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Oilers » Sekera bought out...

Re: Sekera bought out... [message #739787 is a reply to message #739784 ]	Tue, 02 July 2019 11:27

RDOilerfan
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Adam wrote on Tue, 02 July 2019 10:58

RDOilerfan wrote on Tue, 02 July 2019 09:26

Adam wrote on Tue, 02 July 2019 08:48

RDOilerfan wrote on Tue, 02 July 2019 08:02

Magnum wrote on Mon, 01 July 2019 18:35

Ragnarok73 wrote on Mon, 01 July 2019 16:59

So far, the Oil just seemed to have done a whole lot of absolutely nothing. Granted, what else could we expect with the @$@#hole that Chia left the team in cap-wise?

Wish we had a veteran defence man with a history of being elite, with some upside.

I do too except I don't want the Oilers having to pay that guy 5.5 mill for the next 2 seasons. I'd also like to know he will actually be ready to go for the start of the season vs potentially getting hurt for the 3rd year in a row and I would like to know I can count on him for good mins vs crossing my fingers.

If he costs you more than $3MM, you're paying the same as what you were paying Sekera, since we're on the hook for $2.5MM of cap space with Sekera this year.

There's not much left in the free agent market who's going to provide an update. Jake Gardiner...and that's about it. And I don't see Gardiner coming cheap or coming to Edmonton. He may have heard from his old teammate Justin Schultz about how Edmonton fans (most knowledgeable in the league icon_rolleyes

) treat offensive defencemen - and even if he hadn't, he's undoubtedly heard that this team is a tire fire who can't get it together, even when gifted the best player on the planet.

So that leaves trades...but looking at Holland's record, he's not exactly good at making trades. He doesn't make many of them, and there's exceptionally few clear wins when he does make them, so we might be in tough here.

What I don't understand is the notion that Sekera can be anything more than a 3rd pairing guy at best. He played 24 games last year and looked OK playing very sheltered 3rd pairing mins. He didn't dominate, all he did was show that he can probably play in the NHL which was a HUGE thing considering given coming off 2 major leg injuries, they was a chance he was done in the NHL.

What I find hypocritical with this is the Oilers had a young dman in Jones last year play close to the games that Sekera did. Jones played 17 games. When he was in the 3rd pair, Jones looked really good, when he got elevated to top 4, he did fine OK for a few games but slowly got exposed for being not ready. Going into this season most fans and media guys agree Jones is probably ready for full time NHL duty in a 3rd pairing role. He also might have the upside to elevate at some point. But no one is expecting him to play in the top 4 like some people think Sekera could. What's the difference other than experience? Jones moves the puck as good or better, he has more offense than Sekera at this point in his career, he's WAY, WAY more mobile than Sekera ever was. I don't think Jones should play in the top 4 but if someone is going to tell me that Sekera could do it with the main reason being he can pass the puck, in my opinion, you should be saying the same thing about Jones who has WAY more tools in the tool box than Sekera has at this point in his career.

In my opinion, the goal of the team should be to get rid of the breaking down, aging, expensive vets like a Sekera and turning their spots over to younger players. They needed to create a roster spot for a guy like Jones who is more so what the NHL needs in dmen than Sekera was. Sekera in my opinion is a 3rd pairing dman who shouldn't be any higher than the 3rd pair so in my opinion, you replace Sekera with a Jones and it upgrades your defense. You do lose experience but other than that, Jones does all the things Sekera does play all the things he can't, all while doing it for 720K. So you replace Sekera AND you have almost 2.3 mill left over.

I'm really happy if Jones can replace Sekera's contribution to the roster.

However:

1) he hasn't actually shown that he can be an adequate replacement. I didn't think he was solid at all. I thought he looked like he had the tools, but he was also in over his head from Game 1. He finished -9 in 17 games, despite the fact that he was mostly played against weaker opposition.

I did think he was overplayed by Hitchcock, who seemed fine with throwing him in the deep end. He played 7 games with well over 20 minutes, which is a lot for a young d-man.

Part of that was lack of options due to injury, but he kept playing through much of January, despite the fact we'd brought in two veteran defencemen who were supposed to fill the void left by all the injuries.

He did alright from a points perspective with 6 points in 17 games, but his game needed a lot of work at the NHL level.

2) Sekera is better than Kris Russell who we kept. If you're going to get rid of an over-priced third pairing defenceman, maybe it makes sense to keep the better one???

