Can you sign an RFA (benning) for less than he was making before??

It would have to be a verbal agreement: either Edmonton doesn't offer him a qualifying offer or he rejects it. Either way the process needs Benning to go to UFA and want to stay in Edmonton. Given his status in the NHL, some history with concussions, and enough uncertainty in the FA market right now, I think it's highly likely he takes a deal like this instead of one year at >$2M.

No bad honestly, we get a 3c. Not sure how I like the Russell trade, but I wouldn’t want Howard unless he plays better then he did in Detroit. I know Detroit was a bad team but still his stats were terrible.

VAN decline, they don't need a left shot dman.

I feel weird about the trade itself, but I had the same feeling regarding the Neal-Lucic trade. I don't think there's a deal out there that doesn't involve Edmonton taking an equally bad deal back, and I have enough faith in Sven's historical production and willingness to play at the AHL level when demoted that we at least break-even in the deal.

I've touched on Howard before; Willis' bit on his May 20th Athletic article leaves me confident enough to justify Howard on a one-year deal.



It's a stronger body of work than what Smith had prior to coming to Edmonton, and imo the biggest factor between gambling on either Howard or Smith is age. Smith hit his age curve really hard during his November skid and recovered enough to be respectable, but is it reasonable to expect him not to regress further due to age? On strictly a one-year deal (I strongly believe Edmonton needs to push hard for a genuine #1 next season and replace Koskinen when he expires with the winner of Konovalov vs Rodrigue) I think the bet is fine.

Other names mentioned that might be had for cheap were Anderson, Brossoit, Elliot, Miller, and Talbot. I don't think Brossoit and Talbot are genuine options due to their histories in Edmonton: I doubt they want to come back and I don't think the management beyond Holland wants them back either. I think Anderson and Miller are done, and I'm extremely concerned about Elliot's injury history.

That depends entirely on how much mileage you think you'll get out of Benn.

Russell's effectively a replacement for either Stetcher or Tanev, and given that he plays on his off-hand side more than he does his natural side, I think he fits rather well.

..

If Tanev is re-signed, Stecher will be moved possibly. Canucks have Edler, Hughes, Benn, Juolevi, Tryamkin on the left side. Benn is far more effective on his off wing and Tryamkin can play the right side as well. Canucks would also like to make room for Rafferty and Juolevi. Russell is just redundant.

ummm. Buy out neal then retain money on Russell to sign beartschi? Added a ton of dead cap space sent out a d who could be perfect partner for Bouchard (I meant to ask what happened to him) all so we can replace neal for beartschi on a one year? With that dead space your effectively paying beartschi the same.

I doubt Benning takes a cut in pay. Even if he likes it in Edmonton he’s not dumb Bouchard coming up pushes him out he will have to hit free agency to sign for less if it goes that far he’s signing with a team he can see a future with.

Baertschi is an AHLer and you're proposing Edmonton pay him $4M next year??

Russell is an NHL player at least. You're getting hosed on that deal Chiarelli-style.

you can easily do a one of one for baertschi

Russell can pay the right side too

Baertschi isn't signed, he's traded for under identical circumstances to how Edmonton managed to offload Lucic last summer. The idea is that they cost the same, it's just bad cap in a different spot that isn't hindering the development of a better player. Russell isn't the perfect partner for anyone on the Oilers: he's wildly ineffective at essentially every aspect of the game now. Jones is miles ahead of him despite having played a fraction of the games.

If you could read, I mentioned that Bouchard plays the entire season in Bakersfield.

Bouchard isn't going to be replacing Benning. I'm pretty sure anyone with a functioning brain can recognize that Bouchard is expected to become a much higher caliber player than Benning. Bouchard would be slated to be playing in the top four next season, Benning is signed as a long-term #3RD. These two things are not the same.

The massive difference between Neal or Baertschi in this case is that Sven's deal expires after this season AND Edmonton manages a way out of Russell's deal a season sooner. There will not be a team lining up to take his deal for free. With no CBO, the near-$2M cap hit from Neal's buyout is effectively guaranteed. This team cannot justify a $6M replacement-level player that can only produce on the power play. In the same line of thought, this team cannot afford a $4M boat anchor on the back end. Russell's arguably the 5th best LHD in Edmonton's system right now. If you can't offload that hit for free, you need to put the bad money elsewhere on the roster in order to ensure that Jones gets icetime.



