Oliver Ekman-Larsson has been one of the steadiest players on the Arizona Coyotes over the past several years, on both ends of the ice.
He’s a unique player that is able to contribute on both ends with his size, speed and puck skills, but the most unique part about him might be his stick. Earlier today, Reddit user rossco311 pointed out the stick in a recent game, but OEL has been rocking this tape job for a long time.
It would best be described as a thin goalie knob, but it’s not as simple as it sounds.
We spoke to a member of the Arizona Coyotes training staff, Tony Silva, who is actually the man who wraps OEL’s tape for him. The star defenceman has done it for as long as he’s been with the ‘Yotes, and it’s harder to accomplish than you may think.
Silva says the stick can take a while. With how thin the knob is, if it’s not wrapped properly it can deteriorate pretty easily. You have to wrap the tape extremely tight to make sure that the knob stays stiff. If not, it can get floppy and even slide off the end of the stick, which would probably defeat the purpose.
The entire reason for knobs in hockey is to keep the stick from flying out of your hand, so it’s fair to assume this is just an extra measure for when OEL is trying to maintain gap control – something he’s obviously pretty good at.
While we don’t have a specific reason for OEL using the knob, Silva did remind us that the defenceman’s countryman Nicklas Lidstrom had a similarly unique tape job, so that could have offered some inspiration.
Lidstrom’s stick checking was some of the best in history, so you can never go wrong taking some notes from him.