3) If the Oilers do not use the cap space, then making the buyout is foolish because it hurts us for four years now - four years of paying a player not to play here. The Oilers have made a lot of contract mistakes, but they are paying so much in buyouts now that they could add a pretty solid player with what they're paying people not to be here. I was curious how this stacked up:

Dead Space (retained salary, buyouts, plus recapture)
Boston - 3.066MM
Buffalo - 0.792MM
Detroit - 1.883MM
Florida - 2.890MM (incl. $1.094 for Luongo)
Montreal - 1.367MM
Ottawa - 0.729MM
Tampa - 1.833MM
Toronto - 1.200MM (for Phil Kessel!)
Carolina - 8.583MM (of which $6.25MM is Patrick Marleau - they received a 1st rd pick for this cap space)
Columbus - 2.708MM
New Jersey - 1.917MM
NY Islanders - 0
NY Rangers - 3.911MM
Philadelphia - 3.071MM
Pittsburgh - 0
Washington - 0
Chicago - 0
Colorado - 4.25MM (incl $1.5MM for Brooks Orpik buyout that they got Grubauer in order to facilitate)
Dallas - 0.700MM
Minnesota - $1.217MM
Nashville - 0
St. Louis - 0
Winnipeg - 0
Anaheim - 2.625MM
Arizona - 1.944MM
Calgary - 1.500MM
Edmonton - 4.133
Los Angeles - 3.757MM (incl. $1.570MM for recapture/termination penalties on Mike Richards)
San Jose - 1.417MM
Vancouver - 4.066MM (incl. $3.033MM recapture on Luongo)
Vegas - 0.500MM

So there's only two teams in the entire league who have more dead cap space than the Oilers, and both of those teams took that on strategically to get an asset...the Oilers just bought their way out of their own mistakes.

Worth noting, that does not include buried contracts, and the Oilers will have more dead space there with Brandon Manning certain to be in the minors again this year.

I know that the Oilers just blame this on their predecessors - Chiarelli could point to MacTavish on Pouliot and Holland will now point to Chiarelli on Sekera, but the fact is, that's 5% of the total cap that the Oilers are burning on guys who don't play here any more. If it were a player on the team, Burnt Capspace (including the Manning dollars) would be making more than anyone but McDavid, Draisaitl, Nugent-Hopkins, and Lucic. If you exclude the Manning amount, then only Klefbom, Larsson and Koskinen (?!) would be on the list of players who make more.

There's all kinds of talk about how tax rates make certain teams less competitive, but I think burning millions on players who are gone is a pretty big anchor too.

Worth noting that most of the best teams in the league have very low dollars spent on buyouts and retained cap.

First of all, Jones played a bunch of time in a top 4 role when he wasn't ready. I don't expect Jones to be in the top 4, I expect him to be a 3rd pairing guy this season. I am looking for him to be decent defensively, move the puck a little, be able to skate and maybe chip in 20 pts. So mirror what Benning does and Jones skates way better. That's all I was expecting from Sekera. So in my opinion, he can replace what Sekera does. The only thing that he lacks is Sekera's experience. Maybe you disagree but experience isn't worth 4.78 mill which is the difference in contracts between the 720 Jones is making and the 5.5 mill that Sekera was.
Secondly, the pro that I have heard over and over again is the Oilers need puck movers and Sekera is one of their better one. I don't disagree with statement, he can pass the puck. What else? He makes 5.5mill, being able to pass the puck doesn't justify making that much money. It appears that in very sheltered mins, he can play in your 3rd and do well. So can Benning. Benning makes 1.9 mill, Sekera makes 5.5 mill. It doesn't add up.
Third. I think you can trade Russell and someone would take him even if you had to retain something. No one is taking Sekera, not even if the Oilers retained 50%. We saw what he is worth. He's worth 1.5 mill on a 1 yr. If the tables where turned and the Oilers traded for Sekera at 5.5 mill for 2 years after the injuries he had had, with 60 games in 2 years, we'd be freaking out. So why would another team want him?

The Oilers need new blood on the defense, we have ALL been saying that for years. For that to happen, you have to create opportunity and roster spots. At some point something had to give.

