The Edmonton Oilers face a crucial decision on Mattias Ekholm’s future

The Edmonton Oilers face a crucial decision on Mattias Ekholm’s future

As one of the older, more expensive teams in the NHL trying to maintain a window of contention, the Edmonton Oilers have difficult decisions on the horizon. Amongst them, what to do with the future of defenseman Matias on today’s edition of Locked On Oilers. You are Locked on Oilers, your daily podcast on the Edmonton Oilers, part of the Locked On Network. your team every day. Hello everyone and welcome to this Thursday edition of Locked on Oilers. I am your host Nick Zarus. I just wrapped up my third NHL season as a host on the Lockdown podcast network and I want to thank everyone that is making Locked on Oilers their first listen of the day. Lockdown Oilers is a part of the Lockdown podcast network where we’ve got your team covered every day. And today’s show is brought to you by our friends over at Game Time. Download the Games Time app, create an account, and use code locked on NHL for $20 off your first purchase. So, on today’s show, we are going to talk about what does Matias have left as a top pair NHL defenseman because I think everybody understands that at his age, the ceiling is going to continue to diminish over time and the Oilers need to account for that. So, in the beginning, our first segment, we’re going to tackle why defensive defensemen are a little bit harder to project into the future. Our second segment, we’re going to talk about what the market is for defensive defenseman, where the money looks, what the money looks like, and then in our final segment, we’ll talk about just why it’s so important that as Matias Ekholm declines or plays a smaller role going forward, the Oilers find a viable replacement. So, to start things out, and if you’re an everydayer, you’ve heard me say this more than once. When you are putting together a team, you are more often than not better off trying to put together a team that creates more offense than it is elite at defense. And there are outliers like in every every realm of the world. There are going to be 8t tall people even though there’s only a handful of them. There are outliers. There are teams that manage to be successful through defense, but where the game is at and where it’s going, where we’re we’re so skill-based, we’re so speedbased, you need to have a certain functionality within the confines of driving possession, of transition play, and then of meaningfully impacting offense. Gone are the days of the pylon defenseman who’s mostly out there just to block shots and just to take up space. Sure, there are guys who fit that archetype who are lingering around holdovers from either the last 5 to 10 years as that as that archetype has really faded in relevancy. But defensive defensemen are always going to have a harder time getting paid and they are always going to have a harder time getting projected into the future because defense is not a positive value. We can’t distill out defense to a number. Yes, we can evaluate how a player plays defensively based on some statistics. How the other team does per se when they’re out there on the ice. You know, if a defenseman is out there for a lot of high danger chances against, we would say they struggle defending high danger chances. But we can’t distill defense down into numbers like goals and assists that are very easy for everyone to understand. And goals and assists are an imperfect measurement. You know, they’re a snapshot. They tell you specific instances. They don’t tell you what the defense was doing. They don’t tell you what the goalie was doing. They don’t tell you the leadup to the play because technically an empty net goal counts just the same as an OV1 timer from the top of the slot beating the goalie going left to right even though those are very fundamentally different actions. So when it comes to these defense first guys and there is value in this and look I don’t think Ekholm is bad offensively. He’s got a decent shot. He can give you 10 to 15 goals if everything shakes out right for him. But his bread and butter, what makes Ekholm a quality hockey player and an impactful hockey player is his willingness to be the gopher for Evan Bousard, if you’re unfamiliar, that’s a that’s an old head term, you know. I I I think the first time I heard it used was in Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, where Brad Pitt is telling DiCaprio, “Bro, I haven’t been a stunt man in years. I’m a go I’m your gopher.” Meaning, I do a bunch of random miscellaneous things. At Cole is out there to be Buchard’s gopher. He’s there to go into the corners to eat hits to retrieve pucks and get the puck to Evan Bousard so Buchard can use his puck skills, can use his hockey IQ to create transition plays and ultimately try and drive offense. And