By Patrick Powell

Through Wednesday night’s action, every NHL team save the New York Islanders has reached double digits in games played for the 2011-2012 campaign. Every team is beginning to develop an identity, and General Managers are watching closely to determine whether it may be time for a trade.

Perhaps the biggest surprise in the early stages of the season is the young Edmonton Oilers. 2011 first overall draft pick Ryan Nugent-Hopkins, 18, has taken a firm hold of the club’s first line center position through eleven games. Nuge, as he is known, recently earned NHL Rookie of the Month honors for his stellar play in October (five goals and 11 points) while playing with fellow youngsters Taylor Hall, 19, and Jordan Eberle, 21. The entry-level contracts of Hall and Eberle will expire after the 2013 season. Currently, the Oilers have approximately $3.5 million in available cap space (per CapGeek).

Despite being in first place in the Northwest Division, the Oilers are getting paltry contributions from forwards other than the young first liners and 35-year-old perennial fan favorite, Ryan Smyth (five goals, 10 points). Oft-injured Ales Hemsky has dressed for only two games thus far, but he may be available sometime during the Oilers’ current road trip. Hemsky is a dazzling player when healthy, but his $4.1 cap hit through next season may render him expendable this season. Team captain Shawn Horcoff has done well in the faceoff circle, and lead the team’s penalty killing efforts (Oilers rank fifth in the NHL entering Thursday’s action). Horcoff is an interesting story because despite his effectiveness in the faceoff circles and in the dressing room, he carries a humongous $5.5 million cap hit. His contract runs through the spring of 2015, so given that the top trio will probably be in the market for substantial raises, the Oilers may have to make some tough decisions over the next couple of years.

The Oilers have allowed an NHL-low 18 goals through Thursday’s games. A big reason for Edmonton’s early success is the play of goaltender Nikolai Khabibulin, who leads the NHL with a 1.12 goals-against average.

Despite their limited number of offensive threats, the Oilers seem to believe that they will get a boost from Hemsky, and that Ryan Jones will begin to emerge as a threat on the third line. Given that Edmonton’s most coveted trading chips are young forwards Sam Gagner and Linus Omark (who was demoted to the AHL’s Oklahoma City Barons on Wednesday), rumors have swirled that the Oilers are talking to teams such as the Blue Jackets and Rangers about a blueliner.

Speculation from league sources is that the Oilers are eyeing Marc Methot ($3 million cap hit) of the Blue Jackets and Ryan McDonagh ($1.3 million cap hit) or Daniel Girardi ($3.325 million cap hit) of the Rangers. Mathematically speaking, a straight up trade involving Sam Gagner ($2.275 million) and any one of the aforementioned players would keep the Oilers under the cap.
The Oilers may be wise to acquire a young blueliner in exchange for an extraneous forward.  

Given GM Steve Tambellini’s tricky cap situation in the next couple seasons, he needs to be careful to avoid creating further difficulties in re-signing Hall, Eberle, and Nugent-Hopkins when their entry-level deals expire.

Based on Matthew Pouliot’s series on Circling the Bases, I have decided restore the rosters for every NHL team. Like Pouliot, I have established some ground rules for my selections.

1. Each team contains players they originally drafted or signed before any other NHL team. This includes players drafted and not signed, as well as European free agents coming over at an older age.
2. I have chosen to leave retired players off the list, and lean toward players in the AHL rather than those deported (KHL, SEL, DEL, etc.).

Essentially I am choosing the best available players for a team to succeed in the current NHL season. All 30 teams will be covered, with grades assigned to forwards, defense and goaltending. After all 30 articles are written, they will be ranked in order. This series’ intent is to reward or shame NHL scouts.

You would expect a more talented roster with nine first round picks and eight of those in the top 10.  Unfortunately, this is a very green team with Rick Nash the most experienced of the Blue Jackets draft picks.  While that fact would not necessarily be a bad thing to have, the next player on the list played almost half the games and already left your organization, definitely a bad thing.

On a team that for the most part is still waiting for their prospects to develop, it’s hard to say exactly what their strength is.

