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Match day 9: Edmonton Oilers against the Detroit Red Wings

This comes from longtime St. Louis hockey commentator Andy Strickland, who says he’s very happy with the acquisition of Philip Broberg, stolen from the club this summer. Edmonton Oilers with an offer sheet.

Strickland said on social media: “I don’t want to say more, but I’m shocked that Edmonton would allow a 23-year-old with the skating ability and overall skillset of Philip Broberg to get away. Usually the only way to get your hands on these guys is to draft them, they got him eighth overall and lost him at 23. How good is this guy going to be at 27?

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Strickland continued: “He wanted to retire because they weren’t playing him. I tried to negotiate an extension. He’s 23, and with his skill set, teams don’t usually move on from these players… Nothing at all against Edmonton, I was just so impressed with Broberg. These type of players don’t grow on trees, you rarely, if ever, see them make it at 23 years old.

Broberg has seven points in nine games for St. Louis, playing 20 minutes per game.

My opinion

1. Part of me is also still shocked that the Oilers failed to keep Broberg. Didn’t Oilers hockey boss Jeff Jackson realize in July that deals for Broberg and Holloway would be a distinct possibility with the team so close to the cap? If not, why not? It was an obvious play for another team.

Bob Stauffer has repeatedly said on Oilers Now that early last December he was telling Oilers executives that the time had come to lock up Broberg and Holloway. Stauffer was right. Both players were struggling a bit and could have been open to two-year deals if the money was good enough. Ken Holland’s team also failed at this time. Of course, Broberg had also requested to be traded at that point, so perhaps the young player was ready to leave Edmonton. There is no doubt that Broberg’s agent realized that the player’s value had changed after the Stanley Cup Final and determined that it was time to push for a much larger contract in a new city. The agent, at least, did his job well.

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But couldn’t Broberg have changed his mind after being promoted to the second pairing in the Stanley Cup Final? What kind of effort was made? Or was Broberg lost in the Edmonton shuffle that locked up so many veteran players in early July, from newcomers Viktor Arvidsson and Jeff Skinner to returnees Adam Henrique, Connor Brown, Mattias Janmark and Corey Perry?

Yes, there are a lot of unanswered questions for Holland and Jackson here. But it certainly feels like a mistake on the part of Oilers management, and a monumental one at that.

2. How strong did you feel the day Broberg and Dylan Holloway signed job offers in St. Louis? As painful as it was when young star Adam Graves signed with the New York Rangers in 1991, franchises have a hard time recovering when they lose strong young players entering the peak years of their careers. Maybe the Oilers have enough power to withstand the blow. This team has incredible talent. We’ll see.

3. When the offer was made, Edmonton simply didn’t have the cap space to match the Broberg contract. It would have required a major contortion and one or two other contracts removed to make room for him. At the time, I thought there was about a 75 percent chance that Broberg would fulfill his potential in St. Louis or Edmonton as a Top 4 or Top 2 player. I thought it was a good bet . I would have been nice if Edmonton had moved others to keep him. But that’s not the case.

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4. Bottom line: Broberg wanted out and for a team with ample cap space like St. Louis, the risk of offering a two-year deal at $4.5 million was worth it. This made sense given their cap situation, not Edmonton’s.

The other hard truth is that when a team succeeds like the Oilers did, they don’t have the cap space to retain all of their good players. Even if Broberg had re-signed for another year, it would have been difficult to keep him after that unless Edmonton cut one or two players over $5 million.

In the world of NHL caps, no team can keep and have it all. This is the ecosystem, this is the jungle where the Oilers fight for supremacy. But I would have loved to see Broberg here for another year.

5. I don’t think Strickland gets involved or hoardes it. He is simply amazed that St. Louis was able to recruit such a player. Likewise, I was happy when the Oilers were able to bring in Dustin Penner from Anaheim. I didn’t have a moment of pity for Anaheim. That’s how the system worked back then, and it worked in Edmonton’s favor. The system worked against us here, likely abetted by major miscalculations from Oilers management.

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If they made a mistake, it would be nice to hear Holland and/or Jackson just explain it, but we haven’t seen that kind of openness and accountability yet. It’s not too late for this to happen.

Being honest and admitting mistakes goes a long way in establishing credibility for franchise leaders. No one expects perfection and it would be good to know what the thinking was last winter and this summer with Broberg and Dylan Holloway.

6. Edmonton is back to where it was at the start of last season, needing wins in October games. But Edmonton’s roster is solid right now. The team has played five straight games ranging from solid to excellent. The only change in the lineup from the 4-0 score against Pittsburgh is that Calvin Pickard is in net. Pickard may be the least athletic goaltender in the NHL. But he might also be the smartest. His reading of the play is exceptional.

Never count out a smart goalie.

7. Corey Perry and Derek Ryan play a lot of games for older players. Maybe it’s time to send a defenseman to the AHL and sign a forward, so Edmonton can rotate into new legs. That would mean sending Travis Dermott, I guess.

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Would there be any exemptions? I suspect so.

Edmonton vs. Detroit lineup

RNH-McDavid-Hyman
Podkolzin-Draisaitl-Arvidsson
Skinner-Henrique-Brown
Janmark-Ryan-Perry

Ekholm-Bouchard
Nurse-Stecher
Kulak-Emberson

Pickard
Skinner

Striped: Dermott

Essentials on politics

Danielle Smith is moving in the right direction on free speech, but it will be painful, even for her

To the Cult of Hockey

LEAVINS: 9 things

STAPLES: Draisaitl line buzzes as Oilers freeze out Penguins

McCURDY: Can the Oilers turn things around?

STAPLES: Oilers should stick to nurses’ experience

STAPLES: Shock change for Edmonton Oilers power play

LEAVINS: Notes from the game against Canes

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