Monday Mailbag – What to expect from Joakim Nygard?

What have we here? A brand new mailbag for a brand new week! I hope all of you had an excellent practice retirement and that the overall punishment on your livers was kept in check. With everyone back at work for another week, I wanted to put together something to read and help you kill off a few minutes of company time and ease yourselves into this Monday. As always, I’ve sent your wonderings out to the writers and waited for all of their worldly wisdom to come back to me. I still need questions for next week, so if there is something Oilers related (or not) that you want to ask, feel free to hit me up by email or on Twitter. Enjoy.

My sources tell me they have spoken to other coaches, but last week they had focused in on Tippett. He is the guy they want. If he says no, then they will circle back to the other people they have already spoke with. But he will be the next head coach.

Not nervous at all. Tippett is a solid coach. I can only assume interviews have been done. If Tippett is the clear leader in Nicholson’s mind, then that’s how the process has played out.

It just feels like Chiarelli/McLellan 2.0 with these hirings. The Oilers told us that they would interview lots of candidates and while they did, the jobs are being given to candidates who didn’t have to interview and were just offered the job. There’s no denying that Holland and Tippett are very worthy candidates, but the fashion in which they got these jobs does make me a little nervous.

That’s a little concerning. I wonder if it’s just an odd choice of words from the Bobfather. It sure sounds like they’re focusing on one ‘known’ candidate for the head coaching position again, like McLellan.

Lately, I’ve been trying to be positive so I’m trying not to read TOO much into it. You have a point though, I’m also curious why there have been no other coach discussions.

Since it’s coming from Bob McKenzie, I tend to put more stock into it than I otherwise would. That said, I think Holland is too smart to only have a one-man list and even if this thing goes sideways with Dave Tippett, I believe he’ll land a qualified candidate.

Hard to say, but I suspect only one stays, if any.

I think Yawney joins Todd McLellan in LA. I also see at least one of Gulutzan or Viveiros out the door as well. If Tippett is the coach, I expect him to be looking at Jim Playfair and Mark Lamb, two longstanding assistants on his past coaching staffs, as candidates.

I could honestly see Glen Gulutzan and Manny Viveiros sticking around. I’ve heard nothing but good things about the two of them and their relationships with the players. I think it’s important for there to be some sort of familiarity heading into next season. As for Trent Yawney, there are already rumours that he could be heading elsewhere and I wouldn’t be surprised if he heads back to California.

You have to let the new coach bring in his own guys. No more forcing assistants on new coaches coming in. I think at best one stays on while the rest find new jobs, maybe with Todd McLellan in Los Angeles.

I really like our assistant coaching group so I hope most of them stick. However, whoever the new coach is, I totally expect and understand if he brings in a favourite crew of his.

I’ve heard Manny Viveiros is a guy the players really liked so I could see him sticking around. Maybe Trent Yawney on defence? Who knows. All guesses right now.

It is three people from management: Chiarelli, MacTavish and Sutter. And there will be changes in pro scouting. Pro scouting and pro trades were the downfall of this team. That is a large portion of the people who were involved. I think it is a significant change.

What number is enough? I doubt very much that Holland is finished. We will also see changes in the coaching staff, so things are far from settled right now. If you’re looking for Kevin Lowe to be shown the door, that’s a pound of flesh you’re not going to get. He’s not in hockey ops and the only way he’s gone is if he decides it’s time to move on into retirement and enjoy himself. Howson appears safe based on his participation in the transition from interim GM Keith Gretzky to Holland. Does another pro scout go? Maybe.

I think Holland is giving lots of people fair chances to prove they deserve to stay in the organization. The changes he made thus far are very encouraging because it shows that he isn’t afraid to move on from people who were in the organization for a long time. I know some fans wanted the whole front office to be gutted, but that’s not realistic. I wouldn’t be worried that the list of departures isn’t longer and I believe that Holland will dismiss more people when he sees fit.

Nope. I agree completely. There’s no way an organization can be this bad and only a few people get the boot because of it. There’s a lot made about people doing good work and being good people with the Oilers, but if that was the case they wouldn’t have made the playoffs once in the last 13 seasons. Sure, these guys might be nice and accommodating to media or other people in the industry, but they haven’t contributed enough to make the Oilers a competent hockey team. There needs to be more change.

Nah I think there is much more to come. That’s a decent haul of moves though to get done in two weeks. I’m expecting more to happen as he gets to know the organization more.

I’ll be curious to see if the amateur scouts get a shuffle as we get closer to the draft. Remember, when Peter Chiarelli rolled into town, the Oilers made changes in the amateur department right before the draft after all their meetings were done, and I wonder if we might see the same thing again.

I see him as a bottom six forward, who will help on the PK, and might be able to slide up in the lineup now and then. Jason Strudwick played in Europe and he had a few guys who played with and against Nygard text us a scouting report. “Excellent skater. Very good on the PK. Don’t expect him to put up huge points. Average shot.”

Like you said, we haven’t seen him against NHL competition, so nobody knows. I certainly don’t. The ingredient he brings, speed, can be a fit up and down the line-up and the Oilers can use more of that. Helps his chances if the rest of his game is good enough. Could be a PK guy.

I could see him playing solid bottom six minutes all year. He seems to have the speed to compete at the NHL level and that’s obviously very important. At the same time, European and college free agents are always very hard to project. Last year the Leafs signed Par Lindholm and he was supposed to be a really good third/fourth line center. He could barely crack their lineup. While I like the signing of Nygard, I think fans need to be a little cautious with their expectations of the player. He could score 15 goals, but he could just as easily be in the AHL after training camp.

Third or fourth line left wing and time on the penalty kill. The Oilers badly need useful bottom-six players and Nygard apparently has much-needed speed.

From what I’ve read on him, I do expect him to crack our roster. That’s also dependant on any roster moves that happens this summer. My guess is that he falls into the bottom six somewhere.

Normally I would say that he’ll slot in on the third line, but since the Oilers have so few left-wingers that logic doesn’t really apply. At this point, I could see him playing anywhere from the first-fourth line, not because that’s where he should be but because they don’t have many options right now.

Yes, I think it is that simple. Why do you think there are so many older Leafs and Habs fans in Western Canada? Because until 1979 there were no teams in the west, so hockey fans in the west cheered for those teams. Not every Canadian cheers for the Jays or Raptors, of course,  but because people in the west have no NBA or MLB team in their home province many gravitate towards a Canadian team.

That probably plays into it. The Raptors are Canada’s team by default.

As a Leafs and Raptors fan, I can tell you that it is solely because they are the only Canadian franchises in their respective leagues. Credit to them as well because they really play up the “Canada’s team” angle when they do their marketing and it works. The hate towards the Leafs is mainly because they get way more media attention than the other six Canadian teams and their fans have a reputation of being rather arrogant. When it comes to the Leafs/Raptors, they can get all the media attention because there isn’t another Canadian team to cover. I expect the love for those two franchises will eventually fade once the NBA returns to Vancouver and the MLB returns to Montreal.

I don’t think you can discount the only Canadian team element. If the Leafs were the only Canadian team in the NHL I bet we’d see the same thing occur. It’s easier to identify with a team when you can see their games on TV and potentially go see them in person versus some random American team.

Nailed it. There are a ton of Canadian hockey teams to cheer for, but only one in baseball and basketball. Also, Leafs fans…

I think it is because there is only a single Canadian team in both of those leagues, but also because Leafs fans are endlessly annoying. Remember when the Leafs won the Cup in November this year? Yeah, me too.