Richdg

Just some scouting reports: Zablocki: Inconsistent centre who seems willing to let teammates do the heavy lifting, while he waits for a gift wrapped chance. Displays a quick shot and good jump in his skating, and scored 28 goals, but you are not sure from game to game if he is gonna work all 200 feet, or wait for teammates to make him. Gallant: Under-the-radar centre/forward who is a puck generator, scorer, and plays both on the power play and the penalty-kill. Solid forechecker and two way player who will drop the gloves if necessary too. Petruzzelli: Impressive big goaltender who has finally slowed down and learned to let his enormous size and gifts to do the work instead of getting in “fire drill mode.” Terrific combination of size and athletic ability that has NHL teams returning to make their final ranking decisions on him. Displays a strong glove hand and excellent awareness in his area. So big that when in his full spread, he covers the entire bottom while on his knees and still covers most of the top corners! Committed to Quinnipiac University.

A scouting report: A raw, puck-moving, offensive defenseman with great scoring instincts. Most notable for his 4 goals and 5 assists in 1 game for Almunta in U16s. Since then, he's continued to put up great offensive numbers, including 7 points in 4 games for his U19 team internationally. Struggled a little in his first season with Sweden's second tier league, particularly in his play without the puck and defending stronger attackers. He still managed to finish 2nd in scoring for U19 forwards. There's skill here but he needs time to develop his d-zone game and fill out his frame physically.

Lindstrom. An offensive Dman. RHed.

How about Petruzzeli the G from Muskegon in the 2nd? Might be a great pick! Think Coreau but with skill!

Only 2 things left to do: Move up and get Hague in the second, and then hope for some lottery luck next year and get A. Svechnikov or Matty Samuelsson!

I think you get the point. Kid is a good prospect. That is what we want in the draft. Yes he could flop-same is true of everyone. This isn't a reach. He was a top 10 prospect coming in and we got him at 9. Fills 2 major needs: C and front of net guy. Now if Holland gets off of his butt and moves up to get hague in the 2nd, we might have a great draft! Making it clear. I liked Rasmussen before the draft. I am surprised we took him.

#5 NA skater on nhl.com: http://www.nhl.com/ice/draftprospectdetail.htm?cat=1&dpid=106985&sort=finalRank&year=2017

One of the many scouting reports on Rasmussen: Large competitive two-way centreman with skill and good feet. A gritty, naturally strong player with mobility who wins most board scrums. He is a dominant player in the front and below the goal line. A mobile skater who is difficult to contain or move; he wins puck battles and scores. Intriguing prospect with upside offensively: difficult to contain, and effective vision and passing skills. Owns the front of the net on the power play. He might look for the pass over shooting, but he protects the biscuit well. Has an upright skating stride but gets there and shows jam when he greets you. His combination of power and skill is at the high end of this draft class, even though you might hope he would show a bit more effort all sixty minutes. A raw talent who may end up being the best player out of the West.

Guys you all need to relax. This is a good pick. For those that have been around here for a while you know I am not a big fan of Holland. But he has drafted well in the 1st round the last 5 years. Mantha, Larkin, Svechnikov, Cholowski-the one pick I disagree with, and now Rass. That is a pretty good run. Yes everyone has their favs and players they dislike. There were no 0 nadda superstars in this draft. McKenzie said it several times tonight: this draft doesn't have any future Hart or Norris trophy winners in it. So who is Micheal Rasmussen? Yes he is 6-5/220. He is a LHed shot. he scored 30 goals in 52 games before breaking his wrist. He loves to play 15ft in out in front of the net. He will drop the gloves with anyone and win. Yes he needs 3 years to be ready. The question is-and this is true of everyone, who does he become? Is he the next Keith Premiau or the next Eric Daze? No one knows. My last posts-3 or 4 days ago I said we should take Rasmussen or Foote, but thought we would go with Vesilinan (spelling). That is 4 of the last 5 drafts that my final thoughts were correct. Now look down the road 5 years. Our top 6 are: Mantha, Larkin, AA, Svechnikov, G Smith, and Rasmussen. That is a very good group. It has everything you need. Size, speed, skill, toughness, snipers, now a front of net guy. The only problem with this group is they are all LHed.

