Winners, Losers and the Toronto Maple Leafs: Evaluating the NHL Off-Season

The Toronto Maple Leafs are among the losers, unfortunately

May 4, 2024; Boston, Massachusetts, USA; Toronto Maple Leafs left wing Matthew Knies (23) and Boston Bruins right wing David Pastrnak (88) speak after the Bruins defeated the Leafs in overtime in game seven of the first round of the 2024 Stanley Cup Playoffs at TD Garden. Mandatory Credit: Bob DeChiara-USA TODAY Sports / Bob DeChiara-USA TODAY Sports

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The Kings and Clear-Cut Winners of the Off-Season

The Edmonton Oilers celebrated their appearance in the Stanley Cup Final (which was awesome and hopefully no one has been spinning being the runner up as a negative) by making the best move possible for their franchise:

Moving on from Ken Holland.

Ken Holland is one of the NHL's worst GMs but he always falls backwards into success, which must be frustrating for less lucky general managers, but whoever they've got running their team in the interim should really have the job full time.

Most teams who are good enough to make the Finals in a cap-league get ravished in the off-season but the Oilers managed to retain everyone and get better somehow.

They re-signed Corey Perry, Adam Henrique and Mattias Janmark all on very reasonable extensions.

Then they signed Victor Arvidsson, and Jeff Skinner to value-deals that make them better.

The trade with Buffalo which landed then a top-prospect for a mid-range non-star player in Ryan McLeod was a perfect cherry on top of a near perfect off-season.

The Oilers will once again be one of the best teams in the NHL - probably the very best - and should have no trouble repeating as Western Conference Champions.

To be honest, no NHL team came close the Oilers who won the NHL off-season by a country mile.

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