That one player (other than McDavid) the Oilers would be wise to lock up pronto?

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That one player other than Connor McDavid the Edmonton would be wise to sign lock up just now?

Fortunately this player has been mentioned repeatedly on Oilers Now by team insider Bob Stauffer as a player the team intends to sign.

I’m talking about Vancouver castaway Vasily Podkolzin, known affectionately to Oilers fans as Podzilla in honour of his hammering, crashing, board-thumping style of play.

Why get fired up about Edmonton signing such a player? After all, Podkolzin scored just eight goals and 16 assists last season, this despite playing regularly on Leon Draisaitl’s wing.

But Podkolzin brings many qualities that the Oilers need, namely youth, hitting, durability, hitting, hard work, more hitting, dedication, and even more hitting.

Such is his prowess at the physical game, which includes the ability to win pucks through aggressive forechecking and backchecking, that Draisaitl was reportedly satisfied to play with him through the year, which is no small accomplishment.

If we rank NHL forwards by their rates of goal scoring, assisting on goals and hitting at even strength for the 2024 and 2025 playoff season, giving equal weight to each of the three categories, Podkolzin ranks as the top forward in the NHL.

He made the most of limited ice-time, just 10.1 minutes per game at 5-on-5. He found a way to help out on scoring players while delivering 25.6 hits per 60 at 5-on-5, the fifth highest of any forward in the last two playoff years.

Of course this is a small sample size, and if we do a similar ranking for the entire 2024-25 regular season, Podkolzin ranks just 246th out of all regular NHL fowards due to his unexceptional goals and assists rates.

But we can see that if he can just pick up his offensive game a bit, he’ll be a very useful power forward for years to come, one that can hold his own in a Top 9 slot, if not playing in the Top 6.

More evidence of Podkolzin’s worth? At the Cult of Hockey video review project, we track hard plays that Oilers players make on Grade A shots, the goalie screens, hard charges, battles won, tips and jams that lead to Grade A shots and goals.

In the regular season, Podkolzin was the second best Oiler — after the superlative Zach Hyman — at executing such hard plays to create dangerous shots on net.

In 82 games, Podkolzin executed eight goalie screens, seven tip shots, 14 jam shots, five hard charges or drives on net, and won 31 battles leading to Grade A shots, 65 hard plays on Grade A shots in total, 0.79 per game, behind Hyman at 1.64 per game and just ahead of the increasingly frisky and mean Ryan Nugent-Hopkins at 0.78 per game.

In the playoffs this year, Podkolzin’s rate of hard plays at the net on Grade A shots dropped off to 11 in 22 games, just 0.50 per games, but he also get less ice time and less opportunity with Draisaitl.

In the playoffs, Corey Perry went beast-mode, as did RNH, both of them increasing their rates of such hard plays from the regular season, but Perry is gone now, off to Los Angeles, as is Evander Kane, a true hard man of hockey, but now a Vancouver Canuck.

The grit and ferocity of both Kane and Perry will be missed.

One hopes that Trent Frederic, who was pretty much a non-factor in the 2025 playoffs when it came to making hard plays to create Grade A shots (just three in 22 games) will be much, much, much better this coming season with improved fitness and health. Frederic will be counted on to bring much of what Edmonton lost with Perry and Kane departing.

But Podkolzin will also be a key for Edmonton this coming year.

Podkozlin, 24, is on the last year of a contract that pays him $1.0 million this year. 

I’d love to see him sign a five or six year deal with Edmonton. I’m not sure what that would take to get done, or if Podkolzin is interested in such a deal, but I’d love lock him up through the prime years of his career.

Is there risk in such a deal? Yes.

Maybe Podkolzin regresses and he’s never much more than a fourth line guy. Maybe the extra point scoring never materializes and he can’t cut it on a skill line over time.

Maybe you’re stuck paying more over the long term for a bottom line player. There is risk here, but I’m comfortable enough with Podzilla’s game to hope he signs for longer term.

Edmonton is short on what he brings. What he brings can help win Stanley Cups.

Little wonder Edmonton wants to sign him just now instead of waiting.

At the Cult of Hockey

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