oilersrule66

"the young hockey addict"

Welcome to the next oilers dynasty • Canada • 21 Years Old • Male

Hartikainen flees to Russia

Damn.

This is a big blow for Edmonton's bottom 6. Temmu Hartikainen has signed a contract with Ufa in the KHL and is leaving the Oilers organization. This sucks for the Oilers because Hartikainen was a big young physical presence that was ready to start playing on the 3rd line next year and was going to be a big part of their future for years to come. And I just learned how to spell his name! The only good thing about this that I can see is that Hartikainen sopposedly had attitude problems and he might not of been a good fit in Edmonton because we don't want bad attitudes to rub off on the superkids and mess up their developpement.

Well I guess you can't moan and groan forever and sooner or later Edmonton's going to need to address the roster hole this leaves on their 3rd line. The 1st name that comes to mind is Chris Stewart on St. Louis. He's big, can play physical and can put the puck in the net. But to get him we would have to give up someone like say, Sam Gagner. There are also other people we could trade for that could replace him and there are some UFA's like Horton and Clowe, but all of these options mean we either have to trade someone of some significance or overpay for a free agent. So whatever way you slice it, Hartikainen screwed us by going to Russia.

This just goes to show ya that you can't mess around in a prospects developpement. The main reason Hartikainen left was proberly because he was bounced around so much between the AHL and NHL and he got discouraged and was frightened away. Hartikainen has to be tougher than that but still, Tambellini is the reason he left. Thank god he's gone.

Thanks for reading!