2018 UFA Thread

[SterioDesign]

yeah i remember way back looking at stats and draft reports on Matteau and Pearson and they were not really that much different. 

All i remember is going to see Matteau playing in juniors after we drafted him and he was on the 3rd line eventhough he was bigger than most guys... it certainly gave me a pause

[Daniel]

By definition everyone misjudges a great player selected after a certain point in the draft.  You judge a team’s ability to draft by looking at things over a certain period of time especially if they’re drafting the same type of player.  At some point you need to show you have a crystal ball.

[SterioDesign]

3 minutes ago, Daniel said:

By definition everyone misjudges a great player selected after a certain point in the draft.  You judge a team’s ability to draft by looking at things over a certain period of time especially if they’re drafting the same type of player.  At some point you need to show you have a crystal ball.

Thing is, if we do that... it was also very bad. We kept Conte for too long i feel

Edited July 25, 2018 by SterioDesign

[slasher72]

11 hours ago, aylbert said:

You can’t judge any draft, in any year, that way.   It’s like looking back at the weather...  you can only project so much.

Pearson is fair, the others were missed by everybody in the second too; so it’s really unfair to say Lou should have reached in the first for them...    especially when GMs get mocked for reaching ten spots away from consensus rankings.

 

I just thought it was an interesting article and seeing Hellebuyck go after Matteau made me want to vomit. Lol. In this article's defense though, Lou never should have elected to use that first-rounder on Matteau. That was the draft he should have skipped. But whatever... it's history. 

[mfitz804]

Should we go back to 1994 when we drafted some dude named Elias in the second round (51st overall) and laugh at all the people who passed on him?

A list that includes our own team, who picked Vadim Sharifijanov in the first round (25th overall). 

Second guessing is ridiculous. Everybody knows that whatever position you draft, the guy may not live up to his potential or he may exceed it. Just because you pick #10 doesn't mean that he'll be the 10th best guy that year. In fact, even true of #1. 

[mfitz804]

1 hour ago, slasher72 said:

I just thought it was an interesting article and seeing Hellebuyck go after Matteau made me want to vomit. Lol. In this article's defense though, Lou never should have elected to use that first-rounder on Matteau. That was the draft he should have skipped. But whatever... it's history. 

That sh!t wouldn't have happened if I were in charge. Nobody named Matteau should have ever worn a Devils jersey. I was pissed enough about Mike Mottau, just because it was close. 

[MadDog2020]

The Rangers were drunk in addition to blindfolded.

So were the Islanders.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[Daniel]

14 minutes ago, mfitz804 said:

Should we go back to 1994 when we drafted some dude named Elias in the second round (51st overall) and laugh at all the people who passed on him?

A list that includes our own team, who picked Vadim Sharifijanov in the first round (25th overall). 

Second guessing is ridiculous. Everybody knows that whatever position you draft, the guy may not live up to his potential or he may exceed it. Just because you pick #10 doesn't mean that he'll be the 10th best guy that year. In fact, even true of #1. 

Over a certain period of time you need to produce a certain number of bona fide NHL players, a few gems and not too many first round duds depending on where in the first round you're drafting and who is available (so no obvious reaches).  That was Conte and his group pretty much until 2004, but after that things took a real nose dive to the point that the Devils would have been one the three worst teams in the league for two or three years straight but for Schneider playing at his best.  After 2004, the best players Conte drafted until he left were Henrique, Larsson, Severson and Wood.  Unless you have a Crosby or McDavid on your roster, your team is going to really suck at some point.

I remember hearing somewhere that you can trace the decline in the Devils drafting fortunes to the departure of a particular scout.

[Muevelos]

New signing. 

[Colorado Rockies 1976]

Penguin Dollar Store pickup.  No issues with this at all, Bingo needs help, and he should provide it.  He's a pretty solid AHLer, can score some at that level.

