AT RANDOM: COPYCATS
7 years ago
In many ways, the NHL is a copycat league. Always has been. Always will be. Success will do that. We throw around terms like the Detroit model or the Chicago model, as if building a team is like ordering parts from a catalogue. If only it was that easy.
In recent years, in the Western Conference in particular, hockey-ops people have set out to play “heavy hockey” in an attempt to pattern rosters after teams like the Los Angeles Kings, San Jose Sharks and Anaheim Ducks, all of whom have enjoyed varying levels of success with big players, or at least players who play big and with some edge.
Now, with the Pittsburgh Penguins having beaten the Sharks for fun in the Stanley Cup final with quickness and puck movement, we’re hearing about a speed game and people are extolling the virtues of throwing out a line-up with three scoring lines, as the Penguins did, at least in the playoffs.
Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, as the saying goes, so I understand why teams like the Edmonton Oilers might be tempted to pattern their rosters after the Penguins. Speed. Puck movement. Three scoring lines. It helps, of course, if a team can start with pieces like Sidney Crosby, Evgeni Malkin and Phil Kessel.
THE OILER PERSPECTIVE
Some fans might suggest having Taylor Hall, Connor McDavid, Ryan Nugent-Hopkins, Leon Draisaitl and Jordan Eberle up front – at least for now — gives the Oilers a decent start on the so-called Pittsburgh model, on having three scoring lines, even if they’ve exhibited barely two in recent seasons. That’s not crazy talk, but it’s most certainly a stretch.
What we do know is GM Peter Chiarelli tends to favor putting together the kind of skilled, heavy line-up that’s been in vogue, and he’s already started to add that dimension to his forward group with Patrick Maroon and Zack Kassian. Chiarelli will, of course, look at adding more of the same if Milan Lucic doesn’t get his ink done with the Kings. He knows the player. He likes the player.
We also know, or at least should, that too much of the same thing, be it the small skill we saw in Oiler silks for years on end or hulking forwards who can’t do much except muck and grind when they eventually catch up to the play, doesn’t work either. For me, the right mix, a balance that includes a little of this and a little of that, McDavid and Hall, Maroon and Kassian, is the way to go.
There is no one way to play the game. There is no template for building a line-up. LA has won with skill and size. Pittsburgh just won with quickness and depth of scoring, getting production in the playoffs from those who didn’t produce at the same rate during the regular season. Chicago sipped from the Cup with a combination. One thing all three teams have in common is a defensive group that can actually defend and transition the puck. Without that . . .
Unless Edmonton’s blue line group gets way better at moving the puck, helping in the transition from defending to attacking and producing more points in the process, it isn’t going to matter which model Chiarelli goes with up front. The Oilers don’t have a Kris Letang, a Brent Burns or a drew Doughty, but maybe a healthy Oscar Klefbom and a couple of right-handed additions – easier said than done — in the top four is a start.
You can’t build any model with those pieces missing.
WHILE I’M AT IT
- If it came down to having one or the other on left wing, I’d take Lucic over Benoit Pouliot all day every day. I’m guessing Chiarelli, who knows both players – as Boston’s GM he traded Pouliot to Tampa Bay for a Michel Ouellet and a fifth-round draft pick in 2012 — feels the same way.
- I’m fine with Justin Schultz winning a Cup with the Penguins after getting his ticket out of Edmonton, but let’s keep things in perspective. Schultz got into 15 playoff games with the Pens, chipped in four assists and averaged 13:01 in ice time per game. That was eighth (last) among Pittsburgh D-men. Letang led Penguin blueliners at 28:53. He played the kind of sheltered minutes he didn’t have the luxury of here.
While Lucic has said staying in Los Angeles would be his first choice as a pending UFA, he’s also made it known he’d be open to landing in Edmonton if he can’t get a deal done. It’s just talk, and talk you’d expect from a player keeping his options open, but I never dismiss a relationship or familiarity between a player and a former coach or GM as a factor when it comes to these matters.
As always, it’ll come down to dollars and term if Lucic does explore his options. If the Oilers were to land Lucic, it would make Pouliot expendable. He’s likely expendable anyway as a piece in a package – a rather valuable piece, according to those who put a lot of weight in underlying numbers — with Chiarelli needing to upgrade his blue line.
Pouliot has played well in Edmonton and he’s also a guy who, for whatever reason, has had a limited shelf-life wherever he plays. The Oilers are Pouliot’s sixth team – Minnesota, Montreal, Boston, Tampa Bay and the New York Rangers are the others – since he was drafted in 2005. His longest tenure came in Montreal, where he played 118 games. He’s played 113 with the Oilers.
Listen to Robin Brownlee Wednesdays and Thursdays from 3 p.m. to 5 p.m. on the Jason Gregor Show on TSN 1260.
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