those numbers don’t show up in the box score. In fact, if you don’t subscribe to a premium service, whether it’s a League One that’s associated with a proprietary service, if you don’t subscribe to one of the fan projects like I do, I subscribe to all three zones. You might have no idea what I’m talking about when it comes to zone entry statistics. There is an entire subset of statistics within the hockey culture that by and large most people aren’t given access to because they’re behind a payw wall and because they don’t show up on a day-to-day basis. If you are watching game after game after game, there are a lot of innocuous plays over the course of a 60-minute regulation hockey game where pucks go into corners, defenseman back skates, turns around, recovers, moves it to his partner, and that’s five, six, seven decisions that lead up to that, but those don’t show up in the box score. So when we’re talking about a guy like Ekholm who undoubtedly has had a really solid NHL career, upper echelon for sure amongst his archetype of defensive defenseman and the simple matter of the fact is he unlocked the Oilers getting to a higher level because he brought out the best in Evan Bard. And that’s really one of the keys here to me when we were talking about these older offense first defenseman generally you can still manufacture offense out of them. You know, the Capitals can keep milking decent hockey out of John Carlson because he plays with Arasmus Sandee. The Penguins are very content even though, you know, their plan ultimately didn’t work. They didn’t stay contenders. Acquiring Eric Carlson and resigning Chris Leang, the Penguins said, “We know we’re going to be bad defensively. We might as well triple down on offense.” Now, look, I don’t think the Penguins are a great comp because a lot of that team kind of fell apart around those guys, Latang Carlson, Crosby, and Malin, of course. But I do think there is something to the idea that as you move further and further away from offensive production on the blue line, the harder it is to value what they bring to the table. Because how much is blocking shots worth? How much is killing penalties worth? And is penalty killing even a trait? Or are guys that are good at hockey put on the penalty kill because they’re good at hockey? And look, I do think there are some traits that translate particularly well to the penalty kill that I would qualify someone as being a good penalty killer. But as in regards to Ekholm and talking about the aging curve and that was the subject of yesterday’s show talking about how Heyman, Nan Hopkins, Adam Henrik, Matias Ekholm, how the Oilers prepare for that next wave. And I don’t want to jump ahead of myself. We’ll largely talk about that in the third segment of today’s show. But when you are reaching your inflection point and your mid30s as a defensive defenseman, it goes one of two ways. You become a Brian Dumlain or you be Chris Tanv. Those are really the two paths forward here for Matias Ekholm. And I think Ekholm at his peak is a better hockey player than Brian Dumlan was at his peak. So he was starting off at a higher point. So there’s more room for a more gradual drop off. Whereas Dumlain went from being one of the better defensive defenseman in the NHL when the Penguins went back to back to where he’s at now where he’s just signing one-year deals, bouncing around the league, hanging on as a second penalty kill unit guy, as a third pair defenseman just because teams value his veteran experience. They value the way he’s willing to block shots. They think maybe he can perhaps coax better performances out of offense first defenseman by serving as that buffer, that gopher to eat punishment so the offense first guys can be a little bit more focused about creating offense. But that will do it for our first segment on today’s edition of Locked on Oilers. Coming up next, we’re going to break down the market for defensive defensemen, especially guys approaching that the twilight stage of their career where it becomes a real gamble if you want to give them term on a next contract. Coming up next on today’s edition of Locked on Boiler. Have you ever decided last minute to head to a game with friends or family? Maybe it’s game day and suddenly you got that itch to be in the ballpark. That’s exactly where game time comes in. It’s the easiest way to grab last minute tickets without the stress. With the money you save on tickets, you can splurge on food, drinks, merch, or even invite more people to go to the game with you. 