October 17, 2025 by Ryan Lotsberg

Things are getting awfully crowded in the Edmonton Oilers dressing room. The Oilers currently have 23 players on their active roster along with two more on injured reserve and another on long-term injured reserve.

Zach Hyman is on LTIR as he nears a return from the dislocated wrist injury he suffered in the Western Conference Final. Jake Walman and Mattias Janmark were both injured during training camp and are both currently on IR. Those injuries made room for Noah Philp and Alec Regula to get an opportunity to prove themselves in regular season play.

Now Jack Roslovic is in the fold after signing a one-year contract with the Oilers last week. A fully healthy Oilers roster would have sixteen forwards, eight defencemen, and two goaltenders. That adds up to 26 players, which is three more than the league’s limit.

Related: Oilers sign Roslovic

The current annual cap hit of the Oilers roster is $2,824,166 over the cap. According to PuckPedia, the Oilers have a projected cap hit that is $2,807,629 over the cap. No matter which way you slice it, the Oilers will have to shed at least three players whose cap hits add up to a shade over $2.8 million by the time Hyman, Walman, and Janmark are healthy. 

Assuming only three players are moved off the roster, it averages out to a cap hit of approximately $933,333 per player that needs to be shed. If two players making the league minimum of $775,000 were to be removed from the roster, the Oilers would need to shed a little over $1.25 million. The maximum amount of an individual contract that can be buried in the AHL is only $1.15 million. So, the math says that two players making more than the league minimum will need to be removed from the roster barring a trade involving a larger AAV. Philp and Regula both make the league minimum. Odds are that at least one of them will stay with the Oilers through this injury situation.

The Oilers play back-to-back games on Saturday and Sunday. Walman and Janmark are expected to be back sometime this weekend. That means that two roster moves will likely need to be made over the weekend.

Regula, who was injured after two big hits from Evander Kane in Saturday’s win against the Vancouver Canucks, could be back this weekend as well. If he isn’t ready to return, he could be placed on IR to activate Walman. That would kick one roster decision down the road by as long as he is out for.

Roslovic’s contract has a no movement clause in place until November 1, at which point a modified no-trade clause with a four team trade list kicks in. It’s likely not a coincidence that November 1 is when Hyman is expected to return. Essentially, the Oilers and Roslovic have a few weeks worth of a tryout to see if this is a fit for both sides. Oilers GM Stan Bowman has said that he really likes Roslovic as a player, and the Oilers were Roslovic’s preferred destination; so I don’t see him getting traded to facilitate Hyman’s activation from LTIR.

The players that I see as possibilities to be removed from the roster are below.

Regula has a five-on-five expected goals for percentage of 54.27% in the two games he has played so far according to Natural Stat Trick. He’s got size, and he thinks the game well. There will be growing pains as he evolves into an everyday NHL defenceman, but he has the tools to be exactly that. The Oilers are high on him, which makes the odds of him being waived seem low.

Emberson’s xGF% was a dismal 32.46% in his three games, but an outing with a 74.23% xGF% and an assist against the New York Islanders on Thursday night has bumped it up to 47.04% on the young season. Emberson is tied for fourth on the team averaging 2:07 of ice time on the penalty kill each game, so he has carved out a role for himself on the penalty kill.

Troy Stecher made his season debut on Tuesday night. To put it bluntly, it was atrocious. His play improved in the game on Long Island on Thursday night, but Emberson was better. Stecher is the eighth defenceman on the depth chart when the roster is at full health. We generally know what we’re getting with Stecher, which is a reliable puck moving defenceman that battles his tail off. In my opinion, his playoff performance was enough for another team to warrant putting in a claim on him. I would put the chance of losing him on waivers at over 50%.

Tomasek and Howard are the two players on my list that are exempt from waivers. Tomasek has been getting time on the top powerplay unit in place of Hyman, so I don’t see him being one of the first players sent down if he gets sent down at all. However, he could be in trouble once Hyman returns. Despite being listed on the top line, Tomasek got the ninth most five-on-five ice time among Oilers forwards on Thursday night. Tomasek is averaging the second least amount of five-on-five ice time of any Oiler through four games; but he ranks seventh among forwards in total ice time. The 29-year old has more polish than his younger counterparts, but he needs a minute to get used to the NHL pace on the smaller ice surface.

Howard was essentially promised an NHL opportunity when he was traded to Edmonton this summer. The Hobey Baker winner wanted an NHL opportunity that wasn’t coming in Tampa Bay, so he requested a trade. This is professional hockey though. The Oilers have a responsibility to field the best lineup possible. They need to be open to the possibility that Howard might not be a part of that lineup right now. Howard is getting the least amount of ice time on the team. The only players who have less total ice time than Howard so far have only played in two games. He hasn’t done much with the little bit of ice time that he has been afforded.

Related: What are the Edmonton Oilers getting in Ike Howard?

Philp was the forward that got scratched to make room for Roslovic in the lineup on Tuesday. Philp scored his first NHL goal last Saturday, so it might have seemed unfair to scratch the guy immediately after that; but he also had two bad giveaways in his own zone in that same game. He leads the team in faceoff percentage, and he ranks seventh among Oilers forwards in five-on-five xGF% (53.76%). Knoblauch said that a big reason he came out of the lineup for Tuesday’s game is because he isn’t on either special teams unit.

