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How did this happen?

It started with somewhat sound intentions. Hunt had played for former Oilers GM Craig MacTavish in 2011-12 when MacTavish coached the Chicago Wolves. When MacTavish got promoted to GM in Edmonton after the 2012-13 season, he signed up Hunt.

At the time, Hunt was just a marginal pro prospect, mainly due to a lack of size, his advanced age and his unexceptional AHL production. He was 25-year-old, so at the very outer edge of the age-class for any kind of hockey prospect. He’s listed at Hockey Data Base at 5-feet, 9-inches, 187-pounds; he lacks the size and reach to easily defend bigger players and his skating is unexceptional by NHL standards. He’s good with the puck, though, and has a strong shot. He had put up 33 points in 65 games for the Wolves in 2012-13. That was OK point production, but not indicative of any kind of strong bet. He was at very best an OK bet at that point, but not an utterly atrocious one.

The Oilers brought him in to try out for rookie coach Dallas Eakins, Hunt and other AHL vets like Ryan Hamilton and Will Acton, all of them amounting to a sizable opportunity cost for the team. What I mean by “opportunity cost” is the ice-time invested in these players, and especially in Hunt on the power play, that could have gone to other players instead of them.

It perhaps made sense to make a bet on Hunt that first year, 2013-14, as the Oilers had something of a need for a power play quarterback, with Justin Schultz expected to take command at the NHL level, but only Philip Larsen otherwise in the picture. Perhaps with Larsen already on board the Oilers shouldn’t have brought in Hunt at all.