EDMONTON — Leon Draisaitl is not a subtle man.
On Saturday morning, the superstar who signed a new eight-year deal to be an Edmonton Oiler for life performed a clinical, critical autopsy on an organization that’s prepped and ready for a summer on the operating table.
His honesty was as brutal as his backhand dishes are precise, his opinions as direct as a one-timer from his office on the power play.
Straight and to the point, here are the highlights:
Are you concerned the Oilers are headed in the wrong direction?
“Yes, I am concerned about that … we're not trending in the right direction. We've taken big steps backwards. We’ve got to get a grip of this and head back in the right direction.”
How does Connor McDavid’s two-year contract window shape every move the Oilers make?
“In what world do you have the best player in the world on your team, and you're not looking to win? I mean, I know we're looking to win, but we have to be better. There's no way around it: we have to improve.
“(McDavid) is signed for two more years, and God knows where that goes. But as of right now, we have two years. We have to get significantly better.”
What about that age-old Oilers theme of needing to include the bottom of the roster in the process, rather than leaving it all up to the big boys? Head coach Kris Knoblauch mentioned it Saturday, almost like the concept was new.
“There's no choice but that. The best team that we've had, in 2024, everybody played such a major role in it. The (Ryan) McLeods, the (Warren) Foegeles, (Vincent) Desharnais, (Cody) Ceci. … They all played such a massive role in all of it. You need those guys to go deep.
“At the end of the day, Connor, Bouch, maybe myself — when the game's on the line, we have to make a difference. Day to day, we have to set the tone and lead in the right way. Come up with big goals and big moments, yes. But it's not a three- or four-man team.”
Yes, while general manager Stan Bowman filibustered the media Saturday, pouring out reams and reams of words that amounted to a lesson in covering his own ineffective work and trying to preach patience in a situation that calls for expedient action, his star players cut to the chase.
And they cut to the bone.
“I agree with Leon that the organization as a whole has taken a step back,” said McDavid. “That starts with me, starts with Leon. We all can be better. We all need to be better.”
After two straight years in the Stanley Cup Final, the ‘25-26 Oilers looked like a team that became accustomed to being a really good team, but forget what it takes to become a great team.
“Yeah,” McDavid agreed. “You take it for granted sometimes, how hard it is to be a great team, how hard it is just to get in the playoffs. How hard it is to win in the playoffs. How you need to put everything into it.
“This year, everybody took it maybe just a little bit for granted. Like it would just happen. But things don't just happen.”
There are issues here in Edmonton, all operating underneath the terrifying canopy of McDavid’s potential exit, which could end in a trade as early as next summer.
McDavid can be re-signed on July 1, 2027. If he’s not willing to re-sign, Edmonton’s choice will be whether to trade him next summer or risk getting “Mitch Marnered” the way Toronto did.
But on a day like Saturday, McDavid is no Draisaitl where straight-forwardness is concerned. On the other hand, he’s never criticized anything even remotely concerning his team without adding a proviso like, “That includes me,” or, “It starts with me, first and foremost.”
In the front office, where they’ve absolutely blown the last two July 1s and authored the unrivalled worst trade of the 2025-26 NHL season — the Tristan Jarry deal — Bowman offered only obfuscation on Saturday.
He took some blame, mitigated the rest, and turned a question about July 1 into a dissertation on developing Matt Savoie and Vasily Podkolzin — ironically, two players who have helped to mask the Oilers’ incompetency in the free agent market.
At another point, Knoblauch stated that his staff had perfectly outlined the Anaheim power play, and that several Ducks' power-play goals were scored exactly how players were told they would be. A 50 per cent playoff penalty kill was blamed on the players’ execution, or the GM’s acquisition of said players — one or the other.
To be fair, Connor Murphy, a PK pillar, confirmed as much.
It also must be said that separate Oilers management groups built separate teams that took the Florida Panthers to seven and six games in the Stanley Cup Final, and those players failed at the final task.
But, ultimately, it will be owner Daryl Katz and the men who built these rosters who will go down in hockey history as the builders of an organization that had the greatest player in the world — and Draisaitl as well — and did not deliver a Stanley Cup, if it ends that way.
The Tragically Hip once said, no one cares about something you didn’t do.
In this case, they’ll care. And they’ll never forget.
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