BREAKING: Former POHO Kevin Lowe moves out of hockey dep't in EDM, retains role on business side of Oilers Entertainment Group.
— Mark Spector (@SportsnetSpec) April 24, 2015I am told only staffing update to Oiler employees this morning was that Patrick LaForge (president/COO) is no longer with the organization.
— Bob McKenzie (@TSNBobMcKenzie) April 24, 2015The changes are happening fast and it would seem that Peter Chiarelli is going to be the new man leading Hockey Operations for Edmonton. Patrick LaForge is also on the outs. That’s a more shocking bit of news as I thought he has entrenched himself into the company very well. Kevin Lowe will leave his current position and remain somewhere within the Oilers organization.
That last bit should come as no surprise. Kevin Lowe will have a job for life with the Oilers in some capacity or another for as long as he wants, and I’m perfectly fine with that. He was their first ever Draft pick, scored their first goal, coached the team for a season, moved on to be the GM of the club, and eventually the President of Hockey Operations.
Lowe, as far as hockey goes, has been an Oiler from Cradle to Grave. He is a solid citizen of Edmonton and by all accounts a very fine person. I have no issues with Kevin Lowe the man and I wouldn’t ever question his loyalty to the Oilers organization.
That said, I would say that his effectiveness in management peaked as a General Manager. I would go so far as to say that he is unquestionably the best General Manager the team has had since Glen Sather left. His teams were competitive despite heavy salary restrictions at a time when rich teams could buy all the talent they wanted, and he effectively traded Eric Brewer and a mittful of navel lint for Chris Pronger. That deal would be a feather in anyone’s cap.
As the President of Hockey Ops he would ultimately be responsible for hiring disaster GMs Tambellini and MacTavish and ushering in the infinite rebuild. The timeline has already creeped longer than imagined and in the winter the team suggested we could probably tack on another 3-5 years. When the team no longer valued winning at the NHL level for so long that losing became expected even 5 years after Taylor Hall was drafted, there was a problem.
At the end of the day, the team’s vision has to come from the President of Hockey Operations and it’s obvious that Nicholson doesn’t share the vision that this rebuild should be continuing along the path of neglect and faux development.
Peter Chiarelli will be given the keys to the office and it’s going to be his vision the team follows moving forward. He will be the one pulling all of the strings now. Lowetide has a great summary of his best and worst trades that you can see here. The most obvious deal that people bring up as a negative for Chiarelli is the Seguin trade.
He lost the deal. No doubt about it. What we don’t know for certain are all the actual details. We have heard suggestions and innuendo about Seguin’s lifestyle and accountability to the team. We have also heard stores of power struggle in the boardroom between Chiarelli and Cam Neely. As long as Chiarelli has learned from the obvious mistake and doesn’t have a desire to trade Taylor Hall to complete the set then I’m happy.
The facts are that he made the Bruins (through some good moves and some good fortune) into a perennially competitive team. And when I say competitive, I mean they competed for the Cup not competed for respectability. He’s a smart hockey man with a more proven record than anyone the Oilers have hired for any of their major hockey positions in almost a decade. It’s a necessary step in the right direction.
Questions remain unanswered at this time. Specifically, we have no idea what changes if any have been made to the status and role of Craig MacTavish. He is certainly not as autonomous today as he has been purportedly been in the past. This cannot possibly still be HIS team to run. At the most he will be in the same tenuous position Dave Nonis was in all last season when everybody knew that Shanahan would eventually put his own guy in place.
The biggest takeaway from today, however, is that change is really happening. The team’s losing culture has seen so many scapegoats come and go from the lower ranks of the team (remember firing the equipment staff?) but nobody at the very top saw any repercussions for the team’s failures. The same 3 voices at the top of the hockey hierarchy when the losing started (Lowe, Howson, MacTavish) have been replaced or marginalized today. Nicholson has pushed the Boys on the Bus to the sides of the organization and that’s a great thing for Oiler fans. This franchise finally seems ready to move on.
There will be a press conference later in the day. I will update this as best as possible when more info comes.
UPDATE
Peter Chiarelli has been appointed #Oilers President of Hockey Operations and General Manager effective immediately. pic.twitter.com/U5XPzTNxKk
— Edmonton Oilers (@EdmontonOilers) April 24, 2015MacT out as GM!
MacTavish still currently with the organization but not in the same capacity. Much seems up in the air about his status.
Follow me on Twitter @Archaeologuy