Cost for the Edmonton Oilers to keep key young players revealed

The St. Louis Blues recently offer sheeted two Oilers players, forcing the team to look for ways to move some cap in order to keep them.

Those players are 22-year-old forward Dylan Holloway (14th ov 2020) and 23-year-old defenseman Phillip Broberg. Notably, these are two of the team's best prospects from recent drafts. Holloway was drafted 14th overall in 2020 while Broberg was drafted 8th overall the previous year. While neither player has developed the way the team had hoped, surely they both still have value to the team. Both players were starting to show serious signs of improvement towards the end of last season as well, making this situation that much tougher for the Oilers. According to Elliotte Friedman, this is a bit of a self-inflicted wound as well from the team. Broberg was reportedly looking for a deal in the 1.8 million dollar range before he signed the offer sheet worth 4.58 million per season with St. Louis. Likewise, Holloway was reportedly hoping for a deal in the 1.2 million sollar range before signing his deal from the Blues that will pay him just under 2.3 million dollars for two seasons.

If the Oilers simply signed both players to what they were asking for, they would not be in this situation. Now they are forced to scramble, as they need to move cap quickly if they want a chance to match either offer sheet. One player that could be moved is defenseman Cody Ceci, but according to HABSolument Fan Editor in Chief Marco Normandin, the Oilers could need to give up an asset as valuable as a 2nd round pick in order to move on from Ceci's contract in full. This is based on projection models, courtesy of Puckpedia.

So now the team would be giving up a 2nd round pick in order to retain Broberg, who would presumably take over Ceci's role. Meanwhile, the stand to get a 2nd round pick if they let him walk. Not exactly great asset management for a former 8th overall pick. Furthermore, that would not even give the Oilers enough cap room to match the offers on both players, meaning another move would have to come. It would seem then, that new Oilers general manager Stan Bowman may have just made his first major mistake with the team just weeks after signing. Not many Oilers fans will be happy about that.

Source: HabsFanaticsWe now know what the Habs would get to take on Cody Ceci's contract

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