Monday Mailbag – Has Peter Chiarelli made the most of his summer?

Welcome, citizens, to a long weekend edition of the mailbag where your friendly neighbourhood Nation writers are here to help you make sense of all things Edmonton Oilers. If you’re working today, we hope that these here 2000 words of worldly wisdom help you kill off a little bit of company time, and teach you a little something at the same time. As always, I always need you guys for this feature so email me your questions to baggedmilk@oilersnation.com or hit me up on Twitter at @jsbmbaggedmilk. Now sit back, relax, and enjoy. Have a good week, everybody.

He didn’t lose a big trade so that was a good move. Depth moves on short deals were solid. Koskinen signing is the obvious head scratcher.

No, he didn’t, but he didn’t have the cap space to even try to make all the necessary moves. Did good work getting Brodziak and Rieder. Still don’t understand the massive overpay for a back-up goaltender.

I think this is as good as he can do given his limited cap space and talent. The Oilers didn’t have many options. Getting Rieder for cheap was positive. Still need to find ways to move a couple anchors.

Well, I would have loved to see Chia land a big name defenceman or winger. I wasn’t really expecting it, but I was dreaming. With the little resources he left himself from past failed moves, I think he did a pretty good job. He made a few lateral moves that COULD make us slightly better next year…? Only time will tell. We’re banking on a lot of guys having rebound years this season.

Koskinen is the weirdest thing he’s done this summer, and that’s, of course, because of the money. I completely get why he wanted to bring in a backup but Koskinen got way overpaid. Now, with that out of the way, I really dig the Tobias Rieder signing and bringing in Kyle Brodziak. Considering there wasn’t a whole lot of cap room to play with, I like those two signings. I also like what Chiarelli’s team did at the draft. Having Bouchard fall in your lap is pretty sweet.

Not very much. They still have to show up and play.

If expectations, good or bad, significantly impact how a team performs, then there’s a problem. It’s not a factor, or at least it shouldn’t be.

Can’t hurt. I think losing Sekera to injury and Talbot’s babies keeping him up at night had more to do with the team faltering than expectations though. Still, nobody is expecting this team to be more than OK and that’s fair.

I think it’ll definitely help them. I don’t think the pressure is what got to them last year, I think it was their over-confidence. This year I feel like they have more pressure to perform, but might be a little more down to earth on how good they think they are.

There were a lot of things that went wrong last year: injuries, dreadful special teams at times, down seasons for key players, etc etc. The added expectations that they be Cup contenders certainly didn’t help and maybe flying under the radar a little bit will help. We shall see.

April 20th, 1997. Game three of first round series Oilers/Stars. The Oilers scored three goals in 1:56 in the final four minutes of the third period to tie the game and then Kelly Buchberger scored in OT. Half the building had left early and then rushed back in for OT.

I could pick several from all those playoff meetings between Edmonton and Dallas alone and Game 5 of the 2006 Stanley Cup final in Carolina sticks out for me because of Fernando Pisani’s shorthanded goal and the importance of the game. That said, I have to go with Game 2 of the Smythe Division semifinal between the Calgary Flames and Vancouver Canucks in April 1982 on the way to the SC final when Tiger Williams scored the winner in OT and then dashed the length of the ice in celebration. The place was bedlam. Last time I remember shouting my face off as a fan. Wasn’t the “best” game but it was the most memorable.

I don’t know about best, but I was there when Scrivens set the team record for saves in a shutout and he had at least three standing ovations. He let in everything during the warmup and looked like he was fighting it. Game starts for real and he was an impenetrable wall. Crazy. It was like he was having an out of body experience.

I was fortunate to see a lot of exciting games in the 2016-17 season. (not really anything significant before that). I think the best game I saw was game three of the playoffs that year against the Ducks.  This was the game where the mic got cut out before the game for Brett Kissel during the American anthem and the whole crowd jumped in to save the day. This was also the game where Connor McDavid undressed Vatanen along end boards and scored a clutch goal top corner. The Oilers lost that game, but the experience was something I’ll never forget.

That’s tough. I was at the game when Smytty got his teeth knocked out and came back to get an assist on Horcoff’s OT winner. I was at Game 6 against Detroit when the Oilers knocked out the team that was expected to be Cup favourites. I’ll never forget the “Manny, Manny, Manny” chant that broke out during a commercial break and it was loud and jarring. Legace even admitted after the game that the chant rattled him, and I don’t see how it couldn’t. It went on for two straight minutes. I also went to some pretty amazing playoff games in 2017 too: Desharnais’ OT winner, Game 6 against the Ducks when Draisaitl got the hat trick (I ended up catching a signed Letestu hat that night). This is a hard question because I love the Oilers and so many games were amazing to me. How can I pick just one? Bah.

I don’t think Yamamoto making an impact is a safe bet. Safest bet is that that PP and PK won’t be as bad as last year.

Neither Yamamoto nor Puljujarvi are safe bets. Connor McDavid is the safest bet by a bunch. I also expect Cam Talbot to return to form, as he did late last season, and for special teams to be better.

I include Yamamoto in my safe bets category. I really like the kid. I’d also bet on JP *but* I don’t know where the coaching staff really slots him. Safest bet of all is that McDavid can score with or without help.

I almost don’t want to answer this question cause I don’t want to jynx anything. Connor will have a good year, Nuge will have a solid year, and Draisaitl will have a good year. Those are the only safe bets in my opinion.

Easy. Connor McDavid will be worth your time, every time.

His vision is fine. He lost confidence and started forcing plays. The Oilers do have vision tests, but Lucic struggles weren’t due to vision.

I haven’t heard a single word about Lucic having a vision problem. That would be something that would be addressed with any player if there was an issue. Lucic had a confidence problem. He’s talked about it. No secrets here.

I only know things I’ve heard. I have no real sources, just stories passed on from others who heard from others. That kinda thing. Still, I’ve heard a few times that Lucic’s eyes aren’t great and completely unwilling to address the issue via surgery or lenses. Can’t see a damned thing and too cool to do anything about it. Is it true? Hell if I know. Well, at least it explains something.

I can’t speak to what his eyesight is like, but I think it was just one of those things where one thing is going wrong, it’s all going wrong. His confidence was obviously shot which affected his whole game: scoring, vision, awareness, hitting, you name it. I expect he’ll have a bounce back this year.

If you’re a pro-athlete and you can’t see then wouldn’t you do everything imaginable to correct the problem? You’d have to assume, right? Anything less than doing whatever it takes to improve your vision would be completely moronic and I can’t see Lucic being that dumb.

Lexus South Pointe is the official automotive partner of Oilersnation. As citizens of the Nation, you receive exclusive discounts & perks no matter what you drive!

Our state-of-the-art facility also includes a virtual golf simulator, spa, and rooftop patio. Find us on the corner of Ellerslie and Gateway for all your vehicle needs. Check us out on our website here.