Edmonton Oilers should learn a lesson from Colorado to fix their goaltending
The Edmonton Oilers could learn a lesson from the NHL-best Colorado Avalanche when it comes to their goaltending situation.
Things have gone from bad to worse for the Oilers between the pipes. Stuart Skinner has once again gotten off to a brutal start to the season, and backup Calvin Pickard has some of the worst numbers in the entire league. Overall, Edmonton is dead last in the entire league with a horrid .860 team save percentage. That also marks a franchise-worst mark for the Oilers through the first 25 games of the season.
It’s bad in the Alberta capital, but there is a blueprint to get out of this that was written by the Avalanche last season.
Colorado was also getting brutal goaltending at the start of last year, with Alexandar Georgiev posting a .874 save percentage as the starter and backup Justus Annunen flailing as the backup with a .872 save percentage. It was sinking the team, but Colorado GM Chris MacFarland did not stand pat.
Instead, all before Christmas, he found a way to flip Georgiev to the San Jose Sharks for MacKenzie Blackwood and Annunen to the Nashville Predators for Scott Wedgewood. That new duo immediately revamped the Avalanche and is a major reason why Colorado is atop the NHL standings and leads the league with a .920 team save percentage this season.
So, how can the Oilers follow this path to get similar results? Here is the easiest way for GM Stan Bowman to do so…
Trading Stuart Skinner
For a long time, it felt the Oilers’ preferred solution between the pipes was to keep Skinner around and find another goalie to platoon with him. It doesn’t feel like that anymore.
Edmonton has given Skinner plenty of runway to prove he’s an NHL starter, and he still hasn’t. For the past three seasons, the team has had to endure at least two major cold streaks from the Edmonton native that put everything into question. In the last two seasons, he lost the net in the playoffs, creating a goaltending crisis at the most critical time of the year.
The 27-year-old is a talented goalie; he’s shown that in bursts, and he’s on a relatively cheap contract for a starter, but at some point, you have to get results. If Skinner isn’t your guy, it may be time to cut ties and give both the player and team a fresh start.
The latest rumours suggest a potential goalie swap between the Oilers and Blues, with Binnington coming to the Alberta capital and Skinner heading the other way. If that is on the table, Edmonton may have to seriously consider it.
Binnington carries a $6 million cap hit, and having Skinner’s $2.6 million going the other way would help make the money work in such a deal. It would also give the team a starter-quality goalie to plug directly into the lineup to replace Stu.
It may not be the perfect solution, but right now, the Oilers can’t expect perfection.
Waiving Calvin Pickard
If Skinner is traded and a new goalie like Binnington is brought in, where does that leave Pickard in the backup spot?
The Oilers need a complete revamp at the goaltending position. The Avalanche did so with two separate trades to bring in outside guys. Luckily, the Oilers already acquired a goalie before the season started who can play NHL games.
Connor Ingram has been playing in the AHL with the Bakersfield Condors this season and is working to make a return to the NHL. When he was acquired from the Utah Mammoth shortly before the season, the 28-year-old was widely thought of as being a ‘break glass in case of emergency’ option for the club. Well, this constitutes an emergency.
NHL insider Frank Seravalli reported earlier this week that the Oilers were very close to calling up Ingram near the end of their latest road trip. That move was stymied when players stood up for Pickard and resisted the move. The 33-year-old then turned in a good performance against the Tampa Bay Lightning to keep his NHL dreams alive.
“I think the Oilers wanted to make a change with Cal Pickard coming out of this road trip,” Seravalli said on Bleacher Report’s Insider Notebook. “I think they wanted to try to bring up Connor Ingram… Their top players went to bat for Cal Pickard.”
It was a valiant effort, and Pickard has been a warrior for this team, but change is required. The easiest move would be to place the New Brunswick native on waivers and call up Ingram from the minors.
The numbers have been shaky for Ingram at the AHL level, but he is worth a look at the NHL level and can’t post much worse numbers than Pickard already has this season.