RUMOUR: Erik Karlsson an Oiler?
By Phil Gretzky
And now we save the best for last.
What the Oilers get in this situation is obvious – Karlsson himself, and at a heavily discounted rate too. With both Carolina and San Jose sharing the burden of Karlsson’s monster cap hit, the Oilers will only be paying Karlsson $5.75 million a season. The beauty of this is by moving out Kulak and Ceci, the Oilers would actually see $6 million of cap space exiting their books, which means that this trade, despite the huge cap hit acquired, would still see them save $250,000 in cap space. That’s less of a cap savings then Carolina or San Jose are seeing, but that’s fine, $250,000 is still fine when dealing with a contract of this magnitude.
Erik Karlsson would then replace Ceci in the lineup next to Darnell Nurse, which on paper at least would create a great 1-2 punch on offence at the top of the D corps.
Kulak won’t be a great loss as he’s way too expensive for the third pairing and chances are will probably be replaced on the third pairing by Philip Broberg anyway so why not just do it now? I like him as a player but not as a cap hit. He needs to go, and needed to go IMO before Kailer Yamamoto, but that ship has sailed already of course.
Karlsson is the reigning Vezina trophy winner, and such players are usually not available.
There’s a good chance this pushes the Oilers over the top and they win a Cup. Personally I’d love to see Pietrangelo and Karlsson go head to head in the next Oilers-Vegas playoff series, whenever it happens. It would probably make that series one of the most entertaining the NHL had to offer.
Erik Karlsson then gets his wish and goes to a Cup contender.