Ken Holland invested two second-round picks at the deadline in Andreas Athanasiou. I believe, in a real way, AA could be the replacement for Jesse Puljujarvi. What kind of player is Athanasiou?
THE ATHLETIC!
The Athletic Edmonton features a fabulous cluster of stories (some linked below, some on the site). Great perspective from a ridiculous group of writers and analysts. Proud to be part of The Athletic, check it out here.
- New Lowetide: Making the call on RFA and UFA players on the Oilers’ 50-man roster
- Jonathan Willis: The 2020 NHL broadcast rankings: The best and worst markets to watch the games
- Daniel Nugent-Bowman: Q&A: Scott Howson on new AHL job, Oilers’ unsung prospect and development updates
- Lowetide: A look back at reasonable expectations and the Oilers fantastic special teams in 2019-20.
- Lowetide: Will the Oilers rocket to Russia during free agency this summer
- Lowetide: Will Oilers drafts be less reliant on the WHL under new management?
- Daniel Nugent-Bowman: Connor McDavid on a ‘fair season’, working out and picking quarantine teammates
- Lowetide: Dave Tippett deploys unproven talent expertly in first Oilers season
- Lowetide, Daniel Nugent-Bowman and Jonathan Willis: Oilers ABC: Picking the best players in franchise history, from Anderson to Zuke
- Jonathan Willis: If the Oilers need to clear money with a buyout, they have one real option
- Daniel Nugent-Bowman: The 5 games that define Leon Draisaitl’s Hart Trophy-worthy season
- Lowetide: Final Oilers report cards: Second-half impact defines a successful season
- Jonathan Willis: Does Filip Berglund’s new SHL contract mean he’s done with the Oilers?
- Daniel Nugent-Bowman: Evolution of a star: Why Leon Draisaitl was our Hart pick
- Daniel Nugent-Bowman and Jonathan Willis: Which former Oiler has the best argument to have his jersey number retired?
- Lowetide: Which Oilers veterans are in roster peril?
- Jonathan Willis: How good is Anton Slepyshev and what will an NHL return mean for the Oilers?
- New Lowetide: Oilers’ challenge could be finding relief with a low cap ceiling
Athanasiou is a fast train, who is also skilled with size (6.02, 188). Per 82 games in the NHL, he has scored 23-19-42. He scored 30 goals in 2018-19, I tried to find a dominant five on five line but he was all over the place. He played 128 minutes with Luke Glendening and Darren Helm, going 44 percent shot differential and 5-7 goals. Spent 96 minutes with Frans Nielsen and Thomas Vanek, but shot differential (45 percent) and goals (3-5) were nothing special.
He scored 21 goals at five on five in a season where his most common center was Luke Glendening. What do we do with that? Does he need a righty center? Did we not get enough sample in those 9 games?
I wrote about Athanasiou and all of the Oilers free agents today at The Athletic. I look at the big winger as being a key item in observing Ken Holland’s team building over the summer. If AA is in fact (as I believe) the new JP, then trading Puljujarvi for picks gets the team back to something resembling a full arsenal of draft picks.
I think AA’s contract, dealing Puljujarvi for picks, and Ethan Bear’s deal will be the major internal roster stories of the club this summer.
CONDORS EVEN STRENGTH ON ICE GOAL DIFFERENTIAL (BLUE)
First, the overall numbers:
- Jake Kulevich 44 games, 26-21 (+5)
- William Lagesson 25 games, 25-23 (+2)
- Joel Persson 27 games, 24-26 (-2)
- Caleb Jones 14 games, 11-16 (-5)
- Dmitri Samorukov 47 games, 28-34 (-6)
- Keegan Lowe 56 games, 39-48 (-9)
- Evan Bouchard 54 games, 41-51 (-10)
- Brandon Manning 21 games, 9-24 (-15)
- Logan Day 48 games, 25-41 (-16)
Now, let’s run those numbers again from December 29 through the end of the season:
- Jake Kulevich 27 games, 15-12 (+3)
- Keegan Lowe 28 games, 25-23 (+2)
- Evan Bouchard 26 games, 22-22 (0)
- Joel Persson 15 games, 14-16 (-2)
- Dmitri Samorukov 21 games, 13-17 (-4)
- Logan Day 26 games, 13-21 (-8)
Evan Bouchard’s second half was a revelation and I do think the number one takeaway. I don’t know that Ken Holland will move out players to clear the way for him, but Bouchard is going to push his way to the NHL and right soon.
