When the longest-serving Edmonton Oiler defenceman Darnell Nurse waived his no-trade, and they found a taker in San Jose, it looked like addition by subtraction—not really excising Doc’s body of work but what the team had to pay him.
Nurse is a second-pairing NHL defenceman all day long, but not at $9.25 million with four years left on his deal. Whatever player they managed to get back in the trade from Sharks’ GM Mike Grier, the one-time 90s Oiler winger, was gravy.
The price of dumping the contract.
When the Oilers announced they were getting a younger defenceman Shakir Mukhamadullin, plus Western Michigan University forward Zack Sharp, there was more intrigue on how they would get those 13 letters on the back of a name bar if he made the team, not whether the 83-game NHLer would be a fit on their blueline.
But, lo and behold, the Russian defender, who was New Jersey’s first pick in the 2020 draft (20th overall) before they gave him up to San Jose as the key piece in the Timo Meier trade in February 2023, looks like he’ll be with another newcomer, Ryan Shea, on the third pair in the Oilers home opener Tuesday.
The Ufa-born Mukhamadullin got the nod to play the final dress rehearsal Saturday against the Calgary Flames, a tip-off on what coach Mike Babcock saw through camp, and, for now, he’s beaten out Ty Emberson and Spencer Stastney. The left-shot defenceman, more tree than shrub in Babcock’s vernacular for what he sees in rangy defenders, will be on the right side with the lefty Shea, when the Vancouver Canucks are here.
“I had watched him on video (before camp) and I thought he was trying to be cute. He wasn’t cute tonight (4-1 win over Calgary). He made the right play over and over again. And every time he’s out there, he’s still 6’5″, which is kind of nice. He’s big and he’s long,” said Babcock.
Babcock didn’t address what he’d seen on video with Mukhamadullin’s cute side. “I’ve talked to him tons but I’m not big on walking it back; it’s more about what’s going ahead,” he said.
“I’ve seen it a lot in the National Hockey League. You spend three years in one spot and you go somewhere else and really take off, probably because you learned a ton where you were…maybe you get mad and don’t think they’re treating you as good and all that stuff. You go to another spot and you take off. That’s what we’re hoping with him. He’s a big man, can skate, can really pass. I think Stan (Oiler GM Bowman) may have made a helluva deal here.”
Playing the offside for a defenceman isn’t the NHL norm, although the two Swedes, Rasmus Dahlin in Buffalo and Jonas Brodin in Minnesota, haven’t had any trouble.
But it’s harder to get pucks off the boards as a lefty on the right and spin away from checkers.
“First time he got the puck against the Canucks, he passed it over and I thought maybe he can’t get the hips turned around and get up ice. But after that, he never did it again. This was a good game for Shak. He had a bit of an injury the other day and we were worried about him but against Vancouver he was one of our better players,” said Babcock.
Mukhamadullin screamed offence as a teenager, which is why he went in the first round to the Devils. He broke the KHL record for most points as an 18-year-old defenceman, breaking Dmitry Orlov’s record. But he had trouble gaining traction with the Sharks, playing just 83 games in the three years they had him. He was a healthy scratch at times, like last March 17 here in a must-win game at Rogers Place when San Jose coach Ryan Warsofsky opted to play the veteran Nick Leddy, on the downside of his NHL career, ahead of him.
It didn’t sit well with the young player, but it also signalled what the organization probably thought of him, which is why when the Oilers were trading Nurse, they brought up Mukhamadullin’s name. Size, age, and NHL teams always look at first-round draft picks and think, “Maybe we can unlock what’s there.”
While he looks like he’s in the third pair for now with Shea, who seems to be a portable defender who could be in any of the pairings, Emberson may have the edge on Stastney to be the No. 7 because he’s a natural right shot. The Oilers may keep eight defencemen to start the season, though. No sight of Stastney being on waivers to get him Bakersfield.
Mukhamadullin, who turns 25 in January, was the fifth defenceman to go in the 2020 draft. Jake Sanderson (Ottawa), Jamie Drysdale (Anaheim), Kaiden Guhle (Montreal) and Braden Schneider (Rangers) went ahead of him.
Owen Michaels (43) of the Edmonton Oilers, playing the Winnipeg Jets at Rogers Place in Edmonton on Saturday, September 19, 2026.
Michaels ‘ in all the good clips’
It also appears Sharp’s WMU teammate, Owen Michaels, may have a leg up on replacing the injured Jason Dickinson in the line-up for the first game. Michaels, signed last spring as a free agent, didn’t come out of nowhere because the Oilers outbid several teams to sign him. But, he was leaps and bounds better than they thought in his first NHL camp, his attention to detail, his skating and his ability to win draws a right-shot centre gaining him the trust of Babcock.
How long he stays depends on Dickinson’s return, whether they like him more than Josh Samanski as a 13th forward, who can play centre, whether they feel he would benefit more by playing 20 minutes a night in Bakersfield than 11 here.
“He wasn’t even on our radar at all but he kept showing up in all the good clips. He wins these face-offs, he tracks back (defensively), he’s in the right spot,” said Babcock. “He’s never been a guy who led whatever league he was in in scoring but he was the captain of a team that won a national championship so he must know how to play.
“He’s bought himself another day and good for him. We’re trying to create depth, trying to find good players and he looks like he’s a good one,” said Babcock, who dressed Michaels over Samanski in the final exhibition and saw him win nine of 13 draws and take several in the defensive zone, also using him on the PK.
He’s won over a lot of people. The fact they put him beside the captain Connor McDavid in the dressing room was a pinch-me moment for Michaels.
“Pretty cool,” admitted the camp long-shot Michaels, who has been picking 97’s brain, asking lots of questions, as a rookie should, sitting beside the best player in the world. He benefits from being the only right-shot centre, also being coached at Western Michigan by Pat Ferschweiler, the four-year NHL assistant coach to Jeff Blashill when Blashill was head man in Detroit.
“I’ve always believed in myself. Everyone has opinions and they’re fair to do so,” said the communications major in school. “I just control what I can control.”
This ‘n that
Goalie Frederik Andersen is in town. He didn’t take part in any on-ice camp sessions as he rehabs from off-season medical issues, but has been working out. He’s definitely playing catch-up, more so for a goalie with no shots, no practices, no pre-season games. When he returns, the Oilers will be keeping three goalies on their 23-man roster.
Goalie Matt Tomkins is on waivers to get him to Bakersfield where Samuel Jonsson, Nathaniel Day and Connor Ungar are currently residing, before the organization decides who stays in AHL Bakersfield and who goes to ECHL Fort Wayne. Another prospect, goalie Eemil Vinni, has been here all camp, and watched Saturday’s game from the pressbox. With two goalies on each farm team, maybe they’re trying to find a place in another organization for the 20-year-old Vinni to play.
For now, winger Max Jones, who also needs waivers, remains as an extra forward.
Blueliner Damien Carfagna, who was excellent in camp and looks like a strong call-up option if injuries crop up, is on his way to Bakersfield.
Defenceman Atro Leppanen, who suffered a leg injury in Vancouver in the third pre-season game, may start the season on IR. He has to clear waivers to go to Bakersfield.
Centre Sam O’Reilly, sent to Tampa for Ike Howard in 2025, had a very good Lightning camp but the 20-year-old was loaned to AHL Syracuse Sunday as the Lightning got down to 26 players.
Ex-Oiler farmhand forward Sam Poulin, who signed in Montreal, is on waivers to he can go to AHL Laval. Same waiver story for one-time Oiler first-rounder Xavier Bourgault, on waivers in Ottawa.
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