Ah yes. Well that's where a really good GM would come in han...

Nevermind.

Have you heard of that new fangled iPad thingy?

Apparently you can type on it just by touching a screen.

Imagine that?

Rama you complained in your earlier post that we always finish last so therefore I assume you want to win in the now, so I would argue that Belanger gives us a better chance of winning(for this season at least) than Lander would..

Furthermore, I am not a fan of just giving someone a spot on the roster without them deserving it and Lander has done nothing to warrant a spot on any NHL roster to date.. I have hope for him, but he has to earn it

The AHL is a good league and a lot of players, especially bottom six players, hone their skills there..

I saw on 60 minutes that they have computers now that are operated by your thoughts!!!

Lowtide....I would so look forward to your blogs/postings/articles....when you get one of those computers..... :) .......a seemingly endless stream of Scarlet Johanson pics.....then a pic of steak and a brew.....followed by more Johanson......perhaps a classic car.....more Johanson.....( and I'm not really sure we'd even see the car or the steak)...

and.....on the 60 minutes piece they had a monkey operate it.......So........you could even lend it to Jason Gregor if you wanted to.

Roger THAT!!! Alpha Tango.

Has anyone else noticed how horrible Belanger is when exiting the d-zone? The guy'sis a hiccup machine. I for one would be pretty happy with an arnott/horcoff bottom 2. Granted Horc isn't hurt.

Also... Any thought to Nuge playing hurt? He's missing the net all over the place lately.

Sweet baby Jesus... breakin' vet's bones for Seth Jones?

Stop winning for Nate Mackinnon?

Loss accruin' for Jonathan Druin?

Injured like Markov for Aleksander Barkov?

We should start thinking about this year's slogan.

Sigh, if only GMing was that easy.Except you don't just "grab" a player, he has to agree to be grabbed, and Gomez, an American with few years left and a desire to play for a winner was not signing here even for a large overpay, which wasn't offered anyway. Free agent signings should be deliberate and strategic, a la J Schulz, and I don't see how Gomez fit in here, even if he chose Edmonton which he didn't and wouldn't have, ever.

Is it out of the question to put Nuge on the second line? I love him but even the most diehard fan of him has to admit he is playing awful as of late. Maybe we should try Gagner in between the original wonder kids and wait for Nuge to pick his game up

If Belanger is out on IR bring Maggie back so that he,Hartski & Lander can make up our 4th line . They will be our 3rd line in 2015 anyway.If Horc is still out then Smyth has to cover center as we all know Tambellini won't sign anyone .

Here I am on a sunday writing post on Oilers Nation when that Superbowl thing is on.SuperWhat? By the 4th quarter its a blow anyway for one team or another. Usually Super boring. Any ways. Lowetide I know we don't have any love or for that matter anything elso in ways of tender feelings for those folks south of us in that place where the GM's brain is eternally locked on to past Cup glory.But. Would not this be the year that you would want to tank this baby and take a shot at getting a top 5 pick. It shudders me to think that the Flames could have Nathan McKinnon along with Sven Bartschie moving forward. Holy brown bananas hat would be fun. With the ability to unload Bowmeesters contract via buyout. Iggy is a must for a team like Philly or the Pens. Kipper? Tanguay? Heck even Stajan could be bought out this summer. Calgary has a glorious opportunity to sink this season and look to to a better and brighter future led by NM or Droiun or ???. But knowing Feaster he still thinks the Flames are one man away from the cup. What a croc of bananas.

Come back soon Horc. We will fail without you. Not. You bring very little to this team to make a difference, sorry.

I dont wish any player any type of injury. But the only way i feel better is if you were a healthy scratch, and that time is closer than you think. I will take Arnott on 1.5 legs over you.

*face starts to twitch in frustration*

God Bless Shawn Horcoff. And math that can dress a 3 as a 9.

Up and down season so far. Don't mind the Nuge's play, has had lots of chances, better on face offs this year and has broken up a few 2 on 1's with a hard ass back check. Hall on the other hand drives me crazy with his turn overs. He has been good but he still manages to turn the puck over 4 times a game trying to force something that isn't there. Horcoff looks like he can't skate anymore but I guess he is worth his cap hit because he is over 50% in the dot (not). I agree with Lowetide that the team needs more veterans. We are calling up guys like Lander and Paajarvi who don't belong in the Nhl yet. Our top three lines are the biggest pussy's in the league. Is there anyone in the top three lines that can even bodycheck anyone? We have two more rookies in the line up this year and then when we call up players we surround them with ahl players. If the oilers are going to have 6 figure skaters in the top six then you better have some gorillas in the bottom six. Would love to have a guy like Raffi Torres on the team again. Why can't we have a couple more 1.5 million dollar gritty veterans on the team while Lander and Paajarvi play in the ahl?

