Monday Mailbag – November 9th

Another weekend is in the books and it’s, once again, time for the Mailbag to come in and help you kill a few minutes of company time. As always, I need your questions to make this feature work so feel free to submit your inquiries to baggedmilk@oilersnation.com or by DMing me on Twitter at @jsbmbaggedmilk. Without further adieu it’s time to put your feet up on the desk learn something. 

Lucky? Trust me, getting hurt never feels lucky. It sucks and there is so much work to get back into action. Lucky to me is winning the lottery or for Jeanshorts having a girl say yes to a date.

Oh for sure. Obviously this is as close to worst case scenario as it gets, but at the end of the day it could have easily been a head or spinal injury. I mean, only like an hour prior to McDavid going down Chris Kelly broke his femur which will likely keep him out for close to eight months. The TV pundits were even saying that might be the end of his career! So while 10 to 12 weeks without McDavid is going to SUCK it very well could have been much worse.

He is out for 10-12 weeks, I don’t see that as lucky. If he is out 10 weeks he’ll miss 30 games and if he’s out 12 weeks he’ll miss 37 games. If that is lucky, I don’t want to see what unlucky is.

I agree. At first, I thought it might be much worse — his neck or head — until he sat up.

If I’m forced to look on the bright side then sure. I guess it’s lucky that the best player on the team broke his collarbone, requiring surgery and months of recovery. But in all seriousness, a clean break on the clavicle is probably more desirable than a shoulder injury.

Hard to call it lucky, but I agree Barry it could have been much worse. McDavid’s tremendous speed puts him into places of great danger. I’m trying not to think about it!

I agree completely. When McDavid crashed into the boards I was worried that he was going to end up with some kind of neck/head injury. The fact that the injury is his collarbone, with no damage to the surrounding area, can be considered a blessing. Now to see how quickly he returns. I’m guessing he’ll be the Christmas gift this city deserves. 

No. I don’t think there should be any of these types of clauses in contracts and I am a former player!

I think it’s more or less sensible for a team. Obviously we’ve seen time and time again teams run into problems with these scenarios (HI TORONTO DURING THE MATS SUNDIN THING) but to me it’s not a terrible thing to show a player some loyalty and more or less ensure that he doesn’t have to uproot his family. HOWEVER, as a fan I think it hurts the quality of the product somewhat, in that most of the guys that have these NTCs are either big name players, or players who would make a pretty big splash if they were traded. I mean, we all complain about never really seeing any big trades these days, and it’s even worse when 25% of the league can’t even be traded anyway! I think the NHL should create a rule in which you’re only allowed one or two per team, and have very stringent age and/or service restrictions on those as well.

I’m not a fan of it. Not all of those have complete no trade clauses, many are modified, but still there are too many. I’d like to see a maximum of three per team, but the NHLPA will never go for it of course.

Not sensible at all with a salary cap in place. Doesn’t allow enough flexibility. Managers need to stop handing them out at the rate they have. I’d like to see a limit established for each team.  Not sure what that number is, but a maximum of four per team sounds about right.

Nope. Not sensible at all, but the players negotiated the right to earn these contracts and desperate teams need to offer them sometimes just to stand out (*ahem* Ference *ahem*). In some cases the NTC can really hurt the club. They don’t get waived if the player who has one demands a trade. They can demand out and not have to waive it just because an offer came in that makes sense for the team.

No, but stupid is as as stupid does. I think the problem is exacerbated because many of the players without NTC or NMC’s are guys teams would never trade because they’re in their first or second deals of extreme value contracts. Not many players are going to be moved because of the cap issues.

I think there should be a limit of two no trade clauses per team – that’s it. Who knows how many awesome trades could have happened if not for the player saying no when the deal was done? I also think that if a player with a no trade clause requests a trade then their NTC should be void. Why should a player be allowed to ask for a trade but limit the team to having only two or three trade partners? It’s ridiculous.   

I am not into ranking players. That isn’t fair to them and the sample size is so small. I have been impressed by Nurse/ Davidson and Reinhart in a very small sample size for each. Lets have this conversation after 50 games for each. I think Sereka has another gear and can move the puck and his feet quicker.

Klefbom, Nurse and Reinhart have all looked solid and consistent to me. Davidson is starting to come on offensively and looks to be finally feeling more comfortable in his own zone. And this is probably going to be controversial but before he went down Schultz had quite a few good games (mixed in with a few stinkers obviously) and was definitely trending upwards compared to the last few seasons. 

Ference has largely been a non-factor in the games he’s gotten into, which I think is basically best case scenario for him at this point unfortunately. 

Gryba has been very up and down, mostly down on a lot of nights, and depending on who he’s paired up with.