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Terms apply. Again, create an account and redeem code L O C K D O N N N N N N N N N N N N N N N N N N N N N N N N N N N N N N N N N N N N N N N N NHL for $20 off. Download the Game Time app today. Last minute tickets, lowest price guaranteed. Thank you to everyone who is hanging out on this Thursday edition of Locked on Oilers as we begin to navigate the dog days of summer. And I talked about this with one of my friends on Monday on the Rangers podcast. I do I usually don’t qualify the dog days of summer for general the general summer until after the baseball trade deadline, which is about 9 10 days away. And then you get to August where there’s still 40 to 50 games of baseball left somehow even though we’ve been playing baseball since the last week of March. But in the hockey world, this is the dog day. These are the dog days of summer. And there’s a lot of rumor. There’s a lot of speculation, but there’s not a whole lot of concrete reporting going on. The sub the impetus for today’s show talking about Ekholm was Bob Staer saying that the Oilers were interested in an extension with Echol yesterday. So, I think it’s worth discussing because whether or not Bob is as tapped in as he should be, I I do think this is something you need to be considering because it’s part of your long-term planning. You locked up Evan Buchard for four more years. You locked up Leon Dryidle for another seven. You have Dryidle for eight more years now. McDavid, you’re going to take care of whether that’s a four or five or an eater. That will be rectified at some point in the next month or two. And then from there, you have to figure out what the next iteration of your team is going to be. That’s what we talked about pretty in-depth on yesterday’s show. In the final segment, if you’re curious, just how do you maintain a window of contention? And one of the ways you need to line up your replacements a year ahead of time. I think Jake Walman, and we’ll talk about Walman more in our final segment today, and we talked about him quite a bit yesterday, so I don’t want to get too far ahead of myself, but I think the idea of acquiring Jake Walman, who had another year of term on his contract, was not to moonlight him necessarily, but to put him in a position where if the Oilers are able to extend him, which I do think they would like to, he’s probably your long-term successor to Matias. There’s the perception of Walman as a bit of a late bloomer, somebody who didn’t really become an NHL regular until their mid20s. Someone who doesn’t have a ton of miles, hadn’t played in a playoff game before last year, go into the final with the Oilers. So, I think that’s your long-term plan. But for the medium-term, there are a few things to consider here as far as talking about Ekol. Number one, the economics have fundamentally changed in our league very quickly. Ekholm’s last deal he signed as a 31y old for $6.25 million in 2021. The salary cap that year was $81.5 million. That’s 7.7% of the salary cap. Since that period, the cap is going to be $14 million more for this upcoming season than it was when signed that deal. That’s going to come in at $95.5 million. I think, and I’ve said this a ton over the last few weeks. I said this a lot in the leadup to Evan Buchard getting his extension, the numbers are going to start sounding funky, wacky, and ridiculous. With all of this liquidity out there in the market, teams are going to be inclined to spend. Now, if you’re familiar with macroeconomic trends and you understand how people act when they have more money than they’re used to, you’re going to be very, it’s going to seem very familiar as teams tie up money in less than great players. Because the idea here, and this is not the driving force, this is not the main reason. If it were up to the owners, they would pay the players nothing. They would all get handshakes and internship credit as opposed to paying them their market value. But with more money in the system, with a higher salary cap, players are going to be able to command more in their salary. The consideration here when we’re talking about Matias Eholm is the fact he’s 35 years old, the fact he is coming off a major lower body injury, the fact his role, his function invites punishment, it makes him easier, I should say, or more prone to suffering injuries because of the role he plays. And at 35, as somebody who is not in that elite offensive defenseman tier, like even on the second level of that with a John Carlson or an Eric Carlson or Chris Leang, you know, guys who we would consider as offense only defenseman, you know, Carlson, he’ll a John Carlson that is will throw around a big hit from now and then, but he’s not he’s not getting paid what he is for his defensive acumen. he is effectively being told to be a fourth forward to drive offense meaningfully and to really try and bolster what they get at home. And that’s the real tricky part here. I think in an ideal world, like if it were up to me, I would try and get him to do like a three-year deal at five or $6 million and try and get him to walk it yeartoear effectively. And