Judd Brackett

[shiznak]

1 hour ago, theo5789 said:

People reacted similarly when we drafted Pettersson (of course there were some that didn't, but go back to his thread if you don't believe me). They didn't have the mentality that he would just be an okay player, they thought highly of him. And while they were wrong about the Nieuwendyk prediction, he was probably the best center in that range. Even at 14th, Girgensons hasn't done much, Hertl is good but not an NHL center, and Laughton hasn't really been much more impressive than Jankowski at that point. They targetted a player they liked, added a 2nd round pick and they were not far off with where they had picked Jankowski in hindsight. I think the pick has been justified at this point and I get why some would think it was crazy at the time, but their assessment seemed alright and they didn't lose out on much for the potential they were hoping for.

Jankowski would probably be in picked in the late 30s - early 40s in a re-draft. So, in hindsight, he would be exactly where he was projected to go.
 

Spoiler

Rielly

Galchenyuk

Forsberg

Dumba
Hertl

Trouba

Parayko

Lindholm

Wilson

Matta

Pearson

Matheson

Ceci

Severson

Pelech

Hellebucyk

Murray x2

Andersen

Gostisbehere

Slavin

Girgensons

Skjei

Vasilevskiy

Vesey

Tierney

Lindell
Sundqvist

J. Anderson
Athansious

Sissons

Kerfoot

Brown

Ullmark

Hinostroza

Gusev

Korpisalo

Gustafsson

 

 

Edited May 14, 2020 by shiznak

[Gurn]

1 hour ago, Toews said:

Who cares if Hertl isn't a center?

I'd say the teams that were looking for a center, most likely cared.

[ruilin96]

The 2012 draft class is the weakest in recent memory. I honestly don't think Jankowski is a bad pick at where he went. Lots of terrible players got picked in that year's 1st round anyways. MG should've packaged our 2012 and 2011 1st in the 2011 TDL to acquire another top 6 and top 4 defenseman for the 2011 cup run.

[JM_]

18 minutes ago, ruilin96 said:

The 2012 draft class is the weakest in recent memory. I honestly don't think Jankowski is a bad pick at where he went. Lots of terrible players got picked in that year's 1st round anyways. MG should've packaged our 2012 and 2011 1st in the 2011 TDL to acquire another top 6 and top 4 defenseman for the 2011 cup run.

thats a good point, when you look at who ended up the top performers from that draft its all over the place, outside of Reilly, Lindholm and Trouba. 

[Fred65]

44 minutes ago, ruilin96 said:

The 2012 draft class is the weakest in recent memory. I honestly don't think Jankowski is a bad pick at where he went. Lots of terrible players got picked in that year's 1st round anyways. MG should've packaged our 2012 and 2011 1st in the 2011 TDL to acquire another top 6 and top 4 defenseman for the 2011 cup run.

The draft is not consistent. One year good another year bad, this year, the one we just pulled out of, basically was supposed to be a good year, next year is supposed to be poor. But it chnages, the point to scouting is not to some how control what's in the draft but to maximise your chances. For instance we got Madded in the third round and we got Macdonough in the 7th. Gaudette in the 5th and Dipitero in the 3rd., Rathbone in the 4th. That's what scouting is all about. You make the best with what you're given and Vcr has for the most part seemed to do that. I don't want to see players of Jankowski ability being drafted by Vcr is the first round now or in the future 

Edited May 14, 2020 by Fred65

[theo5789]

1 hour ago, Toews said:

What you are describing imho is dog $&!# drafting strategy by Feaster and Weisbrod. If what you are saying is true, then they are even dumber than I gave them credit for. If they went into the draft thinking "i want a rapidly growing centerman", then they were doomed to failure to begin with. 

They were thinking they want a rapidly growing centerman, they were seeing a riser in the draft. A guy that went from 74th ranked to 43rd and who knows how much higher he was by the time the draft rolled around. They certainly felt other teams after them in the 1st could have taken him, but we will never know. The fact that he was rapidly growing could have meant teams may have overlooked him prior (see someone like Tanev). A 6'2 centerman (at the time, now 6'4) who has decent speed and with the assumption to grow from his then 168lb frame to hopefully 200+ lbs (now 215lbs) would be enticing to most in today's game. His career progression was fine for a 1st round pick and really only up until this current season where he hit a snag offensively. I'm not saying they had a brilliant draft strategy, but what I've been saying from the start is that Jankowski wasn't as bad of a pick as it's made out to be.