And it pains me to say it but Sekera and Fayne have both been disasters so far. Again they’ve showed glimpses here and there of being okay, but for Sekera especially he DESPERATELY needs to turn things around or else this contract may look just as bad as Nikitin’s.

Davidson has been biggest surprise. He looks better every game. Fayne has been most disappointing. He is a defensive D-man, but he has struggled in his own end. Klefbom, Nurse and Reinhart are all under 22 and the future looks good for the Oilers on the blueline…FINALLY.

I’ve liked Nurse, Klefbom and Davidson. Not so happy with Sekera. Somewhere in between on Gryba.

I go with : Sekera, Schultz, Klefbom, Nurse, Reinhart, Gryba, Davidson, Fayne, Ference. In that order. I probably rate Sekera a lot higher than others. Schultz started off well but he’s in the two spot VERY tenuously. By the end of the month Nurse could be in the top two. Ference just looks slow, I’m sad to say. Slow to move, slow to react.

The thing that’s craziest to me is that Darnell Nurse could arguably be called the Oilers’ best defenseman right now. The veterans that are expected to play solid minutes haven’t been playing nearly well enough and once again the Oilers are relying too much on youth to be successful. Sekera and Fayne have to be MUCH better. I think Gryba has been okay but not spectacular, but that’s the kind of player that he is. With Sekera and Fayne struggling it puts more minutes on a guy like Gryba that may not necessarily be able to handle them.

Nuge continues to improve each year. With 97 out he will feel the pressure to put up more points but that falls on everyone.

It puts more pressure on the whole team, in terms of showing the rest of the league that they’re not a one man show and they don’t rely exclusively on McDavid to win them games. Nuge will be fine. He’s been great this season, just as he has for pretty much every season in his short career already.

It puts pressure on all the players, but RNH has been the #1 centre for the past few years so I don’t see him playing any differently. He’s been looked at to be the #1 centre before and now he will have to again. If he can get on a 65-point pace over the next 30-35 games the Oilers should be happy.

He’ll get some tougher match-ups with McDavid out, but he’ll also have the return of Jordan Eberle going for him. I don’t see it as pressure as much as I do a challenge to excel. He’s shown he’s up for that in the past.

The Nuge has been dealing with being the only top six calibre C on the Oilers since he arrived in the NHL (sorry Horcoff fans). I doubt he’ll crumble under the pressure of doing something he’s been doing for several years already. He’s a very good player. He’ll be ok.

Nuge may actually get a reprieve from the tough minutes. If Todd McLellan uses Leon Draisaitl as C on the Hall line, Nugent-Hopkins and his line will be playing secondary pairings. He could spike offensively.

Nuge will be fine. He has been the Oilers #1 centre since the first day he played in the NHL, so he’ll be able to handle it. I think it’s the other centreman like Lander that will have to pick up their games. If guys like Lander aren’t able to contribute a little bit offensively I can see Chiarelli looking for upgrades in short order.

No. Lets see what the rest of the season brings. I still can’t see the Oilers being the worst team in the league this season.

Absolutely. Before McDavid went down the big discussion was how the lines were going to be shuttled around in anticipation for Eberle’s return. The top six is fine and has depth to spare. The defence is still as suspect as ever, but the great thing is all the young kids have been showing extremely well early on in the season. If the Oilers can somehow move that pick in some kind of package for a legit top 4 D-man to help bolster Nurse, Klefbom and Reinhart, that would be amazing. I think the Oilers are FINALLY in a position where they can afford to look at a different strategy aside from drafting the best player available. Though so help me if the Flames somehow end up drafting Matthews.

You think the Oilers are going to win the lottery again? If they did manage to win, I would take him rather than trade him for an average package. Very few teams offer up packages that make teams want to trade the #1 pick, so it would make little sense to trade him for below market value just because they don’t need another skilled forward.

We’re less than 15 games in, so how do you answer that before knowing how the group in place now performs and, in the case of young players like Klefbom and Nurse, how they develop? You’re looking way too far down the road.

If anyone thinks the answer to the Oilers problems is another 18 year old forward then they need to shut down whatever device you are reading this on, go to the nearest bathroom, and hold your head under water (sink, tub, toilet) for as long as you can. Yes, trade the pick for blue line help. Do it. DO IT.  The 2016 1st + X = What? 

No, the pick has too much value. If Edmonton wins the lottery, that pick would have far more value in pocket than Edmoton’s first-round selection has currently.

I think it’s still a little bit early to be looking at trading next year’s first round pick but I don’t hate the idea. That being said, the Oilers are all world at winning draft lotteries so I’d be hesitant at moving that pick just yet.