LOWDOWN WITH LOWETIDE
A busy show starts at 10, TSN1260. We’ll be joined by Hailey Salvian from The Athletic to talk more COVID-19 positive tests among Senators players and staff, plus the 2020 draft (Ottawa has two very high picks). John Horn, our tennis insider, will talk Wimbledon canceled and where we go from here. 10-1260 text, @Lowetide twitter. Talk soon!
Awesome! You walked the talk.
hunter1909,
Niptickers…hmm, that works. You’re all a bunch of niptickers. Fuck. It was nearly half a century ago. Who really gives a shit? ?
While I am wandering down memory lane anybody else here make it to this?
https://www.festivival.com/history/strawberry-mountain-fair-1970
We’ve been given the go to give plasma from people who’s had covid 19 but is now healthy to patients to hopefully give them an antibody boost. Been some promising early results elsewhere that it can give more mild illness, very small studies though. Won’t be a miracle cure but anything that can take some pressure off the ICUs is worth a try. It’s just an insane number of people who needs to be put in ventilators. And now we’re not talking old people, we’re talking, for a large part, men in their 50-60s with a big belly, maybe hypertension and type 2 diabetes but not much else in their medical background. Healthy enough to work full time the majority of them.
Yes. There’s a health competition there with multiple companies extracting from recovered patients and other bio-engineering and evaluating different antibodies. The better the results and the scale the bigger the society wide benefits.
Danny Lowe ran Painter and was from Calgary. Painter were never located in Edmonton it’s fairly easy to access this on the web.
Any votes for Chez Pierre?
I hung around with Gary Fjellgaard and Laura Vinson when they were on Royalty records very early 80s, fjellgaard landed with Stony Plain records later. He was a cool guy. Kind of Saskatchewan’s Valdy.
We had Laura Vinson out to Whitecourt for a number of events in the late 70’s if my memory is correct.
hunter1909,
hunter1909,
Bob Ego and I hung out when he was playing with an iteration of Witness Inc. ( later Streetheart.)
He usually referred to Painter as an “Edmonton” band, fwiw.
Yes it is.
That’s true. I think I still have a “Best of Stony Plain” double CD around here somewhere that Holger gave me. Now that you have made me all nostalgic I am going to have to dig it out. I don’t think I have listened to it in close to 20 years.
~They parked the boat astraddle some railway tracks?~
If that’s true the engineer is right. That is a damn suspicious boat.
LOL.Only a grassy knoll, a parking lot and a channel of water between boat and the tracks. Being all in on crazy only gets you so far 😉
WIth some research, there is no max on an AHL deal – They can sign Malone to a $300K AHL deal and keep the player. He loses the “ability” to a big bump if called up to the NHL but, at this point, even Brad has to know that’s not an option.
I would like to see Brad Malone back on the Condors. Injuries aside this past season, he’s still a plus AHL player (unlike, say, Keegan Lowe who is no longer effective) and a few of the youngsters, in particular Yamamoto, have gone out of their way to sing Malone’s presence as a mentor and a huge part of their developing as pros.
Do we think another organization would give him an NHL contract? I’d love to get him on an AHL deal but he has had like 4-5 NHL contracts so he may not sign an AHL deal unless he has no other options at all.
I don’t know what the max salary is on an AHL deal.
Or those souls who saw Radiohead and Tool at Dinwoodie or Queens of the Stone Age at The Rev.
Which he did.
Stony Plain Records has a fabulous catalogue.
Holger was always better off if he stuck to music.
Yes it is.
The best.
A great man and a nice man. That’s a rare thing.
Ha..and so it goes.
Holger and I went to school together at NAIT.
Tony Dillon Davis, who still does a fabulous Sunday morning show on CKUA, and I were roommates for a couple of years (won’t tell you the stories) , Cam Hayden was just a pup and Tommy Banks was the finest human being I ever met.
I remember the first (and last) time Holger was pressed into reading a newscast at CKUA because the News Director was drunk.
It was a story about Lebanese Freedom Fighters.
Holger called them Lesbian Freedom Fighters and I’m still pissing my pants.
#filmyourhospital blew up on twitter after a reporter questioned why it was so quiet in front of a Brooklyn hospital. Ironically this hospital:
https://nypost.com/2020/03/30/disturbing-footage-shows-dead-bodies-loaded-onto-truck-outside-brooklyn-hospital/
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/03/26/nyregion/coronavirus-brooklyn-hospital.html
Of course every nut on the internet piled on with “simple questions” that completely debunk whatever they don’t like today.
