The Athletic Hockey Show - Corey’s updated best U23 NHL players, Team USA men’s Olympic hockey roster breakdown, listener questions, and more

Episode Date: January 14, 2022

First, Max and Corey deep dive into Corey’s newly-updated best under-23 NHL players list and discuss some of the biggest risers, including New Jersey Devils standout Jack Hughes, the trio of likely Calder trophy finalists Lucas Raymond, Trevor Zegras, and Moritz Seider, as well as Jason Robertson, Mason McTavish, Seth Jarvis, Martin Necas, and more.Then, the guys talk about the soon-to-be-announced Team USA men’s Olympic hockey roster, expected to include names like Matty Beniers, Brendan Brisson, Jake Sanderson, Brock Faber, Matthew Knies, and Nathan Smith, how participating in the games could impact NCAA awards for the players, and the evaluation process heading into the NHL Draft in July.Plus, to close things out, the guys open up the mailbag and answer listener questions, including why Cole Caufield and Sebastian Cossa dropped so much in the U23 rankings this time around, comparing and contrasting Matthew Savoie and Logan Cooley as prospects, if Cutter Gauthier can be a top ten pick in this year’s NHL Draft, Corey’s intel on impending free agent Andrei Kuzmenko of SKA Saint Petersburg, initial thoughts on Marco Rossi’s and Matthew Boldy’s first NHL games, and thoughts on the longterm outlook of the San Jose Sharks.And, right now, you can sign up for an annual subscription to The Athletic for just $3.99 a month when you visit http://theathletic.com/hockeyshow Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Hey everybody, Max Boltman here alongside Corey Prondman and back with another episode of the Athletic Hockey Show's prospect series. We got a fun one on tap today. Corey's U23 NHL rankings are out, some good movers to talk about in there. And we are recording this right before the announcement of the U.S. Men's Olympic hockey team. It seems like we've got a pretty good idea who it's going to be. The official announcements will probably come between when we're recording and when you're listening. But it does seem like it's going to be a college and certainly as a reality. result prospect heavy team.

So a lot to talk about there. Corey, how you doing? I'm doing well. Obviously, this is the time of year where I be making the mid-year list updates. Usually on the eve of a world juniors, but even without a world junior, we watch a lot of hockey in the first half of the season. And for the first time in a while, we watched hockey from every major league. I got a whole lot of new information.

and so it's exciting to try and put together this package in a normal way for the first time in a while. Yeah, absolutely. And as always, I think the intrigue starts around the top with who some of the very best prospects are. You have Andres Svetnikov as number one, but number two, and I know he's been in that orbit for you for a while. And I think he was number two on the last ranking. But moving up to the second spot there of under 23 players, Jack Hughes, who I think, I know in the write-up you said, like it may or may not be the breakout yet. It's a little early, but I think I'm there.

I think I'm ready to say Jack Hughes has arrived. Yeah, I mean, again, the sample sides because he was hurt for most of the first half. You know, guys have great 10, 15 game stretches, and sometimes they don't always continue. But I think with Jack, it's not just the performance. It's how he's looked both last season and this season. You're seeing him do a lot of really good things on the ice with his skating and his playing-making. and he looks like a guy who impact shifts.

He's a guy who's scoring more consistently now. Whether that maintains going forward, we'll see. But the early indicator. And I think sometimes when guys have statistical stretches that are good, you don't want to overreact. I think what's different with Jack is, one, the toolkit and two, a long history more before. the National Hockey League, but still a long history of being an elite player.

So that when you see a guy like that who is 20 years old, start to perform like an elite player in the National Hockey League, you can say, okay, this is a pretty good chance. This is real. Yeah, I would say even beyond the production. I just think he's looked, there's always been a swagger to the way that Jack Hughes plays, especially when he was at the NTDP. I think you're just seeing that swagger and that confidence come through a little more at the NHL level. And to me, that's kind of the indicator that, okay, he's comfortable now. And so certainly

when the production matches, as we record this, he's at a point per game. That's where I've inclined to say, you know, this is the guy that was built up as the number one overall pick. And I think he looks deserving of that and like that guy right now. Yeah, I think that's completely fair. And I think, you know, we'll see how the rest of the season goes. But I think it's definitely fair to say he looks like one of the top young players in the National Hockey League right now. A lot of, a lot of kind of the new blood is near the top of this list. Lucas Raymond comes in at number three. He's moving up from 25.

