kipwinger

Lol. None of our current prospects has shown that they'll turn into a 7 time Norris trophy winning, hall of fame, all time legendary defenseman? Whelp...I guess we're screwed.

For sure, and I don't disagree. I just think once you get outside the top 5ish players there enough variability to make it meaningless. Like, I doubt anybody would bat an eyelash if I said Alex Pietrangelo or Aaron Ekblad were a 1A defenseman. Those same people were likely the ones saying for years that Kronwall wasn't a top defenseman, despite him being their equal (in the case of Pietrangelo) or better (in the case of Ekblad) across his career. Likewise Karlsson or Burns might reasonable be considered a 1A defenseman, but probably few would say the same of Byfuglien. I spent a good amount of time looking at all the various top defensemen's HERO charts today. One thing I found really interesting was comparing guys who everyone would consider "elite" with guys who most people wouldn't. The numbers just don't support the narrative. You'd be surprised who's better or worse than who when you take perception out of the judgement and just look at the numbers.

Even that's problematic to use as a guidepost. Is "Norris Caliber" a guy who could realistically win the Norris, or someone who received a Norris vote? Because if the former, then only about 5 guys in the league are 1A, and if the later then you have to include guys like Jacob Slavin, Josh Monson, Shane Gostisbehere, and Mark Eduard Vlasic...according to last year's voting anyway. And none of those guys are realistically better than, say, Werenski, McAvoy, Yandle, Ekman Larsson, Byfuglien, etc. etc. etc. That's the thing I hate about this type of labeling. If it's sufficiently strict enough, it'll necessarily leave out guys we all know are top defensemen; and if it's not strict enough then anybody can be one. https://www.hockey-reference.com/awards/voting-2018.html

These kinds of distinctions are essentially meaningless though. If "1A" is a guy who plays offense and defense equally well, and at basically an elite level, then there are only like 5 of those guys in the league. And if almost no teams have them, then they can't be all that vital to success. If Filip Hronek starts putting up 50 points a season he's a top pair defenseman. If he does that AND plays really good defense then he's elite. If Cholowski plays 20+ minutes a night, plays solid defense, and is good on special teams then he's a top pair defenseman. If he does all that and score 40+ points he's an elite defenseman. Labeling is so arbitrary. It's basically a popularity tool more than a useful categorization.

I'm really not as worried about our defense as everyone seems to be, for a couple reasons. First, we've got genuinely good defensive prospects. Hronek is scoring at a 40ish point pace as a rookie, and Cholowski's right around 30 points pace as a rookie. Pretty impressive. McIsaac battled through injury this season, made Canada's WJC team early (and was a big part of it), and is scoring in line with the top defensive prospects of his draft year while playing a solid defensive game. See no reason why he can't project as a top four defenseman. Maybe Gustav Lindstrom does too, though it's a bit more murky. And then our ranks are loaded with depth guys. And that's all within our own organization. Second, the idea of "you need a elite #1 defenseman" is overblown anyway because nobody seems sure what that means. Quite a few people around here were positive that John Carlson wasn't a "elite defenseman" on the Caps way to the Cup last year. Vegas certainly didn't have one. Pittsburgh has one in Letang, but their most recent Cup was won without him. Unlike centers, where I really believe you need a game breaking talent, I'm less sure you need a star on defense as I'm sure you need two really good pairs. I think we've got the makings of that. Finally, it's nothing you can't fix in free agency. While I've loathed the idea of trading for Trouba for years, nabbing him in free agency a year from now probably changes the entire complexion of the blueline. Same with Josi, Tanev, Muzzin, Spurgeon, Vatanen, Faulk, Barrie. All are FA's next year. Many of them will get re-signed, but some won't. That's what free agency is best for, filling in gaps. I would be really really loathe to reach too far on a defenseman in this year's draft given all the offensive talent that will be available. I still think that our center depth is our biggest organizational weakness at the most important position.

I just saw that the Oilers said they aren't trading their 1st this year, which bums me out because I was hoping they would give a 1st for Nyquist in the hopes of not wasting another year of McDavid's life and then they'd miss the playoffs anyway. Oh well. I'm still holding out hope that we'll get another 1st rounder somehow though. Doubt it will be high enough to get Krebs AND Zegras, but maybe Krebs OR Zegras plus Newhook. A boy can dream.

