There’s a very strange thing happening with the Oilers and the way we talk about the forward lines. I must admit, I don’t like it. There is a certain morality that is being applied to the topic that has no place existing. Its only purpose is to close the mind and, in Edmonton, it’s taken hold.

What I’m really talking about is the concept of “deserving” to play somewhere in the lineup. You’ve heard it most recently, to be sure, in the phrase “Nail Yakupov doesn’t deserve to play with…” It’s a dangerous game to start playing, who deserves to play with whom. An NHL lineup is a strange place to find morality, and yet this Fall in Edmonton it has been front and centre with regards to the status of one Russian winger.

I don’t know where it came from. I’m sure it crept in slowly and can only be properly explained in complex detail. But, today in the capital region, Nail Yakupov does not deserve to play with Connor McDavid and it actually has nothing to do with his performance or even the performance of the team under those circumstances. Every shred of evidence we have suggests he and McDavid were offensively capable together and defensively no worse than other options. Even our (still young) measures of defensive results show Yakupov has made strides in every season and is nowhere near the player he was when he joined the NHL as a teenager.

Yet, the idea that Nail Yakupov gets to play on the first line is not just one that is argued against vehemently, it is flatly denied. It doesn’t even get to be debated. It is simply wrong on a moral level and scoffed at. I want to use Drew Remenda as an example and not because I have something against the Oiler colour man. He’s simply publicly taken the position many times this summer that Yakupov doesn’t deserve a shot with McDavid and his reasoning is because he finished the year so poorly.

The problem is that Nail Yakupov didn’t finish the year poorly. He finished with seven points in the final 10 games, five points in the final six games. His on-ice shot attempt metrics over the final stretch of the season were mostly positive and he showed good chemistry on lines with Draisaitl and RNH. That’s actually what happened, but for Remenda and many others the memory gets more information from the idea that Yakupov doesn’t deserve more opportunities than it does from results.

Yakupov was poor because he deserved to be poor, not because he was actually poor.

That’s the nature of human memory. It’s brutal. We remember the things we want to remember. We can be compelled to remember things that didn’t happen just because we wanted them to happen. Truthfully, we just suck at remembering things.

This article isn’t going to end with me saying that Nail Yakupov unequivocally deserves to play with Connor McDavid. I’m open to the idea that he ought to be playing on the third line or not at all. My only caveat to that is simply that I’d like to see the reason for him playing somewhere else or not at all be because the Oilers are better for it. The last thing I want to see is that the reason be because other people “deserve” it more.

Edmonton is not good enough of a team that it can play a substandard roster and still win consistently. If they can be more efficient, even by 1%, then they need to be playing that lineup in that configuration. For all we know Drake Caggiula is the new Derek Roy for Yakupov or Kris Versteeg is the perfect complement to McDavid and Lucic. Who cares as long as the lineup maximizes Oiler success?

Other teams in the NHL aren’t in the grips of this bizarre morality play. The Pittsburgh Penguins don’t care that Chris Kunitz just works well with Sidney Crosby even though Chris Kunitz doesn’t “deserve” to play with Crosby. They have Kessel and Malkin on different lines away from the best player on their team because it works. Real teams care about one thing and one thing only: winning. If the best combination for the Oilers has McDavid playing with Kassian or Pakarinen or Yakupov, then so be it.

The moralization of the roster does one thing and one thing only: it prevents discourse. It closes the mind to the different possibilities that exist and it does it without providing any justification at all. Who deserves what is completely irrelevant to an NHL team. It’s ludicrous that such a thing would come up at all. I would pit an efficient roster against a morally superior one any day of the week. The loser can go home feeling really good about itself. The winner can go home with the two points.

Nail Yakupov has been written off already even though he’s barely played at all this preseason and finished last season strong. He’s been written off because here in Edmonton he doesn’t deserve to get another opportunity. How that conclusion was made eludes me and it should be concerning to others as well. 

After a long summer of arguing and waiting, the NHL season is right around the corner and that means it’s time for us to throw another party. We wanted a second take on last year’s season and decided that we would celebrate the start of the second year of Connor’s reign over Oil Country. Thanks to our friends at AMA Travel, Cornerstone Insurance, the Pint, Oodle Noodle, and United Cycle we’ve got a big night planned for you complete with raffles, swag bags, and two trips (valued at $5000 each) for two to the outdoor game in Winnipeg courtesy of AMA Travel.

Here’s what you need to know: