Remembering June 27, 1996

I felt nostalgic today. Ten years today Donovan Bailey redeemed Canadian sprinters and made all of Canada proud.

Locked in for Six

Ales Hemsky locked in for six years. Wow great deal Kevin Lowe. It's a 6 years, $24.6M contract

1st Year - $3.5M
2nd Year - $3.6M
3rd Year - $3.6M
4th Year - $4.4M
5th Year - $4.5M
6th Year - $5.0M

It works out to 4.1 million a year (salary cap).

Wow. This is the future of the Oilers. Great deal signing our best player (or top scorer) to a very long term deal. I'm very impressed. He's our franchise player now. So now just Lupul left (and Smyth who is a unrestricted free agent next year. Please sign him up to an extension soon).

And Belfour signed with Florida. Oh Florida, why? Take him out back and shoot him. He's an old dog; on his last legs. It's over Eddie.

One Down....One to Go

Jarret Stoll has avoided arbitration and signed a two year deal. Good news, although I was hoping for a three year deal instead. Now, get Hemsky locked up and we're good to go (get a defenseman).

Speaking of d-man, the Oil sign Tom Gilbert. Who? I have no freaking idea. Another unknown. He played for the University of Minnesota the past four years. Umm, Kevin....what are you doing? You keep signing all these unknown d-men. What's the plan here? I think we have plenty of mediocre and/or young d-men now. Just be patient Kevin, the trade for a top 4 d-man will happen.

MacT Attack

TSN.ca is reporting Craig MacTavish is returning as the Edmonton Oiler's coach and with a four year contract. Good news for sure. I'd be interested in knowing for what amount, since they didn't pick up his option before the playoffs. I'm assuming he's getting a raise then.

So this is basically good news. Although, if MacT had crashed and burned during the playoffs, I have no doubt he would be gone. He made some questionable coaching decisions during the regular season. Actually, for his whole tenure. The thing that annoys me the most, he kept changing his lines. Keep Hemsky with Smyth, they have great chemistry. I noticed this two years ago and he did it again this year. It's okay to shake them up, but not every other game. Second, he needs to find a way to motivate his players. He managed to do this during the playoffs, but not the regular season. They always go through the January blues, and end up losing ten games in a row. Third, get your guys to play with intensity against the crappy teams (aka St.Louis, Minnesota, etc). The Oil always play amazing against the good teams, but the crappy teams, not so much. It's like they drop to their level. Third, the powerplay is such a liability so work is needed in this area too.

So fix those things MacT, and you'll have a much better regular season than last year!

UPDATE: Da Fuhrer says it's all good.......Oil are good. If Grant says so, then it must be okay.

Another one bites the dust

Good news!!! Peca has signed with the Leafs (or according to my friends, the "Leaves") for $2.5 million. I still think quite overpaid for someone with only 23 points last year, and -4. Sure he played much better down the stretch and in the playoffs playing like the Peca of old but is he worth this much money? Of course not. The Oilers signed Marty Reasoner who will take the place of Peca in the face-off circle, killing penalties and being a third/fourth liner grinder. Also, Marty is getting paid $950,000....that's what he should be for the role he plays. It's important but not worth 2.5 million when you score barely over 20 points (Reasoner had 34 pts last year.....hmmm more than Peca).

So thank you Leaves.....for taking an overpaid, overrated third or fourth liner off our hands. This is just another string of signings by the Leaves.....paying too much money for overrated players (hello McCabe, Kubina, and so on). I fully expect Peca to continue to fall short of expectations, as do most players in Toronto.

UPDATE: Neil Smith has been canned in favor of..........Garth Snow. What? He goes from the Isles backup goalie all the way to GM. Really? Is this an April Fool's joke? It can't be since it's not April. Apparently, owner Charles Wang (his name suits him) wanted the GM to work in collaboration with the coach Ted Nolan, Pat Lafontaine, Bryan Trottier and even the janitor. Too many cooks in the kitchen dude. And since when does an owner hire the GM and coach. That's the President's job. The owner should be signing the cheques and nothing else. What an embarrassment. The Isles have become the Leaves.....hahahahaha. ESPN has more info to this story so check it out. It's hilarious: Wang is a complete wang!

