The Athletic Hockey Show - Is Michkov or Stankoven the early Calder frontrunner?

Episode Date: November 1, 2024

Max, Corey, Scott, and FloHockey’s Chris Peters discuss the Calder Trophy race about a month into the season, Macklin Celebrini’s potential impact on the race when he returns from injury, what to make of Will Smith’s rough start, and more. Plus, the guys answer a bunch of listener questions to close out the show.Hosts: Max Bultman and Corey PronmanWith: Scott Wheeler and FloHockey’s Chris PetersExecutive Producer: Chris FlanneryProducer: Chris Flannery Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This is the Athletic Hockey Show Prospect Series. Hey, everybody, Max Boltman here alongside the athletic Scott Wheeler and Corey Pranman and Flohockey's Chris Peters for another episode of the Athletic Hockey Show Prospect Series. They tried to do the show without Scott and I last week. The ratings tanked. They brought us right back in. They'll never make that mistake again. And today we're going to jump right in on the rookie class and on the early Calder race.

Hey, look, the numbers are what the numbers are. The decisions have clearly been made. we're back and we're talking about the rookies. I blame Custins. That's right. I mean, that's the only common denominator here. Let's start, Scott, with the Calder race. And in the early going here, a couple names, I think, jumping right to the forefront,

maybe three names if you're located in Montreal. But I think it's Logan Stankovin and it's Mavimichikov, and this is the early duel here. Is that fair to say? I think that's fair to say. Stankovin has that sort of extra cushion under him, from last year that has allowed him to step right in and play an important role in that top nine, slide up and down that roster, play center, play the wing. He's already a very important player. And then just browsing before we hopped on here, just browsing through the minutes,

it's clear that Michikov is the most important player to his team in the league early on this season in terms of how they're actually relying on him. The rest of the kids in this rookie class are playing anywhere from 11 to 15, 16 minutes a night. Meachkov's pushing 19, occasionally 20 minutes a night and is a go-to guy, certainly offensively for the Flyers and has been a big driver for a Flyers team that has been off to a poor start. So those two felt like two of, obviously with Celebrini, two of the three sort of front runners heading in, and it still feels like they're sort of at the front of the herd here. I think what's going to be interesting, and we're going to get to maybe the agent.

conversation with the Calder when we get to Maxim Cipulikov. But obviously we expected Macklin celebrating to be well in this conversation. And I do expect he is going to be in this conversation when he comes back. And because the Calder trophy is not an MVP. It's not based on who gets the most points. It's whoever was the best rookie this season. But I think the voters are well within their rights to take into account how much evidence they have at that play was the best rookie.

And the games played is a variable. and, you know, guys, I'd be curious, like, what would be the cutoff for you in terms of how many games of Celebrini need to play? Let's say Mitch Kov and Stankov and Stankham and maybe some others do get, you know, legitimate full years in. And Celebrini only gets 70 games, 60 games, 55 games. At what point does he need to come back before you worry, do we get enough sample size with him? Well, Badard played 68 last year and had, what, 60, 61 points. I think that's more or less your barometer. If he can play 65 to 70 games and we're already approaching that territory and he can put up 50 to 55 points in 65 games.

And I think he's probably, if not the winner, he's probably a nominee. That seems to be the threshold typically over the course of the season for guys to get in is sort of above half a point per game. So that 40 to 45 point range to be in the running for one of the five spots on your ballot kind of thing. Yeah, I also think it's going to it's going to come down to what everybody else looks like, too, because you know, you go back to Connor McDavid's rookie year and his incredible point total, but he missed so much time. And that opened the door for others because there were other really strong seasons. So yeah, I think that the games played will come into into the factor. You know, I think like last year, Badaard really didn't have like, you know, I think Brock Faber was was fairly strong competition for a period. of time there, you know, and in the positional difference has always mattered. And I think that the other thing that that I think comes into play with the Calder conversation is, is the hype factor as well. I think, you know, in McDavid's case, there were options that were obvious that you needed to. Was that, was that Panarin's rookie year as well? So, so, so you've got, you know,

that was a situation where Panarin was basically riding shotgun with a, with a heart trophy contender and then just the points were there and the impact was there. You know, the other thing is is the hype factor, you know, Celebrini obviously comes in as the more hyped guy, the most hyped guy of any of the rookies in this class. You have guys like Stankovan and, you know, Mitch Cobb is probably close in terms of the excitement level, especially in his market for his, for him. And, you know, you also have to remember, we weren't expecting to see him in the NHL at this point too. So that's also, you know, you wonder how long, how much distance between a draft year and you start kind of forgetting about a guy.