 

1 hour ago, Toews said:

I wasn't referring to CDC when I was talking about the general hockey community's reactions to the Jankowski pick, they were widely ridiculed across the league. Nobody thought it was an absurd reach for Pettersson to go #5, it was a surprise for some but there wasn't consensus after Hischier, Patrick, Heiskanen. 

While that may be true, there were no draft rankings that had Pettersson at 5. I would say he averaged around 10 and that's where there is more certainty as players selected in the top 10 are scouted way more. The 2nd half of the 1st round and on of most drafts become crap shoots. He was 43rd on central scouting, but could've easily continued to rise to say 35 on some draft boards. Calgary probably could find a trading partner to get them closer and they didn't want to miss out on their player. I get the shock of it, but it's not a simple as he was ranked at a certain spot by a public ranking site and thus that's where he should be picked.

 

1 hour ago, Toews said:

 

Nieuwendyk prediction was farcical. You are again highlighting the poor strategy that is need based drafting, why did the Flames need to select a center?

Girgensons has played like ~280 NHL games more than Jankowski. That's nearly 3.5 NHL seasons. That has value. Same goes for Cody Ceci. Teuvo Teravainen was a far better player at age 19 (see WJC) than Jankowski ever dreamed of being. Who cares if Hertl isn't a center? He is far better than Jankowski. Then there is Vasilevski who would have solved the Flames goaltending problems for the next decade, glad they didn't pick him. Even Laughton who is probably the worst of those picks is vastly outperforming Jankowski.

 

Those were some great times. The Flames were being managed by Dumb & Dumber, of course the Canucks had to steal one half of that tandem. 

I agree drafting by need may not be the best strategy, but they targeted potential. Center was their weak point in their prospect pool. I'm not arguing for their draft strategy though. I've only been suggesting that Jankowski is not a bad as people are making it seem. They traded down to acquire their target player and added a pick (no one would think this is a foolish decision as this strategy is deployed all the time).

 

Games played is less of a factor considering they knew he was a longer term project and he went through the college system rather than jumping into the NHL right away (and that was never the plan for him, nor was their vision for this player). There is no doubt that there were better players, but you could talk about this in any draft year and who teams should've picked instead. Jankowski was not the best of his draft class, nor should he be expected to be, but he's not as bad as people are making it seem. I disagree that Girgensons or Laughton are significantly better players (sure they more games, but I explained about that Jankowski was a longer term project for them in hopes for more). Picking a goalie in the 1st round is always questionable and there's always the Russian factor (how many Russians have gone through Calgary?). Teravainen was probably someone they felt comfortable passing on considering they had Gaudreau and Baertschi. Hertl is probably someone they should've looked at instead, but again, then went with a target they were comfortable with that was ranked lower and added a pick as well in a round that they didn't have a pick.

[theo5789]

2 hours ago, shiznak said:

Jankowski would probably be in picked in the late 30s - early 40s in a re-draft. So, in hindsight, he would be exactly where he was projected to go.
 

  Hide contents

Rielly

Galchenyuk

Forsberg

Dumba
Hertl

Trouba

Parayko

Lindholm

Wilson

Matta

Pearson

Matheson

Ceci

Severson

Pelech

Hellebucyk

Murray x2

Andersen

Gostisbehere

Slavin

Girgensons

Skjei

Vasilevskiy

Vesey

Tierney

Lindell
Sundqvist

J. Anderson
Athansious

Sissons

Kerfoot

Brown

Ullmark

Hinostroza

Gusev

Korpisalo

Gustafsson

 

 

Is that your own list? I would certainly put Jankowski over some of those people on that list. I would put him at about 25th based on that list you've provided (assuming you didn't rank this list in order).

[Fred65]

28 minutes ago, theo5789 said:

Is that your own list? I would certainly put Jankowski over some of those people on that list. I would put him at about 25th based on that list you've provided (assuming you didn't rank this list in order).