UPDATE: Okay, I guess Peca isn't quite the peckerhead I thought he was. He had some very nice things to say about Edmonton and said it's gotten a bad rap over the past few weeks. I totally agree.

On Second Thought....

I've been thinking (yes it happens from time to time)......things are not as bad as they seem. The Oilers have made a lot of changes, but that's not a bad thing. This team was already borderline contenders before the arrival of Pronger. His loss will not be that bad. Sure, we'll miss his 56 points and the minutes he played. BUT.....I didn't think he was the tour de force that broadcasters said he was. I didn't think he was that great defensively. He was only +2 for the regular season (+10 in the playoffs, much better), was tentative at times and not very physical. Sure he played much better in the playoffs, but hell, the whole team did. We can live without him.

Pre-Pronger, the Oilers were one player short of being contenders. I said it for years....all they needed was a goalie. Well, I believe we have the goalie now. Roli will have to be very sharp since our defense is not great. It's good, but not great. The forwards are good, even great at times. So I think we're going to be okay.

The thing is.....the Oilers are the underdog. That's the way it has been for 15 years. We're used to it, so this is nothing new. The Oil are constantly being underestimated, not given much credit and always expected to fail. BUT.....they don't. Sure we had some rough years, going out in the first round to Dallas like twenty times. However, those series, even if lost in five or six games, were always close. The Oilers were always on the verge of making that break. They certainly made it last year and I think that will give the boys confidence this year.

So the moral of the story.....the Oilers are going to be fine.

If I can have one thing, can we please ask the media to stop saying people want out of Edmonton? The media seems to have grabbed hold of the the Pronger mess, twisted it to suit their needs and now any player that doesn't sign with Edmonton, the media say they hate Edmonton and do not want to live here. Stop it (hello TSN.....you're getting on my nerves).

Roloson

The Oilers have signed our RFA, Shawn Horcoff, to a three year deal worth $10.8 million (3.6 avg/year). I think this is smart....he scored 73 pts last year and while I hate players getting big raises based on one year, I don't think he's a flash in the pants. So good deal Lowe!

''I'm ecstatic, happy to be in Edmonton for three more years,'' Horcoff told The Canadian Press from B.C. ''After last year and us going as far as we did, I obviously wanted to stay with this team and try to get back there to win one extra game.''

''I enjoy the city, they treat me great there.''

So Shawn likes Edmonton....report that TSN!!!

All Oil....all the time!

Welcome to All Oil, All the Time. This is a blog dedicated to the greatest hockey team in history. Who else but the Edmonton Oilers.

I should have started this during the playoffs, but I was too busy going to games and plus I was using my msn blog. But time for a change, hello blogger!

There is much to discuss of late: from the defection of Chris Pronger due to personal reasons (which is code for he couldn't keep it in his pants), the following horrible trade to Anaheim (the only good news, we'll get to boo him twice a year during the regular season) and the continued exodus of Oilers such as Peca, Spacek, Laraque, and Conklin (at least we're happy to see leave, bye Conks).

But let's not dwell on the negative. Did I just say that? Yes you're right, we should dwell on the negative. Let's start with our most-hated Oiler, Chris "I'm god's gift to women" Pronger, who has grabbed hold of our most-hated title from Mike Comrie. Here we have someone who has been playing in hockey Siberia, aka: St. Louis. He gets traded to the Oilers, pursues a long-term deal with the Oil, has a pretty good season followed by an even better playoffs. He was coming off several mediocre and injury-filled seasons, is revitalized playing with the Oil, playing with talented youngsters and a great coaching staff. He makes it to within one game of the Stanley Cup, hell one goal. BUT....four days after game seven, he asks for a trade. Actually, he does not ask for it, his agent does. Prongs and the misses are in sunny Mexico, not courageous enough to face the music. He is in Mexico and won't clarify the issue. So let me. Our lovely Chrissy.....

