It’s probably nothing.
But it’s still a little unnerving to hear that Oilers defenceman Darnell Nurse will be watching the start of training camp from the sidelines while he recovers from a lingering playoff injury.
The veteran defenceman had been participating in informal team practices at their downtown rink this week, skating and shooting normally, but according to SportsTalk’s Tom Gazzola, he won’t be on the ice when the body contact begins.
The fact he can skate and shoot and he’s most concerned about taking contact is a good sign, suggesting it’s more impact-related than structural, but if it’s still bothering him two months after the playoffs ended you have to wonder.
So how long he’s out remains to be seen. Right now it sounds like this is a minor issue that will be resolved before opening night, but that’s what everyone thought last year when veteran blueliner Mattias Ekholm missed all of training camp with a lingering hip issue.
Ekholm sat out the first game of the season and, more importantly, didn’t get a chance to test drive what was supposed to be a pairing with Philip Broberg. The hope was that he would forge some chemistry with Broberg in training camp and do for the young Swede what he did for Evan Bouchard the year before.
Those plans got derailed and Broberg lasted 10 games with the Oilers before being sent down to the AHL until mid-April and is now in St. Louis after signing a two-year offer sheet.
It’s a similar situation this year. The Oilers need to find steady partners for Nurse and Brett Kulak on the second and third pairings now that Cody Ceci (traded to San Jose), Vincent Desharnais (signed with Vancouver) and Broberg are no longer in the picture.
The Oilers have four leading candidates to fill the two openings: right-shot defencemen Ty Emberson, Troy Stecher and Josh Brown and left-shot PTO addition Travis Dermott.
Stecher was here last season, acquired at the trade deadline, and played seven games before an ankle injury ground his season to a halt. He’s hoping that two healthy wheels will give him an honest shot at one of the two spots. He’s not big at five-foot-10 and 185 pounds, but he has almost 500 career NHL games under his belt and averages over 18 minutes a night, so he knows his way around a rink.
Emberson, 24, averaged 18:33 of ice time in his rookie season in San Jose last year and was one of the guys they counted on to defend against the other team’s top players. There is a lot to like here, but 30 career NHL games means he’s still unproven over the long haul.
Brown is big at six-foot-five and 220 pounds, a suitable replacement for the nasty presence that was Desharnais, but he’s on his fifth team in seven years so he’s yet to make a strong and lasting impression anywhere he’s been.
Dermott is a veteran presence who spent five seasons in Toronto, a tough hockey market, and two more in Vancouver before going to Arizona last year, where he averaged 17:17 a game over 50 games. He’s proven he can play, and his roots go back to Erie with Connor McDavid and Kris Knoblauch, but the bar is much higher on a Cup contender than it is on a 27th place team on a rebuild. That he couldn’t land a contract anywhere this summer might also be a reason to temper expectations.
The options might not end there, however. The oldest player in the NHL, Mark Giordano, who turns 41 next month, has spoken with Edmonton about a possible PTO opportunity and there are a few other veterans on PTOs elsewhere that the Oilers could scoop up if they’re so inclined.
So it’s a bit of a scramble on the blue line right now and Nurse not being here for training camp to help sort this all out isn’t ideal. But it’s only September and there is a lot of time to figure things out and assemble the kind of blue line that can withstand four playoff rounds.
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