Edmonton Oilers: Did anyone win the Hall-Larsson trade?

Like Hall, Larsson also came to the Oilers in this trade with risk because he also played a hard physical style of hockey (in a different way) for his position.

At the time of the trade the Oilers were absolutely hurting for right side blueliners and they had absolutely bled goals against the season before. With Connor Mcdavid freshly in the fold, Peter Chiarelli thought he could get rid of Taylor Hall – dealing from a position of strength – to shore up a position of weakness.

There weren’t too many better in their own end than Larsson, but of course he was a top pairing guy for the Devils as well so they weren’t going to give him up easily.

But they were the opposite team of the Oilers at the time – most of their team’s strength was at defence, so they felt getting Hall back they could part with Larsson.

Like Hall, Larsson has had issues staying healthy. In his career with the Oilers, he only stayed healthy in two out of five seasons – and one of those was the covid-shortened 56 game season of last year. Who knows if he would’ve stayed healthy in an entire 82 game season?

Only an alternate universe where covid never existed could answer that question.

It’s also interesting to note that Larsson played a lot of minutes for the Oilers during his career here, and those injuries did eventually take a toll on his body. As the depth on the Oilers got better and there wasn’t nearly as much of a need to play Larsson so much, the last couple of seasons he got moved down to the second pairing as other guys – notably Tyson Barrie last season – took his spot on the top pairing.

Then Larsson’s team friendly deal was up last season, and despite his injuries he was still a name player as far as stay at home guys go. Ultimately Ken Holland did all he could to get Larsson to re-up here but it Larsson ended up signing in Seattle with the Kraken.