Ramblings: The Oilers Were Wrong to Practice

steve laidlaw

2016-10-17

Ramblings: Why the Oilers were wrong to practice, Mike Green's relevance, and more.

Following Sunday’s stinker against Buffalo, Todd McLellan decided to turn Monday’s mandated day off into a practice day.

This does not sound like it will go over well. Frankly, I’m not too happy about it either.

I am sure that Todd McLellan has innocent intentions here. He just wants to hold his young team accountable. I am sure that the players’ intentions are pure as well. They have aspirations of being a contender and they certainly understand the need for being accountable, especially after getting beat badly by the Sabres. The problem is that it’s horribly myopic.

What’s best for this particular Oilers team is not necessarily what’s best for the entire Player’s Association. They collectively bargained to have these days mandated to be off and they obviously did it for a reason. Giving back on something you won from an employer who has proven unwilling to fight fair when it comes to collective bargaining is not a wise choice. The NHL has proven time and again that they will simply lock the players out to get their way and it’s almost certain they will do so again. This give back shows weakness.

But forget, for a second, the implications for the Player’s Association. What’s more important is the reason why these days off were mandated in the first place: health and wellness. The players fought for these days off because the NHL season is arduous. It actively wears down it’s players. These days off are a chance to recover and failing that they are at the very least reprieve from the constant pounding. McLellan and the Oilers have elected to completely ignore that.

The Oilers may improve in the short term because of yesterday’s practice. They may not take so many silly penalties in the next game. They may bring a better effort. But will they be a better team if Oscar Klefbom goes down with another injury? Will they be a better team if Connor McDavid is battling a nagging knee all season long? We know that tired players are more likely to be injured. We know that the season is too long, with too many games and too much travel. Maintaining a healthy roster is a far more important, tangible and attainable goal than this mysterious goal of obtaining accountability or correcting some X’s and O’s.

If teams are really concerned about its players taking nights off perhaps they’ll consider reducing the number of games so that each game matters, and they’ll do it to improve the game rather than as a negotiating tactic to break the players. But of course, they’ll never do that. That would require giving up revenue from 82 games worth of tickets and concessions.

The players get their collectively bargained portion of those concessions and ticket sales so they may not have much interest in reducing the number of games either but they are subsidizing the growth of the revenue pie with their bodies, a trade off the league is more than willing to let them make. Today’s players would do well to take a lesson from their retired brethren who have been stuck filing lawsuits to try claw back money to help pay for the injuries they incurred growing the game to where it is today.

That this “give back” from the players took place in Edmonton, the site of the latest arena heist is all the more maddening. The Oilers’ owner not only held the franchise hostage with threats of moving the team should the people of Edmonton fail to subsidize the building of his new colossus but subsequently jacked up the ticket prices for the priviledge of entering the building they helped pay for. You really cannot give these guys anything, a sentiment with which Willie Mitchell certainly agrees.

Shame on Todd McLellan and the rest of the coaches for asking this of the players. And shame on Connor McDavid and the rest of the Oilers players for conceding. Next time, take your day off. It’s in everyone’s best interest, whether we realize it or not.

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How many more multi-point efforts from Chris Kreider before we can feel safe that his breakout is real? I don’t want to get sucked in too deep, just a week into the season, only to have Lucy pull the ball away. The early returns have been great with Kreider scoring a goal and an assist in each of the first three games. He has poured on the shots as well. Kreider could definitely provide a 30-goal/60-point/300-SOG season.

The floodgates were open for the Rangers, with all but seven of the 18 skaters held off the scoresheet. Surprisingly, one of those was Kreider’s linemate, Mika Zibanejad, who is also off to a hot start.

Jimmy Vesey was up on the Rangers’ top line with Derek Stepan and Mats Zuccarello. The rookie scored his first NHL goal and is in a nice spot but I still don’t feel like he is scoring more than 40 points this season.

Ryan McDonagh had a pair of assists in over 26 minutes of ice time. He led all Rangers with 3:39 on the power play. He is back in the driver’s seat for New York.

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You’ll rarely hear me talk about the Sharks because it’s pretty well always the same four guys putting up points for them. If it’s not one of Brent Burns, Joe Pavelski, Joe Thornton or Logan Couture, colour me shocked. Burns and Pavelski combined for seven points last night. Ho hum.

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Mike Green went ham last night netting his first career hat-trick. I pretty well wrote him off after he disappointed with just 35 points in 74 games for a Red Wings team that desperately needed his offense and puck moving from the back end. Green did produce 20 PPP, accounting for over half his production, but he also floundered producing his first season with under two SOG per game since his rookie year.

Green did close the season with a bang, scoring 13 points in 19 games through March and April, with another two points in five playoff games. Toss in the five points he has through three games this season and Green is on a run of 20 points in 27 games. That’s almost vintage Green right there.

