that problem can be rectified if Chiarelli is going to continuously shoot himself in the foot. The dude seems to love making his own job harder and the idea of him actually fixing a problem without creating another is almost a pipe dream.

What dumbass(es) are they going to end up trading Nugent-Hopkins for?

How dare you even put that out into the universe!? Shame on you. He’s just a child. But seriously, though, I’ve been calling the hopefully-never-gonna-but-probably-will-happen Nugent-Hopkins trade #OperationBrownBananas all season because you just know that if he does actually get moved that it will be for some plug like Cal Clutterbuck or some other corpse from Boston or any other equally annoying return. Why? Because Chiarelli loves cheap grit — That’s why. For some reason, Peter Chiarelli likes to trade skilled guys for bags of empties, and another blown one-for-one deal almost seems more like a foregone conclusion. All I can really hope for is that he either gets fired before doing something dumb or that someone takes his phone and throws it in the ocean because the Oilers are way better off with RNH in their lineup than without him.

Is Darnell Nurse closer to being the new Chris Pronger that we’ve always hoped he’d be?

Whoa, whoa, pump the breaks there, big fella. I’m a big Nurse guy too but I think that he’s still a few trips around the sun away from being anywhere close to Chris Pronger’s ballpark. That said, the guy has made some huge steps forward with his game, this season. He’s defending well, moves the puck effectively, and has played some big minutes. If he can keep progressing then the Oilers could have something special there, but they have to make sure to have some patience with him. Right now, he’s able to handle the tough minutes with no real pressure but if the Oilers dump a truckload of expectations on him then he could be the next Justin Schultz that crumbles under the pressure here only to flourish somewhere else. I have high hopes for Darnell Nurse, but it’s also going to take some time to get there.

The Oilers are eight points out of a playoff spot? Could they save themselves?

I’d donate a nut to the cause if meant the Oilers could make up those extra points. The honest answer is that I have no idea. There are games when the Oilers look like world beaters and others when they look like a team that should be relegated. When the Oilers are on their game, they can be very good. When they’re not, then we all pray that Connor can save us. So can they make the playoffs? Yes, they can. The real question is whether or not they can keep their heads out of their asses consistently enough to make that happen.

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Game #41 – Oilers vs. Hawks: Douchebag Du Jour – Angry At Your Numbers

By Sam Fels January 7, 2018 1753 0

We here at FFUD Headquarters are a progressive bunch, or at least we’d like to think so. We think most traditions should be looked at if not outright eliminated. Just because you’ve always done something one way is not a reason to keep doing it if there’s a better way. Especially in hockey, where everything is grounded in Canadian backwoods mythology.

So we’re all for player numbers being more than just 1-35. But the Oilers have way too many fucking stupid numbers.

Look at these things. #91? Who the fuck are you, Drake Caggiula? You don’t get an identifying number. If you’re going above 80, you better know what the fuck you’re doing. 93? No wonder Ryan Nugent-Hopkins is overrated. His number doesn’t make any sense.

97? Yes, you may be the best player in the league Run CMD, but do you really want to wear the number that Jeremy Roenick wore when he got fat and shitty? 98? Even football players who wear 98 tend to be terrible, Jesse Puljujarvi. That’s a dumb hockey number that takes up too much space.

58? Only middle relievers wear 58, Anton Slepyshev! And who are you, anyway?

Yohan Auvitu, you do not get to wear #81. #81 is sleek and cool and intimidating. Marian Hossa gets to wear that. Tim Brown gets to wear that. Night Train Lane gets to wear that. You do not, whoever you are.

EIGHTY-THREE?! That’s stupid and clunky and so are you Matt Benning. You’re not Flipper Anderson! You’re not Willie Gault! Fuck you!

Brandon Davidson you don’t get #88. You have to be someone we can pick out of a lineup, sometimes literally, to wear that. Kiss our ass and call it a love story!