Obviously, we've talked plenty about him. He and his teammate, Mort Sider, who's at number six, moving up from the teens. And then Trevor Zegris, those are probably your top three for the Calder, as things stand today. I did a little bit of a straw poll among some PHWA members along with my colleague Eric Stevens for a story last week. And those three were in some order, the top three on nine out of the 10 that we surveyed. So those are your frontrunners. Zegris comes in at number four on this list, up from number 12. We've talked a lot about these guys.

Anything more to say about them as this list comes out? Probably not anything that new. I think those are three guys that the NHL community are becoming extremely familiar with, as all three of them are playing important roles for their team. Obviously, Anaheim is in a playoff hunt and unexpected playoff hunt right now, and Zegris has been a huge part of that. Detroit's probably been better than people thought they would be probably, you know, even though I think they're only like ninth or tenth and points percentage in the east. It's going to be a tough climb to the mid to playoffs, but I think everybody has seen how big roles Raymond and Sider have been for them.

And, you know, I think Raymond's probably, I might be mistaken, probably has Koolf a little bit after that scorching start, but he's also 19 years old. and it's, I think you look at 19-year-olds who not just perform, but look the way he does at the same spot in their careers. And the track record is a guy who I think is going to be a star in the league for a very long time. I think there's a lot of offense coming from him over the next 10, 15 years. Yeah, the thing that's cool for him is maybe a little bit of the goal scoring. I think the playmaking is still very clearly there. and he's making them in creative and unique ways. But I think teams, if they were ever willing to give him a little bit of space,

have ceased since to be willing to give that up. The one thing I wanted to ask you with these three guys, so obviously when they're numbers three, four, and six on a list, you have them all pretty close. But cider, the tier behind, anything that separated the two forwards from cider in creating those tiers. Yeah, and it wasn't just cider. I think, you know, I think cider, the first to first, There wasn't any defensemen in that top group.

You know, I think you had, I think there was like a blob of them. Cider, Owen Power, Quinn Hughes, Murrow Hayskin, and we're all kind of in that blog. I think it's just, yeah, I think it's generally very hard, I think, for a defenseman to rise to that very, very top group. It's why, you know, whenever we talk about the most valuable players in the league, we usually start with the first three, four names are usually forwards. we were actually having a discussion between this between Dom and Sean Chantilly and myself when we did the skater tiers in the fall we're going to do an update article on that I think

sometime soon we were talking about you know is Kil McCarr now in the discussion with you know Nathan McKinnon and Austin Matthews Connor McDavid like you don't usually have you know and it's a maybe you can see the argument either way but you know it's hard for defensemen to reach that very very top tier just because the forwards usually just provide offense in such huge number that it's, as long as they play decent defense, the values they provide is so enormous.

And that's what I think those four players, Sessionikov, Hughes, Raymond and Zegroch, are going to do over the course of their careers. I see them being at certain times among the top point scores in the league. And those are hard pieces to provide more value then. But I think, you know, obviously Siders, the great all-around defensemen, he's providing much more offense than I thought he would right away. So I see a path where he could maybe eclipse those foreign value. I mean, they're closely.

He said it's between four and six. I don't think it's unreasonable. But that would be my argument right now. It is an interesting one because I agree with what you're saying. I'm a heart trophy voter most years and it's almost always forwards at the top of my ballot. But then I also think the scarcity of defensemen who impact the game in as many ways, I think it might even be just as great as among those top point producers. So it's a good conversation.

Certainly the way I vote, I guess, should say that I, I agree with you on that reasoning. But I think it's an interesting debate to be had because I do think teams covet the value of a defense on the trade market tends to be really, really steep. If McCar keeps playing like he is this year, I think he's going to get hard votes. Oh, yes. Most definitely. Most definitely.

All right. Moving down the list a little bit, not too far, is a guy who's had a little bit of a tough go in terms of his health this season, but has looked really impressive when he's been in the lineup. And that's Bowen Byram. What went into kind of, you know, your assessment? of Byram, especially given all that he's kind of dealt with this year and in the lead-up. Yeah, and as well, I did not have, did not release, I mean, I released the list, but when I was doing the rankings and the analysis and the write-ups, I did not have the information of the latest concussion issues he's been dealing with.

So that was not incorporated in. I hope he'll be able to recover soon and will be fine. But when I've watched Byron this season, I think he's looked exceptional. I see a defenseman with high-end skating ability who can make offensive plays, even though he's a rather young defenseman 20 years old, I think he still looked fine enough defensively to go with the things he can do in transition and in the offensive zone. And obviously that team has some really good young defenseman in McCarr and Samuel and Gerard.

but I think he's even found some ways among those guys to stand out sometimes. So he's obviously always been a top prospect, tough five pick in his draft. And when he has been healthy, I think his impact has been obvious. Yeah. And obviously, we would very much hope that Byron is able to get healthy and stay healthy because he is such a talented player and also just from a quality of life standpoint. Concussions are a scary one. And that's a tough one to see a young player go through this early in his career.