Theo get a grip. Jankowski was a poor pick. He was a surprise pick by the Flames. I remember watching that draft and every "expert" agreed that was a weird pick and it turns out they were correct.  No one should brag about that selection including Weisbrod. I'm not saying it was a good draft. It could have been traded away or heck Pearson was available as well as Oilli Maata. That was a dumb dumb pick and most, your self the lone exception believed that  

[theo5789]

21 minutes ago, Fred65 said:

Theo get a grip. Jankowski was a poor pick. He was a surprise pick by the Flames. I remember watching that draft and every "expert" agreed that was a weird pick and it turns out they were correct.  No one should brag about that selection including Weisbrod. I'm not saying it was a good draft. It could have been traded away or heck Pearson was available as well as Oilli Maata. That was a dumb dumb pick and most, your self the lone exception believed that  

Do your own research and do a re-draft without bias (if that's possible), there's probably 20 definitive players ahead of him. A group including him at the 21-30 range. He was a surprise pick at the time, but the pick isn't as far off as it's made out to be. Just cause it was a "surprise" pick doesn't make it the wrong one.

 

Brendan Gaunce was ranked as high as a mid 1st rounder. So it looked like we got a gem at 26th, look how that panned out. The public rankings that many of the "experts" go with are really only as valuable up to a certain point and it becomes a crapshoot beyond that. Teams reach all the time or take "fallers", so yes this may be a bigger reach than normal compared to the public rankings, but the end result is not as dire.

 

If you read others' responses, I'm not the only one that feels this way. There's probably as many people that share my views that are opposed to it, at least the ones being vocal about it.

Edited May 14, 2020 by theo5789

[Fred65]

Theo, Jankoswki sucked get over it. You're sadly trying to defend the indefensible 

[SID.IS.SID.ME.IS.ME]

That Jankowski draft (2012) was full of grenades. Several teams, picking before and after the Flames, ended up having their first round picks just blow up in their faces. Such a bad draft all around, in terms of the overall results versus expected pick value/position.

 

In hindsight, Calgary arguably did pretty ok, in that they at least have an everyday roster player in Jankowski, versus a complete washout/bust, a player that only caught on after moving to another organization, or one of the guys from that year who've now played their way right out of the league.

 

Of course, there’s no way to spin the Jankowski pick into a good move. It just wasn’t. But it also wasn’t all that bad, at least compared to what many other teams got out of the back half of the first round that year (and even some in the the top-5 or top-10).

Probably the worst part of the Jankowski pick was Weisbrod claiming they’d nabbed the best player in the draft and calling Jankowski the next Joel Nieuwendyk. Just a bad, bad move to put those kinds of lofty projections on any draft pick. At best, the prospect reaches their absolute ceiling, and they’ve only just reached expectations. Anything less than that, and the player becomes a disappointment (even if they have a decent enough career).

 

And for the guy who said it, it becomes a never ending source of embarrassment and ridicule. Hopefully Weisbrod learned his lesson.

[Toews]

1 hour ago, theo5789 said:

They were thinking they want a rapidly growing centerman, they were seeing a riser in the draft. A guy that went from 74th ranked to 43rd and who knows how much higher he was by the time the draft rolled around. They certainly felt other teams after them in the 1st could have taken him, but we will never know. The fact that he was rapidly growing could have meant teams may have overlooked him prior (see someone like Tanev). A 6'2 centerman (at the time, now 6'4) who has decent speed and with the assumption to grow from his then 168lb frame to hopefully 200+ lbs (now 215lbs) would be enticing to most in today's game. His career progression was fine for a 1st round pick and really only up until this current season where he hit a snag offensively. I'm not saying they had a brilliant draft strategy, but what I've been saying from the start is that Jankowski wasn't as bad of a pick as it's made out to be.

 

While that may be true, there were no draft rankings that had Pettersson at 5. I would say he averaged around 10 and that's where there is more certainty as players selected in the top 10 are scouted way more. The 2nd half of the 1st round and on of most drafts become crap shoots. He was 43rd on central scouting, but could've easily continued to rise to say 35 on some draft boards. Calgary probably could find a trading partner to get them closer and they didn't want to miss out on their player. I get the shock of it, but it's not a simple as he was ranked at a certain spot by a public ranking site and thus that's where he should be picked.

 

I agree drafting by need may not be the best strategy, but they targeted potential. Center was their weak point in their prospect pool. I'm not arguing for their draft strategy though. I've only been suggesting that Jankowski is not a bad as people are making it seem. They traded down to acquire their target player and added a pick (no one would think this is a foolish decision as this strategy is deployed all the time).

