Oscargasm wrote on Fri, 08 February 2019 10:47

PlusOne wrote on Fri, 08 February 2019 11:20 Magnum wrote on Fri, 08 February 2019 11:13 RDOilerfan wrote on Fri, 08 February 2019 10:04 Adam wrote on Fri, 08 February 2019 08:54 RDOilerfan wrote on Fri, 08 February 2019 08:05 It's amazing what happens when a team gets NHL caliber goaltending. The Oilers got it and they won. Shocker!! There were a few times when Talbot was called upon to make some good saves but in my opinion, that is pretty standard for most teams. The Oilers have depth issues but I didn't think they were outplayed like I saw mentioned in here. When you have the nuclear weapon that is McDavid and close behind Leon, if they get good goaltending and play somewhat sound hockey, they can grind out wins. Don't look now but Leon is tied for 3rd in goals and 7th in scoring in the NHL. But lets remember that apparently he is overpaid and can't drive a line just because he can't magically make guys like Rieder who has zero goals in 40 games good players. If they outshoot us and out-Corsi us 2-to-1, then yeah...it's probably safe to say we were outplayed. Talbot stole us a game. Not sure why you always need to have a snarkiness to your posts. You could just have left that line at "Leon is 3rd in goals and 7th in points..." For what it's worth, I still think Chia botched the negotiation against Draisaitl, and probably could have had him at similar term for $1 to $1.5MM per season less...which would have been significant. I've never said that Draisaitl isn't a great player - I hope he hits 100 points this year - but I would have liked the Oilers to better position themselves to save cap space, even on their top players. I am snarky when it comes to Leon because I listened to people call in to Lowtide yesterday and complain about Leon again. You are doing almost the exact thing. The guy is going to score more than 40 goals and get 100 points. He's not overpaid, not even close. If you think a 40+ goal, 100 pt guy making 8.5 mill is overpaid, then you must also think McDavid is overpaid because he makes 4 mill more and Leon will be right there in goals and 15 pts behind. It's just not true. Yes McDavid is incredible and the engine of the Oilers. But Leon is close behind and in my opinion, McDavid benefits from having Leon on his team almost as much as Leon does. Then I just saw Matthews sign for 11.634 on a 5 yr deal. Matthews is a one hell of a player but I am not convinced that he will outscore Leon by much if at all. Not 3 mill more worth of scoring. Plus when Matthews is a free agent, Leon will STILL be under contract. Marner is probably going to get close to Matthews money for a similar term. Just like Matthews, I doubt Marner will out score Leon by much if at all and he will be making significantly more money. You mention he should be making 1-1.5 mill less. So that means he should be making in the 7 mill range on a long term deal. So Nylander money. I am not trying to be a jerk but I find that laughable because it's not even CLOSE between Leon and Nylander. If the Leafs called the Oilers and said "We will give you Nylander for Leon" I would hope the Oilers would burst out laughing and then hang up the phone. If you think Leon is only a 7 mill player, does that mean you would do that deal? True, people complain about Leon, despite his scoring levels. That doesn't mean the complaints are unwarranted. People, accurately complained about Ovechkin's lack of defensive GAF, and how it was preventing his team from winning a Cup. Ovechkin matured in his game, and now he has a Cup. It is very possible to be a very good player, while having significant room for improvement. It is also possible, or even likely as usual, that RDOF has missed the point of most of the complaints about Drai. Sure, some complain he is lazy etc but when it comes to his contract most of the complaints are that it could have been cheaper. It is another example of how almost the ENTIRE hockey watching world were surprised at the top dollar and term that was given him when it didnt seem to be required. I think Drai is great offensively. I think he has room for improvement, specifically on some of his passes that get picked off and in the D zone. I also think that he is overpaid, not based on his point totals but based on what comparables were out there when he signed. Not to poop on Draisaitl, but he does the majority of his scoring (goals and apples) when he is on the ice with McDavid. So as a winger... let’s look at a comparable, point wise. What’s Johnny Gaudreau making? 6.75 AAV. Huge win for Calgary there, in point comparison. Okay, so he’s been centering his own line recently and was during that playoff run, for the most part. So as a centre, let’s look at a comparable, points wise. What’s Nate McKinnon making? 6.3 AAV. Huge win for Colorado there, in point comparison. But but but, both Gaudreau and McKinnon signed their deals the season before Draisaitl signed his. Okay... so let’s look at; Winger signed in 2017, David Pasternak at 6.66 AAV. Huge win for Boston there, in point comparison. Centre signed in 2017, Jack Eichel at 10 AAV. Win for Edmonton there, in point comparison. Though Eichel is ‘the face’ of the Sabres and almost exclusively plays centre, without a Connor McDavid inflation. I’m saying points wise bc that’s pretty much all that RD seems to put stock into. Again, my intention isn’t to poop on Draisaitl or throw shade his way at all. What I’m saying is at the time, and even now, his contract seems to be an overpayment when looking at comparables which you need to do when negotiating. However, he and the Oilers agreed on a number and all the power to Leon. He’s been an incredible #2 to Connor and even at times outperforms Connor. Pumped that he’s an Oiler and will be for several more season.

