A marquee matchup between two of the better teams in the league turned ugly on Wednesday night, with P.K. Subban claiming he was bitten by Pierre-Edouard Bellemare during a skirmish in front of the net.
The Nashville Predators defenseman left the incident telling referees that the Vegas Golden Knights forward had bitten his finger, something he confirmed to reporters after the contest.
"He bit me. My finger was bleeding," Subban said, as per Ryan Quigley of Knights on Ice. "All I tried to do was grab him. I grabbed him by the head to pull him up and he bit me. I don't know how I walk out of there with four minutes in penalties."
Bellemare was not penalized in the incident, with the referees instead opting to send Subban and Ryan Reaves to the box after he came to his teammate's defense. While Subban seems certain there was a bite, Bellemare saw his opponent as the aggressor in the situation.
"I'm in front of the net trying to get the rebound and suddenly I'm in a headlock with an entire glove in my mouth and I'm choking," Bellemare told Vince Sapienza of FOX-5. "He started yelling like, 'I bit him, I bit him.' I don't know what you have in your mouth, but like, if you put all of your hand all the way through and you pull up you are going to feel the teeth."
Bellemare wasn't done there, continuing by questioning Subban's reaction to the whole incident.
"I don't know why he's going absolutely crazy there," he said. "I have half a glove in my throat and playing with the back of it and pulling me up and there was no mouthguard, so it's like, those are my teeth."
The teams won't have to wait too long to renew acquaintances, as the two are scheduled to meet in Vegas once again on Feb. 16.
In a scrum in front of the Predators' goal, blue-liner P.K. Subban wrapped his hand around the face of Pierre-Edouard Bellemare and proceeded to react hysterically as if he was bitten by the Vegas forward.
While Subban pleaded his case to the officiating crew, he had to avoid an oncoming Ryan Reaves. He eventually gestured to the Golden Knights' bench that his finger had been chomped on.
Both Subban and Reaves were assessed unsportsmanlike conduct penalties while Subban was given an extra two-minute minor for roughing.
Whoever becomes the next general manager of the Edmonton Oilers will inherit one of the best players on the planet, and, thanks to Peter Chiarelli, not much else.
Chiarelli's tumultuous tenure with the Oilers came to an end Wednesday in what is the latest chapter of a 12-year stretch of franchise futility. And this one is the most disheartening of all. Despite boasting a generational talent in Connor McDavid, Edmonton has been unable to climb out of the NHL gutter thanks to Chiarelli's archaic philosophy and confounding roster moves.
While the rest of the league focused on the draft and set up squads loaded with speed and skill, Chiarelli was fixated on building a "heavy" team, which he attempted to do through free agency and trades. And that misguided approach has left the next GM with an enormous challenge and few tangible assets with which to tackle it.
The lasting damage
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Chiarelli's laundry list of poor decisions is no secret. There's the infamous Taylor Hall-Adam Larsson trade, the haul of picks given up for the slow-footed Griffin Reinhart, and the Jordan Eberle debacle, which resulted in Chiarelli finishing on the losing end of two separate Ryan Strome deals.
Yet, despite these fireable offenses, Chiarelli's biggest mistakes may have been his careless contract signings:
Player
AAV
Length
Year signed
Andrej Sekera
$5.5M
6 years
2015
Milan Lucic
$6M
7 years
2016
Kris Russell
$4M
4 years
2017
Mikko Koskinen
$4.5M
3 years
2019
These four deals will account for roughly one-quarter of the Oilers' salary cap until Russell and Sekera come off the books after the 2020-21 season.
Puljujarvi, the fourth overall pick in 2016, was raw coming out of the draft. He should've spent an entire season, maybe more, in the AHL before he ever saw NHL action. Instead, a year of his entry-level contract was burned as an ineffective 18-year-old player, and he's now up for restricted free agency after this campaign. As a result, his confidence has likely taken a hit from bouncing up and down between the two levels and averaging just 12:30 minutes of ice time per game during his NHL career.
Yamamoto's contractual situation was handled better, but he also should have spent an entire season in the AHL before making the big club. Having a recent first-rounder play fourth-line minutes is bad for everyone involved.
Another rebuild?
Icon Sportswire / Icon Sportswire / Getty
The Oilers have attempted multiple rebuilds over the better part of two decades, so it's likely their fans have had enough of that word. But there's simply no other way around it.
