6th Pick: 2014 NHL Entry Draft

[TOMapleLaughs]

He's based in Florida and has no hockey background. There is a reason why NHL clubs and scouting organizations have regional scouts. I've yet to hear a single person say they have ever seen him at games and I talk to quite a few people in the business. They even ask, "Who is this guy?"

Say what people will about MacKenzie, MaGuire and Button but at least they go to games all of the time. Going to games doesn't immediately make a person a good evaluator but I believe NOT going means you can't be.

It just really bothers me that there is this guy in Florida watching video only and he's got this web cred above Canadians and Americans from the north who actually put in the hours with little credit.

That would bother me as well. But i suppose watching piles of video shouldn't be overlooked either. But based on some opinions being presented, i'm not sure if that's being done either.

[Nuxfanabroad]

It all reads like we're now scouting the scouts..Paralysis from analysis.

Let's make this easy & simply sneak into the office of the Ducks' scouting staff(a la Watergate). You people gotta take a break & enjoy the weather. This stuff's goin' round in circles, like that old Billy Preston hit.

[S N Y P E R S 7]

Nikolaj Ehlers.

[theminister]

It all reads like we're now scouting the scouts..Paralysis from analysis.

Let's make this easy & simply sneak into the office of the Ducks' scouting staff(a la Watergate). You people gotta take a break & enjoy the weather. This stuff's goin' round in circles, like that old Billy Preston hit.

You're right, of course.

I'm going over to a friend's place for a BBQ to watch a double header Mem Cup and Game 7.

That's called having the best of both worlds.

[Piggy Bank]

Will I Am Nye Lan Der

[DJ Kreuzberg]

I think any half quality researcher can do the same. Fair enough if that's his angle but it bothers me that he's put up as a draft expert and evaluator if he doesn't watch live games. There are countless Canadians who should be considered above his qualifications. He's done a good job self promoting on the web but it doesn't equal doing the work required of an actual scout IMO.

Talking to scouts is one thing, scouting is another.

Someone... someone finally sees it as i do... I have spoken out about him but received flack for it on HF.

I once compared his opinions as equivalent to just another poster on a hockey forum; and i got some push back, saying it was insulting to say that about him. But let's be serious here. In 2010, this guy came out of the wood works with no hockey background, went to school for programming, and set up a website to rank these prospects. Promoted himself as an advanced stats guy, who gathered advanced stats on all of these prospects, goes off about Corsi this, corsi that, when guess what? The OHL/WHL/high school leagues don't even track shots on net, the utter basis of corsi. Laughable.

And then when you go into his "explanation" of his evaluation criteria, its the basis of these advanced stats and hearsay he gets from his sources, supposed scouts he knows. Where did he meet these scouts? Why would they befriend a programmer who runs a website? In addition, he once wrote, there are players he has never seen ever, but is only going off of what he hears, in some cases he says he has seen some guys 1-5 times a year, which i assume is through video.

Like you, I feel he is a misrepresentation of a scout. He is a writer and if he passed himself off as such, i'd be fine with it. Except he doesn't. He passes himself off as a scout, but no, he is not. Now all of a sudden that ESPN has hired him as a writer, he has become a legitimate source to some, which is entirely faulty. Now he's going on national radio to promote his ideas. Its a sham. /rant

[Nuxfanabroad]

^Probably just filling a void/demand(serving a market) & enhancing general fan-interest(& ultimately potential media/adv rev-streams).

Ain't killin' noone; nor is he reinventing the wheel. Who cares?

[theminister]

Someone... someone finally sees it as i do... I have spoken out about him but received flack for it on HF.

I once compared his opinions as equivalent to just another poster on a hockey forum; and i got some push back, saying it was insulting to say that about him. But let's be serious here. In 2010, this guy came out of the wood works with no hockey background, went to school for programming, and set up a website to rank these prospects. Promoted himself as an advanced stats guy, who gathered advanced stats on all of these prospects, goes off about Corsi this, corsi that, when guess what? The OHL/WHL/high school leagues don't even track shots on net, the utter basis of corsi. Laughable.

And then when you go into his "explanation" of his evaluation criteria, its the basis of these advanced stats and hearsay he gets from his sources, supposed scouts he knows. Where did he meet these scouts? Why would they befriend a programmer who runs a website? In addition, he once wrote, there are players he has never seen ever, but is only going off of what he hears, in some cases he says he has seen some guys 1-5 times a year, which i assume is through video.

Like you, I feel he is a misrepresentation of a scout. He is a writer and if he passed himself off as such, i'd be fine with it. Except he doesn't. He passes himself off as a scout, but no, he is not. Now all of a sudden that ESPN has hired him as a writer, he has become a legitimate source to some, which is entirely faulty. Now he's going on national radio to promote his ideas. Its a sham. /rant

Hallelujah. Preach it, brother.

The hockey gods will accept your offering.

Enough of these false prophets.

[Robongo]

He's based in Florida and has no hockey background. There is a reason why NHL clubs and scouting organizations have regional scouts. I've yet to hear a single person say they have ever seen him at games and I talk to quite a few people in the business. They even ask, "Who is this guy?"

Say what people will about MacKenzie, MaGuire and Button but at least they go to games all of the time. Going to games doesn't immediately make a person a good evaluator but I believe NOT going means you can't be.

It just really bothers me that there is this guy in Florida watching video only and he's got this web cred above Canadians and Americans from the north who actually put in the hours with little credit.

EDIT: I know from someone who has actually talked to him that as of two years ago he'd never been to Canada and had no travel budget. Maybe that has changed but I doubt it

Asked the question for you, and out of my own curiousity, theminster:

Hey Cory, was wondering how often, if at all, do you get to travel to Canada and watch some of these guys in the CHL live? Also, how much of your opinions on players are based off your own actual viewings of players as oppose to just talking to scouts? No disrespect intended, just curious really.

Cory Pronman: Very fair question which I would ask if I were in your position. I live in NY (from QC), did mostly AHL and college scouting in first half. Did bi-weekly trips through ONT and QC in 2nd half. One trip out west during the top prospect week. Saw guys during international camps as well that came out east. QC, Ont are mostly my views. WHL, high school and Europe (depending on area/player) I lean on sources. Proportion depends on players. If it's a high-end prospect, I make calls. I wouldn't put a guy top 30 based on a couple of views and no extra info but a guy like Shane Gersich was a personal gut call for example.

[Robongo]

he also obviously watches a ton of video of these players, so yea you have to take his view with a grain of salt, but it's also another perspective and I very much welcome that. As we know, year in and year out there are a lot of surprises on draft day, and it never seems to follow the "consensus".

[chickenman92]

 

Someone... someone finally sees it as i do... I have spoken out about him but received flack for it on HF.

I once compared his opinions as equivalent to just another poster on a hockey forum; and i got some push back, saying it was insulting to say that about him. But let's be serious here. In 2010, this guy came out of the wood works with no hockey background, went to school for programming, and set up a website to rank these prospects. Promoted himself as an advanced stats guy, who gathered advanced stats on all of these prospects, goes off about Corsi this, corsi that, when guess what? The OHL/WHL/high school leagues don't even track shots on net, the utter basis of corsi. Laughable.

And then when you go into his "explanation" of his evaluation criteria, its the basis of these advanced stats and hearsay he gets from his sources, supposed scouts he knows. Where did he meet these scouts? Why would they befriend a programmer who runs a website? In addition, he once wrote, there are players he has never seen ever, but is only going off of what he hears, in some cases he says he has seen some guys 1-5 times a year, which i assume is through video.

Like you, I feel he is a misrepresentation of a scout. He is a writer and if he passed himself off as such, i'd be fine with it. Except he doesn't. He passes himself off as a scout, but no, he is not. Now all of a sudden that ESPN has hired him as a writer, he has become a legitimate source to some, which is entirely faulty. Now he's going on national radio to promote his ideas. Its a sham. /rant

 

So what you're saying is my CHL Media pass puts me ahead of this guy. lol

[Ossi Vaananen]

I'm open to new draft rankings, but I did some research into Pronman, and he doesn't seem to have the keenest eye. That is, if he even watches prospects. Anyway, it's hindsight but it's worth a look, here's his rankings from 2011 (I figure 3 years is a big enough gap to see which are NHLers or at least close):

http://www.hockeyprospectus.com/puck/article.php?articleid=955

Now I don't expect anyone to get everything right, but he's made some notable errors. Landeskog at 13 is astounding, as is Hamilton at 12, and Scheifele at 28 doesn't make much sense either. To his credit, he did have Saad and Rattie in the early 20s, though even he missed out on Jenner at 32. Anyways, if that helps discredit him and the blender he took to actual scouts' rankings then I think I've accomplished my goal.

Conversley Mckenzie had a much more accurate list, not only in terms of where players went but also NHL success (thus far).

http://www.tsn.ca/draftcentre/feature/?id=44969

For those that don't have previous drafts close to memorized: http://www.hockeydb.com/ihdb/draft/nhl2011e.html

This is just confirming what I've said from the outset, that hockey blog sites like hockeyprospectus and their jumble rankings really don't hold up to actual experts and hockey analysts. I could of course use other drafts to back up this point, and I'm more than confident that any previous draft comparing McKenzie to Pronman would have McKenzie win outright.

My real point however, is that while Nylander may be top 3 to Pronman, he's a mere 12th to an actual analyst. That being said, McKenzie has Ritchie where we pick, Ehlers at 7 and Virtanen at 8th. So please, let's get back to the Virtanen/Ehlers/Ritchie debate, and leave Kapanen/Nylander to later picks.

[BanTSN]

Asked the question for you, and out of my own curiousity, theminster:

Hey Cory, was wondering how often, if at all, do you get to travel to Canada and watch some of these guys in the CHL live? Also, how much of your opinions on players are based off your own actual viewings of players as oppose to just talking to scouts? No disrespect intended, just curious really.

Cory Pronman: Very fair question which I would ask if I were in your position. I live in NY (from QC), did mostly AHL and college scouting in first half. Did bi-weekly trips through ONT and QC in 2nd half. One trip out west during the top prospect week. Saw guys during international camps as well that came out east. QC, Ont are mostly my views. WHL, high school and Europe (depending on area/player) I lean on sources. Proportion depends on players. If it's a high-end prospect, I make calls. I wouldn't put a guy top 30 based on a couple of views and no extra info but a guy like Shane Gersich was a personal gut call for example.

So six guys out of his top 10 are there based on what his 'sources' have to say?

Useless.

[Robongo]

I'm open to new draft rankings, but I did some research into Pronman, and he doesn't seem to have the keenest eye. That is, if he even watches prospects. Anyway, it's hindsight but it's worth a look, here's his rankings from 2011 (I figure 3 years is a big enough gap to see which are NHLers or at least close):

http://www.hockeyprospectus.com/puck/article.php?articleid=955

Now I don't expect anyone to get everything right, but he's made some notable errors. Landeskog at 13 is astounding, as is Hamilton at 12, and Scheifele at 28 doesn't make much sense either. To his credit, he did have Saad and Rattie in the early 20s, though even he missed out on Jenner at 32. Anyways, if that helps discredit him and the blender he took to actual scouts' rankings then I think I've accomplished my goal.

Conversley Mckenzie had a much more accurate list, not only in terms of where players went but also NHL success (thus far).

http://www.tsn.ca/draftcentre/feature/?id=44969

For those that don't have previous drafts close to memorized: http://www.hockeydb.com/ihdb/draft/nhl2011e.html

This is just confirming what I've said from the outset, that hockey blog sites like hockeyprospectus and their jumble rankings really don't hold up to actual experts and hockey analysts. I could of course use other drafts to back up this point, and I'm more than confident that any previous draft comparing McKenzie to Pronman would have McKenzie win outright.

My real point however, is that while Nylander may be top 3 to Pronman, he's a mere 12th to an actual analyst. That being said, McKenzie has Ritchie where we pick, Ehlers at 7 and Virtanen at 8th. So please, let's get back to the Virtanen/Ehlers/Ritchie debate, and leave Kapanen/Nylander to later picks.

According to most scouts Nylander has the highest offensive potential, even the Canucks scouts acknowledge this, according to Sekeres. However there are a lot of negatives with him, such as his attitude, work ethic , consistency etc. Pronman in no way is perfect, but as I said earlier, he gives a fresh perspective on who he thinks will turn out to be the best players in the draft. He watches far more hockey than any anyone on here would like to pretend to, but by no means does that make his list absolute. He obviously doesn't consider size as much as most do, he tends to look at the skill sets more so. I would never pay to read his work, but at the same time I appreciate the time he puts into it and the in depth explanations he provides to his rankings.

