Analyst takes a damning look at this season's numbers from Milan Lucic.

This does not look good for the Oilers.

HockeyFeed
HockeyFeed
Published 7 years ago
Analyst takes a damning look at this season's numbers from Milan Lucic.
Keystone Press

When the Edmonton Oilers signed Milan Lucic to a massive new contract in the offseason there was a largely mixed reaction, with some feeling the Oilers had pulled off a coup and others expressing their belief that the Oilers would regret the move in the final years of the deal.

On Friday Sportsnet writer Dimitri Filipovic took a closer look at Lucic's stats after 58 games played with the Edmonton Oilers, and what he discovered may cause for concern in Edmonton.

Filipovic analyzed the five on five play of all National Hockey League forwards who have played 300 or more minutes of five on five hockey this season, coming up with a sample size of 368 forwards. Filipovic then looked at how consistently those forwards found their way to the score sheet ranking players by points produced per hour, out of the 368 forwards Lucic, who is making $8 million this season, was ranked 307th.

Filipovic's conclusion was ugly to put it mildly:

[pub]

The back-half of the deal was always going to be miserable but I figured they'd squeeze out 2-3 productive years. It looks catastrophic now.

The Oilers are ostensibly paying out $8M this season for a 4th liner who occasionally drops the gloves. Savvy investment.

To make matters wors. according to Filipovic, Lucic has had the benefit of leaning on forward Connor McDavid, something that becomes clear when you consider that he has just 1 goal and 3 assists in roughly 400 minutes of five on five ice time without McDavid.

General manager Peter Chiarelli will be hard pressed to argue he has received a return on his long-term investment.

Source: