2023 NHL Entry Draft

[hammertime]

5 hours ago, spook007 said:

Think Willander pick is fine. Defo not a bad pick at all...

 

When we drafted Woo in the 2nd round I was ecstatic after the reports coming in left, right and centre... He may still become an NHL player, but the clock is ticking. 
Point being we just don't know... At least the network of scouts should have a feeling for, what they are doing. 
Loved they to a fair few D this year, Rhd in particular, mow time will tell, if they can materialize... if nothing else, they are probably better trade fodder for being rhd's...

 

And a 6'6 winger... they got to try to take a swing at that. 

To be fair there was only But left on the board I had above Willander by a wide margin. The other guys Wood Sale Perreault Barlow weren't guys I was pounding the table for. They were only above Willander by a C hair. Happy to get a toolsy RHD. 

Edited June 30, 2023 by hammertime

[HighOnHockey]

4 hours ago, R3aL said:

Honestly with our roster holes tanking isn't out of the question.\

 

Even if we didn't get the Macklin or Eiserman 

 

Getting Zeev BUIUM would be amazing.

We will see what they do this weekend signing sand trades if any. 

I've been starting to try to figure out the 2024 draft. Probably not the year to tank. Lots of great players, but I'm not sure I see any runaway can't-miss first overall calibre picks. Reminds me a little of 2022 in that both were loaded on defense, and the gap between 1 and around 10 or 12 doesn't look all that significant. Celebrini had a dominant U18s, but so did Shane Wright. Both were mature for their age, physically and also in their two-way play. For myself I'd prefer more dynamic offense out of a first overall pick, and that brings me to Konsta Helenius. Wasn't as impressive at U18s as a smaller, offense-first kinda kid, but man is he fun to watch. Early viewings have me wondering if he might be a bit too much of a perimeter player. Eiserman is the most explosive athlete of the bunch but is he a little bit one-dimensional? Cayden Lindstrom is a 6'5 power forward with skill and quickness. Beckett Senneke is a playmaking power winger with elite vision and creativity. Cole Beaudoin is a smooth-skaing two-way power center. Emil Hemming is a pro-style goal-scoring winger. And Ivan Demidov is another super-skilled Russian.

 

I just realized I already had most of this year's top 5 sorted by this time last year (my June 2022 top six was Bedard, Michkov, Carlsson, Fantilli, Dvorsky, Smith). This year I have little idea. I think any of the forwards mentioned above could find their way at least into the top five, maybe top three.

 

And the defense is even tougher to get a read on. This year it took until pretty late in the season for anyone to start to get the D sorted because there weren't obvious bluechip defensemen to know who to put in the top 15. This year I'm having the opposite problem: too many standout defensemen. Zayne Parekh, Henry Mews and Cole Hutson are ridiculously fun to watch, but not sure any of them will be legit top ten picks for various reasons. Mews is the one I think maybe could go very early if he can sort some things out with his decision-making next season. But the two I suspect NHL scouts are going to love the most are Sam Dickinson and Adam Jiricek.

 

Hard to get a read on what's going to happen with Kiviharju. Looking at Benson this year, the supporters pointed to elite puck skills and hockey IQ, while detractors pointed to size and average skating - it will be the same argument with Kiviharju but amplified, as a smaller player who's not an elite skater is even more worrisome for a defenseman, but also his skill and IQ are at an even higher level than Benson's. I love Buium but at his size I don't think he's enough of a gamebreaker to be a top ten or fifteen pick. And I haven't really seen them myself but Stian Solberg and Artym Levshunov sound like they could be among scouts' favorites.

[BowtieCanuck]

On 6/29/2023 at 4:00 PM, R3aL said:

You know OJ wasn't Swedish right?

 

Willander is going to be a horse for us get behind him and watch him run! 

You're right, I forgot he is Finnish. My bad. I'm still hesitant but I really hope he lives upto his hype because from the plays I've seen, he appears to be defensively mature.

[Dr. Crossbar]

3 hours ago, NUCKER67 said:

I'm not sure who's worse - Don Taylor or Drance. Holy geez, the whining is real.

 

They're still complaining about the "What if they had that 1st and 2nd?", or "Why did they pass on Benson?"  I thought Donnie was a smart hockey guy, but he's not. He knows jersey numbers and some history, but it's like he doesn't get it. 

 

 

They are wet blankets with eyes.

[BPA]

6 hours ago, Screw said:

Horrible.  Trade him to Vancouver.  Poor kid.  He will be a solid player.  

