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After 11 hours of maneuvers by the Edmonton Oilers before Monday afternoon’s deadline, the NHL club’s lineup for the season opener has become clear.
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The Oilers announced they have forwards on loan Devin shore and James Hamblin to their AHL club in Bakersfield and released veteran defenseman Jason Demers from his pro tryout.
Shore released the waivers midday Monday, while Hamblin has an entry-level contract that is exempt from the waiver. Her reassignment allowing the Oilers to move below the NHL salary cap ceiling. Hardly.
It turns out that the season opener roster consists of exactly the 23 players (only 21 of them healthy) listed in this post starting September 24, before the puck fell in the first game of the preseason. Here is the roster as projected at the time:
Eight preseason games later, the roster is the same as it was originally planned. Lines and pairings a bit different, mind you, but exactly 21 active players.
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I hasten to add that almost all of the credit for this prediction goes to salary cap expert Hart Levine at PuckPedia.com. Levine was farsighted enough to see a variation of this coming some time in advance, having accurately predicted it several days in advance Ryan McLeod would sign a one-year extension for exactly $798,000. When McLeod actually signed a deal with that exact number, it became clear to this observer that Levine was on to something.
He made more specifics the day McLeod signed, meaning the hour before the Oilers hit the ice for the first day of on-ice sessions, as overtime was held out until the very last moment.
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Let’s review this tweet point by point:
- Dylan Holloway is on the list, as is another bonus babe Philip BrobergIt was important to get both youngsters on the season opener list so that those bonuses ($500,000 and $850,000 respectively) could be included as future expenses in the bonus excess pool, with only their salaries counting toward the cap; Otherwise, With’s recall during the season would include the full amount of salary PLUS maximum bonuses, potentially being a major impediment to such a recall. (Evan Bouchard also has a bonus-loaded contract, although he was basically added to the team last year so his presence on the team has never been questioned.)
- Brad Malone and Greg McKegg have identical cap hits of $762,500, with one of them having to make the 21-man version of the roster. Both have issued waivers, first McKegg, then Malone. One must be formally recalled, with CapFriendly among other things, suggesting that Malone “won” that battle for a roster spot, albeit temporarily.
- Dmitri Samorukov ($775,000) was first waived and eventually traded to the St. Louis Blues.
- Devin shore ($850,000) was a late cut that was waived yesterday and released today. He won’t be on the season opener list, although he’s still very much in the picture. (More on that in a moment.)
- One of Derek Ryan or Matthew Janmark ($1.250 million each) was earmarked for the squad, you would be an underdog. The latter turned out to be Janmark, which was dispensed with a few days ago. Ryan stays.
- The simplest prediction was Oscar Klefbom and mike smith to the long-term injured reserve. (Tyler Benson will also start the season on this list after sustaining an injury at camp.) Their presence at LTIR means the Oilers must be Cap-compliant every single day of the season with no possibility of im Cap space accumulates over time. So you will master this tightrope walk for the foreseeable future.
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All I did in presenting the list above 16 days ago was to correctly answer the two “either/or” questions Levine left open, namely Malone over McKegg (at least for now) and Ryan over Janmark . The full scenario, including takeovers, withheld salary and buried cap, is shown here.
Paradoxically, the season-opening roster is not necessarily the season-opening roster. It’s just the opening salvo to get camp compliant while also qualifying key newbies for the bonus pool. GM Ken Holland, capologist Bill Scott and the rest of the front office have very little use for it.
Expect a few changes ahead of Wednesday night’s season opener, though. One is the reassignment of Broberg, who was off the practice ice Monday for reasons coach Jay Woodcroft described as roster management. hmm
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Meanwhile, Malone, Shore, Hamblin, and Demers were all on the ice, prior to news of Demer’s release and the reassignment (albeit temporary) of the others.
The situation remains fluid, with the most likely situation being that Broberg ($863,333) will be sent to Bakersfield with him Markus Niemelainen ($762,500) recalled. Niemelainen didn’t need any waivers that used to have to be sent, and he doesn’t have any bonus issues either.
Such a move would open about $100,000 in cap space, allowing the Oilers to replace Malone with one from Shore ($850,000) or Hamblin ($807,500) for opening night. Both had excellent camps. The best guess here is that Shore gets the first crack, although the team is flexible with both players for at least the first 10 games of the season.
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It’s also possible the Oilers could recall Janmark alone in place of Niemelainen and Shore/Hamblin, meaning a 20-man roster for the season opener with all active players. In other words, at the fringes of the roster, there’s the least amount of room for a little flexibility. As long as the club is camp compliant that day, all is well.
Here’s the crazy part: Despite the Oilers’ impressive performance in lowering their cap to 0.0002% of cap, no fewer than three other teams have done even better.
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Let’s just say teams are getting pretty good at it.
In other news, Ryan McLeod is now unhappy his contract didn’t go over $798,164! (Just kidding on this part; McLeod has accepted his place in this complex equation with the utmost professionalism and has kept himself in the good graces of his employers, who veered very much between the proverbial rock and the hard place, while focusing on his own continuous improvement and future arbitration put right into a much stronger negotiating position a year from now.)
Another note for the future: If the Oilers suffered a few short-term injuries, the affected players would remain on the roster, leaving no room to call up a replacement. Under league guidelines, the club would have to play shorthanded for a game and then be allowed to recall players who make no more than $850,000 to fill vacant roster spots in an emergency.
As for lines and pairings, here was Monday morning’s action, with the fourth line being in flux for the reasons above:
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The opening move was made even if the final roster switch remains. Look for the other shoe that will drop on Tuesday.
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