Newest Oilers defenceman may depart the team sooner than expected

The Oilers signed the 32 year old Klingberg to a one year contract for $1.7M, and after being named a healthy scratch today, it's not looking positive that he'll be a piece for this team moving forward.

OilersNation analyst Tyler Yaremchuk recently brought up the point that Klingberg has no trade protection this season, so the Oilers could try to move him and clear his $1.7M salary to make another trade.

Klingberg has had a reputation of being an elite offensive defenceman who struggled in his own zone, and those problems were exacerbated by injury.

While Klingberg is still getting some nice passes off, he's so unreliable defensively that the Oilers couldn't possibly trust him in top 4 playoff minutes.

Last game against Washington, Klingberg had a horrific effort on the backcheck that led directly to a goal against.

While Klingberg can be a decent passer, he's simply not creating enough to offset the dangers of his adventurous defensive play. He has 2 points in his first 7 games, but being healthy scratched today is a sign the coach wasn't happy with his play.

Regardless of how the Klingberg signing went, he was never going to stay with the Oilers long term. Either he registered his game and earned a contract extension the Oilers couldn't afford, or he was bad enough to be cut from the team. If he was in the murky middle, like it seems like he is, Klingberg isn't worth much to the Oilers.

By any measure, there's no real path forward for Klingberg to stay with the team. More and more, it's looking like a mistake to offer him a contract at all, especially at a prorated salary of $1.7M.

The Oilers could potentially look to move off Klingberg's salary at the trade deadline, but if not, there's little chance that he'll be brought back to the team.