Scott Wheeler

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174 appearances 2 recordings 1 series first heard Jul 2026 last heard 21 Jul

Scott Wheeler’s voice in public audio — every appearance, attributed to the second.

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Recordings per month over the last 12 months — 2 in all, peaking in Jul 2026 with 2.

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Oilers NOW with Bob Stauffer · The Athletic's Scott Wheeler (7/20/26) · 20 Jul 2026 podcast

Um,

You need to trust that those guys are going to carry themselves to that one role or two roles on a top six blue line that does have to be a power play guy and does have to put up points and does have to sort of really control the game and be poised.

But a lot of defensemen in the league, you'd be surprised at how many guys in the league don't have that poise, don't have that power.

uh that skill level and they still find a lot of success by making stops by using their lengths by skating by taking away time and space and that is extremely valuable so really i think where i've changed the most maybe is on what i look for in defensemen more than forwards

Yeah, Chase was my number one defenseman and was, frankly, the number one defenseman for a majority of teams when I did my scouts poll at the end of the year.

And my question this year was sort of asking guys to rank the big five defensemen in this year's draft.

And the guy who showed up number one on the most lists was Chase.

was chase reed and sometimes the draft order just falls in such a way that the team that doesn't have them number one is the team that has that first or second pick available when there's a defenseman available and that's kind of the way it played out

for Chase this year, but my belief in Chase hasn't changed.

Obviously, there's been no updated hockey.

We'll have the World Junior Summer Showcase next week in Windsor, and I'll be there to watch him play and get an updated viewing on him, but just really believe in the skater, in the kid, in his ability to make plays in transition, in the way he runs.

the point in the offensive zone and in his developing defensive game, it became a real strength of his game.

He played 30 minutes a night for the Sioux Greyhounds this year.

And I'm just a big, big fan.

I do think that he and the rest of the defensemen sort of in that range, which are the five defensemen from this year's draft plus seven,

Some of the recently highly drafted defensemen, whether that's Sam Dickinson, who played in the NHL a little bit last year, or Zane Parekh, who played a little bit in the NHL last year, those guys are all kind of in the same tier for me.

I don't think there is a Quinn Hughes or a Cale McCarr in that group.

I think you're looking at...

a group of really, really high-end defensemen, but maybe not a true, true sort of Norris type in the prospect sphere at the moment.

So I could have ordered them different ways.

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