Monday Mailbag – Weighing garbage time performances

Welcome, welcome, friends, to another edition of the Monday Mailbag where we’ve all gather round to talk all things Oilers. This week, we’ll take a look at evaluating players in garbage time, whether the crew would make a move on a specific coaching change, and what they were most wrong about this season. As always, I need you guys for this feature to work so email me your questions to baggedmilk@oilersnation.com or hit me up on Twitter at @jsbmbaggedmilk. Now sit back, relax, and pretend to look busy for as long as possible. Have a good week, everybody.

It is an intriguing question. To hire Quenneville you are likely going to have to pay him close to $5 million, which is what Mike Babcock makes. Is Katz willing to spend that and two more years of Todd McLellan’s contract, which is over $2.5 million from what I hear? That is a lot of cake to pay for a head coach. If Chicago fires Quenneville I think it will be more of a mutual agreement to leave. Why would you fire him after one bad season? It makes little sense to me, unless he and the star players aren’t on the same page anymore.

When does Joel get fired — if he gets fired? — does he have any interest in Edmonton? If I come to the conclusion Todd McLellan is the problem, then I replace him regardless of who is available. If I don’t think McLellan is the problem, I don’t replace him no matter who is available.

I would stick with McLellan to start next season but if they start slow and Coach Q is still available I’d pull the trigger on it.

I would drop the head coach who oversaw the worst PK and PP in the NHL in a heartbeat for Q. Sticking with failure for the sake of “continuity” is a bizarre idea that is very NHL but also very stupid.

It’s a difficult one. On one hand, I don’t feel McLellan is an issue, and this roster was somewhat flawed, but on another, it’s hard not to blame him for the team having such a horrendous penalty kill and power play. I really have a hard time believing Chicago would pull the rug from under Coach Q at this point.

If Joel Quenneville is available you have to go after him. I don’t know how the Oilers can sell both Peter Chiarelli and Todd McLellan returning to the fans.

Nah I would stick with Coach Todd. Coach Q has a great track record, better than McLellan’s, but I don’t think coaching is our issue right now. Even the greatest coach in the world can only do so much with bad roster.

I would make that move, sure. There’s no cap on coaching staff and if you’re going to make a move on McLellan then the replacement had better be a guy with Coach Q’s resume.

He isn’t sick. He lost 15 pounds and was worn down. He has 40 points in his last 25 games. Remember he finished last season with 25 points in his final 14 games. I believe getting fully healthy and shooting the puck more at EV has led to his big push. Also, he is a competitive as anyone and he wants to win the Art Ross and get as many wins as possible for the Oilers.

He’s not doing anything differently. He’s more determined than anything else. He’s showing what it means to play wire-to-wire even when games don’t mean anything in terms of making the playoffs. This is what a real pro looks like.

Two things, he’s healthy and he no longer has Lucic on his wing. Honourable mention to having a more aggressive mindset when it comes to shooting the puck.

I don’t know if it can be proven, but it seems like he recognizes that his shooting option is sometimes the best. So instead of passing it off too frequently, he is taking the shot.

There was a lot more to his early-season illness than what was reported, it seems.

He’s probably not sick anymore and he’s free from lugging around Milan Lucic. He wants to get that second Art Ross.

He’s not sick! I honestly think that’s what was the issue. He battled strep throat and other illnesses throughout the beginning of the year and still put up incredible point streaks. Now he’s healthy as a doctor and is living his best life.

I’m going to go ahead and guess that he’s not battling through every illness under the sun as was the case earlier on in the year. That would make a huge difference. Also, the chemistry between McDavid and Nuge is starting to get really good. Bring home the Art Ross, Connor.

Good question. I could see them standing pat with the six they have. Sekera will be healthy. And the Oilers hope Klefbom is healthy and Larsson doesn’t have to deal with a horrible tragedy. Nurse continues to improve and I’d expect Benning to be better. I don’t see how they can afford to sign big ticket free agent, but I’m sure they will look at finding another right shot defender.

I would hope that they do. I don’t want to see the Oilers counting on Ethan Bear to make the line-up next year. If he does, great. If he doesn’t, don’t get caught without the right-shot D that’s lacking.

I’d be surprised if there is any change on the blue line. The only move I could see being made would be Klefbom for a right shot d-man but I’d say that’s highly unlikely at this point.

I see Chiarelli trading Klefbom because of his low PDO.

Standing pat and just coming into next year with a healthy Klefbom and Sekera would be making an improvement, IMO. I really hope Pistol Pete doesn’t pull another sell-low with Klefbom.

