Foster Signs in Edmonton

The Oilers went ahead and added a little bit more offense to the blueline with the deal that brings Kurtis Foster to Edmonton. Foster signed a 2-year deal worth $3.6 million, a $1.8 million cap hit each year.

Foster had a bounce back season after coming back from a broken leg that caused him to miss a calendar year worth of hockey.  With the Tampa Bay Lightning, Foster had 8 goals and 34 assists for 42 points in 71 games, ranking him 21st in defensemen scoring.  Among signed players in Edmonton at the time of this deal, Foster has the 2nd highest point total among them, so his offense will be greatly appreciated this coming year.

Forwards	Defense	Goalies
Dustin Penner	Kurtis Foster	Nikolai Khabibulin
Shawn Horcoff	Ryan Whitney
Ales Hemsky	Tom Gilbert
Zach Stortini	Sheldon Souray
Ryan Jones	Jim Vandermeer
	Ladislav Smid
	Taylor Chorney

Already, you can see the changes piling up in Edmonton and we haven't even made it into training camp to note the other changes that are on the horizon. I know outlets like CapGeek have Jordan Eberle, Magnus Paajarvi-Svensson and Linus Omark on the roster already, I'm holding off until there is confirmation that they have made the team. It might keep the Oilers light on their totals for a while, but that's okay, you'll at least know that they will have room for whoever makes it onto the team.

With the way I have the Oilers structured right now, I have them operating with 13 players at a salary cap hit of $38.6 million.  The Oilers did buyout Robert Nilsson yesterday, so we will have to factor in that, which is actually a bonus to their cap situation, so we'll call it a wash right now, just for the sake of simplicity. 

It shouldn't be any secret that the blueline as it stands is not going to stay put, especially with Sheldon Souray expressing his displeasure with the team in the off-season. The Oilers are certainly not in any hurry to offload him, as they are watching all of these defensemen get picked off the free agent board so quickly. Look for the Oilers to score big with a Souray deal this Summer, likely making their team a little bit stronger.