[DevsMan84]

3 hours ago, Daniel said:

Over a certain period of time you need to produce a certain number of bona fide NHL players, a few gems and not too many first round duds depending on where in the first round you're drafting and who is available (so no obvious reaches).  That was Conte and his group pretty much until 2004, but after that things took a real nose dive to the point that the Devils would have been one the three worst teams in the league for two or three years straight but for Schneider playing at his best.  After 2004, the best players Conte drafted until he left were Henrique, Larsson, Severson and Wood.  Unless you have a Crosby or McDavid on your roster, your team is going to really suck at some point.

I remember hearing somewhere that you can trace the decline in the Devils drafting fortunes to the departure of a particular scout.

Do you happen to know which scout?  It would be pretty amazing that their entire house of cards fell because of one scout leaving (and I honestly don't really doubt it).

[Muevelos]

Blake is a pickle

[Daniel]

1 hour ago, DevsMan84 said:

Do you happen to know which scout?  It would be pretty amazing that their entire house of cards fell because of one scout leaving (and I honestly don't really doubt it).

Honestly, even if you gave me a name, I probably wouldn’t know.  A guy who used to have the seats next to my brother mentioned it to me while we were chatting during an intermission a few years back.  The name didn’t mean anything to me when we were talking about it.

Edited July 25, 2018 by Daniel

[Triumph]

2 hours ago, Daniel said:

Over a certain period of time you need to produce a certain number of bona fide NHL players, a few gems and not too many first round duds depending on where in the first round you're drafting and who is available (so no obvious reaches).  That was Conte and his group pretty much until 2004, but after that things took a real nose dive to the point that the Devils would have been one the three worst teams in the league for two or three years straight but for Schneider playing at his best.  After 2004, the best players Conte drafted until he left were Henrique, Larsson, Severson and Wood.  Unless you have a Crosby or McDavid on your roster, your team is going to really suck at some point.

I remember hearing somewhere that you can trace the decline in the Devils drafting fortunes to the departure of a particular scout.

There's no way anyone can trace it to the departure of a particular scout.  Some guys are better than others at this, but no one's perfect.  For years we heard about how great Hakan Andersson is and how amazing he is at figuring out who the star Swedes are going to be, but he's still in Detroit and they still pick a Swedish player pretty much every year, and the last time he worked his magic was on Gustav Nyquist, who was drafted 10 years ago.  

It's a luck business, and some people are looking for the wrong things which doesn't help, but I don't believe anyone has a huge permanent edge in this business.

[Daniel]

4 minutes ago, Triumph said:

There's no way anyone can trace it to the departure of a particular scout.  Some guys are better than others at this, but no one's perfect.  For years we heard about how great Hakan Andersson is and how amazing he is at figuring out who the star Swedes are going to be, but he's still in Detroit and they still pick a Swedish player pretty much every year, and the last time he worked his magic was on Gustav Nyquist, who was drafted 10 years ago.  

It's a luck business, and some people are looking for the wrong things which doesn't help, but I don't believe anyone has a huge permanent edge in this business.

In the case of Andersson, you’re talking about someone whose greatest hits were the result of taking advantage of inefficiencies that don’t exist anymore.  With Conte, you are talking about someone who all the sudden could not seem to draft a decent player from anywhere in any round for the life of him, and at the end passed on at least four exceptional players for a guy who has disappointed tremendously, but that he absolutely had to have according to Shero.   It’s quite plausible that the loss of someone in Conte’s staff contributed to his incompetence at the end.

[Triumph]

7 minutes ago, Daniel said:

In the case of Andersson, you’re talking about someone whose greatest hits were the result of taking advantage of inefficiencies that don’t exist anymore.  With Conte, you are talking about someone who all the sudden could not seem to draft a decent player from anywhere in any round for the life of him, and at the end passed on at least four exceptional players for a guy who has disappointed tremendously, but that he absolutely had to have according to Shero.   It’s quite plausible that the loss of someone in Conte’s staff contributed to his incompetence at the end.

