Darnell Nurse was involved in a polarizing play late in the second period of the game on Tuesday night versus the Colorado Avalanche. Opinions on the rightness of the penalty call aside, it's fitting, because Nurse is definitely a polarizing player in the Edmonton market.
With 781 games played in his career; 88 goals and 233 assists, totaling 321 points, along with 715 penalty minutes, he's certainly panned out as the #7 overall pick. In his twelve seasons, he's played well enough to make each of his contracts look like a real value - except for one.
Big money = Big expectations
Ken Holland made a bet on Nurse's production arc when he signed him for 8 years at $9.25 million a season. Instead he has remained more or less consistent. A good defenseman with a little offense, Nurse is good for a handful of goals and a couple dozen assists in any given year. He has been generally a plus player, so long as we ignore the current season.
Defensemen don't arrive at their statistics alone though. Mattias Ekholm arrived and steadied Evan Bouchard, allowing him to thrive offensively. Nurse's most common D partners have been Jake Walman and Alec Regula, and both pairings have seen the ice tilted against them. Regula in particular seems like a bad match, because the team has only scored 6 goals with those two on the ice, while allowing 17. Nurse's best numbers are when he's paired with Ekholm or Bouchard, but unfortunately, his limitations on both ends mean that isn't going to be the Oilers' top pairing.
Advanced statistics
The biggest issue with Nurse is, in all but his best season, the advanced statistics suggest that opposing teams get more goals than the Oilers do. His career Relative Corsi is -5.4% and his Relative Fenwick is a similar number at -5.5%. Over more than a decade, those stats are telling. You don't need to know everything about advanced statistics to interpret; the minus equals bad. Nurse isn't worth the money he's paid.
If his defensive game doesn't improve, he risks relegation to the third pairing now that Connor Murphy is in town. As a team that's always pushing against the salary cap, the dollars per minute played are ugly. His contract, though not the only albatross in the Connor McDavid age, plays a role in preventing blockbuster deadline deals that potentially could have pushed the Oilers to a championship win in recent years, and it will continue to be a roadblock until the team pays another franchise to swallow their error or commits to a horrendous buyout.