One of the guys who jumped out from the list is Jason Robertson. And I thought it was an interesting thing you put in the write-up. He's elevated himself to a status where it's a guy who has kind of a notable flaw in their game. But because they've succeeded, they now are kind of someone who gets brought up in conversations with scouts about other players with that flaw is why it can still work. That for him, obviously, being his skating. How recent a development would you say that is? Yeah, I mean, there was reason why Robertson was a second round pick. It's because his skating has always been a very notable issue with his brother,

Nick Robertson, who was second round picked by Toronto, was also the same thing. And Jason's kind of always been questioned when he was in junior, when he was in the American League, World Juniors, et cetera. Like, you know, I get that he's big and he's skilled, he's smart, and he can score, but, man, the feeder are an issue. And I don't know if it's going to work. and I can understand why some people would listen to that, be like, well, he score all the time. Why would he scored in the National Hockey League?

And the question would be, the answer to that question would be like, well, there's a lot of guys who look like that, who never make it out of the American League. And not only has he made it out of the American League, he has become a star player in the National Hockey League. He is a massive piece of the Dallas Stars right now. And that kind of what I mentioned in the profile, where you allude to, I think he's a guy now that, comes up a lot in conversations. There's a guy in this year's draft, the top prospect who's a rather flawed skater, also an American winger and Rutger McGroherty.

And Robertson's name comes up a lot when discussing McGroherty. It's like, yeah, I get he doesn't skate that well, but, you know, if Robertson can do it, why can't he? There's dangers to that analogy. It's like when Cole Cofield is coming up, and the only comparison to him was out of the rinket, that would be the argument in favor of him and the argument against him is okay name name a second player and that goes into the risk assessment but i think jason robertson fantastic player to watch very

unique prospect and a guy i think we'll be having a lot more discussions about in the coming years if i ask you to give me a reason why it's worked for robertson where it may not have worked for guys of that profile in the past is it is it the hockey sense that kind of explains the bulk of it i would say the puck game is just really, really good. Just such a good brain shot skill. He's big. He competes well. To overcome, you know,

basically for any player to overcome a really significant flaw. Whether a significant flaw in your skating, being really small, lacking offensive ability, you need those other attributes to basically pop almost in unison. And I think with Robertson, that's true. And it's why, you know, for very small players, typically they need to be exceptional skaters, skill, compete, so on and so forth.

That's just the way the balancing has to work, especially not to only play in the league, but to excel in the league. Like, that's usually what you need. Another guy who's moved up is Mason McTavich, and he's out of this most recent draft. He spent a little bit of time in the NHL, but has since gone back to juniors and actually just got traded within the OHL. what did McTavish do to kind of, I guess, cement himself in this tier as a top of the lineup players where you have him? Yeah, I think he's just looked really good whenever I watched him this year through his NHL time. In his little junior he's played, he just recently been traded to Hamilton. And in the little time, he's been with the U20 team.

I think for me it's not just a play. I think we always know he's a really good player. But for me, I've seen kind of, for me when I've watched him, I thought his skating has looked sharper than what I thought, when I watched him, when I was 16 and 17, and that was obviously a tough part of the last draft season, too, is even though he played in, like, a second-tier pro league in Switzerland,

it was hard to really get a feel on a guy like that, and kudos to Anaheim for identifying him the third overall. But, and I actually, I had some still my concerns on the skating that I saw when I, when I watched him when he was 16. But right now, I think the skating looks good. Like, it doesn't look like exceptional.

It's not the best part about his game. I would say, you know, the skill and the compete are, are the better parts about his game, but he looks like a guy who has all the attributes you want in an NHL center. Now moved up into the same tier and actually, I think, a couple spots ahead of Matthew Baneers, who was obviously picked right before him in the draft, so just kind of cements his status in that tier of center. The other guy I specifically wanted to talk to among the risers was Seth Jarvis, and this

is a guy who produced like crazy in the Western Hockey League in his draft year, but he goes at the edge of the top ten, just outside the top ten, to care of. Carolina, and he's come in and made a really big impact. And, you know, Portland is an interesting case because you can often see guys that have really big numbers there. And I do wonder sometimes if that causes a little skepticism of guys like that and what they'll, how they'll translate. But for Jarvis, it certainly has.

