kipwinger

Trading back only works if you're convinced the player will still be there. If Yzerman thought Seider would still be there, then that means he (and the other GMs in between) didn't have Seider ranked as highly as some other players. Not sure what's hard to follow about this.

Didn't you just criticize me for NOT having my own points of view and relying too much on people like Pronman? Now I'm being TOO individualistic in my assessments and should fall in line with LGW? Which is it? The reason why center is a bigger issue than defense, even before the draft, is because we have one good center in the NHL (Larkin), and one good prospect (Veleno). Whereas we had a ton of high quality defensive prospects, even before the draft. Hronek, Cholo, McIsaac, Lindstrom, Kaski, and Regula were all on the team already. So I was less concerned with our defensive depth.

I assume all most round picks have the raw physical tools to be good NHLers. I don't need to have that proven to me, I take it as a given. I also voiced concerns about Newhook playing in the BCHL FYI. As did plenty of other prognosticators. Might be the reason he went 16th overall when coming into the season (which he dominated) he was ranked in the top 5. I asked because I watch all games online and was curious if there was another place to watch aside from the ones I've typically used. Is that alright?

Never said he was a bad pick. Ever. I said I would have picked other guys. I also said we had a bad draft overall because we didn't address our biggest needs. Also said he was a reach at 6th, which the GM admitted when he said he wanted to trade back for him. In fact, I've only ever been complimentary to Mortiz Seider while also having a reasonable degree of skepticism given A) his concensus draft rankings, B) the second-tier competition he's played against, 3) the availability of potentially better players. I'm not sure what you're so bent out of shape about.

The minute Moritz Seider plays against good players and excels at it, we'll talk. He just hasn't done that yet. I'm happy to explain all the reasons why the Traverse City Prospects Tourney is a joke if you want though.

Instead of "imagining" how good I hope he is, I'll just wait until he plays meaningful hockey games against decent opponents and then draw conclusions. Guess that makes me old fashioned.

You sure showed me. I'll start studying tape immediately. No better way to evaluate a guy like Seider than by watching a subpar prospect's tournament in the middle of September.

I didn't "crap" on anybody, I gave my opinion on a prospect playing in a tournament this week. That opinion just happens to differ from the "he's awesome" crowd a bit. Also, I'm not being defensive. You addressed me first and I responded. That's what discussion boards are for. Below is my first post about Seider after he was drafted. I stand by it given that since then he's played no meaningful hockey games, and the ones he has played are against lesser competition. It's not confirmation bias if nothing substantial has changed since you last opined on something. "So, I was gone all weekend and am only now getting to review our draft. In short, it sucks. There are some decent players here, but we did nothing to address our biggest organizational weakness: our center depth. Prior to the draft our depth chart was Larkin, Veleno, and (maybe) AA. And it's exactly the same after the draft. The single most important position on any hockey team was completely ignored in a really important draft. We didn't have a really high end defensive prospect before the draft, we don't now. We consistently passed on skill players for guys with intangibles like "hockey sense" and "compete level". It wasn't a complete disaster. Seider will be a good defenseman, but not an elite one. Even if he turns into a Paryako, which is probably his ceiling, a guy like that doesn't significantly change the complexion of our defense or team. He's a good piece but probably not a great one at 6th. Very much the Michael Rasmussen of defensemen (and I'm a Rasmussen fan). Grewe has Tyler Bertuzzi upside, which is a good complimentary piece on a team full of good complimentary pieces. Maybe Tuomisto adds a little offense from the back end, but probably not any more than Cholo or Hronek or McIsaac. But we were a team without any real game changers prior to the draft, and we still are despite a really high pick in a draft with lots of guys with (supposedly) elite upside."

Ok, I'll play. I've said about 2,000 times that the kid may end up being a top pair defenseman but that the proof of concept is not the Traverse City Prospect Tourney. How is that confirmation bias?

Wait, you think I'm holding a grudge against an 18 year old because I don't think Yzerman shouldn't have gotten his current job? Lol. Ok dude. On your way out, just answer me this. If Seider tearing it up at the Traverse City Prospects tourney means he'll probably be a top pair defender, then what does Chase Pearson's 4 goals in 3 games at the same tourney mean? Is he our new 2nd line center now? Or should we maybe temper our optimism a bit?

Good for you. Anybody COULD be a top line player. Even late rounders like Datsyuk turn do it occasionally. That's as useless an observation as saying anyone COULD be a bust. Seider had modest production in a 2nd tier men's league last year, and now he's playing pretty well against a bunch of undrafted CHLers. Good for him, but that is not some indication that he's going to be a top pair defenseman one day. Do it in the AHL and then I'll be a little more optimistic. My point (if you're actually interested in it and not just being an argumentative ******) is that at the time of the Seider pick NOBODY had him going that high. None. And that's not just the Craig Buttons and Corey Pronmans either. That's NHL central scouting, that's our own GM (who said he wanted to trade back but couldn't find a taker). Conversely, two guys who were consistently ranked much higher had slid down the board and given my oft stated desire for a center with offensive upside that was my preference. Edit: Also just for reference's sake, Trevor Zegras had 7 assists in 5 games at the World Junior Championships a few months ago. That is a MUCH better tourney than this one. So using your logic, if Seider is a top guy after this tourney, than Zegras was a hall of famer after that one.

