kipwinger

What evidence is there that they wouldn't?

Seemed to work out for Howard, Hudler, Tatar, and Nyquist. All of whom spent 3 years in the AHL. If by "multiple years in the minors" you mean 2+ years then that group would include AA, Bertuzzi, and Mantha as well. And that's just the North American "minors". If you include guys from overseas who stayed with their minor clubs for "multiple" years after they were drafted it would include Kronwall (4 years in minors after being drafted), Datsyuk (3 years), and Zetterberg (3 years).

Yeah, that's the most consistent criticism I read on Cozens. But it's essentially the biggest weakness of a player with essentially no weaknesses. With top of the draft picks I tend to temper a lot of what I read in scouting reports because it's important to remember the nature of the comparison. You're essentially comparing REALLY good players with each other in an effort to rank order them, so things like floors and ceilings tend to get thrown out the window for more quantifiable things. When people say Dach is "slow" or Cozens has "less skill" it's only in relation to each other. Dach is probably a really good skater, just not compared to Hughes or Cozens. Cozens' playmaking is fine, just not compared to Hughes or Zegras or Turcotte. It's a little bit of minutiae, but it gets amplified at the top of the draft. And it gets amplified a million more times at the NHL level when every player is really good. Edit: As an aside, this same basic dynamic is why Matt Stafford is ultimately a s***ty quarterback. All of his flaws in decision making, arm slot, throwing off his back foot, throwing into coverage, etc. are fine when he's feasting on garbage NFC central defenses. But in the playoffs, when every team is good, those flaws get amplified by a million and he can't manage a game, convert on 3rd down, or avoid turnovers.

Seems to be in line with what a lot of other people are saying. His size and speed made him elite at that level, and might make him NHL ready soon, but his skill level just isn't as high as the other top end guys. Which is another reason why I like Zegras so much. He helps you at center a lot, but his skill level also is a huge asset on the powerplay. And we desperately need to improve on the PP. We basically had three 30 goal scorers (I'm including Mantha because he was on pace to hit 30 until...durrrr...old time hockey!) and had one of the league's worst powerplays. Improve that and you're talking about a BUNCH more offense for those top guys. Zegras has that ability. Maybe Turcotte, Krebs, Dach, and Newhook too. I just don't see it from Cozens though. He's not really that set up guy we need.

I'm open to a trade back if Zegras, Turcotte, and Byram are all off the board by 6. If any one of them remains an option then you take it. But I don't think there's a big enough difference between the rest for me to care about too much. Provided we take a center. I'm not nuts about Podkolzin or Caufield, not because of their talent necessarily but because I think we're already stacked on the wing between Mantha, Bert, AA, Zadina, Berggren, Rasmussen, and Svech. Our center depth remains our biggest weakness. Even if Veleno becomes a solid 2C (which still remains to be seen) who plays 3C for us? Nielsen? Woof. I'd feel WAY better going forward with Larkin, Veleno, and any of Zegras, Turcotte, Dach, Cozens, Krebs, or Newhook.

To me, a nightmare scenario would be if Hughes, Kakko, Turcotte, Byram, and Zegras were the first five players off the board. I guess Dach would be a decent consolation prize there, but I wouldn't be thrilled. I've really soured on Cozens over the course of the year. Admittedly because scouting reports have consistently criticized his skill level (while lauding his physical tools), and not because I've watched him a lot or anything. I actually liked our position a lot more when Podkolzin was still the presumptive 3rd pick. At this point my list is as follows: T1: Zegras T1: Byram 2: Turcotte 3: Dach T4: Krebs T4: Newhook 5: Cozens We'll definitely land one of then, but I'd HIGHLY prefer it be one of the top 3. So here's hoping one of Chicago, Los Angeles, or Colorado likes Dach, Cozens, or Podkolzin more than I do.

No. It just makes is MORE bad for New Jersey. The Oilers still sold WAY low on their most valuable commodity (McDavid being untouchable obviously).

Clearly someone does or I wouldn't have responded to the post I did.

Not that we need to sign the guy, but I think you're exaggerating a bit here. His .85 points per game this year is basically the same as he's had for most of his career. The injury cost him games, but he was still a VERY effective defenseman on this ice. So I guess my question about Karlsson would be whether he's going to continue to miss time, and not whether he's going to be "in decline". Nothing about his effectiveness seems to be declining.

So will Kris Draper apparently. But protein is protein when you're trying to win faceoffs against Darcy Tucker for the Red Wings alumni team.

I hope we draft this chick. She's a smoke show. At least give her a spot on Wingspan or something amirite? F*ck Carley Johnson

Doesn't @LeftWinger have a friend whose brother's Uber driver's uncle's karaoke dj's sister's baby's daddy's wet nurse is also wet nurse to Kris Draper or something like that?

I was more interested in the 30 and the two 2nd rounders. I figured Bouchard. We could be sitting a lot worse had those two not slid.

Doubtful.

All joking aside, I would love to see last year's Red Wings draft board just to see who we would have taken if not for Zadina and Veleno sliding.

Podkolzin sucked at the U20s, and that's going to hurt his draft stock considerably more than it would other guys because his MHL and KHL numbers were generally not good either. I think the perception that he was a top 3 guy was based on the flashy nature of his game. People go nuts for flashy players, even if they aren't that good. The story seemed to be, "yeah he doesn't score much, but he's bound to break out. Just LOOK at him, he oozes skill". Basically the exact opposite of Arthur Kaliyev. But that can only last for so long if you don't ever show up on the scoreboard. I think this guy tumbles pretty far this year.

