August 8, 2025 by Ryan Lotsberg

The 2 Mutts Hockey Podcast (@2MuttsHockeyPod) shared an interesting tidbit to shake up the slow August hockey news cycle on Thursday:

We are hearing that Paul Coffey wasn’t happy with the management staff in regards to trading away Evander Kane to the #Canucks

Coffey expressed why a player like Kane would be someone keep & resign because how deep his connection is in the community, he lives in the City year…

— 2 Mutts Hockey Podcast (@2MuttsHockeyPod) August 8, 2025

Essentially, what they are saying is that Paul Coffey didn’t like Evander Kane being traded away. The post from the 2 Mutts Hockey Podcast says that “there’s some talk that Coffey will have more say going forward on the player movement side because of this move.”

This situation doesn’t pass the smell test for me. The assistant coach didn’t like a roster decision made by management, and he gets more say in roster decisions because he didn’t agree with management’s decision.

In which other professional sports franchise on the face of the Earth would a situation like this play out other than with the Edmonton Oilers?

Coffey vacated his position behind the bench and returned to his special advisor role to Oilers owner Daryl Katz earlier this summer. THAT is why there’s talk of Coffey getting more say in roster decisions.

There’s a pattern of Katz running to Coffey at different times ever since January 21, 2018 when Coffey was hired as a “skills coach”. Coffey’s role as “skills coach” came to an end on May 28, 2019. During that span, Todd McLellan and Peter Chiarelli were fired, and Ken Holland was hired.

While there was never a formal announcement about Coffey being hired as a special advisor to Katz, I was able to piece together that it happened sometime before January 2023. The Oilers claim that Coffey was brought on in 2022. I would suggest it was either early in 2022 or even possibly before then. Coffey met with the Oilers during a three-game New York road trip that began on December 31, 2021. 

Related: Coffey is Symbolic of Katz’s Lack of Trust: Part One

The Oilers were mired in a 2-11-2 slump at that time. Dave Tippett was fired shortly thereafter. 

On the November 12, 2023 edition of Edmonton Sports Talk’s The EST Hangout, Tom Gazzola made comments about Coffey essentially “running the team” during the 2023 offseason before Jackson was hired. The Oilers lost in the second round of the 2023 playoffs after having made the Western Conference Final the year before, and Holland was entering the final year of his contract. Once again, Coffey was inched closer to the team at a time of trouble, and two significant organizational changes followed within a year.

Tom Gazzola on Paul Coffey… pic.twitter.com/UNab2ivKth

— RossCreek (@akaRCN) November 12, 2023

Related: Coffey is Symbolic of Katz’s Lack of Trust: Part Two

The Oilers had a slow start to the 2023-24 season (3-9-1) before Tippett’s replacement, Jay Woodcroft, was fired. Coffey was thrust onto the bench to be an assistant coach on new and current Oilers head coach Kris Knoblauch’s staff. Oilers CEO Jeff Jackson said that it was his decision to ask Coffey to step behind the bench, but I would be floored if Katz didn’t at least put that bug in Jackson’s ear.

Now, if what the 2 Mutts Hockey Podcast is saying is true, Coffey is being given more power at another time of trouble. The Oilers have lost two consecutive Stanley Cup Finals, and the team got considerably younger this offseason. Coffey didn’t like Kane being traded away, and Katz trusts Coffey, so Coffey gets more power.

Coffey doesn’t own the team, so why does he get so much power? Why does the organization turn to him at the first sign of trouble?

Katz.

It’s the owner’s influence. Katz has done A LOT for the city of Edmonton and the Oilers franchise. He has brought financial stability to a small market team that desperately needed it, and he made Rogers Place and the Ice District a reality. His passion for the team and the city is clear.

I’ll also add that treating franchise greats and former players the way that the Oilers franchise does is a wonderful thing. “Once an Oiler, always an Oiler” feels like a real mantra rather than a meaningless slogan.

Having said all of that, Katz’s reliance on Coffey is toxic. The way that Coffey always seems to appear, be pushed closer to the team, or be given more power when trouble is afoot can only be described as “toxic”. It shows a clear lack of trust in the people in place, which makes for a toxic workplace culture. 