It wouldn’t shock me to see Green hit 40 points, but the decline in shooting and the ever-present threat of injuries has me soured. You’ll also remember that I don’t go for 40-point defensemen who don’t pile up shots so unless something changes on that front, Green’s recent run still doesn’t change my outlook. He has my attention, however!

Another Red Wing written off for dead; Thomas Vanek remains hot with a three-assist performance. Vanek has found his way onto the Red Wings’ top PP unit, which makes him rather intriguing in deeper formats.

I still prefer Vanek’s teammate Tomas Tatar who notched his first point of the season. Tatar is consistently seeing ice time with more talented linemates like Frans Nielsen, Dylan Larkin and Henrik Zetterberg, plus he is also getting that top PP unit burn. Tatar is simply being used in better situations. He’ll need to produce if he wants that to continue, however.

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Jarome Iginla scored his first goal of the season, a power-play marker. Iginla scored 13 of those last season and has effectively become a DH. It should be noted that he has been skating with Nathan MacKinnon and Gabriel Landeskog, so he’s in a really good spot but I still don’t envision more than 50 points.

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Strong showing for Tuukka Rask in Winnipeg stopping 34 of 35 shots. He also had a pair of assists, which I firmly believe should count for your fantasy squad. I know Yahoo! doesn’t allow for this type of scoring, but Fantrax does. I would encourage everyone to allow goalie assists to count in your league. It adds an interesting wrinkle.

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I was hoping for some strong returns from Nick Bonino early on but so far, last night’s assist was his first point of the season. He continues to center Carl Hagelin and Phil Kessel but that line hasn’t produced like they did in the playoffs. Bonino’s assist came from filling in for Sidney Crosby on the top power play unit. Those minutes will dry up whenever Crosby returns. Bonino needs to get going now.

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The Oilers have called up Laurent Brossoit with backup Jonas Gustavsson out. Brossoit should give Cam Talbot a better battle for the starting job anyhow, though I doubt Talbot is likely to lose his starting gig.

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That was a speedy return for Jaden Schwartz. I was expecting him out until around Halloween. It will be interesting to see where he lines up as the Blues are looking awfully loaded on the wing right now. It is possible that with the Jori Lehtera injury that Alex Steen moves to center, which he has done in the past.

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Doesn’t sound like Jiri Hudler will be available for tonight’s game:

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Pure gold from Barry Trotz:

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Sad news, as the salary cap website General Fanager has closed up shop as the site runner has been hired by the new Las Vegas franchise. Our friends at Cap Friendly are still in operation so if you were a patron of General Fanager make your way over to Cap Friendly.

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I am very excited that we are back with Sportsnet this year. I’ll be doing a weekly Hot/Not column for them every Monday. You can find my first entry here. Ian Gooding will be providing a Waiver Wire column for them every Friday. Also, watch for our 20 Fantasy Thoughts piece every Sunday, which is a curation of 20 of the best blurbs from the previous week’s ramblings.

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Thanks for reading. Follow me on Twitter @SteveLaidlaw.

16 Comments

  1. Taqi 2016-10-17 at 23:58

    Any thoughts on Steve Mason? You think hes worth pursuing as a second goalie?

    • Dobber 2016-10-18 at 06:45

      I’d feel comfortable pursuing him as a No.3

    • number54 2016-10-18 at 10:51

      I think you could also try your luck with Eddie Lack, for a comparable (he isn’t facing the same competition as Mason with Neuverth breathing down his neck). You’d probably get slightly better rate stats out of Mason, but probably not quite as many starts.

  2. The Cammer 2016-10-18 at 00:45

    The Oilers didn’t “cancel” the day off, they moved it to Wednesday. Which is also the day Cam Talbot is expecting twins, and the players voted to do it.

    • Dobber 2016-10-18 at 06:45

      He’s expecting twins? No wonder his head isn’t in it right now!

      • The Cammer 2016-10-18 at 07:29

        Right?? They mentioned it on the Sabres broadcast, and Jason Gregor from TSN 1260 reported the due date as part of the teams reason for moving practice.

    • sheepdogged 2016-10-18 at 10:20

      And here I thought this was well known news that the day off was moved to Wednesday. All that writing for nothing.

  3. Keep Calm and Bergeron 2016-10-18 at 02:25

    I’m sitting here on a porch in Florida at 3am cuz I worked while others were whining.

  4. rowan94 2016-10-18 at 07:51

    Thoughts on Parenteau vs Iginla?
    IR-ing Hudler for tonight while he’s sick and picked up Parenteau.