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Sekera bought out...	By: sinfulchimp306 on Sun, 30 June 2019 10:23
Re: Sekera bought out...	By: messier11 on Sun, 30 June 2019 10:25
Re: Sekera bought out...	By: Burgeoboy on Sun, 30 June 2019 11:29
Re: Sekera bought out...	By: Kr55 on Sun, 30 June 2019 10:27
Re: Sekera bought out...	By: GabbyDugan on Sun, 30 June 2019 10:30
Re: Sekera bought out...	By: scotiaoiler on Sun, 30 June 2019 10:36
Re: Sekera bought out...	By: CrudeRemarks on Sun, 30 June 2019 10:49
Re: Sekera bought out...	By: GabbyDugan on Sun, 30 June 2019 11:05
Re: Sekera bought out...	By: Burgeoboy on Mon, 01 July 2019 09:10
Re: Sekera bought out...	By: mightyreasoner on Mon, 01 July 2019 09:14
Re: Sekera bought out...	By: Kr55 on Mon, 01 July 2019 09:32
Re: Sekera bought out...	By: CrudeRemarks on Mon, 01 July 2019 09:31
Re: Sekera bought out...	By: ziltoid on Mon, 01 July 2019 11:20
Re: Sekera bought out...	By: Burgeoboy on Mon, 01 July 2019 11:29
Re: Sekera bought out...	By: Kr55 on Mon, 01 July 2019 11:32
Re: Sekera bought out...	By: Kr55 on Sun, 30 June 2019 10:57
Re: Sekera bought out...	By: Goose on Sun, 30 June 2019 11:05
Re: Sekera bought out...	By: WhoreableGuy on Sun, 30 June 2019 11:18
Re: Sekera bought out...	By: overdue on Sun, 30 June 2019 11:25
Re: Sekera bought out...	By: Mike on Sun, 30 June 2019 11:34
Re: Sekera bought out...	By: Magnum on Sun, 30 June 2019 17:01
Re: Sekera bought out...	By: Oscargasm on Sun, 30 June 2019 11:32
Re: Sekera bought out...	By: mightyreasoner on Sun, 30 June 2019 12:08
Re: Sekera bought out...	By: Oscargasm on Sun, 30 June 2019 12:16
Re: Sekera bought out...	By: steve.kreys on Sun, 30 June 2019 12:24
Re: Sekera bought out...	By: Skookum Jim on Sun, 30 June 2019 12:26
Re: Sekera bought out...	By: Magnum on Sun, 30 June 2019 12:56
Re: Sekera bought out...	By: Oscargasm on Sun, 30 June 2019 13:05
Re: Sekera bought out...	By: inverno76 on Sun, 30 June 2019 13:11
Re: Sekera bought out...	By: nullterm on Sun, 30 June 2019 13:18
Re: Sekera bought out...	By: mightyreasoner on Sun, 30 June 2019 13:31
Re: Sekera bought out...	By: RDOilerfan on Mon, 01 July 2019 15:42
Re: Sekera bought out...	By: CrudeRemarks on Mon, 01 July 2019 18:49
Re: Sekera bought out...	By: Iamheretoday on Mon, 01 July 2019 19:22
Re: Sekera bought out...	By: Adam on Mon, 01 July 2019 21:23
Re: Sekera bought out...	By: Iamheretoday on Mon, 01 July 2019 21:46
Re: Sekera bought out...	By: Adam on Mon, 01 July 2019 22:30
Re: Sekera bought out...	By: mightyreasoner on Tue, 02 July 2019 00:05
Re: Sekera bought out...	By: Magnum on Tue, 02 July 2019 00:11
Re: Sekera bought out...	By: mightyreasoner on Tue, 02 July 2019 00:18
Re: Sekera bought out...	By: K.McC#24 on Sun, 30 June 2019 15:16
Re: Sekera bought out...	By: NetBOG on Sun, 30 June 2019 13:09
Re: Sekera bought out...	By: Kr55 on Sun, 30 June 2019 15:26
Re: Sekera bought out...	By: stemhovlichski on Sun, 30 June 2019 17:15
Re: Sekera bought out...	By: Ragnarok73 on Sun, 30 June 2019 17:43
Re: Sekera bought out...	By: mightyreasoner on Sun, 30 June 2019 17:53
Re: Sekera bought out...	By: nullterm on Sun, 30 June 2019 18:18
Re: Sekera bought out...	By: Skookum Jim on Sun, 30 June 2019 18:53
Re: Sekera bought out...	By: Magnum on Mon, 01 July 2019 10:05
Re: Sekera bought out...	By: Kr55 on Mon, 01 July 2019 15:43
Re: Sekera bought out...	By: Ragnarok73 on Mon, 01 July 2019 16:59
Re: Sekera bought out...	By: Magnum on Mon, 01 July 2019 18:35
Re: Sekera bought out...	By: RDOilerfan on Tue, 02 July 2019 08:02
Re: Sekera bought out...	By: Adam on Tue, 02 July 2019 08:48
Re: Sekera bought out...	By: RDOilerfan on Tue, 02 July 2019 09:26
Re: Sekera bought out...	By: Adam on Tue, 02 July 2019 10:58
Re: Sekera bought out...	By: RDOilerfan on Tue, 02 July 2019 11:27
Re: Sekera bought out...	By: Adam on Tue, 02 July 2019 11:51
Re: Sekera bought out...	By: Kr55 on Tue, 02 July 2019 11:54
Re: Sekera bought out...	By: RDOilerfan on Tue, 02 July 2019 11:58
Re: Sekera bought out...	By: Goose on Tue, 02 July 2019 13:24
Re: Sekera bought out...	By: RDOilerfan on Tue, 02 July 2019 13:38
Re: Sekera bought out...	By: Magnum on Tue, 02 July 2019 13:40
Re: Sekera bought out...	By: Goose on Tue, 02 July 2019 13:46
Re: Sekera bought out...	By: RDOilerfan on Tue, 02 July 2019 14:16
Re: Sekera bought out...	By: Adam on Tue, 02 July 2019 15:46
Re: Sekera bought out...	By: RDOilerfan on Tue, 02 July 2019 16:14
Re: Sekera bought out...	By: Magnum on Tue, 02 July 2019 16:27
Re: Sekera bought out...	By: Adam on Tue, 02 July 2019 17:37
Re: Sekera bought out...	By: Dragon_Matt on Tue, 02 July 2019 16:21
Re: Sekera bought out...	By: Rocksteady on Tue, 02 July 2019 10:07
Re: Sekera bought out...	By: Kr55 on Tue, 02 July 2019 10:13
Re: Sekera bought out...	By: RDOilerfan on Tue, 02 July 2019 10:17

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