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2014 Draft Thread


thefiestygoat

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Just got my copy of the Future Considerations Draft Guide for under $20. Been up all night catching up on MLS and UFC so I'm not going to look through it yet but I've always been satisfied in recent years. I'll probably look at some of the names that have been mentioned recently in this thread to see what FC says on them at some point tomorrow.

 

Regarding Demko, he seems like the best G but drafting/scouting G's has been fairly inefficient and difficult in the past so I'm hesitant to take him if he's on the board at 30 or 41 (doubt he slips past that). Really hoping to take BPA available at those spots, hopefully forwards. I haven't looked at the European G's yet but one NA G that caught my eye this year was Alexander Nedeljkovic (Plymouth - OHL).

 

Slightly undersized at 6'0, 182 but put up a .925 SV% this year in 61 games and had an impressive 76 GA%- and 53.49 GSAA which crushed his fellow OHL draft eligibles in his age 18 season. He only saw 26 games in his age 17 season but put up a .923 SV% in 26 games. On the radar of USA Hockey as he's represented them at the Hlinka Memorial Tournament and the WJC-U18 too.

I'm not advocating taking a G since they are tough to predict and can be had for as UDFA's but if the Devils really want to take one and he was still around for their 3rd round pick, I wouldn't mind it. Would be even better if he somehow lasted till their 5th round pick. CSS ranked other G's ahead of him due to size which seems most important on their list. Maybe some teams will pass up on him for awhile.

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Tons of information on OHL prospects just came out in the blogger world...

 

Sean Lafortune (twitter) of TheScout.ca ranks the top OHL skaters. It's a top 40 list with a blurb on each player.

 

Brock Otten (twitter) of OHL Prospects has numerous post on his top 50 OHL prospects for this draft.

- Part 1: Honorable Mentions

- Part 2: 50-31

- Part 3: 30-11

- Part 4: 10-1

 

Terrel (twitter) from Arctic Ice Hockey is putting together his top 60.
Part 1: 46-60 and honorable mentions.
Part 2: 31-45
Part 3: 21-30

 

Got a lot of reading to get through during the next few weeks.

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I didn't mean to imply race really had anything to do with it - I just think the results speak for themselves.

 

If you have a choice of picking an apple from three trees (to keep it simple), and you've picked quite a few rotten ones from tree A, why would you feel inclined to keep picking apples from that first tree?

 

We're all the same race, man.

 

And you'd have a point if there hadn't been any good apples found in that tree, but there were. Devils either picked the wrong ones or handled them poorly.

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We're all the same race, man.

And you'd have a point if there hadn't been any good apples found in that tree, but there were. Devils either picked the wrong ones or handled them poorly.

I wouldn't say it's completely out of line to take a prospect's ethnicity into account. It's not based on genetics, just that I imagine, for example, Swedish players grow up being taught to play the game in a certain way that might be different from a North American or Russian player. It may or may not mesh well with a particular NHL team's system.

Of course it's probably more of a coincidence that the Swedish players the Devils have drafted recently have been underwhelming and that they would have been that way no matter what team picked them.

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I wouldn't say it's completely out of line to take a prospect's ethnicity into account. It's not based on genetics, just that I imagine, for example, Swedish players grow up being taught to play the game in a certain way that might be different from a North American or Russian player. It may or may not mesh well with a particular NHL team's system.

Of course it's probably more of a coincidence that the Swedish players the Devils have drafted recently have been underwhelming and that they would have been that way no matter what team picked them.

 

 

That's fair Daniel. But the Swedish "stereotype" is strong 2-way play, right? Which is pretty much the Devils way as well. They've drafted five guys (lol sample size) and you can argue three of those were considered 2-way players (Urbom, Larsson, Josefson) and the other two offense first and defense never (Bergfors, Tedenby). Jury is still out on Larsson, Urbom's simply not good enough and JJ probably isn't more than a 3rd C at best. 

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Tons of information on OHL prospects just came out in the blogger world...

 

Sean Lafortune (twitter) of TheScout.ca ranks the top OHL skaters. It's a top 40 list with a blurb on each player.

 

Brock Otten (twitter) of OHL Prospects has numerous post on his top 50 OHL prospects for this draft.