My issue isn’t even about Coffey being a part of the “Old Boys Club” or being one of the “Boys on the Bus”, although that factor plays into it. Kevin Lowe being PROMOTED by Katz in 2008 after missing the playoffs in two consecutive seasons after reaching the Stanley Cup Final in 2006 and holding that position until 2015 and still not being removed from the organization after all those years of “darkness” is another glaring example of Katz clinging to the glory days that was baffling to me.

The issue is that Coffey is seemingly the chess piece that Katz moves when he wants to put his staff on notice. If Katz really values Coffey’s opinion this much, he should just put Coffey in charge because it appears that Coffey is the only one that he truly trusts. That would be better than continuing to slowly inch Coffey closer to the team when things start to go poorly for a minute. 

Coffey was a fantastic player and a true legend of the game. It turned out that he was a decent coach as well. That’s where his expertise lies. It does not lie in roster construction. I don’t see any reason for him to be viewed as “the solution” to whatever ails the franchise aside from him having had a legendary playing career. That doesn’t automatically make someone an expert in roster construction.

I don’t think Coffey should have any say in roster decisions, especially if he thinks that carrying a $5.125 million cap hit for a 34-year old forward that just missed a full season of hockey due to a serious core injury was the right decision because he’s good in the room and in the community.

I respect and appreciate Kane for everything he did in the Edmonton Community during his time with the Oilers, but the reality is that Kane is on the wrong side of the age curve and his injuries have piled up over the last few years. He had a nice start to the 2025 playoffs when he had fresh legs, but he was basically invisible in the Stanley Cup Final. He wasn’t the difference maker that everyone thought he would be based on his style of play. The Oilers needed to move his contract to make other roster changes. The Oilers needed to get younger and faster, and they did that through the additions of Andrew Mangiapane and Isaac Howard.

Coffey should either leave the organization or be put in charge because this vague title and the ambiguity that surrounds his responsibilities and his level of power in the organization is toxic. I don’t think he should have any say in roster decisions. I’ll leave you to do the math on what I think Coffey’s role in the organization should be.

It feels like Coffey’s movement within the organization is Katz’s way of imparting control without actually being closely involved. Coffey has his own ideas; but Coffey himself is Katz’s idea. That’s what makes this whole situation toxic. Katz needs to put trust in the people that are in place. If Katz wants to know what’s going on with his organization, he should talk to the people he has entrusted with roles rather than using a “special advisor” to gain information. He should talk to his people rather than putting Coffey in all these different positions.

These moves involving Coffey are becoming more and more frequent. That tells me that Katz’s patience is growing thin. I think everyone involved with the Oilers is getting impatient. That includes the players, the media, and the fans as well as the management group. We all know that this team is capable of winning with the talent that they have, and it’s fair to argue that this team should have won a Stanley Cup by now. 

Giving Coffey more say in roster decisions at this point in time is the first sign of mistrust in Jackson and current Oilers GM Stan Bowman from Katz. We have enough historical data now to know that a shift in Coffey’s role means that an organizational change of some kind looms.

The Oilers are going through a bit of a transitional phase as big contract extensions to Leon Draisaitl, Evan Bouchard, and eventually Connor McDavid are being signed and added to the payroll. That has created a need to get a cheaper supporting cast for the next year or two until the cap rises to the point where the Oilers will have cost certainty with their stars and more flexibility to round out the roster. 

While a Stanley Cup win is certainly possible in the next two years, this transitional phase might mean more waiting for a Stanley Cup. Moving backwards after coming so close is a recipe for a change in upper management, especially in Edmonton at this juncture of McDavid’s career.

I wouldn’t be surprised to see Coffey involved in a more specific high-level capacity whenever the next change in upper management happens. I wouldn’t be surprised to see it happen within the next three years because this transitional period is a recipe for turmoil and a change in Coffey’s role is always a sign of impending change. I don’t want Coffey to run the show, but one could easily argue that Coffey is being groomed for that role.

This is all just speculation on my part; but we need something to talk about in August, right?