I tend to agree with you on a lot of things, but you're vastly underestimating the effect a flat cap is going to have on teams weaponizing cap space.

Senators fans remain adamant that a Gaborik-Russell swap isn't going to happen, and if Edmonton is serious about getting out of that deal, it will not be for no cap coming back. Jets fans are adamant that Perreault isn't the deal. We're adamant that Edmonton shouldn't be paying an exorbitant fee to dump one year of a low cash-dollars cap hit. Kings fans en-masse have refused a Russell-for-a-7th kind of deal. Teams aren't doing this kind of trade for free when everyone was already feeling a crunch due to a low-balled cap. With it remaining stagnant now, Edmonton's only two options are to put that cap hit elsewhere on the roster or to pay through the nose to unload Russell. This is easily the lesser of the two evils.

Did you know that if Baertschi sucks they can send him to the AHL and give Benson those minutes? And that it would effectively guarantee the 4th round pick for Edmonton? Who else is offering a 4th rounder for Kris Russell right now? And yet you think I'm getting hosed? What kind of value do you think a $4M seventh defender has right now? The key to any deal like this isn't to maximize value - I've established that such a trade isn't going to happen due to cap space being such a commodity right now - but rather to ensure Jones sees as close to 82 games this season. There's also the consideration of Lagesson needing to play in 40-some odd games if he's going to be expansion eligible.



Edmonton's possibly getting more here...?

I apologize for not noticing where you had Bouchard to start the year.
That being said I don’t understand why start in ahl at this point and having a defensive minded shot blocker like Russell might help allow Bouchard to take chances and get comfortable with his play. He’s already proven himself at ahl level why burn another pro year off his deal. Dont keep Bouchard in ahl then expect him to be ready for any top four minutes. Thats definitely not ideal nor something holland would consider doing. More pressure more chance of failure longer it will actually take to achieve the developmental goal.
As for buying out neal I can’t see the sense in beartschi as a replacement. The only reason neal isn’t in top six is foot speed isn’t up to par for a line with mcdavid and can’t justify touching Leon’s line. Outside of top six offence dries up but I’d still rather hold onto him over beartschi has a lethal shot for pp and very capable to slot up the line up on either wing. I’d rather give Seattle a pick at expansion draft if needed to avoid dead cap space.

It's likely that Bouchard isn't ready for the top four right now: he's got the offensive side of his game down, but there were a few times I saw him get walked when he was with the Condors. His routing is close, but he's not at the point where he's anticipating pro-level plays and using his high hockey IQ to compensate for his middle-of-the-road skating. On the roster then, there exists exactly one spot where he'd fit. The problem with that is I don't fully believe in Edmonton at the moment: we're on the right path but the top nine isn't at a point where I'd be ecstatic to start bringing up kids on ELC's. Under this approach, there's money available for a high-end rental next season on top of re-signing RNH, Larsson, and Yamamoto. I think that's when they really look at going for it.

Russell is pretty bad at playing NHL-level defense for someone who's touted as being a defensive-minded player. It's silly to think that over the course of his deal he's spent more time on his belly than making good defensive plays. His style doesn't fit today's NHL: if you're blocking a lot of shots, it means you're giving up a lot of shots. The game now is so much more focused on transition and preventing the shot in the first place. Those are areas Russell really struggles with.

The problem with not buying out Neal is that you still have to get rid of Russell. I've established a few times now that this cannot be done for cheap: Edmonton either pays too much in terms of assets they shouldn't be spending or they're looking at taking bad salary back. With how tight Edmonton is against the cap right now, any relevant improvement requires every cent of space available. If you factor for the retained salaries on Lucic and Russell, plus the cost of Neal's buyout, yes it does make it appear like Edmonton's spending nearly $7M to get one year of Baertschi off the books. What you're ignoring is the $3M that's freed up from buying out Neal: that's effectively the entirety of Soderberg's deal. Buying out Neal gives Edmonton the means to afford the #3C they really lacked this past season.

Another thing to consider is that in this AGM, I'm really going in to next season with even more savings: buying out Neal does result in dead cap, but it also frees up Kassian to be levied off of the books. His contract was horrible the second it was announced, and given some of the talent bubbling under in Bakersfield or what could be available at this year's draft, Kassian represents some egregious over-spending in an area where the team didn't need to break the bank on. If you opt to keep Neal, it makes getting rid of Russell all the more disastrous for the long-term success of this team and it limits how much bad money you can truly drop over the next two seasons.

