Two months out from opening night, the Oilers have mostly finished the heavy lifting of their summer. The big names have moved, the free-agent frenzy is over, and now the conversation has shifted to what all of it means for 2026-27.
One analytics model doesn’t love Edmonton’s work.
In The Athletic’s annual offseason improvement rankings from Dom Luszczyszyn, the Oilers landed 25th. That puts them in the bottom 10, alongside a Pacific Division that had a rough summer overall. The San Jose Sharks were the only team from the division to crack the top 10, while the Anaheim Ducks, Vegas Golden Knights, Los Angeles Kings and Oilers all checked in near the bottom.
That’s a jarring spot for Edmonton considering how well Stan Bowman’s month has been received in broader hockey circles. The roster changes have some obvious appeal: Frederik Andersen and Devon Levi give the Oilers a different look in goal after Connor Ingram, and Ryan Shea looks like a sensible replacement for Darnell Nurse when you factor in the price gap.
Still, Luszczyszyn’s model sees a decline, not a bump.
“On the roster, Ryan Shea makes a lot of sense replacing Darnell Nurse, given the price difference,” wrote Luszczyszyn. “Frederik Andersen, when healthy, is an upgrade in net too. But the Oilers could still use a middle-six forward to replace Jack Roslovic, even if he was incredibly inconsistent.”
The reason Edmonton lands so low comes down to how the ranking is built. Luszczyszyn’s list isn’t a vibe check or a subjective offseason report card.
It’s driven by Net Rating, the metric he created to measure a player’s overall impact through offense, defense, play-driving and other factors. By that standard, the Oilers’ roster has taken a minus-8 hit in Net Rating.
That kind of model can be useful, but it also has blind spots. Coaching, for one, doesn’t show up cleanly in the numbers. Mike Babcock is one of the additions to Edmonton that analytics won’t fully capture until the team actually starts playing games.
Kris Knoblauch’s season last year was a messy one. The lines were constantly shuffled, McDavid and Draisaitl were leaned on too hard and looked drained by the playoffs, and too many players never found a stable role. The roster wasn’t perfect, but Knoblauch didn’t get enough out of it.
That’s where Edmonton could see the biggest swing. Whatever anyone thinks about Babcock away from the rink, the hockey case is easy enough to understand: he’s widely regarded as a sharp mind, and if he brings more structure and cohesion, that could matter in ways a model won’t catch.
Luszczyszyn acknowledged as much. “From a pure results perspective, [Babcock] projects to provide a major impact given how the Leafs improved under the hood in his first season there,” he said.
There’s also the issue of fit. Models can prefer one player over another on paper, but they don’t always account for how a player’s style meshes with the rest of the lineup. Shea may not grade out like Nurse in every metric, but his puck retrieval and ability to move the puck up ice could fit better with Edmonton’s forwards.
The forward group is the other reason the model isn’t sold. Roslovic is gone and hasn’t been replaced in free agency. If Isaac Howard is plugged into that spot, the group can look weaker statistically, even if Howard’s age and pedigree leave plenty of room for a breakout.
And Edmonton still has another lever to pull.
According to PuckPedia, the Oilers have $4.725 million in cap space, and if they let that space build over the season, they’ll be able to fit in another contract without needing a hockey trade or a money-in, money-out move. With McDavid locked in for only two more years, Bowman may not sit on that flexibility for long.
Luszczyszyn’s model is respected for a reason, but it isn’t the final word on what Edmonton can become. With a different coaching setup and room to make a meaningful addition, the Oilers still have a path to something better than a 25th-place offseason grade in 2026-27.
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