If they’re not finding simpler answers they’re probably too caught up in their own conceptions:
@MeredithMarsha1 The hospitals have cut off visitors and elective procedures…of course parking lots are empty, that’s most of the normal daily trips to hospitals. The Emergency dept’s are crammed full of sick people & tired medicos
@Sydward_ elective surgeries have been cancelled and visitors restricted. If there’s a 300 bed hospital and each person has on average of 1-3 visitors throughout the day, that’s a lot of people. Now imagine the slow of influx of Emergency room..
@brouhahamama No visitors allowed, only essential personnel allowed. No elective procedures, trying to keep patients out of the hospital unless it’s an emergency.
@haleem967 I TOOK MY DAUGHTER TO EMORY UNIVERSITY HOSPITAL EMERGENCY ROOM. THEY’RE ONLY LETTING THE PERSON WHO NEEDS TO BE SEEN BY A DOCTOR IN! AND NO VISITORS. TO COMBAT THE SPREAD OF #COVID19 IN THE WAITING ROOMS. SO OF COURSE IT WOULD APPEAR TO BE EMPTY DUMBEST HASHTAG #FilmYourHospital
@cinders_SA They reason many are empty now is because they are following Pandemic guidelines to prepare. Many room for a surge. Cancel nonessential procedures, no visitors.
@Kellycoms non essential staff are home, no visitors in most hospitals. and most importantly if you dont need to go to the hospital people arent going unless its an emergency
@harleyswife1 Our hospital closed to all visitors and non emergency cases. So seeing empty parking lots is not surprising to me.
Of course for a few EVERY reasonable explanation is just one more brick in their wall:
@nowthisnews
An engineer is facing 20 years in federal prison for deliberately attempting to crash a train at high speed into the USNS Mercy hospital ship in CA. Eduardo Moreno reportedly thought the Navy hospital was ‘suspicious’ and did not believe ‘the ship is what they say it’s for.’
Painter the band were 100% from Calgary.
The Hovel was a special place for me when I was young. Andy Laskewski started it and was a good friend. After he disappeared into Asia and was gone for 6 or 7 years David Fustukian took over. He was a character in his own right. Chemist who held patents from NASA until he walked away.
I knew Holger quite well, Tony Dillon Davis from CKUA, Peter North, Cam Hayden. I knew Tommy Banks as well from other things.
This conversation is tweaking a lot of old memories.
And, yes, you would know me.
Another Edmonton music legend who worked at CKUA and did it his way.
https://www.gigcity.ca/2018/01/26/rip-tommy-banks-godfather-of-edmonton-music/
So many of us with six degrees of separation.
I must have met you at the Hovel. I was always there.
So we have met. 😉
That is where the Rebels set up every night at the Kingsway. Wild times. I’ve got a lot of stories from those days but probably most of them are less than appropriate for a public forum.
The night they destroyed the place – even wiped out the entire beer cooler behind the bar – the band was asked to settle everybody down after the 12 o’clock cut off. So they came back out and announced that management had asked them to play a slow song to get everybody settled. They chose a little ditty they called ‘Baby let me Bang Your Box’.
The next step was the 300 lb bouncer whose name I forget waded into the crowd in front of the band and grabbed a guy from behind. The guy never even looked, he came around swinging. I was about 5 feet away and I will never forget the look on his face when he realized who he had punched. Said bouncer had, of course, hit on every girl to ever enter that bar in the six months or so he had worked there and was just hated. When he went to hit the guy back somebody grabbed his arm and the riot was on. The Rebels had a deal with management that they could drink there as long as they didn’t start any trouble and helped the bouncers when they needed it and there were generally 20 or so of them in there every night.
The place was pretty much destroyed. End of an era.
maudite,
Come on down
A plague message from Terry David Mulligan.
https://www.recorder.ca/entertainment/music/ckuas-terry-david-mulligan-wants-us-to-sing-the-beatles-for-covid-19-caregivers/wcm/80220ae2-3f23-439b-b91d-9dd8e6026b7c
The name is familiar but my memories of him are vague.
I opened a pizza place in Inuvik in 1975. It was called The Ravens Nest. Same place maybe?
Painter was the illegitimate son of Wes Dakus and the Rebels.
http://www.canadianbands.com/Wes%20Dakus.html
Last time oil hit shit fan 2015 ish…long story but went north with older Ukraine ex boss to try sluice gold and fish or whatever…ended trying to work illegally at gold mine in alaska, drunk playing cards for money and odd jobbing dawson city…mainly just drinking though…eventually got sweet creeper party van. .lived kinda in it for just short of 4 months. Aas happy. Anywhere I went people kept trying to get me to stay and there was always some random job offer attached.