Some more guys that I like in the 3rd/4th rounds: Jonah Gadjovich 6-2/201 LHed LW. Plays like Abby. Maybe a better scorer. D'Artagnan Joly 6-3/180 RHed RW. Great skater and play maker. Is he any good with a rapier? The name alone........ Macauley Carson 6-1/205 LHed LW. Think Smith from last year. Gritty tough F that scores. Dan Bukac 6-4/200 RHed D. Very good skater and passer. Needs to add strength and fill out. Jacob Paquette 6-2/200 LHed D. Classic tough stay at home Dman. Austin Pratt 6-2/210 LHed C/LW. A great checker and defensive F. Good skater. Has a great shot, but is slow at shooting.

this post is rubbish. Z is now a 2C on a good team. That is it. We are 3+ years from contending for a Cup. His back will not make it that long. But again it is a mute point.

havent read the thread in a long time. to many rl issues going on. This is one of those drafts were there are a lot of players I like, no one that I love, and a few that I hate. I still look at our team and see 2 major weaknesses: we have No Net Front players-none 0 zip nadda and we don't have any front of net clearing Dmen. But that is my opinion. I like Tippett and think he is a guy that could be in detroit in 1 more year. Some compare him to Kessel. Kessel doesn't play D so that is kind of the kiss of death and why I dont think we take him. I think we take Vesaleinen becasue he is a good 2 way player, even though he isn't a C which is more of a need. Ves is a 2 liner who should be a 20-25 goal 50 point guy down the road. He could end up being a more consistant Franzen. Never have the hot streaks were he scores 15 goals in 20 games, but also not have the 5 goals in 30 games stretches either.

Ok final thoughts before the draft. Yes there will be trades before and during the draft. But as of today with what we know what would I do? 1st round: Foote or Rasmussen. Foote should be a 2/3 D in a couple of years. Rasmussen should be a 2C maybe better. Both guys fill major needs. Not only do they both have the needed size, both skate well, both are good offensively and good defensively. Rasmussen is a great front of net guy, something we really need. Might be a winger down the road. 2nd round: Jake Oettinger G. The G of the future. 3rd round: Scooter Brickley D. A poor mans Foote. Then grab the best available from there. Is that what I think we do? No for the 1st round. If I was going to bet I would bet that we take Kristian Vesalainen. He is a 6-4/210 LH shooting LW/RW. He has been called Lil Puljujarvi or Puljujarvi Lite for a couple of years. If we go with either Rasmussen or Vesalainen in the 1st, we are going to have a nice core of F's to build around. Mantha 6-5/225, Svechnikov 6-3/210, AA 6-2/190, Larkin 6-1/190, Smith 6-2/210 and then either Rasmussen 6-5/225 or Vesalainen 6-4/210. That is a very good talented group of good sized fast and skilled F's to build around. Yes my disclaimer for Ksmith. We need more Dmen. But you also have to draft value. The F's available at 9th are better than the Dmen.

If they would have taken him I would be happy as hell! Gets rid of his 7 million cap hit for the next 4 seasons! The numbers he puts up are not that great, yes still good and a great leader. But at his age with his bad back he isn't going to be here when we are ready to compete for the next cup. That does not mean I want him to go, just being realistic. Either way it is a mute point.

There are always questions on lists like this. I like both of our G's but both have questions about them. Had to protect 1. This is clearly a message being sent. I don't understand why you protect Z. Vegas isn't going to take him, so why do it? I don't like all of our young Dmen are available. Granted we can only lose 1 player total so not the worst thing if 1 is taken. In the end, no matter who Vegas takes we are not going to be screwed. All of the guys available to them can be replaced fairly cheaply and quickly.

There are no 1 year fixes for this team. It is going to take 2-3 more off seasons of smart moves and developing our young talent to be a good/great team again. The UFA market is juts about dead, the draft takes time, and trades cost you pieces that you want to keep. There is no way the Jets would move Trouba for a package that doesn't include 1 of our top young guys. IMHO we need to move out salary, add picks, draft wisely, and let the youth develop. If we can overachive and find 2-3 NHL claiber players each of the next 2-3 drafts to go with what we have we will be fine. Yes it is going to be the 2020 season before it all plays out, but that is reality.