It's now up to Oilers owner Daryl Katz and CEO Bob Nicholson to find Chiarelli's replacement and patiently allow that person to rebuild the team through their vision. The days of patching holes with short-term fixes can be no more in Edmonton. This team won't be fixed overnight.
It's projected to have just $6.5 million in cap space this offseason, which doesn't include restricted free agents Puljujarvi, Jujhar Khaira, Ty Rattie, and Tobias Rieder, according to Cap Friendly. Nor does it include Alex Chiasson or Alex Petrovic, who are unrestricted free agents. In short, the new GM will have very limited cap space to work with during their first offseason.
The same can be said for the summer of 2020. Ryan Spooner ($3.1 million), Zack Kassian ($1.95 million), Kyle Brodziak ($1.15 million), and Brandon Manning ($2.25 million) will come off the books, but RFA Darnell Nurse will be due for what's likely to be a hefty extension.
Barring an unlikely series of trades that somehow shed the bad contracts handed out by Chiarelli, the next GM will have to wait until the summer of 2021 to put their fingerprints on the team.
By that point, they should've stockpiled draft picks along the way. Ideally, some of those picks - as well as some of the prospects Chiarelli left behind - will already be able to make an impact by the 2021-22 season.
The Oilers are looking at a three-year plan before they can truly begin to turn the page on this unfortunate period. Even at that point, Koskinen will still have one year remaining on his deal, and Lucic's buyout-proof contract will have two years remaining, so Edmonton won't fully clear the roadblocks until the 2023 offseason.
In what may be the biggest decision in franchise history since the Wayne Gretzky trade, the Oilers now look to appoint their fifth general manager since 2008, and if they botch this latest rebuild attempt, the next one could be kicked off by the departure of McDavid.
Carolina is reportedly open to trading Dougie Hamilton, and teams have apparentlybeen calling about Brett Pesce. The Hurricanes also reportedly hope to land a top-six forward in exchange for a defenseman.
The Maple Leafs and Hurricanes have often been linked as potential trade partners. Toronto possesses an abundance of forward depth, while Carolina has four NHL-caliber right-handed defensemen, which the Maple Leafs lack.
Hamilton has seen his production falter in his first season with the Hurricanes. He has seven goals and 10 assists after producing four straight 40-point campaigns. The 25-year-old Toronto native comes with a $5.75-million cap hit and won't hit free agency until the summer of 2021.
While Hamilton has gained a reputation for his offensive abilities, Pesce has developed into one of the more reliable shutdown blue-liners in the league. Among defensemen who have played 500 minutes at five-on-five this year, he's been on the ice for the 14th-fewest scoring chances against per 60 minutes, and the 16th-fewest high-danger scoring chances against per 60 minutes - all while primarily being tasked with shutting down opponents' top players. The 24-year-old is signed through the 2023-24 season and carries a $4.025-million cap hit.
The Hurricanes also employ right-handed defensemen Justin Faulk and Trevor van Riemsdyk, though their names haven't surfaced in trade rumors.
Toronto's blue line is particularly weak on the right side. Left-handed shooting veteran Ron Hainsey plays on the right side of the team's top pairing, while Nikita Zaitsev and rookie Igor Ozhiganov hold down the right side on the bottom two units with limited effectiveness.
The shakeup comes hours after the club stumbled into the All-Star break with a third consecutive defeat on home ice. It's the second major change in Oilers leadership this season, following the November move to fire Todd McLellan as head coach and hire Ken Hitchcock as his replacement.
The decision to dismiss Chiarelli was made before the Oilers' loss to the Detroit Red Wings on Tuesday night, according to TSN's Darren Dreger, and the move itself was carried out before the game's conclusion.
Peter Chiarelli was fired during the second intermission of last night's game, according to Bob Nicholson. Wanted to give him a chance to leave the building quietly.
Chiarelli exits after three plus-seasons with Edmonton. He joined the organization in 2015, two months before the Oilers won the chance to draft Connor McDavid first overall.
Since then, Edmonton's inability to capitalize on landing a generational talent - qualifying for the playoffs just once in McDavid's first three seasons and currently standing at risk of missing out once again - has largely been attributed to roster decisions made by Chiarelli.
Most notable among those franchise-altering moves were the separate trades of Taylor Hall and Jordan Eberle, which landed the club only Adam Larsson and Ryan Strome in return, as well as the free-agent signing of Milan Lucic on a seven-year, $42-million deal in 2016.
Edmonton also raised eyebrows with another move one day prior to Chiarelli's dismissal, giving goaltender Mikko Koskinen a three-year, $13.5-million extension after just 27 games with the team.