Got a phone call for a fancy job again…wasnt looking. Still a lot of people that I knew were looking.. figured be probably dumb not to take it back up again…but been debating in head last 3 years if plan to explode rack out debt bury it somehow go tits up and just then flee to nicaragua in a proper livable van wasnt better idea.
Maybe now is the time.
hunter1909,
Our world of Soylent Green morphed into The Omega Man seemingly overnight on New Year’s Eve.
Awaiting the next twist into The Planet of the Apes.
Worked at CKUA from 1969 to 2000.
It is indeed a world class treasure and remains the best radio station in the world bar none.
It was a pioneer from its inception in 1927 when a couple of U of A professors misappropriated research funds to build a clandestine radio station.
The article I posted earlier about the Procol Harum concert mentions Holger Peterson who has been a driving force in the Edmonton music scene and continues to host the longest running blues show in Canadian history on Saturday afternoon.
An Island neighbour of mine who I share a tipple with occasionally,, Terry David Mulligan, hosts Mulligan Stew every Saturday evening after Holger’s Natch’l Blues.
If you love music…have a listen.
Fun fact for Melvis….TDM had a role in McCabe and Mrs. Miller.
And a note for others.
CKUA is launching its subscriber drive this month and is having to do so totally online due the plague.
Please help with a few bucks if you can.
I’ve been meaning to ask you for a while as your broadcasting credentials have been posted… any chance you know or worked with Ron McDonald who ran the newsroom at CKUA for some time? Probably 80s-90s ish?
TDM? Did a bad interview with Lisa Dalbello that ended up on Good Rockin’ Tonight…I think. Memory fades here a bit. Could have been 90 Minutes With A Bullet or something Ralph Benmurgui was hosting at the time.
Unquestionably the best radio station I’ve ever listened to. I love both those shows plus Bubba is great. I donate on the monthly plan. Don’t even notice the expense on that basis and CKUA apparently likes having the security of knowing their monthly income. It doesn’t take much if we all pitch in and I notice a lot of music lovers on this site
To your point about Larsson being in the lineup meaning he may not have been elevated – for sure, absolutely, for this past years.
My post was in the context of if he’s going to decline, tread or improve next year and I’m speaking about having another legit top 4 RD to help him with those minutes next year. We know he’s a legit top 4 guy but, if/when he has another guy to reduce the responsibility for most of the year, that should help his game next year.
Its really tough to talk contract numbers now give we have no great sense of where the cap will be next year or for the few years after.
I think its going to be fairly flat for the next 4-5 years – it won’t go down next year but escrow will be high and the cap will stay flat over the next few years even though revenues increase (presumably) and the owners will get their share made up and the escrow reduces.
Taking away the current landscape, if you were to ask me two months ago, I’d say yes, long term 6-8 years at no more than $4.25M or a short bridge around $2.5M.
hunter1909,
You forgot Painter. I was living in LA at the time. It was weird seeing an Edmonton band playing at the famed Whiskey A Go Go. I think Bob Ego still teaches drums. Some pics here:
http://bobego.com/paintergallery.html
It will be interesting. I think with many countries (and companies within each) working on this there will be many many more options coming along behind the “one” that gets picked. I wonder actually if even in the US multiple vaccines get ~simultaneously approved since the need is so great. In any case, this isn’t a one and done situation, pretty sure. I expect there will be considerable coverage once there are any options.
Again? Have you ever lived out of a van for 6 months or more?
I used to follow a few van dwellers on YouTube and even though it looks like fun you can see through the lines and at the end of the day you might have to spend 20 hours a day in a space the size of your bathroom. All the while dodging cops and civilians who don’t exactly cotton to strangers living out of vans in their neighborhood.
In fact a lot of them end up simply drifting – from one Walmart parking lot to the next Walmart parking lot.
So far as I can figure, the most important bands to come out of Edmonton in the 1960s were The Nomads, Willy and the Walkers, and The King Beez.
The Nomads were almost the original gold standard for Edmonton music, Willy and the Walkers tried very hard to make it big in the big bad world of show business USA, and the King Beez not only had a hit single or two but like the Rolling Stones added an element of cool to the scene.
In no way am I an expert. Too young to have seen any of these bands. Opinion from available data only lol. There might be other bands just as important.
ps: You want epic? Look no further than Alberta’s public radio station CKUA. CKUA was defining cutting edge music long before anyone else thought it was fashionable. CKUA is in fact a world class radio station.
