Congratulations Taylor Hall. You've been a great player your whole career, and there are few out there more deserving of a Stanley Cup ring than the Edmonton Oilers' first ever 1st overall draft pick.
Hall had a great postseason, leading the Carolina Hurricanes in scoring until Game 6, when linemate Jackson Blake overtook him with a two point night. But it was Hall's game opening goal that stood up as the game (and Cup) winner. Hall's 19 point in 19 games were accompanied by a plus14. He was a difference maker, and one of the main reasons the Hurricanes made short work of most of the Eastern Conference.
What could have been
As Hall finally reaches the highest heights as a National Hockey League player, one can't help but look back and wonder how things might have gone differently. He's far from the first top pick to join a struggling club and be unable to singlehandedly change that team's fortunes. Young but highly skilled stars Macklin Celebrini and Conner Bedard both found themselves watching the NHL Playoffs on television once again in 2026.
Through the dark years, Hall played hard, produced points, and never was the sort to put down teammates or criticize the franchise. He was often a minus player during the six years in Oilers orange and blue, but rarely in the double digit negatives. On a far from perfect roster, Hall was a bright light. And around Year 6, things started to turn around.
Another 1st overall pick was joining the team, named Connor McDavid, and along with him, the pick from the year prior, Leon Draisaitl, looked ready to jump to the NHL as well. Draisaitl and Hall had incredible chemistry from the very beginning of their time. If McDavid hadn't suffered a broken collarbone, that 2015 season might have gone differently, and all the young Oilers could have found their way into the playoffs.
Right at that moment, when the team was finally ready to take a leap forward in production and results, former general manager Peter Chiarelli decided he knew better. Hall was traded to the New Jersey Devils in the infamous "one-for-one" deal that brought Adam Larsson to the Oilers. As a Devil, Hall would go on to win the Hart trophy as the league's most valuable player. Larsson was a decent defender, but his relative impact never came close to Hall's, neither in Edmonton, nor as a member of the Seattle Kraken.
Some have suggested that Hall was traded because the Oilers "lucked out" and had Jesse Puljujarvi fall to them in the 2016 NHL Draft. Some will say the trade was unavoidable because the salary dollars it would have taken to sign Hall long term needed to go to others. But the team was worse the moment he left, and an aging Taylor Hall would have looked pretty decent on the second line left with against the Anaheim Ducks, or in the Cup Final in either of the two prior years. We'll never know if it would have been enough, but we know what the results were without him.
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