2019 Draft Discussion

[herman]

Imbalances in the current makeup of the NHL lineup probably aren?t getting solved directly at the draft.

 

[rdowdall]

Okay so for everyone:

Nick Robertson - 53rd overall
Mikko Kokkonen - 84th overall
Mikhail Abramov - 115th overall
Nicholas Abruzzese - 124th overall
Michael Koster - 146th overall
Kalle Loponen - 204th overall

One of those names is not like the others.

 

[bustaheims]

Imbalances in the current makeup of the NHL lineup probably aren?t getting solved directly at the draft.

Definitely won?t. Most of these guys are at least 3 seasons away. The Leafs obviously thought they were the best guys available, and that?s what you draft. Take the player with the highest ceiling. Everything else is an afterthought. You can trade for everything else when you have assets with high ceilings.

 

[Heroic Shrimp]

Okay so for everyone:

Nick Robertson - 53rd overall
Mikko Kokkonen - 84th overall
Mikhail Abramov - 115th overall
Nicholas Abruzzese - 124th overall
Michael Koster - 146th overall
Kalle Loponen - 204th overall

So, basically if your first or last name (or especially both!) started with an N, M, K or A, odds are the Leafs drafted you.

 

[Kin]

Imbalances in the current makeup of the NHL lineup probably aren?t getting solved directly at the draft.

Picking where the Leafs did today, virtually every pick is going to be decided on nothing more than "What chance does this guy have at being a NHL player?"

The sort of fine tuning people are talking about is probably best done through free agency. Personally, I'd go as high as 7 years and 36.75 million to add some of that badly needed heavy, gritty heaviness.

 

[ZBBM]

Sneer at the doubters all you like, but drafting a bunch of the same kind of players, no matter what their attributes are, is not beyond criticism.

 

[Kin]

Sneer at the doubters all you like, but drafting a bunch of the same kind of players, no matter what their attributes are, is not beyond criticism.

None of us know what kind of players these guys are.

 

[herman]

Imbalances in the current makeup of the NHL lineup probably aren?t getting solved directly at the draft.

Definitely won?t. Most of these guys are at least 3 seasons away. The Leafs obviously thought they were the best guys available, and that?s what you draft. Take the player with the highest ceiling. Everything else is an afterthought. You can trade for everything else when you have assets with high ceilings.

Yep. And these are kids, so right now is just a snapshot of who they are. What is almost always going to happen in the correct environment is that 17-18 year olds will develop strength and more physical skills, but less guaranteed and much more difficult to train is improving the way they process the game. Betting on smart smart players who have honed their skills against larger players and who might get stronger, faster, bigger themselves is generally a good idea.

 

[ZBBM]

Sneer at the doubters all you like, but drafting a bunch of the same kind of players, no matter what their attributes are, is not beyond criticism.

None of us know what kind of players these guys are.

Presumably Dubas et al. do.  They damn well better.

 

[bustaheims]

Sneer at the doubters all you like, but drafting a bunch of the same kind of players, no matter what their attributes are, is not beyond criticism.

Leaving higher skilled players on the board in favour of players with less important attributes is much more worthy of criticism. Top 6 forwards and good puck moving defencemen always have premium value in this league, regardless of how similar they may be.

 

[Guilt Trip]

So we take another player in the 2nd round who is not close to 6'. Maybe he'll have a growth spurt, I hope so. But it seems we want to be the all around smallest team in the league. Can get away with it for most of the regular season, but playoff hockey is a different beast. Until the team adds 2-3 bigger players with some grit and edge to creat some room for our smaller skill players it's going to be the same result in the playoffs.

In the later rounds you draft for skill. You need to try and swing for the fences because a big body with mediocre skill gets you a big body that just can't play.

So my 2 bits on some responses.

There are plenty of players in the draft who are bigger that aren't of medicore skill. Every team needs a variety of role players.

On the potential guys coming up, great.. if they make it. Is the grit and edge there? Hope so.

Bigger and heavier, correct, did we utilize it, with some grit and edginess? No because it's not in some of the guys DNA. I said we seem to want be the smallest team, not that we are.  So my "personal" opinion is a couple 6' plus guys with that mentality, versus a smaller version of that would be better.  A balance of skill players and hard-nosed role players .. I personally think we're out of balance.

Not going to beat a dead horse but against the Bruins, the Leafs were the bigger physical team. They also out hit and outplayed the Bruins 5 on 5. They were the heavier team in terms of play. The fact is they lost the special teams game which is why they dumped their assistant coaches responsible for the special teams. Also add in the Leafs most likely have a few big boys coming next year from the Marlies.

 

[Kin]

Presumably Dubas et al. do.  They damn well better.

I'll let you in on a secret: ultimately, they don't.

 

[Heroic Shrimp]

Damn, Nick Robertson outscored Semyon Der-Arguchintsev by 9 points in 8 less games last year.

 

[herman]

Damn, Nick Robertson outscored Semyon Der-Arguchintsev by 9 points in 8 less games last year.

 

[ZBBM]

Sneer at the doubters all you like, but drafting a bunch of the same kind of players, no matter what their attributes are, is not beyond criticism.

Leaving higher skilled players on the board in favour of players with less important attributes is much more worthy of criticism. Top 6 forwards and good puck moving defencemen always have premium value in this league, regardless of how similar they may be.

