On the heels of the Dallas Eakins – Taylor Hall
incident and a pair of disappointing losses to the Buffalo Sabres and Calgary
Flames, the time has come for Craig MacTavish and the rest of the Edmonton
Oilers management team to take a long hard look in the mirror and figure out exactly
what it is they are trying to accomplish.
While the head coach and team’s best player have
been ripped to shreds for the spectacle that unfolded on the Oilers bench
during their 8-1 thumping at hands of the provincial rivals, we have yet to
hear as much as a peep from management. As embarrassing as Saturday night was,
the continued shots this organization and their players have endured in recent
days have been far worse.
Everyone knows this is broken and has been for some
time. While expecting MacTavish to fix everything that was wrong with this team
in one off season was never realistic, this group continues to show little, if
any, improvement. That said, using one Band-Aid solution after another isn’t
working and it needs to be dealt with this summer or this thing will just
continue to spiral out of control.
First and foremost, this collection of players obviously
isn’t good enough. Anyone who watches this team play with any sort of
regularity knows what ills this roster from a talent perspective. They need a
different dimension upfront and their lack of quality NHL defencemen goes
without saying. There are holes throughout this lineup that need addressing but
the one constant this organization continues to nickel and dime on is
leadership.
It started with the return of Ryan Smyth to Oil
Country prior to the start of the 2011-12 campaign and continued with the
signing of blueliner Andrew Ference during last summer’s Free Agent Frenzy.
While both players have leadership qualities this team needs, they are
basically in the same situation former captain Shawn Horcoff was forced into.
When you have a roster filled with the likes of
Jordan Eberle, Sam Gagner, Taylor Hall, Ryan Nugent-Hopkins, Justin Schultz, and
Nail Yakupov all being used in major roles, not to mention Oscar Klefbom and Martin
Marincin getting their first taste of NHL hockey, one would think having
leaders on board who are still capable of playing a central role to help these
damn kids along would be high on the priority list. Instead of going out and
finding someone in the prime years of their career who could actually help Eberle,
Hall and Nugent-Hopkins do the heavy lifting, they continue to spin their
wheels and look towards Ference, Smyth and the recently acquired Matt Hendricks
to lead the way.
With that being the case, should anyone really be
surprised this group can’t take a true step forward in their development? They
need help and outside of Horcoff, and even he was a stretch, none of the
aforementioned players are capable of helping these kids turn this ship around.
As hard as those grizzled vets may work they are not difference makers and
should not be expected to help show this young core how to lead and carry this
group forward because none of them have the slightest clue as to how to go
about accomplishing it.
Teams who win a lot of hockey games generally have
quality role players littered throughout their roster but when it comes to
carrying the mail, it is the guys who play on the top two lines and eat major
minutes on the backend that lead the charge. As of this moment, the Edmonton Oilers
do not have one of those players and expecting kids who are between the ages of
20 to 24 to do it is a recipe for disaster…which is exactly what this has
become.
Now is this mess entirely on Craig MacTavish? Of
course not but it is his job to fix and he is well aware of it. That said, anyone
expecting this to be fixed by the start of the 2014-15 season is kidding
themselves but there had better be some new bodies in place that can actually
help these kids along. Anything short of that would be completely inexcusable.
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