3 Possible Trade Targets for the Oilers on Defense

After a rocky first few games, the Edmonton Oilers have found their offensive groove, but their defensive game is still an area of concern. The Oilers currently rank fourth in the NHL in goals per game with 3.83 but their goals against are only 24th best in the league at 3.50 per game despite getting around league-average goaltending overall.

I suspect the current group will be given time to try and tighten things up, but there are several reasons why I think the team will ultimately look outside the organization for defensive upgrades.

Current Oilers Dmen

While they managed to re-sign most of their core players from last season, the Oilers didn’t make any meaningful additions on the blueline, and with the retirement of Duncan Keith, they have had to try a combination of Ryan Murray and Markus Niemelainen at the 3LD position.

Murray had a few shaky performances next to Evan Bouchard, most notably in the second game of the season against Calgary where the pair was burned 3 times for goals against. While Bouchard has made strides in his game, he’s still had some defensive issues and Murray hasn’t been able to provide stability to the pairing at all.

Lately, Markus Niemelainen has been getting the majority of the starts on the third pair with Tyson Barrie, and while he has fared better than Murray there are still some valid concerns.

Like Bouchard, Barrie has some deficiencies defensively, and while I like the physical edge that Niemelainen brings, the Oilers are simply asking too much from their rookie to have him play with someone that can’t provide consistent defensive support.

Niemelainen has been mostly serviceable, but as expected, he still makes some rookie mistakes as was the case when he got caught off guard on the game-winning goal scored by Jesper Bratt for the Devils on Friday night.

Offense-first defensemen like Bouchard and Barrie can be valuable, but only when paired with players that can provide balance to the lineup through reliable defensive play. Murray and Niemelainen are fine seventh defensemen, but they aren’t consistent enough at this stage of their careers to be a good fit for this group.

They are ok options for now, but if the Oilers have aspirations to win a Stanley Cup this spring, just ok isn’t going to cut it. Only one team in the last 20 years has won the Stanley Cup with a goals against per game above three (the 2006 Hurricanes had 3.15 GA/GP in 2006).

The Oilers will need upgrades on the back end. With that being said, let’s take a look at a few options they have for addressing this concern.

Jakob Chychrun

Jakob Chychrun is definitely the biggest name out of Edmonton’s rumored trade targets on defense and I think it would be a decent add. Chychrun is a 24-year-old top-4 defenseman who is under contract until 2025 on a pretty solid deal of just $4.6m AAV.

While his offensive numbers dipped last season on a horrible Arizona Coyotes team, Chychrun still had a positive impact on the defensive side of the game both at 5v5 and on the penalty kill. He also proved in 2020-21 that he has serious offensive upside, as he put up 18 goals and 41 points in just 56 games.

Making a Chychrun trade isn’t as much of a no-brainer as it seems on the surface, however. Due to Edmonton’s cap situation, they would need to trade multiple forwards or Tyson Barrie in order to make the money work.

Chychrun would be a big upgrade to the top 4, but trading Barrie for a left defenseman would leave the Oilers short a man on the right side, forcing them to play Niemelainen or Murray on their opposite side.

There are definitely some logistics to sort out with this one, but having Nurse, Chychrun, and Kulak on the left side would no doubt give them a much more reliable group.

John Klingberg

Reports came out a while back that the Oilers had been kicking tires on John Klingberg prior to the start of the season, and were willing to deal Tyson Barrie and draft picks in order to acquire him with salary retained.

While the deal never came to fruition, it was speculated by Sportsnet’s Elliotte Freidman on the 32 Thoughts podcast that the Oilers may circle back to Klingberg before the season’s end.

Out of these three potential trade targets, this one makes the least sense to me, to be honest. Klingberg is yet another offense-first D-man; replacing Barrie with him wouldn’t solve the core issue.

Klingberg has had a disastrous start to the season with the Anaheim Ducks, registering just 2 points at 5v5 through 12 games. Klingberg and Kulikov are the most-scored-on defense pair in the NHL so far this season at even strength, having been outscored by the opposition 12-6.

The Oilers don’t need a powerplay quarterback and they don’t need an offensive D-man. They need help with the penalty kill and with 5v5 defense. I personally don’t see a fit with this player.

Conclusion

The Oilers are capable of greatness due to their electric offense, but until they defend better, they won’t accomplish their ultimate goal.

They have a great coaching staff, but Jay Woodcroft will need better personnel on the back end to work with if he’s going to have this team ready for another deep playoff run.

They may not pull the trigger until trade deadline day, but a move is almost certainly coming.