I've actually heard that from a couple of scouts that they think that they get scared by Portland guys because they, you know, they think they, the way they play doesn't translate to an NHL or something along those lines. But the way Jarvis plays clearly translates to the actual hockey. He's an exceptional skater. He's extremely competitive. He plays with that fear, despite lacking size, to go with his great skill and scoring ability. And, you know, there was a point at the start of the season where he looked like he wasn't even going to play that much.

Like, he was a healthy scratch for most, I think the first couple of weeks there for Carolina. Like, the question was going to be, are they going to send him back? What are they going to do with him? And now it's like, you can't take him out of the line because he's helping him win every night. And he's a 19-year-old. He could have been on the World Junior team this season. I think, you know, looks like an extremely strong prospect for Carolina. And also not a prospect.

He's an NHL player now, but a guy who, you know, we'll see how the rest of his career goes, but I think a guy who you're really happy and optimistic about his future going forward. Martin Natchez was a guy who was pretty high up on this list, too, for another guy. I mean, he was high already coming into the year. But Carolina doing a really nice job of supplementing a veteran corps with good, fairly recent young picks, and that's what it takes to sustain a winner in this era. Right, and those two, you know, those two and especially, they haven't had, like, you know, they didn't have a first round pick last year.

They haven't always picked high in the draft in the last five years, but the times they have with Netchester and Jarvis, they made them count, and those are essential parts to build it a winner. A couple guys who dropped, and I don't know if we want to do them here, or do you want to save them for the mailbag? Because they both got brought up in the mailback. I don't know, we should probably give the listeners some shine, or do you want to just do them right now? We can wait for the mailbag.

I'm fine. All right. So we'll do that. We're going to take a quick break then. We'll come back and we're going to talk about Team USA and the Olympics. All right. Let's now get into Team USA for the Olympics. Like we said at the top, these haven't been officially announced yet.

This is kind of what we think. But Corey, you've reported a few guys and a few of the big names that we expect to be on there, include Matthew Baneers and Brennan from Michigan, Jake Sanderson, from North Dakota, Brock Faber, the King's prospect. Benares, obviously, Seattle, Brasanne, Vegas, and Sanderson, a senator prospect. Those are some huge names, some big-time NCAA talent that sounds like could be leaving their teams to go to Team USA. What do you think kind of the appeal of that to leave the season is and go play in the

Olympics? Well, it's the Olympics. I mean, I mean, that's a, I know it's a unique Olympics. It's going to be in Beijing. It's, you know, there's the issue. There's the quarantine rule that people have people scared. They probably won't be able to have like the whole typical Olympic experience that you would have had in 2018. But it's still the pinnacle of sports in our society right now.

So I don't think there was ever a question that you go represent your country at the Olympics. And for a lot of these guys, they were going to be on the World Junior team this year. You mentioned Ganeers, Sanderson. brought favor. We think Matthew Nyes will be there. You know, those are guys who have to play big roles for the U20 team. And while they did get represented their country throughout the duration of a World Junior tournament, they now get to go represent their country at even a larger stage with the men's Olympics. What are you looking for when you see guys at this level? Because, you know, obviously last year's World Championships, I guess maybe it could be kind of

instructive for this where, you know, you think of the Olympics and the World Championships as these NHL-laden events, at least in recent years. And so when you see a prospect go there and do like what Owen Power did last year, you think, okay, great. But you also do realize when the NHOs aren't at those events, there's some kind of mental adjustment, I guess, that gets made. Yeah, I think you're going to have to approach this with a great assault. You know, you look at last, the 2018 Olympics, which also did not feature NHL players,

you know, where Troy Terry was a whole office, he was also a great player, was very good. And Ryan Donato was very good. He's just put an okay player. You know, Eli Tolviden has become a pretty good NHL player, but, like, he was exceptional there. Nikita Goosev was really, really good there. Didn't turn out to be a great NHL, but Kapparzov was really good there too.

So there's going to be a little bit of give and take, I think, from that. I think it's definitely, you know, there's new information. I think the issue from an evaluation perspective, it's going to be, it's tough to process because there aren't a whole lot of recent comparables, you can say, oh, he played like this, he looked like this guy, this guy, this guy that I've seen before. But it's still, I presume there will be, you know, very talented professional players, they'll be playing games from Sweden, Finland, Russia, Czech, so on and so forth, both with Team USA, and we expect a decent number of

prospects on the Canadian side too. So that, and on possibly Russia as well. So I still think it will make for a good evaluation environment and a fun event for people who like prospects to watch, but it will be, I will approach it with caution in terms of moving guys up or down that drastically. In some ways, I almost think that's a good thing because as much as, you know, obviously we all, like to use these things for work and for scouting, it is going to make it a little bit more of an enjoyable event kind of to see a bunch of college kids go and, you know, this is the kind of stuff that was romanticized when I was growing up. And it was, you know, back in the days of the, you know, the 1980 team, obviously.

