What kind of team?

What kind of team are the Oilers building? Is it a winning team? Is it a team that bases its decisions around results, hard work, and hockey sense?

Here's a quote from Lowetide:

I admire the Oilers commitment to continuity. These teams who change management every 5 minutes never get any kind of sustain because the deck chairs are all getting moved constantly. Credit to the Oilers, who have had the same evaluation group in place for the entire decade, the same coach since 2000, and a management team that is largely the same as it was at the turn of the century.

This is what winning teams do, with examples being the Habs (Pollock-Bowman), the Islanders (Torrey-Arbour), the Oilers (Sather) and more recently the Red Wings (Holland, Nill, etc). The problem is that the Oilers forgot the key item in the equation: winning.

This is especially reflective of MacTavish's comments today, in which he said Robbie Schremp was not physical enough nor strong enough to keep up with NHL forwards. Sure, Robbie Schremp hasn't shown that his skating has improved a whole bunch, though his skating has made great strides - no pun intended. It's not exactly like Strudwick skates a whole lot better himself. And you can argue Strudwick brings a whole different dimension of game to the table that makes up for his lack of skating ability. But in terms of physicality Strudwick trails both Stortini and MacIntyre and Schremp was producing at 0.75 pts/game. I don't even know what that number is in terms of every 60 minutes.

So why all the criticism about Robbie Schremp's supposed inability to keep up at the NHL level? If he had 3 points in 4 games, and we're a team about getting results and rewarding people who produce, then this player named Schremp should be getting a promotion to the 1st line, not Liam Reddox. I love Liam Reddox and all, but right now he's built like a checking forward, not an offensive catalyst.

Ryan Potulny, however, is deserving of the call-up. His play at the AHL level and in Springfield has been deserving of a second look. The Falcons may stink a whole bunch, but at least Potulny is leading the pack.

But in terms of double standards, Schremp loses and Reddox wins.

Why?

Because our Oilers administration keeps saying one thing and doing another.

Look at the photo above - does that look like a guy who's not physical, not up-to-speed, and does it seem like someone who doesn't feel like his level of intensity is important? If you do, you're on crack. And that means MacTavish is on crack.