So this is going to be a bit inflammatory.

The Hitchcock honeymoon period is officially over in Edmonton. After going 8-1-1 and putting themselves into the conversation to be top 3 in the Pacific, the recent 4 game losing streak has put Edmonton back out of a Wild Card spot. At the very best, the Oilers are a bubble team and fans will be watching their team bounce in and out of a spot, likely until the end of the season.

Maybe Edmonton can stay in as a Wild Card team, maybe in a month when Klefbom and potentially Andrej Sekera return, the team can put together a streak which propels them into the post-season.

I'm here today to tell you that if you care about this team...you shouldn't want this for one simple reason; if Edmonton makes the playoffs...Peter Chiarelli stays.

Chiarelli was handed the keys to a Ferrari and 5 million dollars to spend on upgrades... the sweet purring engine remains, but he blew all of his money putting in an 8-track system, a cheap spoiler, and a custom paint job on the side that reads, "built to play in the Pacific" in comic-sans. Squeaking into the playoffs this season saves Pete's job for one more summer and will almost surely mean little change going into the 2019-2020 season.

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Picture this, Edmonton narrowly slides into the last playoff spot in the last few games of April and the city of Edmonton rejoices. Once the team loses in the first round, the braintrust sits down and congratulate each other for the success of making the playoffs. As they discuss what changes they need to address, Chiarelli has a brilliant thought...they don't need to really do anything:

The Oilers need help on defence... well they can simply count on Andrej Sekera being there to start the year! Sure he will be 33 when the season starts, and has dealt with two potentially career ending injuries, but he will surely be able to solidify the back end. Plus the team has a secret weapon in waiting...Evan Bouchard! For years the Oilers have coveted a right shot offensive D-man and at 19 years old Bouchard will obviously be ready to immediately make an impact in the top four. So the defense has been solved.

Next onto the forwards; first thing is of course we need to sign Chiasson to a 2 or 3 year deal... the numbers guys say that his shooting percentage won't last so we should sign him to something reasonable...probably in the 3.5 million dollar range a year.

Khaira and Puljujarvi started to do good things which obviously means we can count on 15-20 goals from both of them so that is another thing off the checklist...but fans want to see action so let's take a dip into free agency. With Simmonds, Lee, Silfverberg, and Nyquist all in waiting we can immediately fix our top 6. Let's sign Silfverberg for a 5 year deal at 5 million and call it a day. Oh our cap is starting to get pretty tight... Ryan Nugent Hopkins is making 6 million a year......

Show of hands does anybody not see Chiarelli's conversations going like that?

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Making the playoffs this season will result in the ship remaining on the same course, and having the exact same conversation next season. The Oilers have Connor McDavid in his fourth NHL season and currently the team's goal is simply to make the playoffs. This team and the fans deserve to be in Cup contention every year and the longer Chiarelli is at the helm... the further away that is from happening.

I would love for this organization to prove me wrong...but everything that they have done and the current state of this team points to the opposite.

Thanks for reading

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