Stan Bowman's grade from hockey commentator Mike Bartner

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This in from NHL commentator Mike Bartner, his assessment that for his body of work with the Oilers, GM Stan Bowman merits a D+.

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“His first 18 months was brutal with easily avoidable moves like Frederic and Jarry… The 2025-26 Oilers had their worst season since at least 2021. Things have definitely been better recently, but now they enter a make or break year with McDavid in part due to management.”

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The overall grade and assessment sounded harsh to me, but I did find myself nodding along to some of the most critical points that Bartner made.

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On the plus side, Barnter noted Bowman resigning his trade deadline acquisitions Jake Walman, Connor Murphy and Sam Dickinson for the McDavid’s championship window, picking up useful winger Vasily Podkolzin for a fourth round pick, trading for Walman who has excelled in the playoffs, and moving out two over-pays, the Darnell Nurse and Evander Kane contracts. “This allowed them to re-sign some key guys.”

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But in the negative ledger were: trading Stuart Skinner, Brett Kulak and a second rounder for Tristan Jarry and his three year deal at $5.4 million; trading a second and fourth rounder for Frederic and Max Jones, then after Frederic played so poorly in the 2025 playoffs giving him an eight-year deal at $3.85 million per year; failing to at least match the two year at $2.3 million St. Louis offer sheet on Dylan Holloway; quickly trading away Viktor Arvidsson for a fifth round pick after one down year; then replacing Arvidsson with Andrew Mangiapane, who was poor and “had to be dumped in the Dickinson deal, making that trade a first (round pick) instead of like two seconds.”

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1. Who is Mike Bartner? A new hockey commentator who has made a bit of a splash on Youtube and is known for colorful and controversial views. In a hockey landscape largely dominated by careful and circumspect mainstream hockey commentators, he’s a departure, hence his pointed take on Bowman.

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I’d have paid him little attention, except his negative commentary is fair enough, the same points often repeated by many Oilers fans.

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That said, most fans have a more positive view of Bowman’s body of work than does Bartner. In a social media poll on Bowman, the majority of fans think Bowman is doing a good job, giving him a grade of B.

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Only about 25 per cent of fans giving him a mediocre passing grade of C, while just five per cent giving him a failing grade like Bartner did.

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2. Could it be that Bartner has it right and most fans are going too easy on Bowman?

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Perhaps Bowman’s grade has been suddenly and positively impacted by his moving out the seemingly unmovable Nurse contract, doing so without any salary retention and doing so during a summer trading period of economic uncertainty in the NHL when not one other GM has been able to move out a bad contract.

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I heard praise for Bowman from some of even his staunchest critics after that one.

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3. I put the Broberg/Holloway offer sheet fiasco on former GM Ken Holland, but mainly on July 2024 interim GM Jeff Jackson, who went on a spending spree, signing players like Arvidsson and Jeff Skinner, putting the Oilers over the cap and making them a target for offer sheet punishment.

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Bowman did well to make up for the loss of Broberg and Holloway by signing Podkolzin and trading for Walman at the 2025 deadline.

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Bowman was just a few weeks into the job when Jackson’s mistakes exploded on Edmonton with the St. Lou offer sheets, but the new Oilers GM and the entire organization would have done well to recognize Holloway’s value and taken the small risk of signing him, trying to find the cap space later.