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Yes. That and the fact that he hasn't played any better than either of those 2 up to this point. I don't really care about his PP presence. We need a defenseman who can actually play the entire position. And so far, he hasn't even been able to take a spot away from the likes of Ericsson, Daley, Biega, etc. And I don't think SY would have signed Stecher and Merrill and traded for Staal if he thought Cholowski was going to have any impact on the roster.

I said at the time that was a bad pick, if he was in fact drafted solely on his ability to play net front on the power-play. You can get those players in the later rounds, and it looks like we may have done just that with Soderblom. I still think Rasmussen can be a capable 3rd liner, but that's not a great look for a 9th overall pick. Svechnikov's value is at an all time low right now. He needs to play this season so we can see what we have in him. Likely another 3rd line winger, but maybe he has a big season and can up his trade value...

They don’t play with jam.

You don't need to pick 1st overall, or top 3, or hell, even the 1st round to get elite talent. It obviously helps, but every year there are elite talents picked later then they should have been. Just look at what Vancouver did in back-to-back drafts. Pettersson was drafted 5th overall in 2017, and Hughes was drafted 7th overall in 2018. If Vancouver had a strong core of young players prior to those two drafts, they'd likely be a top team in the league right now. Instead they had a lot of aging players on bad contracts. The Red Wings have the strong, young core, they just need a couple Pettersson / Hughes calibre picks in the next couple drafts. It's still early, but Yzerman may have two elite talents already picked 6th overall and 4th overall respectively the past two drafts. With another likely top 5 pick in this year's draft, and maybe a little more luck in one of the next two drafts (law of averages). I think we'll get at least one more *elite* talent there. I just hope if it happens, it happens in 2022 with Wright, Savoie and Lambert, rather than 2021 with no real standouts. I'd be content with finishing 28th this season, dropping 4 spots and picking 7th overall, if it means finishing 20th the following season and jumping 10-12 spots and picking top 3...