Again, I just don't find this to be an accurate portrayal of what happened to the Devils under David Conte.

First off, the Devils were short picks almost every year because the NHL team was trying to win and because draft problems dating back a while was already causing shortages in the Devils' organization.  After 2005, the Devils didn't get supplemental picks for having free agents signed away.  Second, it's not like the guys the Devils were drafting were horrendous players - everyone they took in the 1st round was at least a suitable player in a 2nd tier league.  A guy like Bergfors - he was a good player and maybe with a little different path he could've been a consistent 20-25 goal guy.  Maybe if Josefson doesn't have so many injuries early on in his career he becomes a top 9 forward.  There's just a lot of uncertainty that comes with drafting.  I don't think Conte exactly had the right ideas, but he wasn't whiffing on everything.  The draft years 2011-13 each produced a player beyond the first round who plays on the team currently.

Zacha has not been great so far, but it's not impossible to see why he was taken that high.  Would I rather have a different guy, sure, but I don't see one pick as emblematic of a bad process.  The rest of the picks kinda speak for themselves.

[Daniel]

13 minutes ago, Triumph said:

Again, I just don't find this to be an accurate portrayal of what happened to the Devils under David Conte.

First off, the Devils were short picks almost every year because the NHL team was trying to win and because draft problems dating back a while was already causing shortages in the Devils' organization.  After 2005, the Devils didn't get supplemental picks for having free agents signed away.  Second, it's not like the guys the Devils were drafting were horrendous players - everyone they took in the 1st round was at least a suitable player in a 2nd tier league.  A guy like Bergfors - he was a good player and maybe with a little different path he could've been a consistent 20-25 goal guy.  Maybe if Josefson doesn't have so many injuries early on in his career he becomes a top 9 forward.  There's just a lot of uncertainty that comes with drafting.  I don't think Conte exactly had the right ideas, but he wasn't whiffing on everything.  The draft years 2011-13 each produced a player beyond the first round who plays on the team currently.

Zacha has not been great so far, but it's not impossible to see why he was taken that high.  Would I rather have a different guy, sure, but I don't see one pick as emblematic of a bad process.  The rest of the picks kinda speak for themselves.

In isolation, you can say this pick or that pick was understandable, and in a sense most of them were.  But when Adam Henrique is the crown jewel of your efforts for a period of ten years, you’re doing something seriously wrong.  I’m not saying you need to bat 1.000, but something better than .050 would be nice,

And if it’s all just a combination of luck and having a philosophy of some sort (e.g. wanting big guys, fast guys, skill guys, character guys, etc.) you might as well just fire most of your scouting staff, pay a few bucks to subscribe to the Athletic and a few other drafting publications that have prospect rankings, do some interviews to weed out the psychopaths, and just draft based on that.  

[Lateralous]

Conte jumped the shark for me the second he took Adrian foster with the last pick of the 1st round in 2001 when the dude wasn’t even there to go up on stage because they never thought someone would take him that high.  I was already starting to get irritated after using 2 firsts in 3 years on goalies to protect themselves if Marty left.  I know they pulled off the Parise coup and Zajac was a good pick but I was pretty much done with Conte after Foster.  Also, while they deserve credit, Parise was kind of a no brainer.   In such a deep draft, it was pretty telling that they didn’t land anyone else worth a damn in 2003 (Vrana, etc.)

[Triumph]

2 hours ago, Daniel said:

In isolation, you can say this pick or that pick was understandable, and in a sense most of them were.  But when Adam Henrique is the crown jewel of your efforts for a period of ten years, you’re doing something seriously wrong.  I’m not saying you need to bat 1.000, but something better than .050 would be nice[/quote]

I never said Conte should still be a head scout or anything like that.  Just that he had a more challenging job than he is being given credit for and he got some rotten luck besides.  Some picks are downright bad, obviously.