This is not like the Canadiens, where they have retired so many numbers that current players have to pick dumb numbers. Only seven have retired their numbers, and for some reason Glenn Anderson is one of them. There’s plenty to go around. RNH you wear #18 now. The rest of you… who cares? McDavid you wear 10. Messi wears 10. Great players wear 10. 97 looks silly.

Let Milan Lucic wear a stupid number, because he’s stupid. Put 57 on Patrick Maroon to match his clumsiness and uselessness. This has gone on long enough.

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Game #37 – Hawks 3 – Oilers 3 (Hawks win Quarters): They Don’t All Have To Hang In The Louvre

By Sam Fels December 30, 2017 1928 0

Box Score

Natural Stat Trick

So no need to intro this. Shared a few thoughts on Twitter last night so a couple new ones and expounding on what we talked about before. Sorry for the delay. Technology is not my friend.

-We bitched about Duncan Keith’s lackluster effort on Thursday in Vancouver. And apparently he wasn’t pleased with it either, or got the message that his coaches weren’t. However, Duncan Keith trying to do everything is only slightly better than Duncan Keith doing nothing. He makes things happen, like Top Cat’s power play goal by standing up at the blue line that was vintage Keith. He also leaves his partner out to dry a few times. Or he doesn’t make the simple play like in the last minute when he was a foot from the red line and could have just dumped the puck into the Oilers’ zone.

You can see the thinking. If Keith can successfully cycle back into his own zone and hold onto the puck they kill more time. But it could also lead to what it did, which is a scramble, a turnover, and then a goal you can’t give up.

Keith has been put in a tough spot all year, as the only player that can play with him and allow him to do all the things he’s done is Connor Murphy, and that would frontload the defense too much. So he’s having to make up for all sorts of deficiencies. And I guess we’d rather have the super locked in and super hyper Keith than the one that’s just kind of there.

-I guess I could warm up to Jordan Oesterle’s “KEEP FIRING, ASSHOLES!” approach to the game in the offensive end. The Hawks lack any sort of threat from back there now that Seabrook can’t move and Forsling is usually in quicksand in his own end. And Oesterle usually gets his shot through. It would be better served on a third pairing. But then again, we can say that of six of the eight d-men on the Hawks right now.

-Michal Kempny once again had a 60+% Corsi. I’m sure he’ll sit on Sunday so we can see more of Cody Franson pinching in the neutral zone to a puck he won’t get within five feet of.

-As I said last night, I’m sure a lot of people expect me to point out that Jeff Glass’s rebound control was awful. Or that he lost his net too many times. Or that his glove seemed to be made of superballs. But let’s leave that aside. At the age of 32, he won his first NHL start. He spent seven years in Russia for this. Sometimes, it’s just a good story.And this one is. There’s certainly a place for it, and it’s one of the big reasons we love sports. Let’s just hope the coach doesn’t fall in love with it.

-That said, in the pregame they had a clip of Q’s pregame presser where he said he hoped that it would cause a spark and the team to rally. Clearly he wasn’t thrilled with the team’s effort in games this year. But I don’t think he’s talking to the kids. Forsling’s problem isn’t he isn’t playing hard enough. Neither is it Rutta’s. Certainly not Schmaltz’s or Top Cat’s. So where do you think that was aimed?

-Still, Q didn’t do Glass or his team any favors again. Three times in just the 1st period, he sent Schmaltz out for a defensive zone draw. You know McDavid is coming out for those. Yeah, sometimes the rotations don’t leave you much choice. But two of these were after TV timeouts. Is that a matchup you really want? Thankfully it didn’t result in any goals.

Anyway, onwards…

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Game #37 – Hawks vs. Oilers: Spotlight – The Nurseman

By Sam Fels December 29, 2017 1859 0

There probably isn’t a non-Hawk we’ve watched closer than Darnell Nurse the past three years. We were smitten when seeing him on the ’15 Canadian junior team. He was big, he was fast, he played as if someone just broke into his car. He had skills, too. We have had too many trade proposals in our head to get him to Chicago, and far too many of them involved Brent Seabrook to think we aren’t completely delusional. Yes, we do think Peter Chiarelli is that stupid.