I'd rather keep Russell than pay Baertschi $4M. At least he's an NHL player who can be very useful. And I wouldn't gauge Russell's value by what uneducated fans think.

"Russell is pretty bad at playing NHL-level defense for someone who's touted as being a defensive-minded player."

You present your opinion as fact, on this subject and many others. But does your opinion hold up in the light of day? Let's take a look.

There are 31 teams in the league and each team puts 6 defensemen on the ice every game, meaning that there are 186 regular defense jobs available in the NHL. To get a picture of the 186 most used defensemen at 5v5, you simply set the filter at 550 minutes minimum. So everything we look at here is based on the top 186 "regular" defensemen by 5v5 TOI.

Because the accusation is that Russell can't defend, I'll highlight some of his defensive metrics as per naturalstattrick.com.

CA/60: 56.04 (102nd of 186)
FA/60: 39.03 (32nd)
SA/60: 27.44 (15th)
GA/60: 1.62 (3rd)
HDCA/60: 9.97 (58th)
Def Zone Starts/60: 8.66 (63rd)

What can we deduce from these numbers? His corsi against numbers are about median for top-6 defensemen, giving the lie to your statement that "if you're blocking a lot of shots, it means you're giving up a lot of shots." He does in fact defend a lot, but that's due to coaching decisions to have him out for defensive zone faceoffs more than any Oilers player not named Adam Larsson.

Why do you think a smart coach like Dave Tippett would do that? Because he knows that Russell is actually really good at defending and he trusts him to do that job. I mean, just look at the results: 32nd in the league with unblocked shot attempts against and 15th in the league with shots against. That tells me he was contesting every shot, so that even when he was unable to block the shot his relentless defensive efforts caused the shot to miss the net more often than league average.

And then we come to the actual goals against number, which is nothing short of spectacular. Some of that is on the goalies and some on luck, but his ability to get in front of shots and force forwards to miss the net indicates that a good part of this is on Russell himself.

As much as casual fans on this site love to hate him - even Oilers fans - he is still very much an NHL player whose skills are valued by the men that are paid to coach the greatest game on earth.

And we haven't even mentioned Kris Russell's value on the penalty kill.

I want to expand on what you've written here. Thanks for calling me out on anecdotal evidence; you've inspired me to take a deeper dive into what Russell's brought for the team and hopefully we can both use this discussion as a reference regarding Russell in the future.

To Tippet's credit, Russell had a phenomenal improvement in most aspects this season. You have incorrectly identified a few things though: both Larsson and Jones led the Oilers in defensive zone starts. In terms of blueliners that have suited up for the Oilers (no TOI filter, per-60 adjusts for this for the most part anyways), Russell comes in at fourth in terms of the name Tippet utilized the most in his own end. Russell's bread-and-butter came from neutral-zone starts as he lead the team in this category.

However, players aren't going to be judged in the vacuum of their most recent season, although the upward trend in most of Russell's numbers this season are either highlighting Tippet's quality as a coach, or that Russell saw a resurgence and might be able to be sold "high" on. I also wonder how much it has to do with Tippet doing his best to keep Russell on his natural side, something previous coaches elected against. I've filtered for the past three seasons (since Vegas came around) and for >1500min TOI in order to help account for first-year players in Y2/Y3 and to exceed the 186-player threshold. His defensive rates are as follows:

CA/60: 59.20 (156th out of 201)
FA/60: 41.70 (83rd out of 201)
SA/60: 30.20 (84th out of 201)
GA/60: 2.28 (63rd out of 201)
SCA/60: 27.82 (149th out of 201)
HDCA/60: 11.21 (139th out of 201)
OISv%: 92.44 (65th out of 201)
Def Zone Starts/60: 8.56 (81st out of 201)
Def Zone Faceoffs/60: 18.49 (107th out of 201)

It's important to remember with these numbers - with the exception of D-Zone starts per 60 and OISv% - that the higher it is, the worse it is. I've sorted the stats in increasing order, such that the defenders that give up the most rank highest.

