Edmonton Oilers winger Evander Kane will have surgery in a few days to repair two sports hernias and four muscle tears which eventually took him out of the playoff lineup for the last five games of the Stanley Cup Final.
There is no timeline on how long Kane will be out but for a simple sports hernia, medical people say the recovery period is somewhere between six and 12 weeks. With all this bodywork that Kane needs, it sounds like the forward, who turned 33 six weeks ago, won’t be ready to play in even three months.
It’ll be longer than that, although Kane, who saw a battery of doctors over the summer for opinions, was vague on when he would return.
“I’m having a lot done…both adductor (muscles) on each hip, two lower abdominal muscles and two hernias,” said Kane, who was unable to sit between shifts at times during the Oilers’ two-month playoff run and was shown (TV) standing at the end of the bench because of the pain/discomfort, even though he still played 20 games with four goals and eight points.
Because the Oilers have enough salary cap room, even with Kane’s $5.125 million cap hit, Kane will likely just be on the regular roster to start the season, not even on injured reserve. They will need to look at people like farmhands Raphael Lavoie, James Hamblin and Lane Pederson as a 12th healthy forward to dress on the fourth line for league games. Or see how PTO invite winger Mike Hoffman looks in camp, if he has anything left in the tank.
But, if they run into a couple of injuries to other forwards, that could change.
“We don’t need to use long-term (LTIR) right now (Kane),” said general manager Stan Bowman. “We have salary cap room ($946,000 of space) on the regular roster currently but if we do run into a number of injuries that are short-term ones during the season and we need to bring bodies up (Bakersfield), then we have the flexibility to put Kane on long-term.”
Kane, who first noticed skating issues last October, didn’t have surgery earlier in July or August after the playoffs ended because first, he wanted to see if rehab worked, then he was getting first, second, and third surgery opinions.
“We wanted to see how things looked after taking some time off to see if anything settled down and it could be rehabbed and get better but that ended up not being the case,” said Kane, whose last game was Game 2 in Florida in the Cup final after he took numerous practices and morning skates off to have enough left for the actual games.
“We started the due diligence to find the best surgeons; we heard from three different groups of doctors. They all agreed on the (severity) of the injuries,” said Kane, who allowed that different doctors had different (medical) procedures that had different timelines (recovery), however.
“It’s (surgery) a big undertaking and I only want it fixed once so I can continue my playing career. I talked to various players around the league who’ve had similar surgeries or work done by those surgeons. I talked to Sean Monahan and he was really insightful.”
Where is the surgery taking place?
“Would you like the address and the zip code?” he kidded, refusing to say where it is, only that he’ll be having the surgery early in Oilers training camp.
First noticed injury in October
Kane has had a rough last two seasons with his wrist sliced by Pat Maroon’s skate, and now the hernia/hip/abdominal problems that bugged him for months even though he still had 24 goals in 77 games in the regular season.
“I noticed something was wrong in late October. It slowly got worse but the thing with his injury, some days you would feel better than others,” said Kane, who took the last couple of regular-season games off, so he would have a week of rest before the playoffs started, but he was playing on a prayer during post-season.
“Injuries are part of the game, especially being a contact sport. The wrist injury was a freak accident but this one is something I’ve never had, no hip or core muscle injuries in my 15 years,” said Kane, who said there was a shift in the last game of the Dallas (third-round) series where he needed help getting off the ice but he managed to suit up for the first two games of the final in Florida.
‘I don’t have a timeline’: Kane
Could the severity of his medical issues cost him the entire season?
“I certainly hope not. I don’t have a timeline. I’m a few days away from surgery so it’s premature (to say how long he would be out). I don’t have those answers. My understanding is the doctors know the severity of the injury and how long I’ll be out.
The Oilers did sign Buffalo Sabres’ left-winger Jeff Skinner in July to play in the top six, either with Leon Draisaitl or Connor McDavid, so they covered their bases knowing Kane’s medical issues. But Kane is a unicorn on this team; their most physical forward, apart from his offence.
They missed his hard-driving skating and hitting, as well as his intimidation factor in the playoffs, especially. They can likely get by without him for several months of league games but in the post-season, they will need him healthy and banging.
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