from Ken Campbell of The Hockey News,

This time was supposed to be different. And for a while, it actually was. The Edmonton Oilers canvassed the hockey world for candidates to fill their vacant GM position. They talked to people around the league, compiled a comprehensive list of names and did their research on each of them, extensively interviewed them and got their input on everything from how to get the Oilers out of a cap hell to their top coaching candidates. One person who was interviewed said he spoke with Oilers president Bob Nicholson for six hours and came away impressed with how well prepared Nicholson was and how much he had done his homework.

So then what did Nicholson and the Oilers do? After all that work, they went out and threw $5 million a year on a five-year contract at Ken Holland, a guy who wasn’t even interviewed and whom Nicholson has a relationship from his time at Hockey Canada. For a franchise trying to shake the old-boy network image, it was a curious way to go about things.

So what do we make of all this? The safe and prudent choice or the predictable one doomed to fail…again? Well, of course, all of that will depend on Holland’s performance and which route he goes down with this franchise. If he’s Jim Rutherford 2.0, Nicholson will look like a genius. If Holland is the second coming of Peter Chiarelli, the Oilers will be mired in mediocrity for another decade. (And by the way, Oilers fans have every right to question Holland’s hiring and look at it warily. They are not the problem in Edmonton. They are not toxic. They react the way they do because their team has been dismal, dysfunctional and terrible and all those people have done is kept supporting it.)

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