At 4 million dollar? Sure, why not? Best case scenario he's another Larionov and gives you good minutes as a 3rd liner. Worst case, you put him on IR for the last year or two. I'd only do it if I drafted a top center in this year's draft though. Our center depth is trash. Having Datsyuk for the next 3 years @ 4 million is better than having Z for the next three years @ 6 million. Still think he's provide good value on the PP.

Datsyuk returning to the NHL, and potentially the Red Wings, is in the news again today. His agent, Dan Milstein mentioned Detroit by name. He could be our new Larionov. I'd throw 3 years, 4 million per at him. Bert-Larkin-AA Zadina-Datsyuk-Rasmussen Mantha-Zegras-Svech

I like Krebs a lot too. I was actually thinking about player comparisons for him, and coming up with nothing but I think Zetterberg is a good one. Krebs seems to have really good skill, but he's also super fiesty. Zetterberg definitely had that to his game. I'd be happy with Krebs for sure but I'm still leaning toward Zegras just because of that pure offensive upside. He's got something like 10 fewer points that Hughes (and was actually even with Hughes until after the WJC tourney) and plays on the second line. Pretty impressive stuff. Reading people raving about how good he is on the powerplay as well.

This is kinda my thing with Zegras though, the more I read about the kid the more I think he's a really top level prospect who isn't getting noticed because of the team he's on. I also don't really put too much stock in "tier" because they're so often wrong. In 2017, for instance, it was a two horse race between Hischier and Patrick and everyone else was considered a "tier" below. We now know that Pettersson and Heiskanen are definitively NOT a tier below. Some of what I've read seems to suggest Zegras could be another Pettersson. Yes please.

I've flip flopped yet again on this draft. At this point, if I'm the Red Wings and I don't have the top two picks (assuming that's Hughes and Kakko), I'm taking Trevor Zegras in the top five. He projects as a center at the NHL level and by all accounts he's the most offensive dynamic center outside of Hughes.

I said as much in a previous post. Actually I said he probably sees all our potential first rounders, sounds like I sold him a bit short if he sees everybody up to round 3. And by "area" scout I meant geographic area, not position as clearly a skater is probably not the best scout for goalies and vice versa. I don't expect that Wright, or Hakan, for that matter sees every single player we draft. But I'd imagine they see anyone we're interested in using a high pick on, regardless of position or league or anything else.

The guy you're thinking of is Nikolai Vakourov, who was the principle scout in Finland for a while. But I'm pretty sure they reorganized how the scouts operate a few years ago. They no longer have area scouts and instead have European and N. American scouts who overlap their coverage. But Tyler Wright is the head of all amateur scouting, just like Mark Howe is the head of all pro scouting. I'd imagine that Wright sees every potential first round pick a least once or twice. Similarly I'd imagine Mark Howe sees every guy the Wings may be interested in signing as a UFA and/or trading for.

Hakan is the head of European scouting, so if a player gets drafted out of a European League by the Red Wings then that player has been given the stamp of approval by Hakan. I misspoke earlier, Hronek is definitely a Hakan pick. Zadina, however, is not because while European he was on loan to Halifax in his draft year and would have fallen under the purview of the North American scouting team.

I don't see any reason (yet) to think McIsaac won't be just as good as any of those guys. There are a few things he really has going for him, particularly his skating, overall athleticism, and the fact that by all account he already plays a very mature game in terms of his defensive positioning. The latter may explain why his offensive numbers in the Q aren't insane, but in the long term it will serve him well. My hope is that he turn out to be a Matt Dumba type of guy.

I don't know whether Bouchard will turn out to be that good or not. My point wasn't really to condemn him as a prospect as much as to say that of all the top d-men in last year's draft (Dahlin, Hughes, Boquist, Dobson, Ty Smith, and Bouchard) he's the only one who didn't make the list and he's the one we wanted. And that the knock on him, skating and pace, is such an obvious thing to avoid when going to the draft table is worrying. Not to say that this particular criticism is always warranted; Rasmussen was criticisized for the same thing and I think his skating is fine. It's just a little scary that the best draft we've had in ages sorta fell into our laps, and that the top guy we were looking at turned out to be probably the biggest question mark in the top ten. Having said all that, I think the Berggren and McIsaac picks may end up being the sleepers of the draft for us, so it's hard to be too critical given how excellent those picks were.

