I know I’m beating a dead horse here and I will keep it brief, but the Oilers Management and coaching staff clearly have no idea what they are doing. We are 42 games in and the Oilers are 20-16-6 but they are struggling with finding consistency and stringing wins together. This inability to have consistency is a by-product of the lines changing practically every game.
Now during the summer, the Oilers made three acquisitions: David Tomasek, Andrew Mangiapane and Trent Frederic at the trader deadline and signed to an 8 year contract over the summer. So where do those deals stand now?
Mangiapane
Healthy scratch.
So insane. Like i said, play him 12-14 minutes and forecheck the hell out of the opposition. Forget the stats. You have two offensive lines for that. If you just let him play his style on a third line consistently, he will end up with 15-20 goals which is fine by me.
Frederic
Healthy scratch.
Much like Magiapange, stop obsessing about his points. They don't matter. Have him focus on the forecheck and driving the other team crazy. That’s it. He's a big guy who fits perfectly in a bottom six. Let him do that and forget about production.
David Tomasek
Got the hell out of Dodge
Like I quoted him saying this in my previous article; he had no role on the team. He's s great hockey player and I find he would have filled that bottom six checker perfectly.
Simple Plan, Simple Expectations
So, the Oilers latest acquisitions are not going so well, but I really don’t blame the players. The staff needs to manage realistic expectations and establish a plan which reflects it. Because of their wealth of offensive cutlet on the top two lines, all the bottom six needs to do is keep the puck out of Edmonton's net. Their point production should be of no concern.
Top two lines: Provide the offence as they have two of the best players to ever play the game and a top rated PP.
Bottom two line: forecheck, annoy, play good in your zone, throw hits, draw penalties and the coaching staff must not punish them for lack of production as it's not their job. Let them play hockey!!!
The bottom six always looks confused and out of sync as the staff wants them to defend but also score a bunch of points while they get cold sitting on the bench for extended periods of time. This makes no sense and it was reflected perfectly in Tomasek’s comments.
When you start scratching vets like this and putting highly skilled young talent like Howard into the mix to play 8-10 minutes with no pp time, you're simply not doing it right and the dressing room knows it.
Everyone needs to feel involved in order for this team to ascend to the next level. That means cutting minutes from the top players and elevating and clearly communicating with your bottom six that they need to do is not get scored on.
This is the theme time and time again and it's getting rather tiresome.