But the pre-NHL Olympics, there was a romanticism about a bunch of college kids going to the Olympics and playing for Team USA. And there is something inside of me, my inner child, I guess, that is kind of geeked about that. Yeah, I think it's going to be a really fun event for those reasons when, like, the average age of Team USA is 22 or something like that. And, yes, it is different. And it does, you know, bring you back to those years where, you know, the European teams had fully professional squads and Team USA's team, you know, wasn't always a legal drinking agent in their country, you know. I'm excited for it.

I think it's going to be really fun to watch. And, you know, it might be the kind of same dynamic, may not the same dynamic terms of the level of talent, but that same kind of thing that people have said about Team North America at the World Cup, where you just have, you know, if you see like a 19-year-old, like Jake Sanderson just playing exceptionally well versus a bunch of like, you know, grown professionals. Same thing with Matthew Beneers. I think that's going to be awesome to watch. That is something from, I guess this undoes a little bit of the last point here.

But when you talk about players of this age, when they go and they succeed in like the KHL, for example, or Liga or Sweden at a high level, that really means a lot. That carries a lot of weight. And so I do think if you go. go and you saw a Matthew Baneers, Jake Sanderson, especially someone like a Brendan Brasson who maybe didn't have the very top, top echelon prospect status, do a lot of damage. That is, that is maybe a little more meaningful than I guess I maybe had given credit for before that just clicked on for me right now.

Yeah, yeah, no, that's it. It's all, like I think there could be evaluation value. They're just, you want to push with a gain of salt, but I think, you know, if someone's, like, truly exceptional, like, I think you, like, like, like a guy like Tolvan was, his, I think you have to incorporate that, you know, and we spent some of the top guys to go, but like, you know, you could look at a guy on this team like, say, Nathan Smith, who's a third round pick by Winnipeg, and one of the top scores in college, you know, obviously where we have big expectations of the first round pick. But if a guy like that, or Matt, you know, maybe, you know, Matt Nyes or some of the other college players

that I think will be named, such as like a dig Aversizi, goes, and they're, like, one of the top players on USA, that is very relevant information and it goes into their projection for sure. We'll be interesting. So a guy like Nathan Smith, I mean, in college, he obviously is producing like crazy at Minnesota State and that's a team that is always kind of a threat come tournament time. For a guy like him, like I think fair to say that he would be an individual award candidate, how does that kind of affect going away at? Does that affect his chances at something like that?

I don't know. I think this is a unique circumstance for the Hobie Committee to have to bring into it. I think if, you know, they'll only be gone, I think, for four, six games maximum. So it will be. So like a minor injury. Yeah. It'll be, well, hopefully it's only that. Yes.

But I don't think it'll have picked the pack of that much. That being said, if they get hurt or stuck in China, that's a whole other issue. but I think they will be reasonable for guys who have to go to the who went to the Olympics. One more of the individual guys I want to talk about. Do we think Matthew Nyes is going to make this roster, the Toronto Prospect second round pick? Yeah, yeah, he's on, I think he'll be on the team. I don't know if he'll play a big role as a 19-year-old, who probably is another town level of a guy like, you know, Faneers, St. Anderson, etc.

Not an unreasonable statement to make. But I think there's one thing he'll probably provide that. the other college guys don't have his a little bit more size and physicality with some, with enough skill to, you know, do some stuff with the puck, but I would imagine on this team,

he's probably, um, I don't know if he'll play up like a big, big role, maybe a second third line wing, second line of top's third line winger, I would, I would imagine.

But, um, but, but I think he can provide a definitely a different element to this team. He's a guy obviously whose stock is on the rise when you see that he's here and, and guys who were first-round picks like Matt Coronado or Mackie Samiskevich. I don't want to say that because I don't know for sure that they're on the team, but he was among the first players that were named,

at least at the very minimum, he's being mentioned now in a group of guys who went ahead of him. It's an interesting story. I mean, a guy with 57th pick in the draft, I believe he was. He was a late birthday, and he comes in and he's instantly point-per-game. He was a late birthday, but one of them is interesting about him is when he was coming into the year, I was hearing from a bunch of scouts who love Matt Nyes, who said this guy is going top 20 without a shadow of a doubt kind of thing. And then he had a really slow start his draft season,