In terms of actual rates, Russell isn't median in terms of total shots he's giving up: he's in the upper third of the league in terms of CA and HDCA. In consideration with his closer-to-the-norm FA and SA per-60 numbers, what we're really seeing is the confirmation of Russell's niche being a shot-blocker. His high scoring chances against per-60 suggests this as well. The unblocked attempts and registered shot numbers are on the right side of average, but the total attempts is through the roof. His upper-third GA/60 and OISv% numbers don't necessarily reflect this, but I think they do lend some credence to his tendency to get in front of a shot. The discrepancy between his CA, HDCA, and SCA per-60 and his FA, SA, and GA per-60 metrics suggest this conclusion: Kris Russell bleeds chances against; what keeps him in the median range of a defender is his shot blocking.

Drawing further from this conclusion, if Russell were more apt to play the man and/or the puck as opposed to defaulting to starfish mode, he'd actually be a quality defender in the NHL. Tippett obviously found more utility out of Kris than Hitchcock and McLellan did, which only served the Oilers better. I do find it curious that Russell is roughly median for defensive zone starts and defensive zone face-offs however.

I've crudely averaged all of his rankings just to see where he "fits" defensively against 186 regular defenders and the odd spares that worked their way into my equation. Russell ranks 103rd among defensemen by defensive totals over the past three seasons, which has him just under median and a roughly average #4 defender. (1-31 is #1, 32-62 is #2, etc). Admittedly, this is higher than I've been led to believe.

Offensive Production

Offensively, Russell's stats are as follows:

CF/60: 50.53 (194th out of 201)
FF/60: 37.58 (196th out of 201)
SF60: 27.00 (194th out of 201)
GF/60: 2.09 (173rd out of 201)
Goals/60: 0.13 (147th out of 201)
Primary A/60: 0.27 (103rd out of 201)
Secondary A/60: 0.31 (113th out of 201)
HDCF/60: 1016 (136th out of 201)
SCF/60: 27.00 (156th out of 201)
OIS%: 7.73 (106th out of 201)
Off Zone Starts/60: 7.50 (134th out of 201)
Off Zone Faceoffs/60: 16.37 (163rd out of 201)

Safe to say offense isn't what he's being paid for. Nothing here is flattering and some of it is replacement level. Using the same crude averaging for his defensive metrics, Russell ranks 151st among regular NHL defenders in terms of offensive production, which pegs him as a high sixth-defender.

Neutral Zone / Transition

In transition - which was a key part of my statement you ignored - Russell's stats are as follows:

Giveaways/60: 2.81 (172nd out of 201)
Takeaways/60: 1.12 (70th out of 201)
Rush Attempts/60: 0.14 (128th out of 201)
Neut Zone Starts/60: 13.27 (102nd out of 201)
Neut Zone Faceoffs/60: 20.16 (104th out of 201)
On the Fly Starts/60: 46.41 (92nd out of 201)

I wish NST had rates regarding zone exists: anecdotally I'll offer that Russell has a tendency to wrap the puck around the boards and/or turn the puck over on a dump rather than carry it out or make a successful pass in transition (I believe his high giveaway rates and low rush attempts reflect this). Again, same crude average suggests that in transition Russell is 111th among regular NHL defenders in terms of how he transitions the puck between his end and the offensive zone. Shockingly, this puts him just below the mean - akin to his defensive totals - and suggests in this aspect of his game, he's an average #4.

So what does it all mean?

Without context, nothing. Considering this list is relative to defencemen only and only takes 5v5 numbers into conclusion, I guess you could look at it as a semi-accurate assessment of how Russell compares to other defenders. Quality NHL defencemen are often multi-faceted, and we can see here that Russell really only carries one strength. He's not replacement-level as I had previously claimed as that same crude average against all totals suggests Russell is the 129th best defender in the NHL. That pegs him as a quality #5 defender. He's certainly overpaid, and I was probably accurate in observing that finding a team willing to absorb his cap hit for a low cost or little to no salary coming back will be nigh impossible.

The trick is going to be balancing his NMC and high cap hit in order to trade him. Is it fair to assume that his NMC limits him to the Western Canadian teams and/or contending teams and that such limitation is going to result in Edmonton being required to take some amount of salary back even if they retain on him? I still think a team like Winnipeg is a good fit, but what kind of return is going to be fair for both sides?

Nice AGM. You put a lot of effort. I don’t think MTL really needs to do that trade. Maybe try with another team?