I agree with your point, but your facts are a bit off on this one. The year that Mantha and Bertuzzi were drafted was the last year under the old regime, headed by Director of Amateur Scouting Joe McDonnell. McDonnell left that year with Jim Nill on July 6th, 2013, a month after the Mantha draft, and was replaced by Tyler Wright. Wright was responsible for drafting Larkin, Svech, Cholo, Hronek, Rasmussen, Zadina, Veleno, etc. etc. But your general point is correct, that Hakan really didn't have much to do with our recent successes on draft day, though the jury is still out on what we'll be getting from Saarijarvi, Lindstrom, Berggren, who are all Hakan picks.

Horrifying thought, prior to Filip Zadina falling into our laps it was thought (and has since been confirmed) that Evan Bouchard was going to be Detroit's pick. TSN recently published a list of the top 50 NHL prospects and Bouchard didn't make the list. Craig Button mentioned his skating as being a real impediment to his NHL success. So even our best draft in recent memory was very likely a potential bust. Yikes.

It's an intriguing thought. I don't really know much about Broberg though. I see he's fallen on most draft boards, but so have a lot of the early season top picks.

Mantha for Puljujarvi and Edm 1st.

If you took a concussion, turned it into a human, and made it the defense attorney for the NHL in its ongoing concussion lawsuit it would still be more progressive on just about every health related issue than the NFL. The NFL is like the Mountain Dew of sports leagues.

There's one good thing about every dumb s*** GM in the NHL thinking that "all you have to do is get in and then you go on a run". Every 8th seed is looking to buy at the deadline. Much maligned parity is good for sellers apparently.

Again, it's not really about "liking" anybody. My only point is that given how often all these people are wrong about prospects, and given how truly hard it is to be a generational type talent, and given how it's in everyone's interest to have SOMEONE be the "next McDavid" each year, is there reason to believe that Hughes maybe isn't as good as he's being made out to be currently? And if he's not, if the odds are that he'll turn out not noticably better or worse than other top two(ish) prospects, does that change how one might approach the draft? Particularly when the goal of the draft is just as much about making your team better as it is about getting the single best player with your picks. We traded back and got Cholowski and Hronek instead of Chychrun because Arizona thought (correctly) that he was a better prospect than we did. But being a better prospect doesn't mean you'll be a better NHLer (as mock drafts frequently show us). Imagine what you could get for a guy like Hughes if you thought maybe he wasn't as good as everyone else did? I don't have any issue with Hughes, he probably IS the best player available to be honest. The question is ask myself is, "Is he going to be SO much better than someone else I could take in the top two or three that trading back to make the team better is absurd?". I'm not convinced that he is THAT good. Maybe, but I'm not sure. Same with last year, is Rasmus Dahlin SO good that a team wouldn't be better off trading back and drafting Quinn Hughes and getting a bunch of other pieces in the trade? I don't think so. But he was certainly made out to be so, and it was potentially a big missed opportunity.

It's not a matter of comparison, which is a fine analytical tool. It's a matter of profundity. The problem arises when certain stylistic similarities drive a narrative without any consideration for proper scope. The same thing happened when Stamkos and Laine were given the "next Ovechkin" treatment given that they both are righties with awesome slapshots. It will ALWAYS be easier (and therefore more likely) to be the next Yzerman or Sakic than the next Gretzky or Lemieux. It will be ALWAYS be easier to be the next Kurri or Iginla than Bossy, Ovechkin, or Hull. Not that either is likely, but one is so much more unlikely as to be almost silly. That's my issue. Sakic and Yzerman, for example, were far more comparable to each other than either were to Gretzky. So much so that any comparison made to him is almost laughable, and those were are among the greatest players of all time. Lots of players have been as good as Kopitar or Barkov, almost none have been as good as McDavid is shaping up to be. That's my whole point. There's a very real chance that Hughes and Kakko have closer careers to each other than either of them have to McDavid.

You're selling Kuznetsov short. He put up 77 pts in 82 games as a 2nd year player on the second line without Ovechkin. He's super good, I've seen him play a ton, his athleticism is freakish. He displaced Backstrom, who is also a super good player, as the top center for the Caps and is probably the biggest reason the Caps were finally able to get over the hump (i.e. past Pittsburgh). Which is my whole point, one good center (Backstrom) with even the best wingers in the world (Ovechkin) won't beat teams that have multiple top centers (Crosby, Malkin). You have to have top end center depth (Kuznetsov, Backstrom).