 

Games played is less of a factor considering they knew he was a longer term project and he went through the college system rather than jumping into the NHL right away (and that was never the plan for him, nor was their vision for this player). There is no doubt that there were better players, but you could talk about this in any draft year and who teams should've picked instead. Jankowski was not the best of his draft class, nor should he be expected to be, but he's not as bad as people are making it seem. I disagree that Girgensons or Laughton are significantly better players (sure they more games, but I explained about that Jankowski was a longer term project for them in hopes for more). Picking a goalie in the 1st round is always questionable and there's always the Russian factor (how many Russians have gone through Calgary?). Teravainen was probably someone they felt comfortable passing on considering they had Gaudreau and Baertschi. Hertl is probably someone they should've looked at instead, but again, then went with a target they were comfortable with that was ranked lower and added a pick as well in a round that they didn't have a pick.

We are going around in circles so I will just end with this... If you are a scout, heck even just an armchair one, if you couldn't come up with 14 names you would have above Jankowski then you clearly screwed the pooch somewhere. You are correct that Jankowski didn't turn out to be a complete failure so at least they have something to show for that pick but it was still outrageously bad. Filip Johansson was another such pick, the Wild GM fell in love with a player's intangibles and drafted the player at a spot where it is impossible for him to ever justify that selection. When the Flames traded down from #14 passing up on multiple good players to select Jankowski they were setting themselves up for disappointment and the eventual result doesn't make them appear any less inept.

Edited May 14, 2020 by Toews

[Fanuck]

 

Not everyone is going to be a Canuck For Life (except Steamer it seems).

EVERYONE will eventually move on whether it be ownership, players, coaches, management or yes, scouts.  

If Judd moves on then I hope he does well.  The Canucks, for their short history and modest franchise successes we've had over the years, actually have a very good track record of recruiting, employing, and graduating many sought-after hockey management personnel.  We should be proud that some Canucks personnel are coveted by other organizations and/or have higher aspirations, and if they move on - it's the natural order of things in pro-sports imo. 

 

 

[Quantum]

2 hours ago, ruilin96 said:

The 2012 draft class is the weakest in recent memory. I honestly don't think Jankowski is a bad pick at where he went. Lots of terrible players got picked in that year's 1st round anyways. MG should've packaged our 2012 and 2011 1st in the 2011 TDL to acquire another top 6 and top 4 defenseman for the 2011 cup run.

Yeah, that's totally true. You're right on it.

 

The Top 5 were Yakupov, Murray, Galchenyuk, Reinhart, and Morgan Reilly. In a re-draft, only Morgan Reilly stays in the Top 5 and would probably be the #1 pick. (Though an argument can be made that Vasilevskiy or Filip Forsberg could go #1 too). 2 of the 5 are already out of the league with Galchenyuk on his way out too. Murray is a good defenseman that's just been plagued with injury problems since his draft year... if he retires from the NHL, it won't be because he's a bad defenseman, it's that the injuries took too much of a toll on his body.

 

Jankowski would still be a first round pick in a 2012 redraft. He's definitely not the "best player of the draft" and that label was unfairly thrown onto him but he wasn't this spectacular bust others had predicted he would be. He's a good #3 C that'll probably carve out a 10 year career in the NHL albeit doing it quietly.

 

It really goes to show that not every draft class is going to be spectacular. And looking back at it, 2012 is probably going down as the weakest draft class of the 2010's for the NHL.

[ruilin96]

2 minutes ago, Quantum said:

Yeah, that's totally true. You're right on it.

 

The Top 5 were Yakupov, Murray, Galchenyuk, Reinhart, and Morgan Reilly. In a re-draft, only Morgan Reilly stays in the Top 5 and would probably be the #1 pick. (Though an argument can be made that Vasilevskiy or Filip Forsberg could go #1 too). 2 of the 5 are already out of the league with Galchenyuk on his way out too. Murray is a good defenseman that's just been plagued with injury problems since his draft year... if he retires from the NHL, it won't be because he's a bad defenseman, it's that the injuries took too much of a toll on his body.

 

Jankowski would still be a first round pick in a 2012 redraft. He's definitely not the "best player of the draft" and that label was unfairly thrown onto him but he wasn't this spectacular bust others had predicted he would be. He's a good #3 C that'll probably carve out a 10 year career in the NHL albeit doing it quietly.

 

It really goes to show that not every draft class is going to be spectacular. And looking back at it, 2012 is probably going down as the weakest draft class of the 2010's for the NHL.

