The Edmonton Oilers should not be anywhere near the playoffs. They shouldn’t even be able to smell the playoffs, from their vantage point, the playoffs should look like a far away dreamland filled with disappointing overtimes the feeling of “what could have been”. Unfortunately in the new NHL, they aren’t wondering what could have been, they are probably thinking “I can’t believe we are still in this”. As it stands right now Edmonton is five points out of the playoffs and it doesn’t look like they will even make it but I can’t even accept how close they are to being in.
Looking at their record, the Oilers have a pretty respectable record at (37-33-5). But if you delve deeper into this abomination of a team’s season you will realise they should be fighting it out with the Los Angeles Kings for the Stamkos lottery. Fifteen of the Oilers thirty-seven wins are Shootout wins. This means that if the shootout rule was not in place we could shave off fifteen points from the Oiler’s record. To be fair, we should also shave off a few points from all other teams but it would be easier if we just curved the Oiler’s record and gave them four or five points they might have gained from other teams not winning in the shootout.
So with 11 fewer points from the shootout, the Edmonton Oilers are at 68 points and only four points ahead of the lowly Los Angeles Kings. I’m not saying I don’t like the shootout because I truly do enjoy the excitement of it. Whenever a new rule change is implemented, someone always takes advantage directly or indirectly and reaps the benefits. The Edmonton Oilers are a anomaly and I understand this but it makes me angry so I wrote about it.
15 shootout wins.
Tags: hockey, Los Angeles Kings, shootouts, Stamkos, The Edmonton Oilers
March 24, 2008 at 3:08 am
100% agree…the Oilers being anywhere near a playoff spot is a joke. It shows how badly introducing a marketing gimmick(the shootout itself) in an attempt to draw an american audience can mess things up.