3 Oilers Entering Their Final Year With The Team

The Edmonton Oilers have a lot of contract concerns to take care of leading up to this season and throughout, including big names like Connor McDavid, Mattias Ekholm, Jake Walman, and Stuart Skinner, but also plenty of other players to deal with. No team ever looks exactly the same two seasons in a row, and with the Oilers coming so close and Stan Bowman's ability to make solid moves and decisions, the team is in for some more changes, no matter how good or bad they finish.

Brett Kulak

The Oilers are going to be focused on re-signing Ekholm and Walman to multi-year deals and with extensions to some of the other players as well, there won't be enough to allocate to Brett Kulak, very likely seeing him head to free agency and getting a larger payday. He has outplayed his current contract from the start and is going into the final year of the contract with a $2.75 million AAV hit. He can play both sides, kills penalties, and boosts his partner, but the Oilers will have to find someone cheap for their third pairing.

Calvin Pickard

Even though nothing has been done with the Oilers' goaltending this offseason, something is coming, likely during the season. There will be an upgrade, but the right opportunity hasn't presented itself just yet. When it does, Calvin Pickard will be the goalie that is on his way out unless Stuart Skinner has an abysmal season. Pickard is the veteran, cheap, and is capable of backing up in the NHL, so either a team who trades a goalie to the Oilers would need Pickard headed the other way in the deal, or he just becomes a UFA after the season if he stays and becomes the third string part-way through.

Adam Henrique

The Oilers reportedly asked a few players with no-trade clauses if they were willing to waive it for a trade. Darnell Nurse and Adam Henrique said no while Viktor Arvidsson said he would, leading to a trade to the Boston Bruins. Henrique is someone the Oilers would probably desperately want to move to create more cap space as his role can be filled fairly easily. He is firmly in the bottom-6 and could even see himself shifted to a fourth line center role if Ryan Nugent-Hopkins centers the third line at some point. Henrique is slowing down and in the final year of his deal with a cap hit of $3 million. Even though it's unlikely he is traded before his contract expires, he won't be re-signed.