+1 for CKUA
I’m just making fancy sandwiches, drinking beers, coffee whatever…chipping away at smart shit i would never have the time to do as speed out there is insane on those oil projects these days….maybe finally get caught up to point I can drown some people playing politics and driving narratives to detriment of actual logical progress out there…Finally having time to see if I can build a bat big enough to smash some weasels…All the while, in the background, just flipping vinyl records and working whenever whim strikes.
This is a god send. I was ready to hit eject and go back to making next to nothing trying to figure out how to get completely severed from bullshit and just live in a van go where I like again.
It’s quite likely players are going to be seeking bridge deals rather than locking in to long term contracts that will limit their earnings down the road.
I don’t know much about shock and awe, but when I was growing up I was already a WW2 fan and used to worry terribly over reports of the German Army collapsing in Moscow, primarily due to the weather which according to all reports must have been the worst place on earth only to discover mucho later on that the Edmonton area has essentially the exact same(-40) climate. Without even so much as suspecting it, I’d been trudging to school in my very own version of the Russian Front all along.
Was there shock and awe in Edmonton?
Undoubtedly. Specifically speaking, when locals marvelled at the machinations of grunge/rock geniuses Dave Grohl, Kurt Cobain and Krist Novoselic playing live in the flesh in front of an intimate crowd of about 100 lucky souls at The Bronx (10030 102 St) in good ol’ our town.
https://www.livenirvana.com/concerts/91/91-03-05.php
Given the current cap uncertainty, I doubt you will see any 8 year deals.
A boy can still dare to dream.
OriginalPouzar,
That makes more sense now, thanks for clarifying. I was thrown off with the bit about KRusty and Persson, thinking that you were inferring that Bear was partnered with them and not Nurse.
To your point about Larsson in the line up reducing his workload, perhaps. But perhaps that early in the season, game two onward, Coach T would have opted to play the veterans and older rookies more before elevating Bear. Tough to say.
Call me optimistic, but I’d like to think that Bear is on the upward trajectory with a few things in his court gathering momentum. Improved off-season habits, more experience in the NHL (not to mention top-4 and time vs. elite QoC), and improved belief system aka confidence might lend well to sustained success.
What would you want to see him extended at, and what do you think likely?
I’d like to see 8 years at or below $4MM, but think a two-year bridge at about $3.25 more likely.
Nothing of note happened in the 90’s.
But this happened in 1972.
https://writingonmusic.com/2018/09/22/procol-harum-in-canada-the-making-of-procol-harum-live-in-concert-with-the-edmonton-symphony-orchestra/
I was there…sitting beside Carly Simon.
James Taylor was in the row in front of me.
Nirvana say hello.
As does the first Persian Gulf War.
This is gorgeous and beautiful and epic. I’m in the 1.5 generations later but, wow, does this town ever need an epic, ‘recent historical fiction’ novel written about it centred around art, music, and life from about the early sixties to about the late nineties.
Yeah we were from the Cold Lake air base, Grand Center High and living in the big smoke. Lots of great hotel bars to hear bands and party, the beverly crest, the riviera on 50th, the londonderry, the capilano…what a time to be young and drinking in Alberta…no real rules about drinking and driving or hitting on the women!
Don’t think so but i maybe wasn’t clear with my point.
The point I was trying to make is that Bear played a ton of 1RD (he had the most TOI/G vs. elites) and he often did so with little help in the top 4 – when Larsson was hurt, he was a shiny new rookie playing 1RD with either Rusty or Persson playing 2RD behind him.
Extrapolating from that, he’d be better if he had a healthy Larsson taking some of those tough comp minutes and providing better cover in the pairing below him.
Just back from the first time out of our condo since we got back from Palm Springs. The only thing I could think of as we were walking through downtown Calgary is that it is too bad that we overused the word ‘surreal’ so much in the last decade that it isn’t there for us in its real sense now that it is the most appropriate word to describe what a town of over a million people looks like when the streets are basically deserted.
Pretty sure I’m one of those who over used the word. You’re very right it’s the best descriptor of what’s going on these days.
Feels like you’ve cross-posted some thoughts on Caleb Jones into a post about Ethan Bear?
I’m thinking this break will maybe help Bear in terms of what it takes to get through the grind of a full season. Fatigue was a definite factor for the team in certain stretches, one in particular. He could put in another summer of solid work. In fact, getting an early jump on off season training as it looks like no hockey til Fall.
So yes, he could be even better.
Thanks so much.
We’ve been pretty much in isolation for three weeks now.
My wife has serious COPD so is very vulnerable.
Haven’t seen Noreen for quite some time but ran into Bruce (can’t recall his last name) the CFRN tech guy a few weeks back.
Edit: Bruce Bedford.