Might wanna read what I said at the time guy. Even then I said that Seider might well turn out to be a good defenseman, but that I'd rather have one of the two centers with "star" upside who were still on the board. Also, I'm more than happy to eat crow on prospects. Did it with Pulkkinen, Frk, Kindl and will do it again with Seider if need be. But I'm not ready to say the kid is a stud top pairing defenseman after performing well in a tournament which is a step down from the competition he played in the DEL. Let's see how he does against BETTER players than he did a year ago before we start licking our chops.

I have every intention of watching him play. In the AHL. Regardless of how he looks in this tourney, half (or more) of each roster is filled out by undrafted scrubs. And looking good against them if you're a top player (or even a Chase Pearson) isn't that impressive to me. Again, Seider may end up being as good as you're all suggesting. But the Traverse City Tourney isn't likely to convince me of that.

Skepticism, not cynicism. In general though, I think regardless of the level of competition it's clearly better to be performing well at these things than not doing well. So there's reason for optimism. If Seider, or Veleno, or Pearson, or whomever continue this in the AHL then I'll start taking notice. Right now it's all potential for me though.

Didn't see it. But in a game where Chase Pearson scores a hat trick my guess is that the level of competition isn't great. Seider might very well turn in to a cornerstone defender, as you've suggested. I'm just not likely to be convinced of that by a solid showing in the Red Wings prospect tournament.

I like your enthusiasm guy, but you might want to hold off on those kinds of pronouncements. If he scores 12 points and gets torched by AHL level competition I suspect you'll be singing a very different tune.

Lol. If there were moderators around here I wouldn't be having this conversation with you.

Don't make me a party to your incoherent "ideas" you f*cking martian. I agree with none of what you said here, and I suspect I don't agree with any other aspect of your existence either.

At one point no less a student of the game than Mike Babcock believed Darren Helm was the "best 3rd line center in hockey". I'll reserve judgement on Joe Veleno until he actually does something impressive against quality competition. The road to NHL stardom is littered with guys who everybody just knew "will be really good", but who couldn't hack it.

The trouble with projecting either of Veleno or Rasmussen a few years from now is that we're all really susceptible to recency bias. A year ago people thought Zadina was making the big club out of camp too. One year, and a "meh" AHL season later, and people have a totally different perception of things. If Veleno struggles against AHL competition things change. If he breaks into the NHL and dominates on the wing, a la AA, then things change. If Ras starts in the AHL and dominates as a center, things change. In theory I obviously agree that our centers don't have to be elite offensively if our collect group of wingers are. I made that point to begin with. But as I've been saying since before the draft, center is our weakest positional groups right now and a lot is up in the air. We have one quality NHL center and one quality center prospect. That's it. So determining the strength of our center group in 2 or 3 years, with or without a Brayden Schenn is pretty tough.

That would depend entirely on how well Joe Veleno turns out. But yeah, in theory that could be really good. Though, if Veleno turns into a solid 2C then you could still draft a winger, like you're talking about, and put Rasmussen at 3C. I'd still really like that top 9 in theory.

Nice, thanks.

How'd you find replays of the games to watch?

Totally agree about the goaltending. It's a bit of a truism to say that you need a hot goaltender to win the Cup, but it's hard to build around that. In fact, it's one of those rare situations where having the "best" goaltender hardly ensures you'll have "good" playoff goaltending. Consider that NONE of Luongo, Lundqvist, or Price have a Cup. Also totally agree that a group you can "build around" is a better situation than a few "elite" guys. But that's where I think positional strength matters. For instance, say you've got a couple workhorse centers but they're guys who don't score a ton relative to their peers. No problem if you collective group of wingers do score more than their peers. I don't think we need Super high scoring (80-100 point centers). Another 70 pts. guy will do as long as he's an assist machine. Because I think ALL of our top 6 wingers (and maybe one of our 3rd liners too) are going to score 20-30 goals. In this thought experiment lets use a Claude Giroux type. A top 9 of Larkin, Giroux, Veleno, Mantha, Bert, AA, Zadina, Ras/Berggren/Mastrosime/Svech, probably brutalizes opposition defenses without a single "elite" talent. Same with the defense. I think they need to collectively be able to put up points, without the need for any one player to be an offensive stud. A couple 30 point guys paired with a couple 40 point guys are a really good top four as long as they can defend competently.

I don't disagree in theory, I just think "elite" comes in a lot of different formats these days. Probably not a single St. Louis Blues player would be considered top 5 at their position prior to their win. Maybe Tarasenko. In contrast I think Tampa had elite players at every position and they got crushed. I realize that recency bias but nevetheless the point is interesting. Anymore I think you need good players, obviously, but you need depth and a good match between the players and the coaching systems. By which I mean that you need 4 lines and 3 pairs that won't get absolutely torched if they get caught out against an opponent's top line for half a shift, and you need those players to be able to execute a coach's system (and especially special teams systems) to a high degree.