look, if it were totally up to me, like I didn’t have to consider the player at all. I would keep doing one-year deals loaded up with the over 35 incentives. That’s one of the benefits of being an older player. I don’t want to invite the um the conspiracy theorying that we saw with the Maple Leafs and Chris Tanv, the Florida Panthers or Brad Marshand where the Oilers sign home to like an eight-year deal knowing he’s only going to play three or four of those years and then that contract goes the way of say Sheay Weber or Pavle Datsuk where it just gets pingponged around the league until the term expires as a means for bad teams to reach the cap floor. But the money here is tricky because with the cap $14 million higher than it was the last time he signed, I don’t think you’re going to be able to convince a guy who is still a decent NHL defenseman. And look, I think there’s definitely some room for discussion about whether or not at Col is a first or second pair guy. Now, I assume he’s going to start the year with Evan Busher. I think if the results are good, they are going to stick those two guys together and they’re going to keep rolling with what’s working and they’ll figure out the rest. Whether that’s Wman with Nurse, whether that’s Koulak with Nurse, whatever it takes for Chris Knoblock to come up with two different defensive pairs he feels good about and then the third pair will be probably piece meal together between Ster Emerson and then whichever nurse or Koulak doesn’t end up on the second pair. I think if the Oilers want to maximize at Holm going forward, I think reducing his role ever so slightly, I think giving him a little bit more leeway offensively to try and maybe diminish the opportunities teams have to really pound on him in corners on retrievalss because that’s where the mileage really accumulates on these defense first guys, especially when they’re playing with guys who are offense first like a Bushard. The expectation is Akol is out there to kind of eat it so Bousard doesn’t because Bousard’s value is significantly higher because of the offense he brings. When it comes to the money, the three players that I think are reasonable comparisons, facts. We talked about Chris Tanv before. At 34 years old, Tanv signed a six-year deal worth $4.5 million, 5.1% of the cap. I don’t think Chris Tanv is gonna play till he’s 40. He has so many miles on the treads. He is constantly injured. He’s still a really useful hockey player. Like I wish the Oilers had a Chris Tanv. I wish the Rangers had a Chris Tanv. The next one, Ryan McDonald doesn’t really work in the context of his contract, even though I think now Mcdana is more of a defense guy because of the role he’s been assigned. But precoid, Ryan Mcdana signed a 7-year 6.4 45 million deal as soon as he got to Tampa Bay when the Rangers traded him there. 8.3% of the cap and Mcdana, you know, more of a 4050 point guy as opposed to a 30 40 point guy. A little bit more room there. And then Chris Latang, I don’t think is particularly applicable moneywise. That was a six-year deal at 6.1 million. He signed at 35 years old and that was 7.4% of the cap and he signed that deal two years ago. I think these are reasonable comps for where he might end up production-wise. Matias at home where he might end up valuewise, but not in terms of dollar and cents. I think we are going to get a very radically different understanding of NHL economics over the next 12 months. I think McDavid is the domino that is going to put this in motion. And we’re gonna see because if Ekko wants to be a team guy, the Oilers can keep running one ones where they give him a one-year deal and huge incentives based on games played, based on performance, based on team performance as a means of not hamstringing cap over an extended period of time to a player who is going to decline at some point. Like father time is undefeated. Even Jazoara eventually became an actively bad NHL defenseman at the end when he was a capital. So that is something to keep in mind. We are going to take our second and final break on today’s show. When we come back, we’re going to tackle why that first pair left Dy roll is so important. Why the Oilers need to have a long-term replacement in mind even if they bring home e bring back Ekol and what I think ultimately ends up happening with EKM on today’s edition of Locked on Oilers. Thank you to everyone who is hanging out on this Thursday edition of Locked on Oilers where we are breaking down the financial prospects and career trajectory of Matias and these types of open-ended conversations where we don’t definitively know because we don’t know. And I do think it’s really important that you guys hear me say that that there are things I don’t know because that’s being accountable as a journalist, as a content creator, because I look at this as what do