Oilers done waiting for Campbell to figure it out: report

The Edmonton Oilers are reportedly no longer satisfied with waiting on goaltender Jack Campbell to figure things out between the pipes.

The 31-year-old has had an absolutely rotten tenure with the Oilers dating back to last season, where he had a .888 save percentage.

Starting this season, there was some hope that Campbell could rebound in Edmonton. After his fantastic preseason, where he won all three of his appearances and posted a .971 save percentage, he was able to win back the starter’s net for the first game of the regular season. Unfortunately, the results since have been putrid.

Through five games, Campbell has a record of 1-4-0 and has let in four or more goals in four of those games. Now the Oilers sit with a 2-7-1 record and are already entertaining a coaching change.

According to Jeff Marek on the latest 32 Thoughts podcast, the Oilers have run out of patience with Campbell.

“The scrutiny is being placed very much on the two netminders, and most specifically Jack Campbell,” said Marek. “[Friedman] mentioned on Saturday that it sounds, looks, feels, smells, however you want to describe it, like the Oilers are about to give Stuart Skinner a run here.”

If this is true, the Oilers are also asking a lot of Skinner. The 24-year-old has been equally as shaky between the pipes this season, with a 1-3-1 record and an even worse .861 save percentage. The saving grace is that Skinner actually had a pretty good season in Edmonton last year, finishing second in Calder Trophy voting.

Losing confidence in Campbell is understandable, but it will be a hard pill for the organization to swallow. He is in year two of a five-year deal that carries a cap hit of $5 million. That is a significant amount of space for a team as cap-strapped as the Oilers.

Options are sparse if they want to make an improvement. Campbell’s trade value will not be high and the Oilers would most likely have to sweeten the pot by quite a bit to have a team even go near that contract.

One option the Oilers could entertain is taking a page of out the LA Kings playbook. The Kings opted to send their struggling $5 million goaltender Cal Peterson to the AHL back in November 2022, which cut the overall cap hit down to $3.85 million.

According to CapFriendly, the same could be done to Campbell to help open up some space if they want to bring in a replacement, whether that is through a trade or taking a flyer on one of the Bakersfield Condors goaltenders — Olivier Rodrigue or Calvin Pickard.

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