started to kind of fall down lists. People were worried that he couldn't, about the scoring ability, finishing touch, and in the last couple of weeks of the year, he kind of came on hot, still goes in the second round. But yeah, definitely been interesting player to fall the last couple of years. And now we'll see where the Olympic story takes

him. Anybody else you really are interested in on Team USA or about these Olympics? Any kind of storylines that are gripping you? I think another 19-old defenseman, I think Kings will be excited to see. Kings fans will be brought in favor. I think, you know, to another teenager guy who's going to be a big part of the World Junior team. Getting an invite as a rather, rather young player, I think he'll be an important part of this team. USA will have a, you know, a good-sized mobile defense corps with him, with Jake Sanderson. with Drew Helleson, who I've been a big fan of the last two years. I think this will be a very fun defense unit to watch for USA fans.

All right, let's go now to the mailbag, and there's a few that tie really nicely into the U-23 list on the topics from today. So I want to start there, and they're both kind of guys who, I guess, would be more fallers. And the first one is Cole Coffield, this is from Grimlock. He wants to just know having not watched Coffield a ton this season, how he's looked to you. Is size been a limited factor? Is it something else?

What explains his drop in the U-23 rankings? Yeah, I mean, the size has always kind of been relevant with Cole. I would also say his skating has always been, I think, good, but never elite for a small guy. I remember, like, I've seen instances where he gets caught, like, rather easily by it and gets closed on. The cash can't, doesn't he beat guys wide? Like, those are all variables. And when, you know, I think when it comes to evaluating. guys who look like that, who are 5758, not elite skaters.

I think there's always, you know, who don't basically have overwhelming toolkits who the appeal to them is the skill and the fact they always score. When they're not scoring, he has one goal in the National Hockey League this season. It brings up a ton of red flags that, you know, the thing, you know, because you're not projecting the toolkit, like, oh, yeah, when he fills out, like he's going to be. be this, you know, this monster kind of thing. It's, you know, no, I like you because you score. And you think you want to, you want to balance these things because he's only 20. He has a long history of scoring before. And, you know, we talked about this, like, say, with like,

you know, a guy like Jack Hughes earlier in the conversation. But there's between him and Hughes is Hughes is a, two, three inches bigger and also a dynamic, dynamic skater, where you can at least, there's a little bit more projection there to bank on. So that's kind of where I realized it probably pokes of Montreal fans the wrong way. And I understand the arguments against maybe dropping him to that extent. I still think he's a very good player. But I would say, you know, talking to people around the league, you know, obviously there were a lot of scouts who love this guy.

And there were a lot of scouts but hesitations. And I've heard a lot from the first camp over the stretch of the previous season. And I've heard a lot more from the second camp over the stretch of the last six months. The thing that I would say to the Montreal fan out there who wants some reason to believe here is that, you know, Cole Cawfield, number one, as a kid, does strike me as the kind of kid who's going to be willing to make whatever adjustments have to get made into this game. And so that's something you can really, I think, when you have a prospect like this, who doesn't quite get off to the zip that you might want, that's something that I think you can feel good about falling back on is, I think he's going to put the work in to do what it takes to maximize himself, whatever that means.

Sure. Yeah, I still think I still preferring as a second line winger. Absolutely. Absolutely. Yeah. Not a knock. Not like a Hale Cofield. But yeah, like if you came into the year saying like this guy's a star, he's going to be like a top of line up 30, 35 goal every year type of guy. This new information is a rather large swing in the opposite direction. The other one was Peter Clutche who wanted to talk about Sebastian Cosa dropping. How much it was the. the world junior performance or lack thereof or what more is there to it. Obviously, his numbers in Edmonton are down this year too from last year. Yeah, I think it's a combination of a lot of things.

It's the numbers and how I, just from watching, I've watched a lot of their games, just because, you know, all because of Cosa and Genter and Jake Neighbors, I watch a lot of those games. I think he's looked good, but I wouldn't say he's looked exceptional like I thought he did in his draft year. We are draft here, mind you, but still in his draft year. still see 6-6 guy who moves pretty well, like very well actually.

For a goal at size, I wouldn't say the puck tracking and the reeds to me have looked at the same level. I thought they were the previous season and kind of go with the international performance. His summer camp was disappointing? You're like, oh, okay, it's a blip. Like, you know, it's, you know, you don't want it right off.

Then he kind of goes, you know, to the summer camp. and he's just okay. And then he goes, he plays in his one-nil pre-terming game and he's really bad. And now you're like, oh, damn, like that's, you know, he's trying to see a little bit of a pattern here.