Still the first two years of his career, Nurse didn’t quite pop. There were flashes, but the blue line was the weakness of the Oilers and the glaring sign of “Under Repair.” But as we know, it takes young d-men some time to learn the NHL game. The benchmark is usually 200 games. It doesn’t always have to be that way.

It might just be that Nurse needed 103 games. Or maybe last year’s playoff run showed what he needs to do. Either way, the hellbeast we always envisioned might be on display now.

Nurse has simply killed the competition this year. He has a 54.8 CF%, which puts him nearly four percent above the team-rate. He has a 56% xGF%, which puts him 4.5 points over the team-rate. Most impressively, as Nurse has taken more and more minutes, he’s lowered the amount of attempts again, he’s seriously lowered the amount of shots against, and the big leap is in the types of chances he’s allowing to be aimed at Cam Talbot (because the Oilers backup goalie is an actual husky). Last year his xGA/60 was 2.65, and this year it’s 1.97. Nurse sees only about half his zone starts in the offensive end, and has been taking on the toughest competition for the Oilers all season.

Perhaps most impressive is that Nurse has done this while dragging around some real deep-frier-runoff as his partner. Most of his season has been with Adam Larsson, who is the very definition of “fine.” Away from Nurse, Larsson’s rates–Corsi, Fenwick, scoring-chances, whatever–all fall somewhere between 5-10%. Lately, Nurse has been skating with Russell, the most ear-flush partner you can get. All of Russell’s rates drop 10% or more when away from Nurse. He is the tonic for this team, and could set the blue line to be just fine for a while.

That will be something of a challenge for the Oilers, of course. Nurse’s entry-level deal is up after this year, and the Oilers only have somewhere between $15-$20 million, depending on what the cap does after this season, to sign somewhere around 10 players. That’s thanks to Run CMD’s extension and Draisaitl’s as well. It can be done, especially if they fill some gaps with other kids, but they’re going to have hold down Nurse’s new contract number.

Whatever Nurse wants, the Oilers shouldn’t hesitate. They have a real #1 d-man in the making here, and it doesn’t take much more. The Kings got two Cups because of Drew Doughty turning Jake Muzzin into something useful and like one other second pairing guy. The Penguins barely had a #1 d-man. The Lightning have Victor Hedman, two second pairing guys in Stralman and Sergachev, and that’s it. Perhaps no position makes more of a difference than having a true #1 d-man who can just punt the play up the ice every time he’s on the ice.

Nurse might not ever be a huge offensive contributor, but he doesn’t have to be if his feet and defense simply get the puck up to McDavid and Draisaitl quickly and let them go. He could rack up points the way Duncan Keith did, standing up at his line, creating turnovers there, and getting the puck up to his forwards ASAP. The Oilers have others who can score from there.

This season may have been a downer so far for EdMo. But this is the biggest highlight so far.

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Game #37 – Hawks vs. Oilers: Q&A With Some Shaved Ape We Found

By Sam Fels December 29, 2017 1909 0

Scott Lewis works for some alternative station in Toronto. He claims he used to work at TSN. We’re not sure. But he’s an Oilers fan, or at least a fair approximation of one. So we let him do this, and rewarded him with many treat pellets as a result. Follow him on Twitter @TheScottLewis.

Why do the Oilers blow chunks?

The Oilers’ struggles begin and end with Peter Chiarelli. They’re thin on the wing after he traded one of the league’s best in Taylor Hall so he could sign his large adult son Milan Lucic. Then he shipped Jordan Eberle out for Ryan Strome, who’s probably got a couple All-Star campaigns in him in the AHL. On top of that Chiarelli values Kris Russell’s severe case of shittiness because he spends most of his ice time chasing the puck around or diving in front of it because he’s shitty. Did I mention he traded picks, including a first rounder that became Matthew Barzal, for Griffin fucking Reinhart? I don’t know how PC hasn’t been levied with a restraining order to stay away from under-25 talent.