I was referring to the Flames. Would you not think that this would serve the Flames organization better long-term. The Flames fans must be scratching their collective heads right now.

How does the draft work this year? Same as always or did they tweak it?

When is the trade deadline?

If your Tambo would you trade Hemsky to Washington for either Filip Forsberg or Kuznetzkov? The way Washington's offense looks right now a move seems imminent. Backstrom looks lost.Ovie is back to the one man show. Both players need help. I think the time is ripe to reap full value for Hemsky. The market is ripe right now to put a Top 6 forward on the market. Will Hemsky be here when the Oiler's are ready to make the next step? Strike now and we could see a player like Forsberg fall right into our lap. Washington's owner knows full well he can't have a team with Ovie on it "not" making the playoffs. He has worked to hard to bring the Capitals back from obscurity for that to happen. They have the assets for the trade to make it happen. Its whether both sides see the benefits of the trade short and longterm.

Thanks. April 27th? Seems a little way off. But I think we'll see movement before then for alot of teams. especially those teams looking to make a run like TBay and Philly.

BTW. How bad is Detroit>They look beatable for the first time in years.

You're an idiot....look at Belanger's stats before he signed with the Oilers. He's a legitimate NHLer. As for ST, did he spurn you for an autograph - I would have no problem with your opinion if you backed it with some facts or logical thought but you just cast stones. You should try a little harder, an intelligent thought might come eventually...

I got a lot of flack during the lockout for saying a few points I believed were key items for the Oilers.

In no particular order, I mentioned that I thought the Oilers were still a boarderline lottery team, that even though the addition of Yakupov and Schultz both payers are huge, it doesn't fix the whole problems.

I mentioned along with a few others that in hindsight, I thought the Oilers would have been better off taking Galchenyuk even though Yakupov is the better player( I am in awe of Yakupov).

They never addressed the Goaltending issues, one being nobody knew how Dubnyk would play, and Khabibulin's body and game is not reliable.

Well, now they have no tough minute centers, the Oilers are being outshot every game by a substantial margin and can't score 5x5.

They are absolutely counting on Dubnyk to save them game after game and without the timely goals from a rookie the Oilers would be sinking.

While a lot of people think that the 5x5 will even out, the same has to be expected of the goaltending.

DSF mentioned that prior to the season starting, if the Oilers were to lose Horcoff or RNH it would be a catastrophic for the Oilers.

The Oilers don't have Horcoff, Belanger and RNH isn't putting up numbers and without Dubnyk the Oilers would be right were the Flames are............again.

It seems a bit early to panic it was just one game with no offence. They probably score 5 goals the next game.

This is not panic, this is reality.

Every game has had limited offense, W 3-2. L 6-3 W 2-1 W 4-1 EN W 2-1 L 3-2 L 3-1

The Oilers have not scored more then 4 goals and that was into an empty net.

The goals for suggest they won't score 5 goals, how do you score more goals when your always coming from behind?

Being out-shot every game with the team healthy, what do you think happens without your two best defensive centers?

This could get bad.

~Ya that bad tambo. All those good centers just waiting to be signed and he sits on his hands. ~

Lack of offense could start to hurt.

Remember that kings game?

This is also really starting to concern me. I was thinking about this after the game against the Sharks. This team is supposed to have high end offensive output yet they are only scoring 2 maybe 3 goals a game. I like how the lines are playing but I think now that we are almost 10 games in maybe RK could switch those top two lines up to help jumpstart the offence. 5v5 scoring and the lack of shots are going to catch up to this team in a hurry.

Love Horcoff or Hate Him, it doesn't matter. Doan needs to be taken out the next time the Oilers play the Coyotes.

Mr. Furbag.......at least I never call fellow bloggers idiots! As mom would say, takes one to know one.

Belanger is what we call a has been.......he tries as does Horcoff but accomplishes very little. Our bottom six needs work, and escapes criticism because the top six is doing their job. This will eventually cause us major problems. This problem did not just creep up........the writer , pundits, experts, have been talking about a supporting cast for the kids for the better part of three years!

It's guys like you that keep looking at the Oilers through rose coloured glasses. I think if and when we make the playoffs and the going gets rough ( very rough) we will all wish we had some big strong bottom six players that can actually play the game.

As for Tamby exactly what is his vision for the team and what has he done ( besides drafting first) to accomplish this?

Perhaps you can enlighten us with your wisdom?

Our bottom six doesn't produce because it has no skill.

Horcoff and Smyth get all their offense from tip ins and rebounds. It is hard to score when all you do is cycle, grind, and don't get shots to the net.

