You think the pressure is tough in Edmonton? Try following a Columbus team that, in its eighth season of existence, is still attempting to secure its first post-season berth.

Try facing a future that, though blessed with the presence of youngsters such as Nikita Filatov (the No. 1 NHL-ready prospect as selected by the Hockey News’ upcoming Future Watch special edition), Jakub Voracek, Derick Brassard and Steve Mason, could include the departure of star forward Rick Nash, slated to become an unrestricted free agent in the summer of 2010 and rumoured to be considering employment with another team.

Year-in, year-out, mismanagement stunted the Blue Jackets’ growth — and only since GM (and former Oilers management mainstay) Scott Howson came on the scene in 2007 has there been some semblance of discernable progress.

But even then, the road to championship contention is almost invariably slow and fraught with potholes.

That may be the ultimate lesson the Oilers learn this season.

For argument’s sake, let’s say Edmonton falls short in its playoff drive; does that mean GM Steve Tambellini and the rest of the front office should begin placing dynamite sticks around the team’s pillars to begin the process of starting over from scratch?

Of course not.

The fact of the matter is that Edmonton, like Columbus, has got a handful of solid young players still finding their NHL identities, one or two top-level performers and a collection of league veterans who haven’t proven able to guide the Oilers into a group of elite teams that includes Detroit and San Jose.

Therefore, Tambellini’s challenge is just about identical to Howson’s: Settle on a core of four or five players to build around, and augment that core with both bargain-type role players and the odd splurge on veteran UFAs.

Panicking or pouting over a disappointing season does nobody any good.

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You got it — Dustin Penner. The same dude Craig MacTavish introduced to the underside of Edmonton’s careening bus last week when the coach called the player “not competitive enough or fit enough to help” the team.

But it isn’t only Penner who has caused the Oilers to lose five of their last eight. He isn’t the root cause of Edmonton’s 27th-ranked penalty kill, nor his team’s faceoff percentage that is even worse (at 46.5 percent efficiency, the third-worst in the league).

No, it has truly been a team effort that’s put the Oilers in the middle of the Western Conference pack. And maybe that’s where Edmonton deserves to be at this point, in spite of MacTavish’s pre-season crowing that his squad could legitimately challenge for a championship.

Whatever the case, the last thing either Penner or the team needs is for him to be isolated and ostracized for his sins, however distasteful MacTavish finds them. 

That Anderson was labeled a “space cadet” as a player because of his unconventional nature is more of a comment on the ultra-authoritative nature of those who govern the game than it is on the man himself.

In fact, when I spoke to Anderson for The Hockey News’ Top 60 Since 1967 book (in which a panel of observers ranked him as the 55th best player in the post-expansion NHL) I found him to be personable, witty — and most importantly, worldly in a way that’s extremely rare among any elite-level hockey player I’ve ever dealt with.

That natural curiosity about topics other than hockey revealed itself in virtually every decision Anderson made.

Although he was drafted by Edmonton 69th overall in 1979, his primary goal initially wasn’t to make the NHL, but rather, to play for his homeland in the Olympics and to travel as part of the Canadian National team.

That decision didn’t endear him to those hockey authorities who believe every player should have a singular focus on the game — at the expense of even cursory knowledge of the world around them — but Anderson was comfortable enough in his own skin that he stuck to his guns.

Even after all his success with the Oilers, Anderson maintained his love for the international game, to the point he negotiated the option to play in the 1994 Lillehammer Olympics into his pro contract. The NHL ultimately denied him the opportunity, but couldn’t stop him from using the game to see the world once his days in that league were done; he would go on to play in Germany, Finland, Italy and Switzerland before retiring in 1997.

For all his brilliance scoring key goals in the NHL, Anderson didn’t let it define him as a person. And when he sees his plaque put up in Toronto, it would be perfect to see him underscore his individualism one last time.