He's also acknowledged that Landeskog is one of his biggest errors, and he simply thought that his skill set wouldn't translate as well as it has to the NHL and his numbers in junior were good but not great.

[Robongo]

So six guys out of his top 10 are there based on what his 'sources' have to say?

Useless.

A lot less useless than your ridiculously biased posts

[BanTSN]

A lot less useless than your ridiculously biased posts

I'm only biased against failure though.

Pronman has been dead wrong on many players and it kinda looks like he just sucks. Not sure why anyone would refer to him.

[thad]

According to most scouts Nylander has the highest offensive potential, even the Canucks scouts acknowledge this, according to Sekeres. However there are a lot of negatives with him, such as his attitude, work ethic , consistency etc. Pronman in no way is perfect, but as I said earlier, he gives a fresh perspective on who he thinks will turn out to be the best players in the draft. He watches far more hockey than any anyone on here would like to pretend to, but by no means does that make his list absolute. He obviously doesn't consider size as much as most do, he tends to look at the skill sets more so. I would never pay to read his work, but at the same time I appreciate the time he puts into it and the in depth explanations he provides to his rankings.

He's also acknowledged that Landeskog is one of his biggest errors, and he simply thought that his skill set wouldn't translate as well as it has to the NHL and his numbers in junior were good but not great.

Kinda weird about landeskog. The big dogs like mackenzie were all raving about him. I remember them saying he was likely the most nhl ready of any of the draftees too.

I wonder if his sources are messing with him.. "Oh ya landeskog, most likely gonna be an ahl grinder"... "Cory, my man, just callin to let you know Fiala is going top ten this year, buddy, book it"

[DJ Kreuzberg]

he also obviously watches a ton of video of these players, so yea you have to take his view with a grain of salt, but it's also another perspective and I very much welcome that. As we know, year in and year out there are a lot of surprises on draft day, and it never seems to follow the "consensus".

I don't think my issue with his rankings is that he doesn't follow consensus, i question his methodology and values (regarding prospects). Even if i may not agree, Button certainly does not follow consensus, but i still respect his opinion. He watches these kids and makes his judgement. It's as simple as that. A method that makes sense. But Pronman on the other hand, has in the past said he combines advanced stats, which are terribly difficult to track in junior leagues as I mentioned, hearsay from his supposed sources, and very limited viewings. How is this different than say a typical HF poster going off of scouting reports from the scouting agencies available and watching a handful of games on the players in the 1st round? I don't see much difference once you throw the bogus advanced stats cred out the window.

So what you're saying is my CHL Media pass puts me ahead of this guy. lol

Not so. It's not simply being at games that is my issue here, perhaps more of theminister's bone to pick. It's the basis of his opinions, which as Ossi mentioned are well out there at times.

[Absent Canuck]

Pronman sounds like some of the posters on Cdc. Ignore overall package, focus on pure talent. Then throw hands up in air when it doesn't translate.

The real kicker is Fiala in the top-6. Over Leon and Dal Colle. Good God. Put down the crackpipe.

Maybe the asterisk is that some of these guys will go on to score meaningless points on horrible teams. Like Grabner.

You dont like Pronmans list, so rip the list and Pronman apart in a childish attempt to invalidate him. Well done.

Would expect nothing less from you. I tend to view consistency as a virtue, so you have that going for you at least.

Here I was thinking Pronman's list is like anyone elses, except he works for ESPN so he probably knows more than the average joe sitting behind a computer posting here.

Here is a concept for you:

Its ok to disagree with the guys list without feeling the need to rip him a new one. Try it .

[messier's_elbow]

Here's Pronman's list of the players he think that will end up being the best in this draft :

1 Aaron Ekblad D Barrie OHL

2 Sam Bennett C Kingston OHL

3 William Nylander RW Modo SHL

4 Sam Reinhart C Kootenay WHL

5 Nikolaj Ehlers LW Halifax QMJHL

6 Kevin Fiala LW HV71 SHL

7 Leon Draisaitl C Prince Albert WHL

8 Michael Dal Colle LW Oshawa OHL

9 Kasperi Kapanen RW KalPa Liiga

10 Haydn Fleury D Red Deer WHL

Edit: Sorry, just saw it was posted. Interesting list none the less

What the hell? No way we take Fiala over Dal Cole. Or Draisaitl for that matter...