Even with that lineup, someone has to be your 7th defenseman. Why not have it be Ericsson or Daley? As a 7th they wouldn't appreciably hurt the team, and burying both their salaries (plus signing someone else to be the 7th) essentially wastes about 8-9 million bucks of the owner's money. Something I can't imagine Chris Illitch has much of a stomach for. Then again, given that they've spent almost no money on their "District Detroit" pipedream maybe ol' Chris has a few extra (tens of) millions to throw around.

Karlsson doesn't wear them in a post game press conference in front of the logo of the team he's currently playing for (but has been reluctant to commit to long-term). Not that it's a sure thing. Nothing is until a deal is signed. But if there was ever enough circumstantial evidence to warrant hedging your bets a bit, it's probably now in the case of Jacob Trouba. Throwing assets at Winnipeg for this guy is dumb, that's all I'm saying. Well, that and the Tigers hat is indeed awesome. I'd post a pic in mine, but you plebeians don't deserve to gaze upon my superior visage. @Dabura

They were loaded with guys who were ABOUT to become really good players, but none of them were quite there yet. If you check out their regular seasons stats you'll notice two things, A) almost all of them later became household names, B) almost none of them were highly productive individually. Kane was the only player with 30 goals. Toews wouldn't have been considered a top 5 center (and maybe never will be). None of Byfulgien, Ladd, Seabrook, or Campbell topped 40 pts. Hjalmarsson didn't even crack 20 pts. Troy Brouwer and Kris Versteeg were their 6th and 7th most productive players. I think it's a matter of hindsight. We know now that all of those guys went on to win more Cups, and be more productive throughout their careers. But if you looked at that one season on paper you likely wouldn't conclude (at the time) that they were about to be a powerhouse. Definitely not more impressive than Toronto or Tampa were this season (again, on paper).

Red Wings signed 23 year old, Finnish, defenseman Oliwer Kaski to a 1 year ELC today. Kaski was 2nd in the Liiga in defensive scoring this season and had previously played at Western Michigan for two years so he's familiar with North American hockey. Oh, and he's a right shot for the dopes who over value that particular characteristic. https://www.freep.com/story/sports/nhl/red-wings/2019/05/13/detroit-red-wings-oliwer-kaski/1191355001/ And his highlights package: https://youtu.be/OKbOJyjwwTM

Might wanna check the stats on that one bud. Assuming Tavares, Matthews, Nylander, and Marner are Toronto's core forward group, that's probably a more productive group than Chicago's Kane, Toews, Hossa, and Sharp were during Chicago's run. Then TO has Kadri, Kapanen, Johnsson, and Hyman, all of whom were 40+ point players and three of whom scored 20 or more goals. None of them individually are better than a Saad or Panarin, but they're more productive collectively. Morgan Reilly just put up 72 points, which is better than any season in Duncan Keith's career, the difference offensively between Jake Gardiner and Seabrook or Hjalmarsson are laughable, and Muzzin is certainly their equal defensively. The only obvious place Chicago was better was in goal. But regardless of how you value individual players (or even if you conclude that Chicago was better) the gap is pretty slim. The hard part for TO will be losing guys like Johnsson, Kapanen, Kadri, Gardiner, etc. and replacing them with comparable talent. Chicago essentially did that twice.

Unless he's just insane in training camp I'd start Cholowski in the AHL next season. If he dominates, then he's the first call up and he can do what Hronek did last year. While I agree that he's probably a better player than Daley or Ericsson at this point, he still struggled pretty badly. If he has indeed taken another step in his development he can prove it for the Griffins and then take over in due time. That said I'd still waive one of Daley or Ericsson if Kronwall retires, give Green top line minutes to pump up his trade value, and Kaski up full time. My lineup would be something like this. DK-Green Kronwall-Hronek Ericsson/Daley-Bowey Kaski

The only way I trade that 6th pick is if it's on draft day, and it's only a few spots back, and the board is favorable. We still do not have elite center depth. We can get it this year with one of Turcotte, Zegras, Cozens, or Dach. Our prospect pool on defense is really good already. We also made shrewd moves with Bowey and Kaski. Between those two, Hronek, Cholowski, McIsaac, Lindstrom, Regula, and Barton we've got some really good young defensemen in our system. As also have as good as shot as anyone to sign Trouba if he hits UFA (the dude wears Detroit hats in post game pressers FFS). You don't trade your best possible shot at creating dangerous center depth given all that.

I think TO will be fine. Chicago showed you can have all your cap tied up in a handful of players so long as those players are really good. Tavares, Matthews, Nylander, Marner, and Reilly is a pretty good core. You can fill in around those guys with bargains and entry level deals and still field a really competitive team.

I think Zadina's struggles have less to do with age, though he does have maturing to do physically, and more to so with the fact that prior to this year he had only played 57 games of North American hockey. He came over from Europe, played in the Q where he dominated a bunch of kids who weren't on his level skill wise, but learned very little about playing "correctly" because the Q is a garbage league. His first real exposure to North American systems was this season, against a bunch of guys who are more physically developed and who know the NA game intuitively. So the learning curve was very steep. Reminds me a lot of Mantha, who also came from the Q and therefore had no idea how to play right. He struggled just as badly, and he was 20 instead of 18.