Big, new & nasty forward debuts today in Edmonton Oilers organization
This in: big and nasty Ontario Hockey League power forward Connor Clattenburg, who signed a contract with the Edmonton Oilers just before Christmas, will make his debut for the organization in Bakersfield today.
My take
1. The odds of any fifth round draft pick making it in the NHL are small, more so if they were an over-age player that scored just 13 goals in 60 games in their draft year. But Clattenburg has some skill, 16 goals in 46 games this year, and a quality that is greatly desired by NHL GMs: ferocity.
The young man is a Cal Clutterbuck-style hitting machine on the ice, and as Clutterbuck demonstrated that kind of player can come out of nowhere to have a long and successful NHL career. Clutterbuck was a third round pick who played in 1064 NHL games.
His Hockey DataBase mug shot certainly gives me a chuckle. He looks an extra from a 1970s brawl scene from the movie Slapshot.
2. When he was drafted by the Oil last June, Steven Ellis, prospect analyst for Daily Faceoff reported, “Clattenburg isn’t much of an offensive threat, but he makes it a mission to hit everyone in his path.” And Edmonton’s top scout Rick Pracey: “He plays this game hard. He’s thick, he’s strong, he’s competitive. He was a development event player, he got traded to Flint and he just took off. He’s an exciting player for us.”
3. In September, after a game against the Jets rookies, the Cult’s Bruce McCurdy reported: “Physical winger met his match early when he got drilled in the corner by Liwiski, a 23-year-old who had 310 (!) PiM in the ECHL last year and another 26 in 7 AHL games. Later was heavily boarded by 25-year-old Dylan Anhorn, survived the crash, got up mad and proceeded to fill in his opponent with some solid punches. Somehow only coincidental minors were called after the bare-knuckled set-to. Made a good play to win the puck with an aggressive forecheck and feed it to a mate in the low slot, the type of sequence that will need to become a trademark if he is to make it in the pros.”
4. In a follow-up preseason game against the Calgary Flames, the Journal’s Rob Tychkowski said of Clattenburg: “Clattenburg was all over this game. He had more scoring chances than anyone but couldn’t find a goal.”
5. In ranking Clattenburg at #22 among Oilers prospects this past summer we expressed the following expectations for the season: “A cameo at Oilers rookie camp, then back to Flint for a third full OHL season to round out his game. Not impossible he’ll get an over-age season there as well, given the Oilers don’t have to reach a contract decision on this player until mid-2026.”
6. Clattenburg exceeded expectations this year, enough that he earned an pro contract. Can he do so again?
The Oilers are dead last in the NHL in hits per 60, just 24.7 per game, with NHL leader Florida at 29 per game. Florida stocks its fourth line with rough and aggressive hitting forwards. The Oilers might well do something similar. Right now the only Oilers forwards who play much of a hitting game are Vasily Podkolzin, Trent Frederic, Max Jones and Evander Kane, with Kane gone still out. There will be openings in the years to come for forwards with enough skill to hang in the NHL game and with the determination, guts and ferocity to hit hard and often. Clattenburg is in the running for one such job.
