The Edmonton Oilers have already started digging out from years of moving picks and prospects, and the turnaround is showing up in the young talent they’ve brought back in. Matt Savoie, acquired by Jeff Jackson, plus Vasily Podkolzin and Ike Howard, brought in by Stan Bowman, give the Oilers a much different-looking pipeline. By the end of this coming season, all three could be in feature roles on a team with a shot at Stanley.
That leaves Bowman with a pretty clear next task: find more.
He’s been dipping into Europe, U.S. colleges and the fringe-pro free agent market, with Eduards Tralmaks cited as a recent example. The approach has its appeal.
There’s work ethic there, and some of the numbers on these players are respectable. Max Jones, for instance, is viewed as a potentially sneaky middle-six winger who might one day score 15 goals in a season.
Those kinds of players matter.
But the bigger swing still has to come. Bowman needs to steal one, and it doesn’t really matter how he gets it done.
The point is that it has to happen. Past examples of that kind of move include Charlie Huddy, Randy Gregg and Jason Smith under Glen Sather, Patrick Maroon under Peter Chiarelli, and Vasily Podkolzin under Bowman.
A deal like Ike Howard and a second-round pick for Kaapo Kakko plus a legit prospect one year away from the NHL is the kind of framework that comes to mind, though these trades usually involve less familiar names. Matt Poitras of the Boston Bruins is another player who fits the idea and, in this view, shouldn’t cost much.
The broader concern is McDavid’s long-term future, and the biggest obstacle to keeping him is finding replacements for veteran forwards who are aging out. Matt Savoie has already stepped into the Nuge spot on the top line, with the question now whether Mike Babcock keeps rolling with that setup.
Howard on the Draisaitl line is also presented as the right move. Bowman, in this view, needs to steal a player soon.
Today on the Lowdown, the round table will take up the Blue Jays’ knowledge of baseball rules and the idea of a trade for someone like Kakko. The show runs from noon to 2pm on Sports 1440 and You Tube.
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Ryan Nugent-Hopkins Is About To Make Oilers History
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Now, with the season just getting underway, he is lined up to pass Kevin Lowe for the most games played in franchise history. Nugent-Hopkins is expected to tie the mark on Oct. 10 and move past it on Oct. 13 during an early-season road swing, a fitting next step for a player who has been at the center of Edmontons story for so long. [Read more 🡒]