EDMONTON — In Toronto, general manager Kyle Dubas scratched the requisite itches on his Maple Leafs roster this week. But he didn’t stop there, wheeling and dealing to the point where an entire third of the Leafs roster of skaters (six of 18) Thursday night in Calgary had been acquired during this trade deadline window.
Then there is Philadelphia, where GM Chuck Fletcher chose sloth over sleuth. He inexplicably failed to move pending unrestricted free agent James van Riemsdyk, when a last-minute deal with the Detroit Red Wings fell through.
“A simply remarkable blunder by Flyers general manager Chuck Fletcher,” penned a staff writer at BroadStreetHockey.com. “And this is just the latest of his unthinkable gaffes.”
Back here in Edmonton, Ken Holland sat down behind the table at the Hall of Fame room inside Rogers Place, knowing his work load had fallen somewhere in between.
He’d made a big, sexy deal, bringing in the reliable veteran, defenceman Mattias Ekholm from Nashville. He’d also checked a box by landing centre/right-winger Nick Bjugstad, and Holland had made tidy work of off-loading Jesse Puljujarvi without retaining money or adding an asset to the deal to make it happen.
You can always do more. See: Toronto, Boston.
But you can always accomplish less: See: Philly and Calgary.
In the end, the goal of shoring up Edmonton’s defensive posture and helping the penalty kill was met, and Bjugstad at the Oilers’ cost of $450,000 is an upgrade on Puljujarvi at $3 million.
We’ll give Holland a B-plus, with the caveat being that another defenceman a la Luke Schenn would have made this a perfect deadline for the Oilers GM.
“We went into this last two-week period, getting a defenceman was a priority for me. A top-four defenceman who would have an impact on our team,” said Holland, who robbed a bit from Edmonton’s vast reserves of offence when he moved Tyson Barrie, then added to its defensive pool with Ekholm.
“I tried to make the team different … but the reality was we were not adding. We had to either upgrade or (make) a change,” he said, referring to his tight cap situation. “Tyson Barrie is an offensive defenceman. He can run the power play. Mattias Ekholm is a different player than him. He’s not running the power play. I would say he’s a defensive defenceman. He blocked shots. He’s a PK guy. He’s a bigger man.
“I tried to make the team different.”
So, let’s continue down that path. Because making the team “different” means a lot of things.
Holland wants his penalty killing to improve, and Ekholm/Bjugstad should aid in that. But he doesn’t want his league-leading power play to be different, which is the risk when you move Barrie out and install Evan Bouchard at quarterback.
Holland wants his defence corps to be “different.” More stingy. Block more shots. Break out more cleanly.
Ekholm will help with all of that, but losing the veteran Barrie will detract from the puck-moving part of that equation. And considering that the slack will have to picked up by the sophomore Bouchard, whose season has not been great thus far, and rookies Vincent Desharnais (17 NHL games) and Philip Broberg (59 GP), there is some risk involved here.
“You never know. You never know,” Holland began. “At some point in time, you’re gonna have to play some playoff series or playoff games. You can’t hold them out until they’re 25, 26, 27. They’ve got to play.
“I think (Ekholm) is going to be really good, and not only for what he’s going to bring to our team. He’s gonna be a good role model and a mentor for our young defencemen, Bouchard, Desharnais and Broberg.”
The template here is Duncan Keith a year ago.
Keith came in from Chicago and settled Bouchard right down, while lending a sense of calm to a playoff run that ran all the way into June. Now it’s Ekholm’s time — not just for this run but for two more seasons after that.
There is no doubting the quality of the Viking Ekholm. He’s a big, physical D-man who does just fine with the puck on his stick and will punish you when it’s not.
Now, the Oilers need some quick growth from a few kids to help mask a D-corps that isn’t as deep as Colorado’s or Toronto’s.
Could Holland have done more?
Hey, you can always do more.
Under his cap constraints, did he do enough? Well, Edmonton is better today than it was five days ago.
The rest of that question won’t be answered until June.
