11:01 a.m.: The trade call is complete, and the Oilers have now announced the deal.
10:01 a.m.: The Oilers and Canucks are working on a trade that would send winger Evander Kane to Vancouver if completed, Elliotte Friedman of Sportsnet reports Wednesday. Kane has confirmed the move himself on his X account. The Canucks are sending the Senators’ 2025 fourth-round pick (No. 117 overall) to Edmonton in return, according to Frank Seravalli of Daily Faceoff.
Kane had frequently been speculated as a trade candidate in the days since the Oilers lost their second consecutive Stanley Cup Final. Edmonton requires additional salary cap flexibility this summer to iron out a new deal for restricted free agent defenseman Evan Bouchard while reserving space for potential depth scoring and goaltending upgrades.
The 33-year-old winger is entering the final season of the four-year, $20.5MM contract he signed with the Oilers in 2022, which carries a $5.125MM cap hit. Edmonton is not retaining any of his salary, per Ryan Rishaug of TSN. Kane had a 16-team approved trade list as protection, but it doesn’t appear that was a hiccup for today’s move. Vancouver, Kane’s hometown, was his preferred destination if traded, LeBrun reports.
Kane’s move comes amid an active league inquiry into the Oilers’ handling of his surgeries and subsequent long-term injured reserve placement that kept him out for the entire 2024-25 regular season. The 6’2″ lefty underwent a wide-ranging abdominal/hip surgery last offseason but waited until the beginning of training camp to do so, keeping him sidelined until an expected January return.
Edmonton then announced shortly before he was due to return that Kane needed knee surgery, which paused his recovery from the previous surgery and added weeks to his return timeline. He wasn’t cleared to return until Game 2 of the first round, and the Oilers used the cap space Kane’s LTIR placement created to acquire defenseman Jake Walman from the Sharks in the week before the trade deadline. That surgery was recently reported as addressing a congenital issue, raising concerns with the league about the team’s decision to have him undergo the surgery at that point.
Upon returning to action in the playoffs, Kane’s performance was as expected. Even for his injury troubles and disciplinary concerns – he led the Oilers with 44 PIMs in the postseason – he’s still an extremely effective top-nine scorer and posted a 6-6–12 scoring line in 21 games. His defensive impacts continue to drag on his value, though. While never a stalwart shutdown winger by any stretch, his possession play was historically competent enough to help compensate for his defensive faults. That hasn’t been the case during his last couple of seasons in Edmonton, though, and it was especially apparent in the playoffs. Kane’s 45.5 CF% at even strength was 16th out of 23 Oilers skaters, while his relative impact of -6.5% was 18th.
That won’t be of enormous concern to Vancouver, though, especially with just one season left on his deal. The Canucks desperately needed to acquire scoring depth this offseason, and they’ll accomplish that in a pure form with Kane’s pickup. He’s averaged 29 goals and 54 points per 82 games over his 16-year NHL career. Those numbers would have put him in the team lead in goals and second in points last season. Vancouver only averaged 2.84 goals per game, 23rd in the league. Health is a legitimate concern – Kane’s only topped the 70-game mark once in the last five seasons – but with no long-term financial risk and a minimal acquisition cost, it’s a risk worth taking.
Kane should be penciled into a top-six role in Vancouver. He could even see increased minutes as a top-line wing option for Elias Pettersson, particularly with the Canucks expected to lose Brock Boeser in free agency next week.
As for the Canucks’ salary cap picture, they’re down to just over $7MM in space but have just one roster spot to fill assuming depth names like Linus Karlsson and youngsters like Jonathan Lekkerimaki and Victor Mancini get cracks on the opening night roster in the fall. While Boeser won’t be back in the picture, they have the flexibility to iron out an extension to keep center Pius Suter off the UFA market if they choose.
Rick Dhaliwal of CHEK TV was the first to report that the Oilers received a mid-round draft pick in return for Kane.
Image courtesy of Perry Nelson-Imagn Images.
Why would Vancouver do this? They just traded away a locker room problem only to pick up this guy?
Not to mention the surgeries (in both September 2024 and January 2025):
Two torn hip adductor muscles,
Two hernias,
Two torn lower abdominal muscles,
Arthroscopic knee surgery.
1. Didn’t cost them much for potential 20 goal scorer
2. It’s his hometown and he’ll be very happy there
3. It’s a contract year so he will be focused on playing well and being professional in effort to raise his stock
4. If it doesn’t work out he’s on an expiring contract
Jim Rutherford went senile around 2018
If the front office can’t point to locker room problems or injury issues as excuses they might actually have to build a successful team. Trading for Kane allows them to use both excuses.
Edmonton says thank you very much.
Good old fashioned addition by subtraction.
Oilers must be just as happy with the deal as those desert monkeys in pajamas and thank God this radical fiend stays north of OUR BORDER! God bless Canada and God bless The United States of America!
Lol. Figured I’d respond before message gets flagged haha. TOTAL OBLITERATION!
lol
Does anyone know what the Canucks are doing? Do they know what they’re doing?
Yes, see my reply to someone else’s comment. This isn’t bad for Vancouver imo
And you didn’t mention that he pisses off his teammates and coaches.
Didn’t have that problem in the playoffs this year
I get it. They need three top-6 forwards, does not have a ton of money to work with but several other teams have huge amounts of cap space, the worry that Quinn Hughes might walk soon, and an owner who demands playoffs as a goal. Given those parameters, it’s a worthwhile gamble.
Getting demoted to the 4th line because he couldn’t stop taking stupid penalties wasn’t a praoblem?