we know for sure? We know he’s in his mid30s. We know his archetype defensive defenseman are very reliant on their mobility. As their mobility dissipates, they become less effective over time. And without offense to kind of offset losing the defensive value, it becomes tricky for these guys to age well. And look, at 35, you can make an argument Ecom already has aged well. That based on being this good, at least prior to that injury he suffered and then the fornations where he wasn’t great and the injury he suffered and coming back in the playoffs, he is still an upper echelon defensive defenseman. I don’t think he’s in the Forsling Slavven tier of guys. I think Tanv is probably better now. Even though I think they’re pretty close, I think Tanv’s role is a little bit more conducive to his skill set, whereas I think at home by virtue of having to be the one defensively responsible guy who’s out there with Evan Bousard, with McDavid, a lot of the time it puts a lot more on his plate and it requires him to absorb maybe a little bit more punishment than you would like from a guy who’s undoubtedly been a key driver in the Oilers success. Look, I like Darnell Nurse, the guy. I love Oscar Cleftbomb. Neither of those guys was getting the production out of Evan Buchard that Matias Ekholm has over the last three years. There is a direct correlation in the unlocking of Evan Bousard in acquiring Matias Ekholm in solidifying that first pair. A legitimate playdriv game controlling first pair has unlocked a level of playoff success the Oilers fundamentally did not have before before arrived. Yes, Zack Heyman helps there as well. McDavid and Dry Cidle reaching their physical primes. That helps. You needed this first defensive pair squared away and being able to meaningfully impact games for the Oilers to take that step from playoff team to Stanley Cup contender. Now, you have gotten great hockey out of Ekholm. I I don’t want anyone to construe this as me feeling that Ekholm is washed, that he’s let failing the team. I think there’s a strong argument that over the last few seasons, Ekholm’s probably been their most important. not necessarily their best defenseman, but I think there’s an argument he’s been their most important. He has given them so much value because of the performances he’s been able to get out of who he plays with. That’s kind of the key here. You’re never going to be the most exciting, exhilarating guy, but I pulled up his evolving wild card while we were talking. I mean, a 95th percentile player in goals above replacement as an Oiler over the last three years. 95th percentile. You know, in a league of 30 32 teams, we’re dressing 18 skaters a night. 32 by 18. I can’t do that math off the top of my head. I’m going to grab the handy dandy locked on Oilers calculator if I can locate it. I forget where I put it. I was using it before when I was putting together my show notes. And I don’t want to use my phone. That kind of looks tacky. But when we do 32 by 18, and that’s skaters, not just defensemen. 32 by 18. 576. So, of 576 players, if we’re going to multiply that by.95, we’re saying he’s better than 540% of 540 of the 590 players in the NHL over the last 3 years in terms of wins above replacement. Of course, that doesn’t count everybody who’s played in the NHL because more than just 18 skaters per team have played over the last 3 years. But in the context of just giving you a sense of scale, this has undoubtedly been one of the best defenseman in the NHL as an Oiler. And replacing that, even if you like Jake Walman as much as I do, is not an easy task. It is not the easiest thing in the world to play with this type of player. And look, the the Avalanche, that’s an outlier. Devonte’s could very well be his own guy on his own team. He could be the number one on a bunch of teams across the league. But playing with Macar, playing with Quinn Hughes, playing with Adam Fox, Charlie Makavoy, look at how often those teams have rotated their defensive partners, you know, Adam Fox largely played with Ryan Lingren, but this past year, Lingren’s decline really became an issue. They went out and traded for Carson Susi, and that didn’t work particularly well. They went out and signed Vlados Gaov in free agency. You look at the Conucks, Philip Bronick, Tyler Meyers, they’ve tried a bunch of different guys. Makavoy started with Hampus Lindholm once they traded for him. Played of course with Charara before that. They brought in Nikita Zidorov in free agency this past year to play with Makavoy. Finding that right partner for your best offensive defenseman is really an integral part of unlocking that next tier. And for the Panthers, it was playing Gus Forsling with Aaron Ecklad. And look, Forsling is the best defensive defenseman in the NHL today. I know there are going to be people who prefer Slavven. I