It has taken 42 games at the cost of burning a year from Puljujarvi's ELC and burning a year of club control, but Peter Chiarelli has finally sent the Finnish rookie taken 4th overall to the AHL.
The Oilers made it official this morning sending Jesse Puljujarvi to the Bakersfield Condors. They made the corresponding move of calling up Anton Slepyshev. One RW in, One RW out.
The 3rd move was placing Jonas Gustavsson on waivers with extreme prejudice.*
Puljujarvi has contributed just 1-7-8 in 28 games played and the last game he dressed for he managed only 3:27 in playing time on 6 shifts. Its clear that with the race for the playoffs that is going to take place in the final half of the season, Puljujarvi was not going to get development time with the club. It's the right call to move him to the AHL. I wish it happened 2 months ago.
Anton Slepyshev is 4 years older than Puljujarvi and has 2-2-4 in 15 NHL games this year along with 3-7-10 in 9 AHL games. He's a forward who has shown offensive ability in other leagues, he plays the body well, and if he is the 13th forward then nobody is crying about wasted assets or development time.
Jonas Gustavsson is an embarrassment to the position of Goaltender and has no business playing another NHL game in his life. He has an .878 save percentage this year and a .901 in his career. He flops around like a recently caught trout playing out the last moments of his life before dying an agonizing death outside of water. To suggest that his playing style is erratic would be to suggest he has a style at all. If he plays for the AHL Condors it will be at the expense of developing players or those who are actually good at their profession. I expect to never have to watch him ever again, unless the Spengler cup is on TV in 2019.
*Ok, the "extreme prejudice" part was added by me.
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