I don’t think it can be overstated, just how much the right to Draft Connor McDavid has shaped the Oilers in such a short amount of time.
So much has happened so fast for the Oilers and everything about the club’s perception has changed in a matter of months. Months in which the Oilers haven’t even played a single game! The transformation has been remarkable.
The Oilers were seen as the home of dysfunction and failure by the end of the season. Lots of high end picks, no winning. The stench of all that losing came perilously close to being labelled a permanent attraction to the city of Edmonton. Stripped of the title “City of Champions” by our own city council, Edmonton was just where good hockey went to die. End of story.
The McDavid lottery changed all that. The lottery win was like 50ccs of adrenaline to the heart. For a hockey mad fanbase fuelled primarily by summers of Hope we are very used to the excitement of new young talent. McDavid is on another level.
The McDavid Effect was immediate. MacTavish barely had time to celebrate the lottery win before Nicholson started making sweeping changes to Management. He acted intensely fast to get Chiarelli in place and the changes kept coming.
The new wunderkind ushered in new management and that management ushered in an established coach like Todd McLellan. The only “name” coach I can ever think of the Oilers hiring was the venerable Pat Quinn and that experience ended after a single season. I haven’t seen the Oilers get an A Grade coach in the prime of his career since I was a child.
No, really. Edmonton’s head coaching history post-dynasty is basically a list of people who were willing to
do the job for a discount and were willing to help put up drywall on the weekends.
So new Management and a new Head Coach. Excellent. But the real test of the McDavid Effect was always going to be Free Agency. My entire adult life I’ve been told that the Oilers won’t be an attractive place for UFAs until they win. It makes sense. It holds true 95% of the time.
And then the Oilers signed Andrej Sekera to a deal at market value and when he discussed his reasons for coming his top 3 reasons were the new management, new coach, and the chance to play with McDavid. They signed Letestu and as soon as he started doing interviews he started saying that the reason he signed was because of the new management, the new coach, and the chance to play with McDavid.
Connor McDavid managed to do what nobody in the last 25 years has been able to do and that’s make Edmonton a desirable place for Unrestricted Free Agents. I’m not a religious man but I am petitioning the Vatican to recognize these events as legitimate miracles. We could have this kid Sainted before the beginning of the season.
The Oilers have had a very successful off-season so far and it all comes back to McDavid. And the Oilers wasted no time getting him on the ice at the Oilers development camp with Nurse and Draisaitl. The future is bright and the team is making sure that is front and center.
And how is McDavid feeling about his Oiler experience so far at development camp?
“The fitness testing wasn't a whole lot of fun, but (it was) really cool to throw on the Oilers gear, the gear I want to play the rest of my life wearing.”
That can be arranged, I’m sure, Connor.
Follow me on Twitter @Archaeologuy