Why won’t they just let Draisaitl play center and be deep down the middle like most good teams with Run CMD and RNH as well?

Draisaitl with Hall on the wing was one of the deadliest Oilers duos I’ve watched since 1988. I’m just a former NHL media body and decent EA Sports GM, but I may have given them a run together on the second line with a full healthy season from McDavid on L1. I guess Chiarelli’s self-induced dearth on the wing is why Draisaitl doesn’t see regular duty at center.

What dumbass(es) are they going to end up trading Nugent-Hopkins for?

Seeing as the Oilers are in desperate need of help on the wing, I fully expect GM PC to move RNH for some bag of bones like Radim Vrbata and picks. Maybe James Neal when Las Vegas crashes back to earth. If it’s RNH for an defenceman I’d put money on Cody Ceci. That’s a Chiarelli move for sure. I’m aiming low because I’m a realist.

Is Darnell Nurse closer to being the new Chris Pronger that we’ve always hoped he’d be?

I’m in the Nurse’s shot at becoming a legit top-pairing defenceman ship has sailed camp. It’s hilarious that the Edmonton media went wild for Nurse after he pounded the ever-loving piss out of an unwilling and vulnerable Roman Polak a couple years back. I still think he can be a solid second-pairing D-man. I’d love to be proven wrong here.

Somehow, the Oilers are still only four points out of a playoff spot? Could they save themselves?

I believe the Oilers will make the playoffs. McDavid is that kind of generational talent that can put a team on his back. He’s practically carried Patrick Maroon around the ice in a fanny pack for a couple years now. They’ve effectively wasted the last year of McDavid’s ELC, but I’d wager a bit on them getting in and maybe even upsetting a California team, the Blues, or the Jets. This would buy Chiarelli a couple more years to fuck it all up, which is the McDavid Oilers’ destiny.

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Game #32 – Hawks vs. Jets: Douchebag Du Jour – Savior Hendricks

By Sam Fels December 14, 2017 1835 0

Actually, we kind of love what Matt Hendricks has become to the Canadian media. If you haven’t paid attention–and judging by the NHL’s ratings, you haven’t–the Oilers media thinks one of the biggest reason their team’s head has been rectum-ized is they let Matt Hendricks move along to Winnipeg. So it stands to reason that one of the biggest reasons the Jets have surprised everyone, including themselves, is that they picked up Hendricks.

It’s funny how in just a few short months, the feeling can from this to this. They both clearly can’t be true, but yet in The Great White North they most certainly can be.

Matt Hendricks is a nothing player. He gives you less than ten minutes per night, he tries to fight a lot. No one in the NHL today actually fights a lot by the old standard. He can’t really do much else. Of course, with all of these guys there’s always some intangible, inexplicable “glue” factor. And this only comes up after they leave. Funny, no one mentioned Jonathan Toews’s “glue” abilities when he was scoring 65+ points a season and he was, y’know, the fucking captain. And no one has used his leadership ability to try and excuse the downturn in his offensive production.

Imagine the Bulls blaming their downturn in recent years on the fact that Brian Scalabrine wasn’t around anymore. We’re sure he was great in the locker room. He would have to be, otherwise Tom Thibodeau wouldn’t have dragged him everywhere. In practice he was probably useful. We doubt Hendricks is any more useful during practice than he is during games.

But when things go wrong, especially with Canadian teams, it can’t be roster construction. There is something mythical that those teams are missing and winning teams have. It’s not that the Penguins have two of the best centers of all time. It’s Conor Sheary’s angry-face that won them two Cups or something. The Hawks wouldn’t have three banners without Ben Eager, Adam Burish, and Dan Carcillo don’t you know?

God bless Canada.

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