Trade rumors are in full swing this week as insiders dig deep for some info on what NHL teams might pull off this summer. As we inch closer to the offseason, Edmonton Oilers defenseman Darnell Nurse finds himself hogging the headlines for all the wrong reasons.<\/p>\n
Sportsnet\u2019s Mark Spector reports that Oilers general manager Stan Bowman is set to have a sit-down with Nurse to check if he\u2019ll waive his no-trade clause so Edmonton can more effectively maximize the $9.25 million cap hit he carries.<\/p>\n
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As it turns out, this may not be the first time the two parties have broached the subject.<\/p>\n
Why Oilers Veteran Darnell Nurse Was Upset With Edmonton Brass<\/p>\n
On Friday\u2019s episode of the 32 Thoughts podcast<\/a>, NHL insider Elliotte Friedman reported that Oilers bosses had a conversation with Darnell Nurse after the end of the 2024-25 NHL season.<\/p>\n \u201cA year ago, Nurse had a very emotional season-ending interview with the team. They went to him (and a couple of other guys, all guys with no-trade clauses), and they said, \u2018Would you be willing to move?\u2019 He was upset that that got out. He said no, he wouldn\u2019t, and we reported on this pod, and it became a big story out there. And Nurse was really upset about that, which is totally fair,\u201d Friedman said.<\/p>\n Advertisement<\/p>\n \u201cThis year, they didn\u2019t do that at the end of the year. They didn\u2019t ask him, and based on Mark\u2019s reporting, they need a bit longer to decide what they are going to do.<\/p>\n \u201cThe thing about Nurse is he\u2019s a year away from his no-trade clause going from a full to a partial. It\u2019s clear they\u2019re going to say to him, \u2018This is the last year you\u2019ve got control, so do you wanna work with us or not?’\u201d<\/p>\n The Oilers\u2019 primary goal this offseason will be to strengthen a blue line that looked porous all season long, which explains their pursuit of Bruce Cassidy. However, doing it without shipping Nurse\u2019s $9.25M cap hit out will be a Sisyphean task.<\/p>\n Edmonton figures to have about $16.4 million in cap space, counting Nurse on the books. However, they have a clear priority list of UFAs to target, starting with in-house names like Jason Dickinson<\/a>, Connor Murphy<\/a>, Kasperi Kapanen<\/a>, and, potentially, Colton Dach<\/a>. Names like Jack Roslovic<\/a> and Connor Ingram<\/a> will likely fall outside the Oilers\u2019 price range, given the salaries they will command on the open market.<\/p>\n Advertisement<\/p>\n DON\u2019T MISS: NHL Free Agency Rumors: Oilers, Rangers Could Battle it Out For 41-Point Scorer<\/a><\/p>\n There\u2019s also the teeny-tiny little task of getting another top-six scoring option to take the load off Connor McDavid<\/a> and Leon Draisaitl<\/a>. The Oilers have been linked with St. Louis Blues<\/a> forward Jordan Kyrou<\/a>, but then again, absorbing his $8.125M cap hit will be a tall order if they don\u2019t ship out Nurse\u2019s contract.<\/p>\n All things considered, Stan Bowman has his work cut out for him in a year where McDavid\u2019s two-year extension kicks in. Bowman will be on the clock the second the puck drops on the new season, given McDavid is eligible to sign another extension at the end of the coming season.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Trade rumors are in full swing this week as insiders dig deep for some info on what NHL…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":592641,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5125],"tags":[26,11097,2663,155,1563,1809,198,146,5300,2300,5,1648,4446,1479,4812,370,4,24,84,6269,4991],"class_list":["post-592640","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-edmonton-oilers","tag-calgary-flames","tag-colton-dach","tag-connor-ingram","tag-connor-mcdavid","tag-connor-murphy","tag-darnell-nurse","tag-edmonton","tag-edmonton-oilers","tag-edmontonoilers","tag-elliotte-friedman","tag-hockey","tag-jack-roslovic","tag-jason-dickinson","tag-jordan-kyrou","tag-kasperi-kapanen","tag-leon-draisaitl","tag-nhl","tag-oilers","tag-st-louis-blues","tag-stan-bowman","tag-the-oilers"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nhl\/116703280744917277","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/592640","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=592640"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/592640\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/592641"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=592640"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=592640"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=592640"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}