Monday Mailbag – How would you grade Ken Holland’s offseason work so far?

Happy Monday, Nation, and welcome to a brand new Mailbag to help you get your week started and break down what the Oilers got done in free agency. This week, we’re looking at the free agency surprises, Ken Holland’s scorecard, RFA contracts, and a whole lot more. If you’ve got got a question you’d like to ask, email it to me at baggedmilk@oilersnation.com or hit me up on Twitter at @jsbmbaggedmilk and I’ll get to you as soon as we can.

Evander Kane back in Edmonton.

Nichuskin getting eight years and Rakell getting six years. I don’t see either signing aging well.

I’m a little surprised that Washington just cut ties with Ilya Samsonov and handed out a big contract to Darcy Kuemper. Johnny Gaudreau is somewhat surprising, not that he left the Flames but that he didn’t go to New Jersey. The Devils with all of their cap space and being close to where he’s from seemed inevitable.

It has to be Johnny Gaudreau going to Columbus. Although, if you would have told me six months ago that the Oilers were going to land Jack Campbell, I probably wouldn’t have believed you. I’m honestly still kind of surprised that Toronto let him walk without an offer.

I was stunned to see Evander Kane re-sign. I thought he’d be a one-and-done player for sure.

Kane is a steal based on the numbers he put up. Term is OK. Campbell will have to grow into his contract a bit but that’s fine. Seems like a character guy who’ll take on the challenge. Has paid his dues. Question is the length as it pertains to Skinner’s future. Would have preferred three years. Kulak is a good value deal.

Good deals for Edmonton. Campbell is tied for 14^th-20^th highest paid goalie so he comes in around where he should. If Kulak becomes a regular 2^nd pair LD his contract will be a major steal. Kane should give really good value at $5.125m as well. Term is a bit of a risk based on past, but if he remains a good teammate then his deal won’t be issue either.

The dollars and terms on both Kane and Kulak appear to be very good value. Campbell got exactly what you’d expect a starting goaltender to get in free agency. I don’t think anyone expected he’d be taking a discount, whereas the two who re-signed seem to have done that.

I love the Kane and Kulak signings. They’re both relatively low risk with the potential for them to each turn into tremendous bargains. The Campbell deal scares me a little simply because goaltending is wildly unpredictable. If that deal doesn’t work out, it could be very costly. I still like the gamble that Holland took there, but there’s still some risk attached to it.

I think the Campbell contract is a bit too long and for a bit too much, but I don’t think it’s a crazy UFA signing deal that we’ll be dreading down the line. Fingers crossed, of course. Like everyone else, I like the Kane and Kulak contracts a lot.

I’m not making the same assumptions you are, so I don’t know. We’ve got the Mattias Janmark signing from Sunday and arbitration for Yamamoto and Puljujarvi will play into the bottom line.

Holland will look to trade Foegele or Puljujarvi would be my best guess based on convos I’ve had. There is more interest in Puljujarvi at this moment, but his pending arbitration case likely means a deal isn’t done until all parties know what his next contract is. I wonder if Holland considers allowing a team who is interested to negotiate a new contract with Puljujarvi and then trade him.

I think the focus now is getting the three restricted free agents signed. Two of them have arbitration rights and could wind up earning decent raises through the arbitration process. Ken Holland won’t back himself into a corner by making another significant addition before those cases are dealt with, I would assume.

I think the Oilers should just look to sign some players making around $1m in free agency to fill out the rest of their roster. Get a veteran defenseman for cheap and go sign a bottom-six forward with some upside, like Zach Aston-Reese or Sonny Milano. I would keep Foegele and Barrie unless you can swap either for Soucy or a similar shutdown LHD.

The Oilers just signed Mattias Janmark on Sunday so I wonder how much that affects this overall question/plan?

Excellent. Couldn’t ask for much more, could you? If you’re looking for a letter grade — A.

He signed three key pieces for less than $13m, so that is very good. The Kassian trade made sense to free up cap space. His next moves will likely be discussed and debated more. Who he trades and what kind of return the Oilers get will be a hot topic.

We’ll see what happens with the RFAs, but it’s at least an A- for now. I think this has been Holland’s best off-season with the Oilers.

I give him an A. He made a couple of great signings in Kulak and Kane plus he finally signed a big name goaltender. He checked some major boxes and found a way to keep a team that made the conference finals relatively intact.

He’s had a hell of summer and I’d have a hard time giving him anything less than an ‘A’ grade at this stage.

Thank goodness I don’t have to. Near as I can tell, Gregor is the only guy who played at any reasonable level and who is still somewhat young enough to have any chance to not embarrass himself. After that, I don’t know. A lot of the young guys these days talk a good game but I haven’t seen them play.

Jay Downton will be staring on the blueline. Big mobile defender.

I’d have Chalmers as a winger. He’d a pest type of winger.

Yaremchuk would be the other winger. Not sure what type of hands he has though.
Baggedmilk would play goal. We’d train him like Goldberg in the Mighty Ducks by tying him to the net, and he’d be better for it.
Wanye Gretz would partner with Jay. He’d try really hard, but is likely more of an off-the-boards and out type of defender.

I’d be the centre.

Just as long as we have Tyler ‘Beer League Legend’ Yaremchuk on the ice we’ll be more than fine. I’ve heard that he averages more than four points per game in the Capital City Rec Hockey League.

I’m going to use some of the knowledge I have from our pond hockey tournament out in Jasper. Up front, you gotta have myself and Baggedmilk up there since we have some much natural chemistry. We’ll go and throw Rick from The Pint up on the top line too. On the blue line, we’re going to have the towering presence of Jay Downton playing alongside the steady, stay-at-home Zach Laing. Between the pipes? Producer Liam said he played in net once in a floor hockey game, so we’ll go with him.

After Brownlee’s answer up top, I’m putting him in net so I can shoot pucks at him. I’ve got me, Yaremchuk, and Jay up front with Gregor and Cooomsy settling in on the backend.

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