Remember when people refer to the 2017 draft as a weak draft class? Some even suggest the 2017 draft class would be the weakest of the decade at the time. I don't think people would say the same things now with players like Pettersson, Makar, Heiskanen, Suzuki making impact with their NHL clubs right now. Overall, 2012 was definitely the weakest of the 2010s. 

[theo5789]

30 minutes ago, Quantum said:

Yeah, that's totally true. You're right on it.

 

The Top 5 were Yakupov, Murray, Galchenyuk, Reinhart, and Morgan Reilly. In a re-draft, only Morgan Reilly stays in the Top 5 and would probably be the #1 pick. (Though an argument can be made that Vasilevskiy or Filip Forsberg could go #1 too). 2 of the 5 are already out of the league with Galchenyuk on his way out too. Murray is a good defenseman that's just been plagued with injury problems since his draft year... if he retires from the NHL, it won't be because he's a bad defenseman, it's that the injuries took too much of a toll on his body.

 

Jankowski would still be a first round pick in a 2012 redraft. He's definitely not the "best player of the draft" and that label was unfairly thrown onto him but he wasn't this spectacular bust others had predicted he would be. He's a good #3 C that'll probably carve out a 10 year career in the NHL albeit doing it quietly.

 

It really goes to show that not every draft class is going to be spectacular. And looking back at it, 2012 is probably going down as the weakest draft class of the 2010's for the NHL.

I think this summarizes the whole Jankowski situation. People calling it a bad pick is because of the expectation that was put on him by his team which I say is not the best strategy. The people that are calling it a back pick are basing it on that expectation and how he didn't live up to that, but at the end of the day, he was decent pick (despite him being ranked lower) to the point where he's at least a 1st round quality player in that draft year. Put Jankowski in a stronger year under the same circumstances and this would be a different discussion.

[Jester13]

JANKOWSKI JANKOWSKI JANKOWSKI JANKOWSKI

 

[Fred65]

Quote

Probably the worst part of the Jankowski pick was Weisbrod claiming they’d nabbed the best player in the draft and calling Jankowski the next Joel Nieuwendyk. Just a bad, bad move to put those kinds of lofty projections on any draft pick

There's a cautionary tale there. Don't employ the guy that made those predictions, who woudl do that, Oooops I know the answer

[theo5789]

55 minutes ago, Toews said:

We are going around in circles so I will just end with this... If you are a scout, heck even just an armchair one, if you couldn't come up with 14 names you would have above Jankowski then you clearly screwed the pooch somewhere. You are correct that Jankowski didn't turn out to be a complete failure so at least they have something to show for that pick but it was still outrageously bad. Filip Johansson was another such pick, the Wild GM fell in love with a player's intangibles and drafted the player at a spot where it is impossible for him to ever justify that selection. When the Flames traded down from #14 passing up on multiple good players to select Jankowski they were setting themselves up for disappointment and the eventual result doesn't make them appear any less inept.

This is the part that I disagree with. They got a serviceable NHLer out of their 1st round pick. Not all 1st rounders are going to be superstars. Now of course they likely expected more from him and he never reached his ceiling, but his floor was higher which takes away some of the risk involved. A 3C at pick 21 is not the worst outcome and while it may have surprised people at the time of the pick, this should at least justify the pick that they found an NHLer in a year that many weren't or have accomplished little in their time.

 

The likely had a list of players above Jankowski, but they wanted him and thought he could be something special and knew he could be had later. They traded down and got an additional pick. Perhaps they would've liked to trade down further, but there were no feasible trading partners, so they simply took the player they wanted. Similarly to why we didn't want to trade down further than a certain point for EP and couldn't make a trade with the team that we felt comfortable doing so and thus took him at 5 when he too probably could've gone later (yes I know it's a bigger reach than for EP, but it's the same principle and I believe it applies here).

[brownky]

17 minutes ago, Fred65 said:

There's a cautionary tale there. Don't employ the guy that made those predictions, who woudl do that, Oooops I know the answer

Personally I’d lean towards hiring the guy who has already had the egg on his face. Reason being, nobody likes wearing egg, so if they got it out of the way for some other team/organization, the better. Mistakes are very good learning experiences, or rather they can be. That said, if people don’t learn from their mistakes that makes them liabilities. 
 

Now anybody who hires Chia for example as a GM is probably reaaaaallly rolling the dice since his mistakes were definitely repeated.