STAY BAD FOR EKBLAD

As I type this, the Oilers are losing 3-1 with just under a minute left in the game. Another tough loss for the NHL's second-worst worst team [thanks Buffalo, try to stop beating teams other than the Leafs! -ed], the Oilers have now lost 5 in a row, their record officially becomes worse than the 4-14 Eskimos were this season, and Dubnyk against gave up three or more goals in a game. (TSN kept charitably giving Dubby a break saying the defense let him down: having enviro-idiot Andrew Ferrance treat his goaltender like a top lends credit to that theory).

It wasn't all negative: for about 5 minutes in the 2nd period the Oilers played like a team that actually gave two shits about this "hockey thing" that they are paid to play. Nail Yakupov scored, making his asshole agent happy and preventing the Oilers from becoming the first team since 1927 to be shutout in 4 consecutive home games. (212 minutes, apparently. Back in the 20s they never kept much track of these things, and Justin Schultz scored with about 2 minutes left in the Washington game a couple weeks back, so it's hard to know specifically how this home shutout streak ranks precisely in league history)

Yet the negatives, as they are, continue to pile up: more lacklustre scoring by the "explosive Oilers offense" that every season preview writer kept promising, the great Moscovian Hope got shellacked in Oklahoma City today, and Ryan Smyth continues to have the hand-eye coordination of Michael J. Fox. Yakupov gets a goal and instantly draws a stupid 4-minute penalty: players are still lazily skating around the ice, there's no urgency by this team on almost every play, and I probably should mention that since I started typing the Oilers have, indeed, gotten around to officially losing the game. Meanwhile...well, if you read Grantland you should know that they charitably don't call this the most depressing CapGeek page day after day only out of mercy.

I don't know if I've mentioned this before, but I haven't attended any Oilers games in person lately. In fact, I know exactly which game I went to last: Oilers vs. Pittsburgh, January 14th 2010. The Oilers were winning 2-0 after two periods, and then Crosby stood on his head and knocked us to the dirt. That was the game, that was the precise game when the fans realized that the season was over, and the only course of action available was to tank completely and gun for the first overall draft pick. This was 2010, and Tyler Seguin was a top-scoring centreman who might save the team. But the other guy had the more appropriate name.

"Fall for Hall" was born that night, and I was there. The Oilers did indeed fall to a lowly 27 wins on the season, picked Taylor Hall first overall, and have had two more #1 picks and a #6 pick since. Hall, RNH, Yakupov...and I've never seen any of them play live. That was the year I started the rule: If the Oilers are over .500 on New Year's Day, I'll go see a game. They weren't over .500 on January 1st 2011 (they made a push that year but fell short), and then tanked in March/April and got another #1 pick in RNH. January 1st 2012 they sure weren't over .500 again, and cruised to an easy #1 pick in Yakupov. January 1st 2013 the entire league had yet to play a game...which means they weren't over .500 and I won't be buying Oilers tickets in 2013.

Remember the good old days of this franchise? Forget Gretzky and Messier and Fuhr. Forget Pronger and Peca and Roloson. Hell, forget Todd Marchant scoring in OT in 1997, and Janne Niinma and Jason Smith and Mike Grier. Remember the good old days of January 2010 when we hadn't been a lock to be last place in the NHL yet? It's the midway point of November and we've written off the season. With 21 games to go, for the Oilers to get me to buy any tickets between January 1st and December 31st 2014, they will need to go 17-4 in their next 21 games of the year. Stick a fork in this disaster, they're done.

RNH didn't have a good chanting name, but "Fail for Nail" caught on a couple years back. In the half-season they played last year, the Oilers couldn't compete in the suck prize with teams like Colorado and Florida, but now we're right back into the stink of things: poised to be contending for that number one pick in the draft come June.

It's a weak draft, just the Oilers luck, with no clear standout like Yakupov to choose from. The November 2nd snapshot of rankings is available (from an Oilers blog, natch), and Sam Reinhart still tops the list, with Leon Draisaitl, Haydn Fleury, and Willie Nylander still holding down the top-10 rankings they've been holding for 4 months now. But remember last year when overall #1 consensus Seth Jones fell to 2nd place in the rankings with a week to go? There's some room to move here, and one name that really stands out. I've never seen him play hockey, can't name his team, and have no idea if he'd be a good fit in the Oilers dressing room (or even if he'd be a candidate to play right away). But he's perfect for the Oilers franchise this year. Why? Because of the chants.

So join with me Oilers fans who didn't read the post's title, and let's all begin practising our mocking cheers now:

STAY BAD FOR EKBLAD!