But the athlete is so promising, like six-six guys, a six-six guy, sorry, who can move in the net like he can. Like, that's a really appealing athlete. He has a good statistical performance overall in the dub. I still really like this player. But I think it's fair to say,

you know, If I had him in the range I had him because of the year he had last year, it's just gone a little bit the other way and I adjust. But I'm open to the argument that I could be wrong. And by this time next year, he's a first year pro and he's killing it in Grand Rapids. Is there anything to the – so we always talk about the size and is there ability of big goalies. Is there any downside to it, like for a goal? Like if you're 6'6, does it mean you got a bigger five-hole or you got more kind of to cover up under the arms or anything like that?

I think in general with athletes, there's kind of, I think, an ideal size you want. I think, you know, like I talk about this. There was a guy who were watching Curtis Douglas. I was watching this. I was talking about this about a couple of scouts the other day. Who was like, who was drafted by Dallas in the third fourth round. He's like a six, seven, six eight fours or something of that. And that's literally, I think, too big to play hockey.

Yeah. Like, you know, it's, I mean, you can do it. I'm sure people have done in the past, but like, it just limits your scale. so much by being in that big. He's so slow on the ice. It's why he didn't get signed. It's why he's probably not going to play in the National Hockey League. Although I know he's playing in the American League.

I think he's done okay. So that's a variable. I think six-six for a goalie is perfectly fine. It's not within the unreasonable height dimensions as long as you have good athleticism, which he does. He has good athleticism. But I think you can be, I think just like you probably could be too small to play. I think you could be, there is an argument.

You'd be too big to play, but I don't think it applies to COSA. I guess before we wrap on the goalies, let's talk about Jesper Walsett, who I think moved into, I believe he was the top rated goalie on your list. He was, yes. And he's, yeah, surpassing Spencer Knight, though in the same tier. And Dustin Wolf also right in that mix between those two guys. Let's talk about Wollstead and Wolf really quick and what they've done to cement themselves up there. I mean, you know, Dustin Wolf was a guy that I've had some reasonable scuticism about as

a pro prospect just because of the same reason for for his size despite his excellent excellent numbers throughout his four seasons in junior um and i mean he's been unreal this season i think he's lost one game in the in the hl all season or something like that um some stupid statements like 930 940 or something like that yeah 931 um and it's not just the numbers it's the way he looks too like i think i underrated his athleticism i think he looks much cool quicker, much more dynamic than I thought he was when I've watched their games. And in terms of Walsdet, just he's done everything you've asked of him to do this year. He's been really good versus men.

Brief, 14-year appearance, obviously that game versus Slovakia, he was incredible. But especially his games in Sweden versus men, I think, just a very impressive season. The games I've watched, he just looks in control. The hockey sense looks really elite. Yeah, just very impressive season so far. All right, let's move into some 2022 draft questions. Nam-danan, two-parter here. First one is, can you compare and contrast Matthew Savoy, Logan Cooley,

kind of how close they are, some key differences in their games? That's a good question. You know, those are two of the top rated forward in this year's draft. similar size guys than Savoy's like 5'9 Kuli might be 510 510 and a half something like that skating abilities

probably close between them I would say I would call Kuli just a little bit more dynamic with the puck in terms of just

the what he can make I think they both have great skill, I think he makes more skill plays at faster paces, which makes him a little bit more dynamic. But I think they both compete well. They both can score. They both can make plays. So I don't think it's unreasonable to ask for a comparison. I just think there's a little bit more of a pace and dynamic element to Cooley game than Savoy, who I think is, this season has been heavily power play driven.

But I see where the question is coming from. And then part two comes about from Namdaon comes about Cooley's NTP teammate Cutter Gautier, who kind of filled in with the program while Cooley was out away with the World Junior team in the bubble. Tor it up, Named Don says. Did scouts take notice of that and what happens when he gets that usage? Where's his stock at? He asks, could he be a top 10 pick? Yeah, Ozzie, Central Scouts put out at a midterm list.

he was, I think, six or seventh among North Americans. I would say most scouts I talk to, consider him my first round pick right now. I'm not hearing top 10 buzz, to be quite honest, consistently. I think he'll need to have a really strong second half, particularly if the team is healthy. Charlie Strainbill, but they'll come back, I think, possibly this weekend,

if not the following weekend. Cruz Lucius will come back at some point soon, too. So when they have a full team, you know, can he stand out among a very deep forward group? Where does he slot in? You know, can he outperform guys like Strainball, like Frank Nazar? Isaac Howell, Rick and McGororough, Jimmy Snugglerud consistently.