Trade Brisebois and Beauvillier for the kid.  MTL gets 2 French (at least their names sounds French) players.

 

[guntrix]

7 hours ago, NUCKER67 said:

Is this pretty much the D prospects depth chart?

 

Brisebois - Willander

Rathbone - Woo

Hirose - Brzustewicz

Pettersson - Johansson

Mynio - McWard

Kudryavtsev - Celebrini

Jurmo - Persson

Utunen

Truscott

 

Brisebois is turning 26 in less than a month. I wouldn’t consider him a prospect at all. 

[Ballisticsports.]

5 hours ago, NUCKER67 said:

I'm not sure who's worse - Don Taylor or Drance. Holy geez, the whining is real.

 

They're still complaining about the "What if they had that 1st and 2nd?", or "Why did they pass on Benson?"  I thought Donnie was a smart hockey guy, but he's not. He knows jersey numbers and some history, but it's like he doesn't get it. 

 

They do it to get people talking

Can you imagine the talk here if we had Montreal's spot and picked who they did?

Didn't they go off the board last year too?

[MaxVerstappen33]

I'm not a Craig Button guy. But he was low on Virtanen and Joulevi. And had has Benson at 14.

 

Bensons weakness is skating speed. Red flag for a short guy. Shroeder and Shinkeruk territory. Plus his scouting reports give off Laffrenier vibes

 

 

https://twitter.com/SneakyJoeSports/status/1674520977907109888?s=19

 

Edited July 1, 2023 by MaxVerstappen33

[MaxVerstappen33]

5 hours ago, NUCKER67 said:

I'm not sure who's worse - Don Taylor or Drance. Holy geez, the whining is real.

 

They're still complaining about the "What if they had that 1st and 2nd?", or "Why did they pass on Benson?"  I thought Donnie was a smart hockey guy, but he's not. He knows jersey numbers and some history, but it's like he doesn't get it. 

 

Don Taylor doesn't like Jim Rutherford. Just doesn't like him. Never has 

[J-Dizzle]

3 minutes ago, MaxVerstappen33 said:

I'm not a Craig Button guy. But he was low on Virtanen and Joulevi. And had has Benson at 14.

 

 

https://twitter.com/SneakyJoeSports/status/1674520977907109888?s=19

 

And Willander at 8 

[Ilunga]

7 hours ago, Wolfgang Durst said:

another terrible canadian market where things are getting completely out of control.

 

 

This is so messed up and also why I despise social media.

Cowards, sitting behind their keyboards abusing an 18 year old kid. 

Ruined what is meant to be one of the better days in this kids life.

 

[hammertime]

6 hours ago, GunnerStaal said:

You never really know what you are getting in a player beyond the first round.  If you go back in the most recent years and look at the players who end up making the NHL taken from the 4th round and beyond, you start to notice a lot of overaged draft picks.  Now I wouldn't call any of these kids striking gold, but they are players that amounted to be some of the best in their range.

 

In 2020, the best pick taken after the 3rd round (so far) is Nils Aman who was drafted by the Av's as an overager.
In 2019 the three best picks taken after the 3rd round (so far) have been Maccelli, Parssinen, and Harvey-Pinard.  Harvey-Pinard was an overager taken by the Canadians.
In 2018, the best pick taken  after the 3rd round (so far) was Sharangovich. Yep you guessed it he was overager taken by the Devils.
In 2017, the two best picks taken after the 3rd round have been Batherson and Aho(d).  Sebastian Aho the defenseman was taken by the islander as an overager.

 

Who knows, maybe this year was the year a Kaprizov or Gaudreau slipped through the cracks but I don't think you can claim it was a waste or the players will never amount to anything because they were overagers.  Ondre Palat, Viktor Arvidsson and Devon Toews were also overagers picked within the last 10 years.

https://www.eliteprospects.com/player/627775/bogdan-konyushkov

 

Bogdan Konyushkov 20yo RD exploded into the KHL this year. Having a whale of a regular season as a rookie and then going on to score at 0.5ppg in the playoffs voted one of the 4 best players in the 2nd round of the Gagarin cup.

 

https://www.eliteprospects.com/player/509851/oskar-asplund

 

Oskar Asplund LD. Passed over in last years draft went on an absolute tear this year. Posting 30 points in 49 Allsven games yes you read that right. Well ahead of several high profile picks from last years draft. Shocked Oskar went undrafted again. 

 

Just sayin. 