Forwards:

So many players playing out of position and on lines that they should not be on which speaks volumes about the Blue Jackets drafting struggles.  Nash is the only established NHLer playing where he should be.  The forward corps is full of potential, but potential only gets you in the door.  Producing is what keeps you on the roster.

Rick Nash – Gilbert Brule – Jakub Voracek

Nikita Filatov – Derick Brassard – Tim Jackman

Alexandre Picard – Dan Fritsche – Jared Boll

Tom Sestito – Andrew Murray – Derek Dorsett

Bench - Maksim Mayorov

With very little production help for Nash, this team is going to struggle to score goals.  Providing Filatov returns to the Blue Jackets next season, and Ken Hitchcock loosens his reigns, Nash may finally get some scoring help.  Filatov is a naturally gifted scorer and I watched in amazement a few years ago as he dazzled in the World Juniors for Russia, scoring eight goals in 2009.  With six top 10 draft picks, you hope that this squad can fulfill its potential.  Only time will tell.

Grade: C

Defence:

Definitely not the strength of the scouting staff to say the least.  With only 1 bona fide Top four defensemen drafted, this corps is going to give up a lot of shots.  Hopefully they buy the goalies very nice Christmas presents.

Rostislav Klesla – Aaron Johnson

Ole-Kristian Tollefsen – Kris Russell

Marc Methot – John Moore

It was a struggle to find 6 NHL calibre defensemen that the Blue Jackets have drafted and I’m still struggling to find them.  Aside from Klesla, who’s currently on the IR, the defence is filled with 3rd pair defensemen at best.  Top pick John Moore has yet to play an NHL game and is currently playing in the OHL.

Grade: C-

Goaltenders:

If I had to pick an area of drafting strength, I guess I’d have to say it was in between the pipes.  Leclaire and Mason could be a very formidable duo on any roster.  I don’t think I can stress COULD any more then I’m about to.

Pascal Leclaire

Steve Mason

Dan LaCosta

With both goalies having career save percentages hovering around .900 and a very inexperienced defence corps playing in front of them, they will constantly be facing 35-40 shots a night and giving up 3+ goals a game.  Combine that with a forward group that is going to be struggling to score goals and it means both goalies are going to have to improve significantly for Columbus to have any success.  Mason currently is in the middle of what hopefully will just be a sophomore slump.  If he can find the “I don’t know what” that he had in his rookie campaign that produced a 33-20-0-7 record with 2.29 GAA and 10 shutouts, the goaltending situation in Columbus greatly improves.  If Leclaire can remember that stopping a puck with your face hurts when you’re not wearing a mask and can get into more than a handful of games, the situation almost takes care of itself.

Here’s hoping 2010-2011 is better for Blue Jackets goalies then 2009-2010 was.

Grade: B-

Jose Simoes
NHLHS Storyteller
jsimoes@nhlhotstove.com

TSN’s Darren Dreger wrote that the Blue Jackets were looking to move a wing for a defenseman if there is a “right fit”.  Clearly the injury to Rostislav Klesla (right) appears scary as the defender ranks third on the team in TOI, averaging a little over 20 minutes a game.  This injury comes with Marc Methot already out, a 24-year-old defenseman who averages over 19 minutes a game.  Needless to say, GM Scott Howson needs to make a move soon or his team could fall out of the race. Although they appear to want to improve from within, I think they will be forced to trade a younger asset.

The options at wing are: Jared Boll, Michael Blunden, Alexandre Picard, Jacub Voracek, Rick Nash, Kristian Huselius and/or Antoine Vermette and RJ Umberger. Looking at this list, I am pretty sure Nash, Voracek, Huselius, Vermette and Umberger are not getting moved while Blunden and Picard probably would not fetch much.  If Derek Dorsett is healthy, he could make Boll expendable.  Another option is Nikita Filatov.

Quick to rebut, Aaron Portzline of The Columbus Dispatch says Howson has not talked to a single GM and is not actively pursuing a trade. Portzline makes it abundantly clear that a trade is not brewing right now.  Most trade talk starts around February but with the Olympics who knows how things will play out.

What are your thoughts? Who do you see being moved?

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-Alexander Monaghan
NHLHS Founder
thehotstove@gmail.com