frankly, and look, this is a hot take. I think Slavven’s massively overrated because he blocks a lot of shots and he plays defense in a visible way. I think I am significantly more impressed with what Forging does where he’s able to contribute a lot more puck possession-wise. I was talking with somebody the other day a few weeks ago who had watched the um the rewatch the team USA Canada four nations games both of them and what he was telling me was Slavven does a great job winning a lot of loose pucks but he turns them over almost instantly because he just doesn’t have the requisite puck skills to orchestrate breakouts and him and Brock Faber spent a lot of time in the four nations especially against Canada getting their skulls caved in in their own zone just absorbing pressure blocking shots and look there’s value in that being good at defense, but if you can’t get from defense to offense, if you’re struggling to drive possession, it’s a lot harder for your team to win, that’s just the very nature of how hockey works today. And Ekholm, if he stays off the aging curve and has a very gradual decline, at most has two or three seasons of being a top four defenseman left. I think it’s realistic to say if the Oilers give him anything more than 3 years, we’re going to wink wink nudge nudge that the the additional years after that are likely going to be spent on sbatical where his contract will be traded around on LTIR so bad teams can root the floor because that’s just the nature of this position and this style of player. I think I has been a great Oiler. He’s one of the he’s one of the real pleasures of watching this team because of how subtly good he is, the stuff he’s able to do in the corners, the way he’s able to absorb pressure and get pucks to Evan Bousard, and really the way he’s unlocked Evan Bousard as a player. I have no reservation in saying that Buchard does not become a $10.5 million point per game defenseman if he doesn’t get Matias in that crucial stage of his development. You know, there are plenty of good offensive defensemen who flop for varying reasons. You know, the Hurricanes, the Flyers, the Islanders, the Rangers, they all tried to make Tony D’Angelo work as an offense first defenseman who doesn’t give you a lot defensively. Doesn’t really work when you’re that bad defensively without the partner who’s able to really cover for you. The top of the market for defensive defenseman is Forsling, Slaving, and Weaguer. Forsling 5.75 million. He signed that deal at 28. Slavven 6.395. He signed that at 31. And then Mackenzie Weaguer 6.25. All of those guys got eight years the maximum term. I think if the Oilers are playing this as smart as they can, they try and keep this to a 2 or threeyear deal. They try and keep it between five and $6 million and they understand that over time they are going to need to replace because if he’s still giving you elite first pair impacts as a 38 or 39year-old that would be amongst the most extreme of outliers as humanly possible within the realm of what we understand about aging curves and about statistics. But that will do it for today’s edition of Locked on Oilers. Thank you to everyone who made locked on Oilers their first listen of the day. If you could be so kind, please subscribe to the show wherever you get your podcast. If you’re on Apple or Spotify, please leave the show a fivestar review. The reviews help the show so much. If you’re over on YouTube, hit that subscribe button. Join the conversation. Let me know what do you want the Oilers to do with Matias going forward down in the comments. I will talk to you guys tomorrow. But real quick, be sure to subscribe to Locked on NHL and Locked on NHL game night available on the Locked on NHL feeds wherever you get your podcast or over on YouTube. See you guys tomorrow. And until then, let’s go Oilers.

On today’s episode of Locked On Oilers, host Nick Zararis dives deep into the uncertain future of veteran defenseman Mattias Ekholm. As the Edmonton Oilers attempt to extend their Stanley Cup window, Ekholm’s age, injury history, and value as Evan Bouchard’s partner raise major questions. Can the Oilers afford another multi-year deal? How do other aging defensive defensemen like Chris Tanev, Ryan McDonagh, and Kris Letang compare?

Drop your thoughts in the comments: Should the Oilers re-sign Ekholm or plan for his replacement?

0:00 Intro: Oilers’ decisions on Matthias Ekholm’s future

5:14 Challenges in valuing defensive defensemen

10:22 Current NHL market for aging defensemen

15:58 Comparing Ekholm to other defensive contracts

20:04 Ekholm’s importance to Oilers’ playoff success

24:38 Finding the right partner for top defensemen

28:41 Outro: Subscribe to Locked On NHL

The Edmonton Oilers face a crucial decision on Mattias Ekholm’s future
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