• been screwing around with a 22 yr old from Club Fit
• the little mistress confronts the wife
• wife demands Chrissy get out of town, anywhere but Edmonton
• this is not the first time Chris has had a problem with his zipper (also had a fling with the CITY TV reporter before moving on to Club Fit girl)
• wife makes Prongs move, they'll be living in Anaheim now, so have fun policing your husband in sunny California

So our little Chrissy has flown the coop via an abysmal trade. Sorry Kevin Lowe, I absolutely adore you. I think you have done wonders with this team, with all the trades in the past (yes, in the past, we could not afford to keep anyone. Now that we can, no one wants to play for the Oilers, save Georges Laraque. That is another story). Prongie's stock is at its all-time high, so Kevin trades him to Anaheim; a team in our conference (I will enjoy booing Chrissy, but you never trade a great player within your own conference), a team that was pretty good last year, a team that gave up very little to get Chrissy....

• We get a Lupul (yes a local boy. We all know how that worked out last time, hmmm Mike "I can't handle the pressure" Comrie),
• a Smid (who? Oh yes, another prospect),
• 2007 first round pick,
• 2008 second round pick,
• and a conditional first round 2008 pick (conditional on Anaheim's playoff run next year).

So does anyone else think we got screwed on this? I was expecting at least one superstar. At least one. Lupul is no superstar. Maybe someday??

So with Prongs gone, Spacek has signed with Buffalo, Peca might be signing with the Leafs but not sure about that. All we know, Pecs is not coming back. For 4 million, no god damn way we want him back.

Then Dvorak, actually his lovely agent Rich Winter, stated he wanted out of Edmonton. I believe it was anywhere but Edmonton. Thanks! (more to this later).

Next up, finally a player wants to stay in Edmonton. Says he will take a pay cut. Great. What? You want a no-trade clause. If Prongs doesn't get one, a Georges Laraque is not going to get one. He signs with Phoenix, for more money and his no-trade clause. Thanks Georgie.

We sign Daniel Tjarnqvist. Who? Some Swede who played for Minnesota last year. I know we need to toughen up our blue line, but we need someone I've actually heard of please. At least it's only a one year contract.

Next up, we trade a 7th round draft pick in 2007 (ugh 7th round, let me guess, this must be a prospect and not a very good one) for Jan Hejda.

Kevin.....you are forgetting about one player. What about Igor?? Ulanov, who I thought should have been playing in place of Matt "cough up the puck per play" Greene.

Let me first say, I'm a life-long Oilers fan. I love them more than my own family (okay, that's not true. But I love at least as much as my family). I will support them no matter what. I supported them during the lean years in the mid-90s (oh god, those were rough years) and I supported them this year when they had a very mediocre season (although, we are in a very tough division and conference so our 95 points was VERY earned compared to those eastern teams). But I'm a bit worried about our team.

Oh wait, I forgot about our savior. Yes we resigned our savior, Dwayne "hell yes I'm the savior" Roloson. Okay, I'm not so worried all of a sudden. Yes we paid big bucks for this man (overpaid, hell yes) but it's worth it. We have seen the horror of Morrison, Conklin and Markkanen (who has redeemed himself during the playoffs. He's always been a solid goalie, but he's not a number-one guy. He's a great backup) so the 11 million over 3 years is worth it for Roli.

Oh yes, Dvorak says how much he loves Edmonton and is not sure why his agent said that (bargaining power?). Ok, he doesn't hate Edmonton. So if that's the case, sign a contract (has one even been offered?). Do we want him?

So we have a very good goalie, great forwards, but a weak blue line. They might be okay? It doesn't matter, I'll be coming back as a season ticket holder and will be proud to cheer on the Copper and Blue (in my mind, it's not copper, it's orange. Bring back the orange!!!!!!) and boo Prongs (and Comrie, Weight, Carter, Guerin...is there anyone in the league who hasn't been an Oiler? So many people to boo, so little time)!!!!

Bring on October. I'm ready for my boys!!!!!!

Psst.....schedule for the 2006-2007 season is up. Get ready to boo on November 28th and January 18th!!!

Well, Samsonov has signed with Montreal. Two year deal worth 7.05 million. The Habs got took...he's not worth 3.5 million a year.