Edited July 1, 2023 by hammertime

[Junkyard Dog]

1 hour ago, Ilunga said:

This is so messed up and also why I despise social media.

Cowards, sitting behind their keyboards abusing an 18 year old kid. 

Ruined what is meant to be one of the better days in this kids life.

 

Thankfully these “fans” are being condemned by actual Habs fans online. Habs Reddit especially, even the ones that didn’t agree with the pick, decided to send messages of love and faith towards him to counter the hate messages. 

[hammertime]

1 hour ago, Ilunga said:

This is so messed up and also why I despise social media.

Cowards, sitting behind their keyboards abusing an 18 year old kid. 

Ruined what is meant to be one of the better days in this kids life.

 

Man thats just f'd up. We'll take him!!

[JeremyCuddles]

1 hour ago, hammertime said:

Man thats just f'd up. We'll take him!!

Hard to roast Montreal too hard, given the hate the Juolevi pick received at the time. Fans can get a little too emotional over these things.

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

4 hours ago, hammertime said:

Oskar Asplund LD. Passed over in last years draft went on an absolute tear this year. Posting 30 points in 49 Allsven games yes you read that right. Well ahead of several high profile picks from last years draft. Shocked Oskar went undrafted again. 

Hopefully some of the higher end undrafteds (like Asplund) will be getting invites to development camp.

 

Masden Leslie (50 point RHD with good size who played in our own backyard with the Giants) would be another undrafted kid worthy of an invite. Really surprising he wasn’t picked. Some people had him ranked as high as the third round.

 

https://www.eliteprospects.com/player/565459/mazden-leslie

 

Prince George’s Hudson Thornton is another WHL defenceman who’d be worth a look. Went undrafted for the second year in a row, despite earning some high rankings (Malloy #87; EP #101) as a re-entry, and posting a 74 point season in his D+1.

 

https://www.eliteprospects.com/player/483418/hudson-thornton

[R3aL]

9 hours ago, BowtieCanuck said:

You're right, I forgot he is Finnish. My bad. I'm still hesitant but I really hope he lives upto his hype because from the plays I've seen, he appears to be defensively mature.

He’s got the full package 

 

after next season everyone will be super excited even the draft benson omg camp

[R3aL]

6 hours ago, hammertime said:

https://www.eliteprospects.com/player/627775/bogdan-konyushkov

 

Bogdan Konyushkov 20yo RD exploded into the KHL this year. Having a whale of a regular season as a rookie and then going on to score at 0.5ppg in the playoffs voted one of the 4 best players in the 2nd round of the Gagarin cup.

 

https://www.eliteprospects.com/player/509851/oskar-asplund

 

Oskar Asplund LD. Passed over in last years draft went on an absolute tear this year. Posting 30 points in 49 Allsven games yes you read that right. Well ahead of several high profile picks from last years draft. Shocked Oskar went undrafted again. 

 

Just sayin. 

I don’t understand the asplund Passover again either. Wonder if he has a terrible attitude or soemthing we aren’t aware of 

[hammertime]

4 hours ago, SID.IS.SID.ME.IS.ME said:

Hopefully some of the higher end undrafteds (like Asplund) will be getting invites to development camp.

 

Masden Leslie (50 point RHD with good size who played in our own backyard with the Giants) would be another undrafted kid worthy of an invite. Really surprising he wasn’t picked. Some people had him ranked as high as the third round.

 

https://www.eliteprospects.com/player/565459/mazden-leslie

 

Prince George’s Hudson Thornton is another WHL defenceman who’d be worth a look. Went undrafted for the second year in a row, despite earning some high rankings (Malloy #87; EP #101) as a re-entry, and posting a 74 point season in his D+1.

 

https://www.eliteprospects.com/player/483418/hudson-thornton

Absolutely. I most certainly thought Leslie was a great target for a 3rd or 4th

[Isam]

9 hours ago, hammertime said:

https://www.eliteprospects.com/player/627775/bogdan-konyushkov

 

Bogdan Konyushkov 20yo RD exploded into the KHL this year. Having a whale of a regular season as a rookie and then going on to score at 0.5ppg in the playoffs voted one of the 4 best players in the 2nd round of the Gagarin cup.

 

https://www.eliteprospects.com/player/509851/oskar-asplund

 

Oskar Asplund LD. Passed over in last years draft went on an absolute tear this year. Posting 30 points in 49 Allsven games yes you read that right. Well ahead of several high profile picks from last years draft. Shocked Oskar went undrafted again. 

 

Just sayin. 

Would love to bring in astound for the rookie development camp