Oilers earn marks in free agency by handling internal work

Ken Holland has earned himself some flexibility for signing reasonable contracts with Evander Kane and Brett Kulak after finally scratching the goaltending itch.

Video Transcript

JUSTIN CUTHBERT: Another winner is the Edmonton Oilers. I understand reservations around Jack Campbell. It's not often that the top of the class or the co-leader of the class in terms of at least goaltenders hasn't really proven himself to be a sure-fire starter. But for the first time in forever, and it has been forever, the Oilers searching for decent goaltending, they were able to attract one of the top names at the position, and that should be worth an upgrade for sure.

But it's also what the Oilers did with their own assets that I think was very impressive on the opening few hours of free agency-- the fact that the Oilers didn't have to really break the bank to pay free market prices on either Evander Kane or Brett Kulak. I think that helps the Oilers stay at the competitive level that they reached last season, but opens up some flexibility for them to continue to add and to augment the roster, which, of course, did very, very well last season-- showed that it was incomplete, but went very far in the Stanley Cup Playoffs and showed that it had real potential.

So with Kane just over $5 million, four years, they didn't really bend on term or dollar, which I think is a definite win, given that we don't know what the future will look like for Kane, other than the fact that he fit in really well with Connor McDavid. I think that can be considered a win. And now we'll see what happens for the rest of the offseason for the Oilers. But what they did in the first 24 hours of free agency was certainly impressive.