{"id":87838,"date":"2020-10-10T15:08:06","date_gmt":"2020-10-10T19:08:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/?p=87838"},"modified":"2020-10-10T15:08:06","modified_gmt":"2020-10-10T19:08:06","slug":"goalie-mike-smith-edmonton-oilers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/2020\/10\/10\/goalie-mike-smith-edmonton-oilers\/","title":{"rendered":"Goalie Mike Smith Re-Signs With the Edmonton Oilers"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><strong><strong><a href=\"https:\/\/www.hockey-reference.com\/players\/s\/smithmi01.html?utm_campaign=Linker&amp;utm_source=direct&amp;utm_medium=linker-\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Mike Smith<\/a><\/strong><\/strong> will remain in Edmonton. The unrestricted free agent goaltender has signed a new deal with the Oilers. It is a one-year deal worth $2 million dollars.\u00a0 The Oilers bring back both of their goalies from the 2019-20 season.<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" data-width=\"550\" data-dnt=\"true\">\n<p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">The <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/hashtag\/Oilers?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">#Oilers<\/a> have agreed to terms with goaltender Mike Smith on a one-year, $2 million contract.<a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/Rogers?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">@Rogers<\/a> | <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/hashtag\/LetsGoOilers?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">#LetsGoOilers<\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/2x9IQc1DsE\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">pic.twitter.com\/2x9IQc1DsE<\/a><\/p>\n<p>&mdash; Edmonton Oilers (@EdmontonOilers) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/EdmontonOilers\/status\/1315001986706669568?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">October 10, 2020<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n<h2>Mike Smith Signs Deal<\/h2>\n<p>The 6&#8242;-5&#8243; Smith is hoping to be a big presence this year after two &#8220;down&#8221; seasons. This past year he split duties with <strong><strong><a href=\"https:\/\/www.hockey-reference.com\/players\/k\/koskimi01.html?utm_campaign=Linker&amp;utm_source=direct&amp;utm_medium=linker-\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Mikko Koskinen<\/a><\/strong><\/strong>, on the <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/category\/oilers\/\" target=\"_self\">Edmonton Oilers<\/a>. But he was clearly their second choice come the play-in round. Smith managed just over one period of play against the <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/category\/blackhawks\/\" target=\"_self\">Chicago Blackhawks<\/a>, allowing five goals in 27 minutes. To be fair, Chicago fired 23 shots on net in those 27 minutes. Any team giving up 50 shots a game isn&#8217;t going to win often, whoever the goalie is. But Smith was also off during the season with a .902 save percentage over 39 games. That number is slightly better than the one he had the previous year with the <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/category\/flames\/\" target=\"_self\">Calgary Flames<\/a>. There, he had a .898 save percentage in 42 games &#8211; but that&#8217;s not why Edmonton signed him. In Calgary&#8217;s five-game ouster, Smith had a .917 save percentage, turning away 188 shots.<\/p>\n<p>There was hope he could do the same in the bubble, but it&#8217;s hard to blame one man for the team being outplayed.<\/p>\n<h3>What This Means for the Future<\/h3>\n<p>At 38-years old, Smith won&#8217;t be called on to be the clear-cut starter. He&#8217;s at an age where short-term deals are the norm, so he wasn&#8217;t going to get four years. And after this off-season of cap limits and Musical Goalies, he&#8217;ll take what he can get. His age and mediocre numbers might make his signing a surprise for some fans. His 2019-20 contract was bonus-laden for a reason. Smith can split duties capably, however, carrying his team for a stretch if needed. He is still solid outside the net and able to move the puck to his skaters quickly. And after 14 seasons in the NHL, he&#8217;s not going to be surprised by much.<\/p>\n<p>In what is likely a very compressed season, having that insurance policy is a comfort.<\/p>\n<p>Main Photo:<\/p>\n<p><a id=\"kfqm2Jo6TpRPJNcELplcww\" class=\"gie-single\" style=\"color: #a7a7a7; text-decoration: none; font-weight: normal !important; border: none; display: inline-block;\" href=\"http:\/\/www.gettyimages.com\/detail\/1208865252\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Embed from Getty Images<\/a><script>window.gie=window.gie||function(c){(gie.q=gie.q||[]).push(c)};gie(function(){gie.widgets.load({id:'kfqm2Jo6TpRPJNcELplcww',sig:'8TDIU3RwxO9Yz7s6Q_3LB-0ZF0N2eNoEKgO_kXqBsvI=',w:'594px',h:'443px',items:'1208865252',caption: true ,tld:'com',is360: false })});<\/script><script src='\/\/embed-cdn.gettyimages.com\/widgets.js' charset='utf-8' async><\/script><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Mike Smith will remain in Edmonton. The unrestricted free agent goaltender has signed a new deal with the Oilers. It is a one-year deal worth $2 million dollars.\u00a0 The Oilers bring back both of their goalies from the 2019-20 season. The #Oilers have agreed to terms with goaltender Mike Smith on a one-year, $2 million [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3171,"featured_media":87882,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"","_lmt_disable":"","sfio_featured_image":false,"sfio_embed_code":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[4548,23,4547,34],"tags":[138,1781,662],"class_list":["post-87838","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-nhl","category-oilers","category-hockey","category-news","tag-edmonton-oilers","tag-mike-smith","tag-nhl-free-agency"],"modified_by":"Ben Kerr","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/87838","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3171"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=87838"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/87838\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/87882"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=87838"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=87838"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=87838"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}