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Edmonton Oilers Avoid Arbitration With Schultz

By Kurt Leavins

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The Edmonton Oilers and Justin Schultz avoided arbitration, Wednesday, as the young rearguard signed a 1-year, 3.9 million dollar contract. But the ink had barely dried on the paper, when out came the knives.

Now, there’s no easy way to defend the season that Justin Schultz had in 2014-15. Even on nights when he started to look like the promising prospect we all expected that he would be, an errant pass would float through the neutral zone and BAM…the puck would inevitably end up behind Ben Scrivens. Some called it “Jultzing”, others called it much less flattering things, but fair to say we all wondered what on earth had happened to this kid?

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But to pick only Justin Schultz out of a lineup filled with hockey convicts, guilty of equal and as frequent ice-crimes as his, seems…petty. But then, some Oilers fans are spectacular at chasing decent talent out of town. See Jeff Petry, Shawn Horcoff, Dustin Penner, etc., etc. There’s always one whipping boy on this team, it seems, and right now it’s (with honorable mention to Nikita Nikitin) Justin Schultz.

This kid is still just 25, in a league dominated by men, on a team that is terminally behind. What choice does a coach really have, other than to keep running his only offensive threat from his blue-line out there, over and over, until his tongue is hanging down by his knees. Hmmm. Let’s see. Inexperienced, over-matched, over-played. Gee, I can’t imagine why he kept getting torched.

I maintain that Justin Schultz has tools that you can’t teach, and that are worth the effort and patience to try to extract: Terrific 0-60 acceleration from the blue-line in, a great nose for a developing play once he is IN said offensive zone, and a soft yet crisp pass that the likes of Taylor Hall, Nail Yakupov, Jordan Eberle and others love to be on the receiving end of.

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While criticized for the ice-time logged, his TOI numbers really stack up nicely with some pretty great NHL defenders in THEIR first three years: Jay Bouwmeester, Marc-Edouard Vlasic, Ryan McDonough, Eric Karlseson & P.K. Subban (thanks to excellent Cult of Hockey blogger Bruce McCurdy for posting that table).

Schultz-haters also conveniently forget how absolutely dominant the kid was in his one and only season with the OKC Barons. The AHL is a tough league to dominate in, especially as a 21-year-old. All Schultz did was register a spectacular 18-30-48 in a mere 34 games, and he was also +8, FWIW. That doesn’t just “happen”.

But what really gets me are those who scream about his “exorbitant raise”. Really? A $200,000 “raise” in NHL terms is mice nuts. I saw one critic complain how this would “impact the Oilers cap situation”. $200,000 would barely cover the hockey tape an average team will go through in a year. Get a serious grip.

All the Edmonton Oilers have done is ensure that this promising asset signs, at a cost that affects nothing of importance, without poisoning the relationship with a young player by attempting to force a pay cut down his throat. Yeah, that approach would send UFA D-men streaming into Edmonton by the dozens. Ahem.

Justin Schultz is a smart college guy. He knows the score. He understands that he has a second chance with a new GM and Coach, in the best league in the world, and will be paid well to “prove himself”. He wasn’t good enough last year, has said as much, and has already hit the gym in preparation for the challenge ahead.

How be we put the fate of Justin Schultz in the hands of the guy who has to make it happen on the ice (and off)?

A novel thought, for some, I know.

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