This is exactly right.

There were several comparables for Draisaitl, but the Oilers seemed to forget them all when the agent suggested even the possibility of offer sheets. (I'd point to Sean Monahan, for instance, who signed a year earlier and who's been neck and neck with Draisaitl most of the season, while making over $2MM less).

It wasn't just that though - Their priorities were poor that summer all around:

June 22 - Oilers trade Eberle for Strome (one for one!)
June 23 - Oilers sign Kris Russell to a 4-year deal
June 26 - Oilers sign Zack Kassian to a 3-year deal
June 27 - Oilers sign Eric Gryba to 2-year deal
June 29 - Oilers buyout Benoit Pouliot
July 1 - Oilers sign 7 minor leaguers
July 2 - Oilers sign Brad Malone to a 2-year deal
July 5 - Oilers sign Connor McDavid to an 8-year deal
July 7 - Oilers sign Jussi Jokinen to a 1-year deal
July 10 - Oilers sign Johann Auvitu to a 1-year deal
August 16 - Oilers sign Draisaitl to an 8-year deal

There's been a lot of talk about the Oilers decision-making on when they did the McDavid deal versus the Draisaitl deal, and it's a good question - why did they prioritize the expensive one? If they were going to do that, they should have made a huge focus on the discount given in order to keep the team competitive. They kind of tried to do that, but the communication of it was ridiculously bad. They made it sound like McDavid had basically had to come back to the Oilers and tell them to sign him for less than they were willing to spend...it makes Chiarelli look ridiculous, and while there was definitely a discount given, it was poorly defined.

For both players, their extensions came after the team had made three bad overpays within a week to fringe players. Kassian had had a good playoff, but he was a fourth liner - paying him almost $2MM was way out of market. Kris Russell had gone all summer without a contract the year before, but they gave him top dollar, top term and a no-move clause. And Eric Gryba was a HEALTHY SCRATCH for most of the playoffs so a one-way, two year deal at over a million a year was just mind-boggling. He'd even tried UFA a year before too and went almost the whole summer before inking back with the Oilers. There was extremely limited market for the player, and he would only play 21 games on that contract.

If you're negotiating with your stars and trying to convince them you need them to take a discount so that you can build a team around them, you can't really be giving that away in the week before with overpay after overpay. It destroys your argument to these guys.

Trading Eberle for Strome is pretty awful too...these guys knew Eberle and were guests at his wedding, and they traded him straight up for a guy who scored 20 points less during Eberle's worst season to that point - a year after the terrible Hall deal, and right after they lose Reinhart to the expansion draft - exposing how bad that trade was as well.

If you're looking at signing and thinking about leaving money on the table because you're going to play for a winning team, it's pretty tough when the GM (the same guy who said he didn't think they could make any noise in the playoffs a couple months earlier) is blowing trades and signing bad deals.

I don't think it's even debatable now - Peter Chiarelli is a poor negotiator, and he got run over by Draisaitl's agent. Given the comparables at the time, given that Draisaitl had big numbers, but much of that was driven by playing with McDavid, given that McDavid had discounted his own salary demands - there was enough ammunition to get Draisaitl to accept something less than top dollar. The Oilers didn't use it.

Draisaitl is doing a good job for us, and he's not grotesquely overpaid, like Kassian, Russell or Gryba...but we could have saved on that contract, and the team needs some value contracts.

The only good thing, I suppose, is that Draisaitl's deal has been inflationary around the league. He helped set the stage for the Eichel contract, the Nylander contract and others...Chiarelli's helped to screw over other GMs by setting a poor precedent in a league where comparables are a huge part of contract negotiations. It's to Leon's credit that he isn't just seen as an outlier.

"Thinking that a bad team's best players are the reason the team is bad is the "Tambellini re-signing Lennart Petrell" of sports opinions." @Woodguy55
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