How is the Wings' Pro Scouting?

[Nevermind 363]

While our amateur scouting has definitely been one of the best in the league for quite some time now, I'm beginning to think we're not so good at scouting at the pro level. Recently, I was reading in the Freep how Holland was meeting with the pro scouts to discuss potential trade targets. It mentioned our entire pro scouting staff. We only have four pro scouts altogether.

Mark Howe

Glenn Merkosky

Bruce Haralson

Kirk Maltby

Ideally, our pro scouts would be watching every game and every team on a nightly basis. And that should include the AHL. I highly doubt that's happening when we only have four pro scouts total. I'm sure they watch a list of targets closely and have many hockey connections they get information from, but surely that's nowhere near comprehensive.

Perhaps that's one of the reasons (in addition to the high price of trades and free agency), that most of our team consists of homegrown talent? Also, I'm not sure about the thinking behind signing guys like Colaiacovo, Samuelsson, Commodore, etc. when those guys didn't look very good in their last stints before signing with us. Either Holland simply made desperate stop gap moves, or he needed better information from his scouts.

In a cap world, minor, but savvy trades and signings can make a big difference. And I feel like we just fill in all the gaps from within. Which is fine given our track record at the draft, but you'd have to think we're missing out on ways of potentially making our team better.

Thoughts?

[rick zombo 3,739]

Well, Maltby scored 50 goals in Jr...................

[kipwinger 8,518]

All the guys you mentioned were depth AND stopgap signings. The fact that they didn't have a huge impact isn't really that big of a surprise to me. There's nothing wrong with this team's pro scouting. Holland and co. are the best in the business at managing a roster. Which isn't to say that he cant make mistakes, but when he does they're typically MUCH less harmful than the mistakes of other GMs.

[Echolalia 2,961]

I dont know if it's as big of a deal to have many pro scouts. There are only so many pro players that are available at any one time, and the team can whittle down that list to just their particular needs (for example there are only so many defensman available at this trade deadline, and the Wings don't have much interest in a bottom 3 defensman, or a left handed defensman, so is it worth wasting the resources to scout these players?). After a more narrow list is made, when you consider all the tape that's out there one these players, and their league-wide reputation, there may only be a need to have a few pro-scouts on staff to go investigate these guys in person.

Edited February 24, 2015 by Echolalia

[PavelValerievichDatsyuk 1,935]

I think 4 pro scouts is around the norm. I did some random checks to see:

Habs have 3

http://www.gohabs.com/staff.htm

Looks like Pens have 2

http://penguins.nhl.com/club/page.htm?id=56530

Not sure why you would need more. Every NHL game is televised - you would pull tape any player you're targeting. If it's during the season send them to watch the one player intently for a while. Having a scouting dedicated to watching every NHL and AHL seems overkill. We have enough arms in the organization that they'll know most players in both leagues. I mean, the coaching is watching tape preparing for each game and Blashill and company are doing the same in the AHL.

As for the players you mentioned, we knew them quite well. Sammy obviously played here and Babs coached Commodore. We knew what we were getting. Injuries made the these signing a lot worse, but that's not a fault of scouting - we definitely would have known Coliacovo's history of injuries. They were signings made with limited options and I think that has to be taken into account.