I suppose this reduces to the old argument about picking for need vs. BPA.  Of course, by the time you get to even as as high 53rd pick in the draft the demonstrable talent differences between the players available are already narrowing, and by the later rounds it is, as I think everyone would agree, a crap shoot.  Seems to me that you might use at least a few of the lower picks to address gaps in the system, since the chances of any of them panning out are low.

 

[Guilt Trip]

Damn, Nick Robertson outscored Semyon Der-Arguchintsev by 9 points in 8 less games last year.

Yup, lead the Pete's in scoring. Not an offensively gifted team.

 

[bustaheims]

I suppose this reduces to the old argument about picking for need vs. BPA.  Of course, by the time you get to even as as high 53rd pick in the draft the demonstrable talent differences between the players available are already narrowing, and by the later rounds it is, as I think everyone would agree, a crap shoot.  Seems to me that you might use at least a few of the lower picks to address gaps in the system, since the chances of any of them panning out are low.

Those gaps in the system can be addressed by trading our crap shoots that pan out for other teams? crapshoots that pan out. And, if you want the best odds of a crapshoot panning out, you take those that you think have the highest ceiling rather than specific attributes. In the draft, you always always need to be looking for guys who will provide maximum value as assets. Trade to fill need, draft to fill value.

 

[Kin]

I suppose this reduces to the old argument about picking for need vs. BPA.  Of course, by the time you get to even as as high 53rd pick in the draft the demonstrable talent differences between the players available are already narrowing, and by the later rounds it is, as I think everyone would agree, a crap shoot.  Seems to me that you might use at least a few of the lower picks to address gaps in the system, since the chances of any of them panning out are low.

Those gaps in the system can be addressed by trading our crap shoots that pan out for other teams? crapshoots that pan out. And, if you want the best odds of a crapshoot panning out, you take those that you think have the highest ceiling rather than specific attributes. In the draft, you always always need to be looking for guys who will provide maximum value as assets. Trade to fill need, draft to fill value.

It's also pretty debatable that grinding, physical wingers with size is a big weakness in the system right now with guys like Marchment and Engvall and so on. Honestly, I look at the system and the things that stick out as real problems is just a general dearth of talent and especially down the middle.

 

[Hobbes]

I suppose this reduces to the old argument about picking for need vs. BPA.  Of course, by the time you get to even as as high 53rd pick in the draft the demonstrable talent differences between the players available are already narrowing, and by the later rounds it is, as I think everyone would agree, a crap shoot.  Seems to me that you might use at least a few of the lower picks to address gaps in the system, since the chances of any of them panning out are low.

Those gaps in the system can be addressed by trading our crap shoots that pan out for other teams? crapshoots that pan out. And, if you want the best odds of a crapshoot panning out, you take those that you think have the highest ceiling rather than specific attributes. In the draft, you always always need to be looking for guys who will provide maximum value as assets. Trade to fill need, draft to fill value.

It's also pretty debatable that grinding, physical wingers with size is a big weakness in the system right now with guys like Marchment and Engvall and so on. Honestly, I look at the system and the things that stick out as real problems is just a general dearth of talent and especially down the middle.

And maybe even moreso in net...if Freddie has any sort of injury issues we're in trouble.

 

[brd13]

So we take another player in the 2nd round who is not close to 6'. Maybe he'll have a growth spurt, I hope so. But it seems we want to be the all around smallest team in the league. Can get away with it for most of the regular season, but playoff hockey is a different beast. Until the team adds 2-3 bigger players with some grit and edge to creat some room for our smaller skill players it's going to be the same result in the playoffs.

In the later rounds you draft for skill. You need to try and swing for the fences because a big body with mediocre skill gets you a big body that just can't play.

So my 2 bits on some responses.

There are plenty of players in the draft who are bigger that aren't of medicore skill. Every team needs a variety of role players.

On the potential guys coming up, great.. if they make it. Is the grit and edge there? Hope so.

Bigger and heavier, correct, did we utilize it, with some grit and edginess? No because it's not in some of the guys DNA. I said we seem to want be the smallest team, not that we are.  So my "personal" opinion is a couple 6' plus guys with that mentality, versus a smaller version of that would be better.  A balance of skill players and hard-nosed role players .. I personally think we're out of balance.

Not going to beat a dead horse but against the Bruins, the Leafs were the bigger physical team. They also out hit and outplayed the Bruins 5 on 5. They were the heavier team in terms of play. The fact is they lost the special teams game which is why they dumped their assistant coaches responsible for the special teams. Also add in the Leafs most likely have a few big boys coming next year from the Marlies.
[/quote

Fair point on special teams.

So as you say, not to beat a dead horse and this will be last my comment on this topic, then time to move on. The Leafs where known around the league as a soft team privately and some stated that publicly. Nick Foligno and some others publicly stated this, I'm paraphrasing but it was basically " if you pound them in the corners they start backing off and you can exploit them".  In the last series to me at least, the team that came out with the puck in the corners most of the time when it counted wasn't the blue and white.

Done.. now to the future. Go Leafs! I have vague memories of the last cup win so I want fresher memories real soon, this team is so close. Lets hope next year around this time we're all talking about how we defend the cup.