They are as confused as we all are 💀
Canucks going to Canuck 😂🤦🏻♂️
I recently said Patrik Allvin is bad at hockey, And he has built the Vancouver forward group into an expansion team, Here’s even more evidence.
Just like all of your options
Going to have to pre-ban him from the Roxy
Edmonton wins this one easy! LOL! Congratulations Vancouver! You’ve got yourself a new liability! HaHaHaHaHaHa!
Cheap pickup for Vancouver. Kane has some baggage for sure, but still a decent middle six option.
He’s a cancer, And everybody knows it, Well, With the exception of Patrick Allvin, Vancouver management learned NOTHING from last season’s drama, Vancouver will soon be the Buffalo of the Western Conference, In that, Nobody wants to sign there. Nice job Patrik Allvin. YOU ARE FIRED!
Hi Wilf.
Does this current Vancouver’s management team have idea on what type of team they are attempting to put together? Management would prefer to have Kane or Boeser? And some of their other previous deals are definitely head scratchers?
Kane can be good, but that game 3 was a massive embarrassment for the Oilers and was the turning point of the series, and Kane was a big part of it getting out of hand — he was completely out of control, and for what. Later in the series, it looked like he lost a step because he was trying to dial it back, and he didn’t contribute any secondary scoring, which was his role. He wore out his welcome.
As a Panthers fan, I completely agree with you. His conduct destroyed the Oilers direction. They are lucky to be rid of him.
hope kane’s new teammates are ready to kill off all the dumb penalties he takes
I remember reading an article a few years ago that speculated players like E. Kane and Byfuglien received a disproportionate amount of scrutiny and criticism because of their race.
Reading the comments here, I think that article was dead-on. Plenty of “problem child” players in the NHL, but Kane really gets crapped on more than most.
Because he’s not a good human being and off the ice has been more trouble than he’s worth on the ice, so it’s unfair to lump him in with Bufuglien.
This is very true. Domestic violence, sexual battery, bankruptcy, gambling addiction?
I don’t think that is a race thing against him.
Because he is a terrible human being away from Hockey. Slasher extreme. Nothing to do with race, nice try.
Honestly, I agree that Black players get a disproportionate amount of scrutiny. I hate it when people say K’Andre Miller “has raw athleticism but lacks intelligence,” as that’s exactly the same thing they used to say about Black quarterbacks in the NFL. I do think with Kane, there are legit criticisms about him being out of control in game 3. Honestly, I would say Jake Walman was also out of control. But Walman did what was expected of him after that game, whereas Kane didn’t provide the secondary scoring he really, really needed to after Hyman went down. Not an Oilers fan, just my thoughts about it.
I could agree with you to a limited extent but Kane is the wrong poster boy for this argument. The broader point has some relevance but I’ve hated Kane for many of the reasons that others have mentioned. As a Hawks fan I loved Big Buff and Seth (didn’t love the contract but still defended his talent) and think that most fans are mostly color blind. I don’t think it’s a completely irrelevant point but trying to use Kane to justify it is ignoring a lot of truly valid criticisms of his ability and character.
Probably the worst thing the NHL took from NBA’s influence was lazy player comparisons.
White guys are unathletic and fundamentally sound. Will make a great coach when their playing days are done. Always. Black players are athletic and fundamentally unsound. They have an aversion to authority and don’t care about winning. Always.
You rarely see a white player compared to an existing black player or vice versa. James Harden, for example, has no black contemporaries, but a really, really obvious white one in Manu– they’re basically the same player in silhouette.
I honestly can’t think of the last time a black NHL player didn’t have some sort of critique about his intensity, desire to win, or coachability. Ho-Sang, Duclair, Reeves, Buff, Kane, Miller, the incredible racism that followed someone flashy like Subban, etc. Buff especially should have been vindicated when the locker room issues persisted in Winnipeg after he left.
It wasn’t like this in the 90s and 2000s— no one questioned Jamal Mayers or Joel Ward and their ability to play hockey “the right way”.
Well said.
This race baiting BS is over the top. There’s quite a few black hockey players in the NHL now. Only one gets negative press for his behavior. You hear zero about any others. Marchand, Wilson, Perry, Bennett, the Tckachuk brothers are all in Kane’s group, and none of them are POC–just POS lol.
If that’s true, Then list those players, If you can’t do that, Your just race baiting.
He didnt have that problem because he sat in the penalty box for 90% of the playoff games haha
Looks like a win win for both. EDM gets some cap room for Bouchard or goalie hunting. But EDM now has less grit and protection for their stars. VAN probably knows they’ve lost Boser so they get a top 6 Wing. Kane is a FA after the season and will be easier to flip for more than the 4th rounder they gave up. Or he can play on EP’s wing and give him space and confidence to get his game back.
Prediction: if VAN not in playoff race, VAN flips to Metro team in playoff race at the deadline for a 2nd rounder
Can’t believe Stan Bowman did something right in his career.
Very true, This is actually the second thing, I believe he signed Artemi Panarin. But your are right.
He wasn’t a cancer in Edmonton, so the cancers gonna come back?
A 4th round pick for a guy with proven potential is… bad?
If the oil didn’t need to do ANOTHER re-tool, like signing another third string goalie, finding depth to replace or resign Arvidsson, Klingberg, Stetcher, Henrique, Brown… , AND break the bank to re-sign one dimensional Bouchard AND beg MacDavid to stay… would the oil have even traded Kane?
Oh ya, they gotta pay Perry too, no?
Perry’s not going to get much more than $1M, if that. They can fit him in if they want to keep him.
Was Kane really a cancer in Edmonton? Early on they were saying they liked him. Was that just typical press release stuff?