Been a while. Divorce will do that. There is still only 1 guy that I pick at 9 and that is Foote. Good size, good skater, good offensively, and good defensively. He will be a #2 in the NHL is about 3 years. Draft and we all can smile and be happy.

I can't believe it, there isn't a lines thread on page 1. Maybe the first time on this forum? Oh well. TBH I should have wrote the title PP, PK, lines, and pairs. Because the first 2 PP and PK fill out the last 2: lines and pairs. Power Play. I am a fan of the 1-3-1 PP setup. But it doesn't matter which system is used. The skills and player types are still the same. There are 5 players needed for a successful PP: The QB at the BL, a RHed shot that works the left side of the formation, a LHed shot that works the right side of the formation, a deadly sniper in the slot, and a tough front of net guy. Teams need at least 2 PP units. Looking at our roster and system overall we are ok at some positions and the case is empty at others. PP quarterback. We have 2 guys that can do it, but one is about done due to injury. Dekeyser and Kronwall. We must find an upgrade over Kronwall that can run the 1st PP unit thus letting DD run the second unit. RHed shot on left side. We have 2 guys that fill this role currently: Green and Sproul. Both have the skills needed. Green only has 1 year left on his contract and we need to find a replacement for him. Hello 2017 draft and Cullan Foote! LHed shot on the right side. We have several guys that can play this role: Neilsson, Z, Larkin, maybe AA. Sniper in the slot. We have 2 guys on the team now and 1 on the way: Vanek and Mantha are here now and Svechnikov will be here soon. Front of net. This is the major area in need of an upgrade. Right now we have 1 guy that can kind of play the role in Abby. But he is only average. 3-4 years from now he could be replaced by Givani Smith. But we are at least 1 player short. We have tried Sheahan before but he hasn't shown any real skill at this position. This creates the 2 following PP units: PP1: Kronwall, Green, Vanek, Neilsson and Abby. PP2: Dekeyser, Sproul, Mantha, Larkin, ????(Sheahan). That takes up 10 of the 18 skaters that a team dresses for each game. Penalty Kill. We want fast aggressive skaters to cover the extra ice. We have a bunch of guys that can do that: Helm, AA, Larkin, Abby, Glendening, Lil Bert, plus some more skilled guys like neilsson and Z. On the BL DD, Oullett, Ericsson, and Marcenko are the best we have. Those names over fill the 18 players we can dress for any one game. All of that creates the following lines/pairs: Abby-Neilsson-Vanek Mantha-Lakin-Sheahan (need better here) Z-AA-Jurco? Lil Bert-Helm-Glendening Dekeyser-Green Kornwall-Marchenko Oullett-Sproul Yes we need better than Sheahan on the second line and need to replace Kornwall asap. Of course everyone also needs to get healthy. We do have some in house replacements coming over the next couple of years like I mentioned. Svechnikov replaces Vanek, Smith replaces Abby, and lets hope and pray we can draft Foote to replace Green.

I saw this on a couple of websites: WIIM and ProHockey something or another. When the Yotes traded Yandle a couple of year ago he was 28, had 1.5 years left on his contract and was known as an offensive Dman. The Yotes got Duclair, Moore, a 1st round pick and a 2nd round pick for him. The Yotes did retain some salary. When Hudler and Stepniack (spelling) were traded both in the last year of their contracts, the selling teams got a 2nd round and a 4th round pick for each one. Those guys where used as the baseline for potential trades of Green and Vanek. If we can get close to those type of returns, both should be traded tomorrow! Let the rebuild begin! Then get whatever we can for Smith and Ott.

Was just looking at the upcoming schedule. Yikes! In order: Ducks, Kings, Sharks, Blackhawks, Stars-all on the road, then come home to play the Pens, Habs, and B's. Normally I would hope for 8 points out of those 8 games, but now...... I am thinking maybe 5....... Hopefully this ends our misery and gets Holland into sell mode for more picks/prospects.

If Holland returns I think and fear that Blashill gets 1 more year.

Blashill is Hollands personal project. This is the coach that Holland wanted. He will finish this year and TBH I would not be surprised if he returns next season. The only sure way he doesn't is if Holland is gone this summer. The 2 are tied together, like it or not.

3 points out of the possible 10 in the first 5 games. The fat lady is standing by the mic.......