2 hours ago, Daniel said:

And if it’s all just a combination of luck and having a philosophy of some sort (e.g. wanting big guys, fast guys, skill guys, character guys, etc.) you might as well just fire most of your scouting staff, pay a few bucks to subscribe to the Athletic and a few other drafting publications that have prospect rankings, do some interviews to weed out the psychopaths, and just draft based on that.  

Can you refrain from hyperbole for once in a debate?  It's exhausting.  Seeing players is obviously important, but there's also clear flaws that come with trusting a scout's eyes over everything else.  Scouting is still vital, but head scouts and general managers have to make sure that scouts are looking for the right things.  If they're not looking for the right things then bad decisions will tend to be made.

[Devil Dan 56]

21 hours ago, SterioDesign said:

Well to be fair in 2003 you could be blindfolded and throw a dart at the selection board and get a superstar lol

Someone beat me to it, but the Rangers must have missed the board haha

[SterioDesign]

13 minutes ago, Devil Dan 56 said:

Someone beat me to it, but the Rangers must have missed the board haha

It's funny cause at first i actually typed something mocking the Rangers... but KNEW someone would love to bring it up so i left it out lol

[aclc79]

15 hours ago, mfitz804 said:

Should we go back to 1994 when we drafted some dude named Elias in the second round (51st overall) and laugh at all the people who passed on him?

A list that includes our own team, who picked Vadim Sharifijanov in the first round (25th overall). 

Second guessing is ridiculous. Everybody knows that whatever position you draft, the guy may not live up to his potential or he may exceed it. Just because you pick #10 doesn't mean that he'll be the 10th best guy that year. In fact, even true of #1. 

In the end, one just doesn't know how it will all turn out.  Determining a player's mental makeup is hardest of all.  A lot of that is based on highly subjective valuations.  There are more objective values assigned to determining a physical skill set.  Great scouts just have an innate feel for the mental aspect.

[Daniel]

10 hours ago, Triumph said:

 

Can you refrain from hyperbole for once in a debate?  It's exhausting.  Seeing players is obviously important, but there's also clear flaws that come with trusting a scout's eyes over everything else.  Scouting is still vital, but head scouts and general managers have to make sure that scouts are looking for the right things.  If they're not looking for the right things then bad decisions will tend to be made.

Maybe when you stop throwing out the word "luck" the way journalists these days throw out words like "collusion" or "meddling."  Using the word "luck" as a euphemism for "when things don't turn out the way my models say they should" is much more exhausting to everyone here.

This all started when I suggested that it was plausible that the Devils ability to find talent in the draft really took a nosedive because a certain person in the scouting department left.  You say it's completely implausible because luck has more to do with it than anything else and one guy couldn't make a difference.  Then you say well it's obviously not just luck it's that the scouts have to look for the right things, in other words, they need to be good scouts?   Well what is it?

[vadvlfan]

15 hours ago, Triumph said:

There's no way anyone can trace it to the departure of a particular scout.  Some guys are better than others at this, but no one's perfect.  For years we heard about how great Hakan Andersson is and how amazing he is at figuring out who the star Swedes are going to be, but he's still in Detroit and they still pick a Swedish player pretty much every year, and the last time he worked his magic was on Gustav Nyquist, who was drafted 10 years ago.  

It's a luck business, and some people are looking for the wrong things which doesn't help, but I don't believe anyone has a huge permanent edge in this business.

Not sure who (scout)  it was, but someone said Tedenby, Josefson,  can't think of the D-mans name (starts w/ U) the next coming. None panned out even close. Therefore whoever was the Euro scout that lobbied for these guys,  sucked. 

[titans04]

33 minutes ago, vadvlfan said:

Not sure who (scout)  it was, but someone said Tedenby, Josefson,  can't think of the D-mans name (starts w/ U) the next coming. None panned out even close. Therefore whoever was the Euro scout that lobbied for these guys,  sucked. 

Alexander Urbom, picked 73rd.