EDMONTON — Let’s face it: the only forward jobs being contested at Edmonton Oilers training camp are on the fourth unit. That’s the bottom line.
“We’ve got to figure out our bottom line,” said Tippett. “Our Top 9, we’ve got a pretty good idea who they’re going to be. But the bottom three (positions) we’re going to look at a couple of scenarios.”
The Oilers' top three lines look like this:
Hyman | McDavid | Puljujarvi
Nugent-Hopkins | Draisaitl | Yamamoto
Foegele | Ryan | Kassian
Then there are six players — Devin Shore, Kyle Turris, Ryan McLeod, Tyler Benson, Brendan Perlini, Colton Sceviour — fighting for the last three spots, and likely five jobs overall.
So, what kind of fourth line do you want?
Do you want penalty killers? A power-play specialist? Grinders like Sceviour, who is on a PTO at Oilers camp?
On a team with Edmonton’s Top 6, skilled, swift, but not very physical, we’d prefer to see some size. Bigger players who will hit you during their scant, 12 minutes per game.
Well, the biggest candidate is Perlini, and though he is scoring like crazy this pre-season (five goals) he is not a physical player. Josh Archibald (myocarditis) was likely the most likely to lay on the body, but he won’t be playing any time soon. Turris, Shore and McLeod are definitely not physical players, the latter a big body who would be well served to use that size more often.
Right now, though, McLeod is trying to figure out how to get on the other column of the score sheet.
“He hasn’t got a lot of points in the NHL yet,” Tippett said. “Shore is a more veteran player who understands what the role entails. McLeod understands it, but he’s still learning it.”
We asked Tippett if he has enough physicality among the fourth line candidates. Here’s what he said:
“We think we’ve added that in (Zach) Hyman. We think we’ve added that in (Warren) Foegele. A healthy (Zack) Kassian coming back. I’ve got no issue with that.”
Here’s a look at the fourth line candidates, and our thoughts on who will get the gigs:
Tyler Benson
Benson is a six-foot, 190-pound skill guy. Asking him to grind it out as a fourth-liner — check, play it safe, get in on the forecheck, kill penalties — is simply asking him to forget about all the things that got him here.
I’ve never been from the “just put him on McDavid’s wing and he’ll be great,” school, when it comes to young players who come to town. But Benson simply isn’t a fourth-line player. And if he is, then your fourth line is too small and not physical enough.
I like Benson, and he deserves a chance to be what he is. If that can’t be in Edmonton, then here’s hoping the Oilers put Benson on waivers, and he gets picked up by a team that’s light on the left side and wants to use him in their Top 9. Trying to make him your 4-LW isn’t only bad for the player, it’s not what this Oilers team needs out of its fourth line.
Devin Shore
Shore makes the team. Full stop.
He is (almost) exactly what you want on Line 4: he can play centre or wing, and take draws; he kills penalties; he is quick, and can forecheck. Plus, Shore has played 326 NHL games and is on a two-year deal making $850,000 a year.
Shore is six-foot-one, 206 punds. Big enough, but ideally he is the smallest player on the line.
Edmonton Oilers' Brendan Perlini, right, checks Calgary Flames' Martin Pospisil during third period pre-season NHL hockey action in Calgary, Alta., Sunday, Sept. 26, 2021 (Jeff McIntosh/CP).
Brendan Perlini
Five pre-season goals is nothing to sneeze at. Perlini may just score himself onto the team.
“It’s been decent so far,” said Perlini, who scored again in Edmonton’s 4-3 win over Calgary Monday night. “Working as hard as I can, doing those little things. Create something, be hard on pucks, and play a real solid game. Luckily we could chip one in.”
When you consider a successful fourth-liner gives you between eight-to-10 goals per season, you’ve got to ask: What will Perlini bring to the team when he isn’t scoring? Or, maybe he’ll not stop, and move up in the lineup.
Remember Ty Rattie? When the goals stopped coming, he couldn’t tread water.
Can Perlini check? Is he physical? He has never used his considerable size (six-foot-three, 211 pounds) that way before. Does he make you harder to play against, like a fourth line should? Can he survive on the road, when the opposing coach will put his top line out against Edmonton’s fourth unit?
If you’re keeping Perlini on the team to be a goal scorer, then play him up the lineup. If you think a player who has never been strong in his own end is a fourth-line answer, we think you’ll be regretting that decision by about Dec. 1.
Kyle Turris
Committed to prolonging his career, somehow it seems like this former top line player might be able to adapt to a role where keeping pucks out of his own net is the focus. Smart and skilled, he’s another guy who won’t punish anyone, or make the Oilers a team you wish you didn’t have to play.
If you have Turris and Shore on your fourth line — a righty and a lefty for faceoffs — that’s good news. But, you’d like the other winger to have some size and aggression if possible.
Ryan McLeod
He’s a young player who will require some patience, but we see the potential reward at the end. At the risk of sounding like a broken record, though, this is another fourth-line candidate who doesn’t hit a soul.
We see McLeod shifting to the wing, or perhaps centring two centremen in Shore and Turris, with the objective of grooming a player who is destined to grow into the 3C role behind McDavid and Draisaitl.
