Over the past few weeks, people have been concerned with the reports on Darnell Nurse and his camp using Jacob Trouba's 8 million dollar a year contract as a starting point for negotiations. Agents typically start use the highest possible comparable they can and work their way down. There was no chance that Nurse was going to come close to that number (which by the way was a complete overpay by the Rangers).
For me, Nurse's next contract always looked like it would be something similar to Josh Morrissey in Winnipeg, who signed an 8 year 6.25 million dollar deal which kicks in next season. Comparing the two players shows how close their career numbers are:
With inflation and the cap starting to climb up again, I wouldn't have been surprised to see Nurse receive a longer term deal in the 6.5-6.7 million dollar range. Instead Ken Holland and Nurse took a different approach with some interesting pros and cons.
Yesterday Nurse signed a 2 year deal worth about 5.6 million (the exact number isn't official yet). At the end of this deal, Darnell Nurse will be an Unrestricted Free Agent. Therein lies the riskiest portion of the deal.
Nurse is a good top 4 defenseman. Paired with Ethan Bear, the two eat up a ton of even strength minutes for the Oilers and Darnell has been one of the better producers in the NHL on the backend at 5 on 5. When Nurse is on the ice alongside Connor McDavid or Leon Draisaitl, the team has a higher chance of scoring. Even though he is a big man, Nurse is also the best skater on the Oilers backend. There are far worse options to have on the left side of your second pairing defense.
Now the ugly.
Nurse is not good in his own end. He frequently loses his own man and there is a montage worth of clips which show his man in front of the slot wide open to either setup a goal or score it himself. Despite his size and ability to be physical, it's rare to see him consistently use his body to separate a man from the puck. Also, if I see Nurse on his knees in the crease with his stick out trying to stop a pass one more time I'm going to throw something at my TV. At 25 and with just over 300 games played, it's likely that this is what Darnell Nurse is. That isn't to say he can't or won't improve more, but his overall style of play isn't going to dramatically change.
At 5.6 million a season, Holland has effectively saved Edmonton an extra million a season over the next two years. With the team still dealing with some cap crunches that extra million is huge.
Summer of 2021 will be Nurse watch for the Edmonton Oilers. Next summer Nurse will either sign a long term extension with the Oilers, where they will be buying years of free agency, or he will be traded. There is next to zero chance the team goes into the 21/22 season with Nurse unsigned.
Jump ahead two seasons from now and there are a number of internal candidates that could replace Nurse in that second pairing position. Caleb Jones, William Lagesson, Kris Russell (kidding), Dmitri Samorukov, or my vote Philip Broberg. Edmonton has a plethora of left shot defensive prospects and young players in the system that could take a stranglehold on that spot in the next two seasons.
It isn't perfect but in the short term it makes sense for the Edmonton Oilers and there are enough options for the long term that could see this ending up going from being a good deal to a great one.
Thanks for reading.
Edmonton Oilers Blogger • 
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