But I think what he has, a lot of the guys don't have are just a pure physical tools, 6-2, 6-3, good skater to go with some skill in it and a really good shot. He's a very interesting player. I kind of see him more like a 20 to 35 guy right now, not top 10. But he's a good prospect. Next one's from Tate Fraser. What, if anything, do you know about Andre Kuzmenko? He seems to be a pretty fun guy to watch among the undrafted potential UFAs.

Andre Kuzmanko, for those who don't know, plays for Scott St. Petersburg in the KHL. He's among the leading scores in the KHL this season. His deal is up at the end of the season, and he's expected to sign a contract in the National Hockey League this summer as a highly pursued European free agent. I still need to dig a little bit deeper into these. I do an annual European Free Agent, College Free Agent article, and I expect, you know, it'll be interesting it'll be a great Olympics to

use that for us because we're going to have I think a couple of college free agents there Ben Myers has been confirmed I've heard there's a couple other undrafted college free agents who have been considered for the second segment of USA's list and all of the European teams will be you know for the European

on the European free agent front so I'll be excited for that on that front but Kuzmanko I think will be a very important part of Russia's team really high skill level like a really, really skilled playmaker, you know, good scoring ability. My question on him is he's just an okay skater, I think, for his size. So I don't think like you're getting like Panarin or anything like that on this guy.

But I think he could help an NHL team for sure. And I think he will be a highly sought-after player this summer. Charles W., your initial impressions on Marco Rossi and Matt Boldie's first couple of NHL games. I thought Boldie was very good. I think, you know, obviously they sent Rossi down afterwards, Bullies down the taxi squad. I think that's probably an indication of how they played. I thought Boldie has shown that he should stick around. I thought his skills, visions stood out in those games.

I think Rossi had some flashes where you saw, you know, the competitiveness that he has some puck game. I think the pace looked a little fast for him. I think he probably needs to play the full year down in Iowa. You know, maybe the following season he starts pushing for more consistent games. Boldy, though, who's been very good in his, I guess, two, I want to call it two seasons, but his two stretches of professional hockey over the last year, I think he showed it. I think he's ready for the National Hockey League. All right. Last one is from Darren M.

Not Darren Helm. Although maybe. What is your long-term outlook of the sharks? Do they have the farm talent to make a run in a few years? my instinct says no but the sharks over the last 10 15 20 years always find a way to turn water into wine and there's probably some six-seventh round pick that i'm not a big fan of that will become like a top six four you know the next whatever kevin le bank joe pevelsky something along those lines there's some there's some guy that got there that

they'll that they can turn to it might be brand and co brandon coe's looked really good this season in the Ontario League 6-4 guy. We can skate. He's got some skill. You know, so I think average roster, average farm pool would probably be my assessment right now. I don't think they're going to fall off and be like a disaster. I don't think they have enough to be a true contender either. But they've, I think them and Pittsburgh have always surprised me with what they've been able to turn out of their system. So time will tell. Yeah, well, I saw them this week, actually, San Jose. And I thought Jonathan Dahln looked really good.

He made a great play on an assist. Dallant's a great example, too, a guy I didn't think was going to do it. And yet here he is. Yeah, so certainly, you know, you hope there's that for them. The thing that I think is going to be their obstacle. And I thought Carlson looked good when I was there, too. But they're just the age on the money on their roster, I think, is their big obstacle, right? Like, you can get by if you're a little old and you've got a lot of money,

given up, but the guys who are old are going to are going to wean off, but it's long deals left for Velasic, for Burns. You know, I think Kature is still very much a top center and all that, but that to me is their bigger obstacle, I think. And still, you know, I think Carlson looks really good. Does he look good enough to be an 11.5 million guy with that many years? Like, that's where you're hurting, I think. Yeah.

I mean, they got obstacles of that, given that it would probably almost no increase in the salary cap next season. What happens with Thomas Hurdle? I mean, those are, those are very real. obstacles for them and I'm not percent it's going to be easy. I think for now they're fine. I just probably wouldn't call them on the path becoming a contender just yet. Yeah, they're in a weird spot and I don't know what that, which one of those two dominoes that we just talked about kind of has to give first. They either need to find gems that's like, all right, well now you kind

of have free, free found money on an ELC or something probably has to happen on the contract front. So we'll see which one that goes. That's all we got for today, Corey. Anything else you want to talk about for? We let everyone get on with their lives. No, Max and I will be at the All-American Prospects game on Monday. And our next episode, we will be talking more draft-centric. I'll have a new draft list out. So we'll have a lot more on that front for the many questions on the draft that were asked and not answered. Yeah, something to look forward to or dread, depending on your general feelings on this podcast.

We will talk to you soon. Take care.