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OilersNation Top 25 of 2020: #20 — One deal the Edmonton Oilers could make by the deadline
Photo credit: Sergei Belski-USA TODAY Sports
By Zach Laing
Dec 6, 2020, 13:16 ESTUpdated: Dec 6, 2020, 13:28 EST
Welcome to the yearly wrap up of the top read articles over the last year!
Rumours, rumours, rumours. Those type of articles make up some of the most read articles across sports sites. And an article penned by me on Jan. 29 took a look at how the Oilers could make a big splash ahead of the deadline.
It was the 20th most-read article this year.
The article was playing off some rumours that the Oilers were showing interest in Kaspari Kapanen, a player the Toronto Maple Leafs eventually traded while the return-to-play playoffs were still ongoing.
In the article, I dove into what a trade would look like. Kapanen is a cost-controlled asset with three-years left paying him $3.2-million. I used PuckPedia’s MyGM tool where a deal was built around Kapanen coming to Edmonton in exchange for defenceman Adam Larsson and a 2020 2nd round pick — a selection the Oilers later used to acquire Andreas Athanasiou.
It also saw the Oilers eating a shade under a million dollars in order to balance the cap for a strapped Leafs team.
Here’s more of what I wrote about the proposal:
Trading a young, cost-controlled offensive weapon isn’t something many teams are willing to do but the aforementioned mountain of offence — and lack of defence on the Maple Leafs — has caused him to be one of the hottest commodities this trade deadline.And for the Edmonton Oilers, they may have the perfect right-shot, top-four shutdown defenceman that the Maple Leafs could use — Adam Larsson.The trade would allow the Edmonton Oilers to slot Kapanen into their top six as a scoring threat ahead of the playoffs, while the Maple Leafs would acquire a staunch defender to help bolster their team.
On Twitter: @zjlaing
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