OptionalPants

Reading through this thread has got me so excited for the draft. My opinion is changing page to page, and there is honestly no way that Benning could screw this up (unless he goes wayyy off the board with someone like Rasmussen). Every single player ranked around 5 brings a totally different skillset and I would be more than pleased with any of Necas, Vilardi, Makar, Lilijgren, Glass, Middlestat or Hesakainen.

Because of the great memories the name Glass brings Canuck's fans. Seriously though, I've never seen him play but from what I've heard, he seems to have a higher ceiling then the other centres (besides Patrick and Hischier) in this draft. Not too many people have been talking about him on these boards, but if you go over to HFboards (I know it can be an awful place, but their prospect discussion is very good) there is a lot of good things being said about Glass' game. From what I've read, he plays a dynamic style but would be a riskier pick then Vilardi for sure. I can come back and edit this post or make a new one with some actual quotes about his style once I'm done with exams. Sorry for the rather low on actual information reply

This is the most true statement I have seen on CDC. Honestly I wish there was just one main message board for Canucks fans so both sides would have to interact with each other. Instead, both groups get trapped in an echo-chamber on their respective forums

Oh yeah, I'm fine with his statline as is considering the London Knights are definitely a weaker team this year. My concern was with his uninterested play, as I mentioned he often allows players to get behind and around him because he is just too calm and not fast/aggresive enough and almost looks like he is bored all the time. I was hoping to get a discussion going as to the reasons why this has become so much more prominent for him this year. My thoughts were that perhaps he is bored with the OHL? Or just unmotivated for some reason? I mean, this would bode well for him being a lot better than he is currently showing, but it would still be a rather disappointing trait to have. Or perhaps he has some injury that he has been hiding that has slowed him down? Because I really didn't notice this drop until after he came back from the World Juniors.

Ok, I generally try to say nothing too negative about our prospects as they are probably the most interesting part about the Canucks theses days, but is it not a little concerning how Juolevi seems to have slowed in his development this year? I have watched more than a few London Knights games and the points I saw brought up from that post quoting HFboards are often valid. He does seem very uninterested when he plays, almost to cool and calm. His skating his very smooth, but also way too relaxed and payers are always getting in behind him. He also doesn't get too engaged in battles down low and seems to struggle to run a powerplay once inside the o-zone. There are still lots of positives about his game. As mentioned, he is remarkably smooth and calm, and his breakout passing skills are as good as last year, if not even better. Also his wrist shot seems to find a way to get through. His positioning is always excellent which at times makes up for his slow reactions/ lack of explosiveness. My concern about all this is that either, he has taken a step back in his development. Or another possibiliy is that he is bored with the OHL and as a result his play seems uninterested. That second option may sound encouraging, but honestly I'd be a little disappointed if that were true. Any thoughts on why is play seems to have been like this so far?

And Schneider wasn't a top 5 goalie before this year? Still, really excited about how Demko is looking though. If he turns out like Schnieds at all, we got a steal

Horvat was actually ranked lower than 5-10 by most which made him quite a huge sleeper pick. However, I would defnitely be pleased if the Nucks grabbed Villardi with their pick (sleeper or not). Also, I would say that Barkov is easily a better forward than Horvat at this point offensively and defnsively, not to take anything away from Horvat as their is an argument to be made for him being the 2nd best forward in that draft which is incredible. But anyways, this is Virtanen talk, so I should probably make a comment on his play. Very nice to see him getting a goal last night, and considering how all I've heard is that his game is improving...maybe this is the confidence booster he needs to start racking up the points?

the AHL contracts dont matter. They don't count against the 50. Also I hope someone can clarify this, but generally the college free agent signings start before the season ends? So all those guys contracts won't be off the books for another couple of weeks.

We are at 46/50, and there will be not contracts coming off the books before the college free agent frenzy starts. So take away two for Boeser and Gaudette and that leaves 2 more for college free agents. That may be enough, but it is definitely pushing it. Seems a shame to spend an NHL contract spot on a guy with a best case scenario of a 4th liner. You can grab guys like this on AHL contracts instead rather than use an NHL slot

I think he meant Olson might be in the ECHL which would allow Mceneny to play in Utica next year due to a less crowded blue line. The previous few posts highlighted concerns that Benning might not qualify him due to a surplus of Utica bound D prospects next year.

Hmm, good point. But it took how many games for Babcock to finally do so? With Virtanen, Willie gave him basically zero leash. He was mostly playing on the 4th and 3rd lines last year, and the same for this season as well. Also Nylander's offensive game is definitely well developed so they can afford to make him learn some defence at this point.

Yeah, I agree that Willie was focusing too much on the two way play/ not losing. Sometimes with the rookies you need to let them be aggressive or let them go a bit on the offensive side of the game (obviously you don't want to go too far otherwise you end up like Edmonton). But look at Toronto with their rookies, they let them have a little more freedom than Willie is giving and they are flourishing quite nicely in the NHL. If Green can let Virtanen hone his offensive skills a bit more than what he was able to do with the big club than maybe we'll see the Virtanen we all hoped we were getting when he was drafted. *Also as a side note i thought that EW was always you just saying "ew" with some oomph, but I'm pretty sure now it's just you signing off w/ your username which makes quite a bit more sense.

I love what you're saying here, but I'm pretty sure Demko was the higher ranked goalie. So the Canucks went with both the scouting report and the eye test (knowing how Benning does his scouting). Why Calgary passed on Demko...I have no idea, but it is looking to be one of the best things they could have done for the Canucks.

I would probably say he got lucky with Lucic

I have to agree with this. Plus so many other teams were after Stecher as well, it's not like Benning outscouted the whole league to figure out that Stecher was going to be any good

Alright, thanks for responding. I must admit that I haven't really been following Juolevi too closely so it is good to hear that he might end up like a more offensive Hamhuis. What do you think about Hamhuis kind of being Juolevi's low end of potential...like if his game doesnt fully translate to the NHL we would still most likely be getting a steady defensive guy with like a 20 point average?

Would Dan Hamhuis in his prime be a fair comparison for what Juolevi's most likely potential is? I hear a lot of things about his game that reminds me of Hamhuis, and Hamhuis was a fairly legit #2D in his prime so this wouldn't be a bad thing by any means (around 30ish points every year and super smooth/solid defensive play).

I agree with your assesment that Shink probably won't be a reliable top six guy. But Granlund can't score consistently, he's pretty weak in his own end (always getting outmuscled), and his pk ability isn't anything to write home about. We got a fringe NHLer in Granlund, who has shown almost no indication that he'll be anything more. However, we gave up another guy who looks destined to follow the same route...though he does have a higher ceiling. I mean, I really want Granlund to succeed, I truly hope to be proven wrong, but absolutely nothing he has done has shown that he'll develop into anything more.