Lazar is a serviceable veteran depth forward. He’s a right-handed shot that can play centre or wing, and he kills penalties. Lazar is a quality depth option to have around in the spring time; but to play devil’s advocate, a 30-year old depth forward is ultimately replaceable and the fact that he missed a significant portion of last season with a knee injury might scare teams away.

Janmark is an option as well. Janmark does a lot of things that coaches like, and he has more speed than he gets credit for; but his offensive production has plummeted. The Oilers have to decide whether or not his reliability and his penalty killing are enough to outweigh the fact that he doesn’t score anymore.

Verdict

I don’t see a defenceman getting sent down right now. Defensive depth is so important come playoff time, so I have a hard time thinking the Oilers want to risk losing any defenceman on waivers.

The “Ice Man” hasn’t seen much ice so far this young season. Howard has had the least ice time on the team through three games. He had just 7:30 in Tuesday’s game against the Rangers. I’m not sure that he even saw the ice in the third period as the Oilers juggled their lines in search of more offence and shortened the bench to defend a one-goal lead. Playing around ten minutes a night or less isn’t ideal for his development. He could benefit from some AHL time. I would send him down this weekend.

In my opinion, the other player that should be sent down to make room for Walman and Regula this weekend should be Philp. This choice isn’t meant as a slam on Philp or his play because I like the guy and he has played well.

It’s hard to see who should come out of the lineup to make room for Philp in all honesty. The Oilers are loaded with centres. For Philp to get into the lineup at centre, two of Connor McDavid, Leon Draisaitl, Ryan Nugent-Hopkins, Trent Frederic, and Adam Henrique have to play wing like we saw in the first two games of the season when Draisaitl and Frederic flanked McDavid. 

None of those centres are right-handed like Philp is, but the Oilers have Tomasek and Roslovic as righties on the roster that can take draws or play centre. There’s also Lazar if they feel so inclined. I found it interesting that the Oilers added Tomasek and Lazar this summer to add competition for Philp. They wouldn’t have done that if they truly felt that Philp was the solution as the 4C going forward. Then they added Roslovic as well, who can play centre but is more comfortable as a winger.

The centres I listed earlier are less likely to play wing once Hyman returns because there will be one less open wing spot at that time. The reality for Philp is that this is a deep lineup that was always going to be tough for him to crack regardless of how well he played. It doesn’t do him or the team any good to have him sitting in the pressbox, so he should be sent down.

If Philp was to get claimed, then he would get more of an opportunity elsewhere, which is the whole point of the waiver system. Being waived and claimed could end up being a good thing for Philp, although it would suck for the Oilers to lose him.

From a cap perspective, it’s a choice between Philp and Lazar. Lazar is equally as likely to be claimed as Philp in my opinion. Philp has shown some promise, but there’s a reason the 27-year old hasn’t established himself as an NHL regular yet. Lazar has proven to be a quality depth forward, but last season’s knee injury could scare teams away. 

As noted by Knoblauch, Philp hasn’t killed penalties at the NHL level. That makes Lazar’s toolbox a bit bigger than Philp’s right now, which tells me that Lazar is more likely to stay with the Oilers than Philp is. 

Prior to Tuesday’s game in New York, Knoblauch said that “we have a quality player that we haven’t played yet who is healthy that will be coming in soon”. He was referring to Lazar. That’s a tell. If he’s coming in soon, then he isn’t likely to be waived this weekend.

If they send down Howard and Philp this weekend as I think they will, they also need to send down at least one player that will clear more than $1 million off the books when Hyman returns. Burying Lazar’s $1 million cap hit wouldn’t be enough to activate Hyman if Howard and Philp were to be sent down.

The decision is between Janmark and Tomasek.

It should be noted that the Oilers waived Janmark and sent him to the Bakersfield Condors at the beginning of his first season with the club in 2022. He was waived on October 7, 2022 then subsequently recalled on November 9, 2022. Waiving and demoting him for a spell would not be an unprecedented move by the organization. No team would put a claim in to get two years of Janmark at $1.45 million.

I’m having a tough time getting a sense of what Knoblauch thinks of Tomasek. He’s getting Hyman’s role on the powerplay and he got a look on McDavid’s wing; but his five-on-five usage has been minimal.

My choice would be to waive and demote Janmark because I want to see more of Tomasek. I like his size and his potential to score more often than Janmark.

Moving Janmark, Howard, and Philp off the roster would clear $2,875,000 off the roster. That would be enough to get the Oilers under the cap when Hyman returns. The active roster would have thirteen forwards, eight defencemen, and two goaltenders.

When all the dust settles, the lineup would look something like this:

Mangiapane ($3.6M)	McDavid ($12.5M)	Hyman ($5.5M)
Nugent-Hopkins ($5.125M)	Draisaitl ($14M)	Roslovic ($1.5M)
Podkolzin ($1M)	Frederic ($3.85M)	Kapanen ($1.3M)
Savoie ($886,666)	Henrique ($3M)	Tomasek ($1.2M)
Janmark ($30k)[Buried]	Lazar ($775k)

Ekholm ($6M)	Bouchard ($10.5M)
Nurse ($9.5M)	Walman ($3.4M)
Kulak ($2.75M)	Emberson ($1.3M)
Regula ($775k)	Stecher ($787,500)

Skinner ($2.6M)

Pickard ($1M)

Total Player Cap Hit: $92,674,166