I think they should, but it’ll be difficult with Andrej Sekera and Kris Russell having expensive contracts and trade protection. Oscar Klefbom has been rumoured but the Oilers would be selling low again. I’m not sure how much trust I’d put in a left side with Sekera returning from injury and Darnell Nurse. They still need a second-pair RHD.

I can actually see a larger named defenseman getting moved this summer. Maybe Klefbom, maybe Sekera? I don’ think Chia is happy with that group and he shouldn’t be. He’s going to be looking for a top-end defenseman for the rest of his life.

That’s a good question. Unless they do something crazy like move Klefbom, or find a taker for Andrej Sekera, then I don’t see how things change. Good if you don’t like change, bad if you’re hoping for some kind of defensive upgrade.

I don’t buy the garbage time theory much. Will anyone question McDavid because he is scoring a lot down the stretch? I doubt it. It seems people who want to find something to complain about will. They will applaud McDavid for scoring a lot, but Drake Caggiula will likely be ripped for producing, even though he’s only played 120 NHL games. I’d argue it is more difficult to play down the stretch when the games mean nothing. It would be easy to fold the tent.

Lots. “Garbage time” is a lazy way of dismissing or downplaying performance when a team is out of playoff contention. Players are playing for jobs and contracts just as they always are. Opponents want to win, just like they always do. You don’t think the LA Kings desperately wanted two points here Saturday night? Like the question about McDavid above, how he’s playing now without playoffs on the line tells you a lot about him. Who quits when it doesn’t matter? Who digs in? You can learn a lot about a player at this time of year.

I think this depends on the opponent. I wouldn’t put much stock into blowout wins over the Senators and Hurricanes but a win over a Kings team fighting for a playoff spot is something to build on.

I think if the Oilers plan for Aberg and Rattie to both score 20 goals next season then they deserve to have another terrible season. It’s nice for these guys to suddenly start producing in their NHL careers, but assuming it will keep up is no different than what they did with Caggiula and Slepyshev after the playoffs.

It still matters a bit. It’s not like all the other teams the Oilers are playing have given up. These games are still competitive. I would suggest the good performances are just giving the team more options and depth to work with next year. They lacked internal competition this year and I think good performances during garbage time have given them more of that for next season.

It still matters but I wouldn’t be penciling Ty Rattie in the 1RW spot next season.

Yeah, that always sticks in the back of my mind. That goes with our opponents too. Watching Connor McDavid walk Hoffman in last Thursday’s game against the Sen’s was a pure example of a player (Hoffman) on a team out of the playoffs (senators) not caring and giving any effort at all. It’s good to see that the Oilers are still working hard though at this point of the year.

We’ve seen this movie before, haven’t we? Remember when Todd Nelson came in, the boys started to feel good about themselves, they played well, and we were all sent off in the summer with hope in our hearts? Proven skilled players aside, I’m wary of putting too much stock into guys cashing in points at the end of the year when the playoff teams start to worry more about staying healthy. Do they matter? Yes. But I’d like to see points go up more when the games actually matter.

Wrong about where they finished. I thought they would compete for division title. I wasn’t close on that.  I was right about Darnell Nurse taking a big step and that Chiarelli wasting cap space would hurt the team.

Most right about McDavid not taking a step back or falling off after his breakout season. Wrong about just about everything else. Didn’t see the Golden Knights being anywhere near a good as they are. Didn’t see the Oilers being as bad as they’ve been.

I’ll admit I was wrong about Strome being better on the wing then he is down the middle. He’s fitting in nicely as a third line centre. I still would have liked to have seen him get three or four games on McDavid’s wing though, surprised that didn’t happen.

Who wasn’t right about the team making a mistake by not having someone to step in while Sekera was hurt? Their entire blue line was a step behind from the very beginning and basically had no room for error or injury.

Wrong: I thought they would be fighting for a playoff spot. So that looks like I was drinking the Kool-Aid in hindsight.

Right: I was pretty bang on with the Strome expectations.

Wrong about them being a contender, obviously. Right about McDavid being far and away the best player in the league and him making that $12.5 million deal look like a bargain.

I thought Klefbom would have another strong season and Lucic could have ~45 points. I was right about their defence not being strong enough with Sekera out and their inexperience on the wings.

I was most wrong about my Stanley Cup prediction (the Oilers). I was the most right about the NUGE having a great successful year! (Despite some injury trouble).

I was way wrong in thinking that the Oilers would easily make the playoffs. I didn’t have them pegged for a division win, conference win, or anything like that, but I certainly thought they would make the bonus tourney.

I was right about the downgrading of skill on the wing and questioning why there was no experienced help brought in on the back end with Andrej Sekera out because of his ACL surgery. I was also tweeting that McNuge should be a thing as early as February of last season. Thanks for listening, Todd.

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