The Oilers currently sit below all but three teams in the Western Conference standings, owning a 23-24-3 record and 49 points.
Washington Capitals captain Alex Ovechkin has decided what game he'll sit for as part of his one-game suspension for missing the NHL All-Star Game.
Ovechkin will play in Wednesday's contest against the Toronto Maple Leafs, head coach Todd Reirden confirmed following Tuesday's loss to the San Jose Sharks. The decision means Ovechkin will miss the Capitals' first game following the break against the Calgary Flames Feb. 1.
He will be eligible to return to the lineup for Feb. 3's contest against the Boston Bruins.
The 33-year-old announced at the beginning of the month he would not attend this year's installment, even after being named captain of the Metropolitan Division, stating that his body "needs a rest."
Ovechkin has attended seven All-Star Games during his 14-year career. With a hat trick on Tuesday, he now has a league-leading 36 goals in 49 games.
The Edmonton Oilers handed a three-year, $13.5-million contract extension to goaltender Mikko Koskinen on Monday - and all indications suggest this was an unnecessary overpay by general manager Peter Chiarelli.
A second-round pick by the New York Islanders in 2009, Koskinen joined the Oilers on a one-year, $2.5-million deal last offseason after spending the preceding nine years in the KHL. He's become Edmonton's No. 1 netminder, largely due to the struggles of Cam Talbot.
The 30-year-old Koskinen's been inconsistent in his first season in North America in nearly a decade. He owns a .911 save percentage and a 2.78 goals-against average in 27 games, and he enjoyed a hot streak shortly after Ken Hitchcock replaced Todd McLellan as Oilers head coach. However, in his last 11 appearances, he's gone 3-7-0 with an .879 save percentage.
Given his recent struggles, why extend Koskinen at all, let alone now?
Talbot is a pending unrestricted free agent after this season and doesn't appear to be in Edmonton's plans. The franchise likely wanted to assure itself of having an NHL netminder signed beyond this season. Extending Koskinen to do so, though, compounds the Oilers' long-standing mediocrity in the crease and makes their salary-cap situation that much more hairy.
What's Koskinen worth?
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Koskinen's $4.5-million cap hit makes him the 17th-highest paid goalie for next season. Once some of the league's pending unrestricted and restricted free-agent goalies sign new deals, he'll likely be bumped into the low 20s. Still, the Oilers are paying Koskinen mid-to-low-tier starter money. The problem is, he hasn't proven to be capable in that role.
If any single stat is best for evaluating a goalie, it's goals saved above average (GSAA), which Corsica Hockey explains as "goals allowed below the expectation based on shot danger faced." Koskinen's 0.44 GSAA ranks 27th in the NHL among goalies with at least 500 minutes of ice time.
Using Cap Friendly's comparable contracts tool, the best match for Koskinen's extension is Arizona Coyotes goaltender Antti Raanta's three-year pact with a $4.25-million cap hit, which he signed in April 2018.
However, Raanta was 28 years old when that contract was signed, had 124 NHL starts under his belt, and was coming off a season where he ranked seventh in the league with a 19.95 GSAA.
If the Oilers were eager to extend Koskinen this season, something in the neighborhood of Carter Hutton's deal with the Buffalo Sabres - three years with a $2.75-million cap hit - would've been more appropriate.
What does it mean for the Oilers?
Andy Devlin / National Hockey League / Getty
The Oilers project to have $6.5 million in cap space next season after committing to Koskinen. This projection doesn't include pending RFAs Tobias Rieder, Jesse Puljujarvi, Ty Rattie, and Jujhar Khaira, or pending UFAs Alex Chiasson, Kevin Gravel, and Alex Petrovic. Even if the Oilers wanted to retain just three of those six players - let's say Puljujarvi, Chiasson, and Petrovic - that would conservatively cost them around $4 million, leaving them with just $2.5 million in cap space and plenty of holes on the roster.
There's no reason the Oilers couldn't have rode out the season with Koskinen's expiring deal. If he excelled, they could've likely retained him for a similar price. Alternatively, they could've explored this summer's goaltending free-agent market, which features several unspectacular but solid, affordable veterans with better track records than Koskinen.
Edmonton took a major risk by investing $4.5 million annually in a goaltender who hasn't proved he can solve the team's issues in net. The lack of cap space means the Oilers will now essentially sink or swim with Koskinen as "the guy" between the pipes over the next few seasons - and that's less than ideal during Connor McDavid's prime years.