  5. Striker 2016-10-18 at 08:19

    Boy are we on opposite sides of the CBA issue’s. Nice little slag of the NHL to start your article. It’s really very simple, the NHL locked the players out twice as it’s their only leverage for the NHL to foce the players to give back the NHL was bleeding, it still is for the most part. The last reported financials we have, 2014-15 show 8 teams lost money including TB who went to the cup final & averaged over 19K fans per game. The next 8 barely turned a profit, the Kings are in this next group & made 2.2 mil. You shouldn’t have to make the playoffs to have any hope of making a profit. How can TB be losing money averaging over 19K fans per game & going to the cup finals? That’s beyond ridiculous.

    The players get far to large a share of revenue, players coming out of their ELC’s shouldn’t be getting 8 year contracts at 5 mil plus or even 5 year deals at 5 to 6. There will be another lock out come 2022. Neither side will opt out early but upon expiry of this current CBA the NHL will shut down yet again. You can’t have over 1/2 your league barely making money. The top 4 teams in the NHL, Montreal, NYR, Tor & Chi make more money than the rest of the league combined. There needs to be far better revenue sharing as well & there will be. It has improved in both CBA’s & will again just like the players giving back. You can’t claw the over payments back in 2 CBA’s it will take many more. The players return for having given back is faster UFA status which ironically is 1 of the most inflationary issues in the NHL.

    This business model is seriously flawed. We should soon start to see the 2015-16 financials but like the 2014-15 their credibility & accuracy is really unknown. Nor does it say if it was pre or post tax.

    • number54 2016-10-18 at 10:47

      I don’t think trying to lump blame on one side or the other is really the best way to look at the issues facing the game, economically. It’s certainly a case of push-and-pull. The owners recognize that their teams are bleeding money, while players want to maximize their salaries earlier on in their fleeting careers to make sure they’re financially stable after retirement.

      So in terms of what’s driving up the costs for teams, players are making bigger asks on their contracts, and GMs are writing those checks. Before worrying about revenue sharing, both sides need to work on keeping salaries in check.

      First (thought not necessarily because it needs to happen first), I’d say that GMs need to present a more unified front on salary negotiations, in the way that they do when it comes to offer sheets — they COULD offer more to poach a player, but they nearly never do. They need to start treating UFAs this way, to prevent things like David Clarkson’s contract from happening.

      Second, the players and their agents need to recognize that they’re often best served by playing for a pay check that makes them bang-for-buck commodities, rather than liabilities. Too many guys get waived over contracts that are just too big for their abilities (see Tomas Vanek), even when they’re still viable assets.

      I think this starts, first and foremost, with nixing front- and back-loaded contracts. Structuring the cap so that cap hits are commensurate with salary would kill teams’ abilities to shell out more than the cap should afford, while denying players their egregious demands on term. Nobody in the league should be on a 10 year contract, when the average career doesn’t last half of that, let alone ‘peak’ performance years.

      • Striker 2016-10-18 at 11:44

        I agree & could debate this situation with buddies over beers for ever. No perfect solution as the playing field isn’t comparable, yet players want to be paid based on com parables. Bad decisions by 1 GM are then essentially been born by all etc.

        The last 2 lock outs have helped level the field. The next 2 or 3 will eventually get it fixed with the growth of the game & the NHL is growing rapidly. What ails the NHL & NHLPA can’t be solved in 2 lockouts & 1 players strike. It will take probably 4 to 6 work stoppages to balance the field so fair for all. We’ve had 2 so only 2 to 4 more to get it right.

        Revenue sharing has to be addressed & more sharing put in place. The have teams wouldn’t be making as much money if not for the expansion of the game to 30 teams. It’s this expansion that’s lead to that growth & ever increasing popularity.

        The NHL will eventually garner a decent TV contract in the US. I would assume another 5 years probably closer to 10 to get the monies to a reasonable & respectable level. The NHL is expanding it’s marketing via electronic media rapidly. Having the ability to watch NHLcenter ice anywhere I go now is awesome. I’ll gladly pay that fee for almost every NHL game. Cost me less than a night out for a 1 game live with a client.

        The growth of hockey at the youth minor league level in the US, kids starting to play the game as 5 year olds, is staggering & the future benefits from these US stars entering the game will continue to bear fruit for the NHL. We have NHL hockey players that would have been middle linebackers, basketball or baseball players now choosing hockey over conventional sports. This is due to expansion & Gary Bettman’s vision of how to grow the game.

  6. Chris Liggio 2016-10-18 at 11:16

    any concern with Matt Duchene? Not gonna freak two games in but no shots last night seemed odd to me and they have 10 goals already.

  7. Big Ulf 2016-10-18 at 13:06

    I 100% agree with your analysis of the Oilers practice. Nicely done, and hope that message gets the widespread audience that it should.

  8. TigerUnderGlass 2016-10-18 at 20:04

    Setting aside the fact that the CBA language specifically sets out that days off are subject to rescheduling and are not even guaranteed in the first place, are we now seriously pretending that moving (it was never canceled and the suggestion otherwise is disingenuous) a day off from Monday to Wednesday constitutes a health risk?

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