- Part 1: Honorable Mentions

- Part 2: 50-31

- Part 3: 30-11

- Part 4: 10-1

 

Terrel (twitter) from Arctic Ice Hockey is putting together his top 60.

Part 1: 46-60 and honorable mentions.

Part 2: 31-45

Part 3: 21-30

 

Got a lot of reading to get through during the next few weeks.

Lots of good info

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  • 2 weeks later...

It doesn't affect his status as an elite prospect, but yeah that pretty sad lol. To illustrate how easy it is to to do a pull-up, I was able to do 8 of them when we used to do the state health and fitness test in high school. It isn't difficult at all.

Edited by MadDog2020
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Holy #### that is pretty crazy. Being an in shape 18 year old and not being able to do a single pull up is sort of sad

I remember hearing Niedermeyer was particularly underwhelming so far as strength was concerned.

Doesn't really effect anything, but kind if interesting.

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I remember hearing Niedermeyer was particularly underwhelming so far as strength was concerned.

Doesn't really effect anything, but kind if interesting.

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Obviously it has little-no bearing on how he'll be as a pro, but with how much training has improved the last 20 years, it's somewhat shocking

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Some guys intentionally don't work out for this thing because they figure their draft status will go up if they do poorly, or so I've heard. I believe Huberdeau could only do 2 pullups.

I take it because they feel a GM will say that look how well he did when he was a weakling, get him into the weight room and he'll only get better?

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I haven't read up on the European G's yet but glancing at Husso's numbers he seems pretty good. Pronman has him listed as his #2 G and Future Considerations has him ranked at #105 and #6 amongst G's.

 

I can't remember if I posted this in the past but it's interesting to see how metrics like Goals Saved Above Average and Goals Allowed %- clash with the Central Scouting rankings. I only have the data for the QMJHL and OHL:

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Reminder that you want a positive GSAA and a lower GA%- (100 is average). Despite being slightly undersized, Nedeljkovic really separated himself from his OHL peers this year. Moran seems to benefit from being 6'4 in the eyes of the CSS scouts.

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We're all the same race, man.

 

And you'd have a point if there hadn't been any good apples found in that tree, but there were. Devils either picked the wrong ones or handled them poorly.

Well, to be specific, we are all the same species. Otoh, race is a concept that has been (mis)applied to a variety of human types showing physical differences. The reality is that race does not exist as a biological concept--it is an intellectual construct and exists merely as a subjective identity with some seemingly objective traits.

Okay, back to the discussion...

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This draft has pretty good depth in the 30-60 range.

I really want to take another shot at the diminutive scorer. Vladimir Tkachyov has one thing Tedenby doesn't, a track record of putting up points.

 

Aube-Kubel

Tkachyov

Lemieux

Kamenev

Karlsson

Husso (G)

Ho Sang

Barbashev

Goldobin

Edited by Jas0nMacIsaac
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This draft has pretty good depth in the 30-60 range.

I really want to take another shot at the diminutive scorer. Vladimir Tkachyov has one thing Tedenby doesn't, a track record of putting up points.

 

Whyyyy?  Why take a gamble on a short guy when height, like it or not, is a significant factor in the NHL?  

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Whyyyy?  Why take a gamble on a short guy when height, like it or not, is a significant factor in the NHL?  

 

No it isn't.  I mean, yeah, gimme two guys of equal skill and I'll take the bigger guy, but I don't really think that height is significant.  Tedenby's issue is not height, he's not fast enough, strong enough, or smart enough.  If he dominated the AHL and couldn't do much in the NHL, then maybe I'd think his height is an issue.  That's just not how it is.  Meanwhile some of NJ's best draft picks have been smaller players:  Sullivan, B. Gionta, Gomez, Sykora, etc., and Reid Boucher may continue that tradition.  

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This draft has pretty good depth in the 30-60 range.

I really want to take another shot at the diminutive scorer. Vladimir Tkachyov has one thing Tedenby doesn't, a track record of putting up points.

 

Aube-Kubel

Tkachyov

Lemieux

Kamenev

Karlsson

Husso (G)

Ho Sang

Barbashev

Goldobin

I think we'll get a decent prospect @ 30 & 41. Although most here would like to see forwards taken across the board, there are some very good D prospects (Sanheim/Dougherty/Glover) I'm wondering if Husso will also be around by #71? (although I think Ho Sang, Barbashev, Goldobin will be gone by 30)

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