What can be said about Darnell Nurse that a drunken fan hasn’t already shouted from the nosebleeds of Rogers Place? Nurse’s failure to live up to the $9.25 million payday he negotiated in 2021 has drawn an increasingly loud reaction across Oil Country throughout the years. It will define his career with the Edmonton Oilers, and potentially cut it short.

If we put aside the cap hit for a moment and focus on Nurse’s game, the results don’t look quite as disastrous as one might think. HockeyViz’s model ranks Nurse as a below-average second-pairing defenceman, and that feels like a fair assessment.

He possesses the mobility to skate the puck out of danger and activate in transition, and pitches in for the odd hot streak offensively. He’s also durable and rarely misses time with injury despite eating heavy minutes and logging some of the highest hit totals on the team.

Unfortunately, Nurse’s shortcomings have become a growing concern. His poor decision-making with the puck and lack of execution on exits are limitations that can erase the positives that his skating creates. While he had a net-positive impact on expected goals, much of that came from spamming low-percentage shots from the point rather than seeking out quality looks. The creativity with his passing and shot selection just hasn’t been there.

From a defensive perspective, his passive gaps left the Oilers vulnerable to rush chances, and his tendency to deflect pucks into his own net led to some frustrating ‘fluke’ goals against. HockeyViz’s data indicates that penalty killing is his biggest weakness, placing him 11 per cent below the league average in PK defensive impact. If the Oilers are going to find a way for Nurse to turn things around and succeed more consistently, taking him off the penalty kill next season and rolling back his high-leverage minutes might help.

Another move that might help him would be re-signing Connor Murphy. Nurse’s goal share shot up from 42.7 per cent, to 57.1 per cent when he played with the big stay-at-home defenceman this season. They weren’t a perfect duo, but they certainly defended well and kept goals against to a minimum.

Perhaps the Oilers will continue to experiment with ways to maximize Nurse’s impact, but they might also move on from him entirely. Earlier this month, The Fourth Period’s David Pagnotta reported that Nurse’s name came up in trade talks with the Toronto Maple Leafs before this season’s trade deadline. It appears management has at least explored ways to move forward without him.

Nurse has four years left on his current contract, with his no-movement clause becoming a modified no-trade in the 2027 offseason. Given the Oilers’ need for cap space, it wouldn’t surprise me if they revisited trade talks. If they can facilitate a deal this offseason, it will be one of the biggest storylines of the summer.