I'm surprised Doan didn't get suspended though, a late, blindside hit that resulted in injury? And he didnt even have the puck.

I think everyone is getting excited for nothing. If the Oilers finish .500 and just out of the playoffs. That's an successful year. Remember they were 29th in the league last year. They brought back the exact team with the same issues with two highend rookies. I agree they have glaring holes in there line but just about every teams does. It's time for management to get off there hands and start doing there part cuz u have relied on drafting. At the end of the year or near the trade deadline, management will evaluate Gagner, Whitney, Hemsky and Dubnyks season then possibley make changes. Thats how tambo has worked the last four years.

Krueger has set a plan to put all his offense on two lines with the advantage that this gives the young players, more familiarity and confidence and, it gives you two strong PP units. He will probably stick with this system unless injuries force him to do otherwise. This is at least a part of the reason we are not scoring a lot of 5x5 as you typically need some output from your bottom two lines to achieve decent 5x5 numbers.

The idea of spreading the offensive talent across 3 lines will probably come next year via trade(s) for one or two power forwards or through the promotion/development of players like Hartikanen, or the drafting of a rookie power forward type.

All in all, things are going along according to plan with lots to be happy about, 9 points in the standings, Gagner, Hemmer, Dubnyk, J Schult, Fistric, Yak, all doing pretty well. As well as lots of areas that need improvment, better play 5x5, more toughness, more face off wins, etc.

We are probably only at the half way point of the rebuild, and it isn't just about trades and plugging holes. The larger part is about time. Time to grow bigger and stronger, Time to gain experience, Time to gain playoff experience, Time to develope depth throughout the system, etc. And yes, I feel like the rest of you.....hurry up...I cant wait.

But lets not get panicky.

Finishing .500 and just out of the playoffs is NOT a successful year.

It's just a tragic indication of how low the fan expectations for the team have become.

Kevin Lowe has been piloting the ship for 12 years now and the Oilers have made the playoffs exactly 3 times.

Making the playoffs in the NHL is not all that difficult since nearly 2/3rds of the teams make it every season.

Missing out 7 years in a row would be a firing offense for every other team in the league.

Amen Brother!

Perhpas it helps to look at things a different way.

Chances are that about 30% of this team will not be here when we challenge for the cup. Thats about 7 or 8 of the current active roster players.

Who will be gone? Who will take thier place? What will that team look like?

A novel idea. too bad the rosters on both the ahl and nhl squads have about no one capable of performing said task unless peckham is back from the fat farm or Fistric happens to find him on the trolley tracks.

I think your both right in parts of what you say.

Missing the playoffs is never considered a successful year. TRUE

Going from 29th place to making the playoffs the following year is highly improbable. TRUE

Look at the stats of how many teams go from 29 place and make the playoffs the next year especially with two new rookies and the same team. I think ur emotions are getting the best of you. Keep drinking the coolaid boys.

Agree with the first sentence. As for the second sentence, 3 out 4 Oilers fans are prefer sipping their coolaid from the Stanley Cup.

Remind again how many Cups the Minnesota Wild have won in the illustrious history?

Agree with the first sentence. As for the second sentence, 3 out 4 Oilers fans are prefer sipping their coolaid from the Stanley Cup.

Remind me again how many Stanley Cups the Minnesota Wild have won in their less than illustrious history?

Exactly. Time for Kruger to grow a pair and time for Hordichuk to earn his 1:17 minutes of ice time.

I think all oiler fans want to sip the cool aid from the cup but look at the team going into the season: A goalie that has never played a full season as a starter A defense that wasn't very good last year, u bring a stud defenseman that will need time to develop and another guy in Whitney that's had foot problems before he came to Edmonton. Two small centermans that can't win a face off so ur relying more on an aging horkoff to stay healthy, no crashers, bangers or size especially in our top six. Zero scoring from the third or fourth lines and they haven't even been close. I hate losing just as much as everyone else but this team needs a lot money pieces and time to grow. It takes time

I agree that we need to hold this group to a higher level and stop making excuses every year. And yes, 3 years out of 12 is woeful, to say the least.

But to say 16 / 30 teams is "nearly 2/3 rds" is just wrong - percentage is much closer to 50/50 (53/47). Your point in this case is valid but PLEASE stop misrepresenting data to make your case. You are better than that.

Making the playoffs in the NHL is not all that difficult since nearly 2/3rds of the teams make it every season.

53.33% of NHL teams make the playoffs in any one season.

So, about half of NHL teams make the playoffs, but more than half of DSF's comments are asinine and only meant to troll others into a response. I am sure DSF would agree with this. Please prop him when he does