You know, so that's the other thing that I think kind of comes into the factor here of the decision process. But I think as long as I would say, you know, if Celebrini's out for more than 20 games, it's really, you know, that that's when it does definitely become a very significant piece of the conversation. Yeah, I mean, to Corey's point, like if we do go back to that McDavid year, it wasn't just. Panera in that beat up McDavid. It was also Shane Gassasperr. Right. Gossisbert had a nice year. 46 points in 64 games and 17 of those are goals. That's a great year for a defenseman, certainly. But I don't know that that's, you know, if we saw Celebrini put up, you know, and I don't think we're going to see him put up a McDavid type year. But let's just say, you know, he puts up close to a point per game in 55 or 60 games. I think that should outweigh,

you know, that kind of a season from, say, like Elaine Hudson, right? Yes. But maybe not a Right. Exactly. Yeah, right. So there's, I agree with your point, Chris, is that it all depends on what the other guys around him do. But I think it's 55 or 60 games if we're looking for a cutoff to where where you treat that rate stat really seriously. I think, you know, McDavid was above a point per game in 45 games at any finish third. So certainly that that is good context to go back to. Let's talk about Lane Hudson here, though, because we just mentioned him as kind of the defender here. I know our Montreal listeners are always, you're going to get Corey's thoughts on Lane Hudson so far. He's playing a big role for the Canadian so far. He's producing. There's a few minuses on the sheet as well. How do you kind of balance what you've seen so far from Hudson? Well, for handicapping the Calder is, I know, Scott talked about this in our first

Calder episode, a lot of it comes down to opportunity. And he's getting a lot of ice time, but he's not on the first power play unit. You know, Mike Matheson is the guy running that unit. And I think, I think we all agree probably long term. That's going to flip at some point. I would guess that Hudson takes that job from him at some point. I don't know whether that point is this year or next year or what that point is going to be.

We're talking about Calder. I think it's just going to be, I think, tough for him to have the point totals because his value is mostly on the offensive side of the puck. His defensive game is not really what you're going to be, you know, pumping him up for the Calder for. And you never really are quite honestly when it comes to defenseman for the Calder. So I just don't know if he's going to get that kind of offensive point totals to win it,

I think he's going to get votes at fans right now. I don't know if, but you said, hype is a thing and the hype is definitely there for him. And, you know, you look at all the flashy plays he makes with the puck and the high end things he can do in the offensive zone.

I'm guessing he kind of finishes in that four to five spot on the Calder ballot. If I was to get how it go right now, does that sound unreasonable to you guys? No, I think that that sounds right. I think he has a chance to finish as a finalist. It just depends how his year goes. But typically if the forwards play at the level that people want to see them play,

you just tend to, there's been a couple exceptions. I mean, Brock Faber and Mosider have finished really high in this race. I don't remember where Jake Sanderson finished, but I think he made a decent run at it. But typically the edge does go to forwards for this award. One forward who I think is going to be a particularly tricky guy, Scott, is on the Islanders. and that's Maxim Sipulikov. And I think we had this debate a lot around Michael Bunting in his year. Caprice off to a lesser extent because he was so good and he wasn't quite so old.

But Sipulkov at 26 years old, he's been good. It's kind of a quieter pool. I don't know if you're voting this year. But if you, let's just say you had a ballot. Like how do you approach a guy like Sipikilov? I think it's tricky. I've been pretty vocal in the past about not loving that 26. 25 and 26 year olds are still included in the criteria.

Now the criteria isn't going to change. But I didn't love how much love Panarin got. I have tended in the past to consider age in casting my ballot. That isn't to say that I'm not going to exclude players who are clearly eligible under the criteria of the award. But I do think for me personally, it feels like something that should be an important context when you're talking about an award that is specifically about age.

It's specifically about youth. It's specifically about first year players. So it's something that I'll consider in considering Maxime over the course of this season. He's been a good top nine forward for them, though, and he's contributing. And I believe he's on the second power play unit there. And he has to be at this point in the race, I think, at least in the back of your mind. Corey, what about you? Do you wait this at all?

I've always kind of come at it like the league tells us who the pool of players we should be looking at are. And I kind of treat them all equally within that pool. How do you approach stuff like this? I would lean towards how you would think about it. I think if they're letting him be eligible and they're not explicitly excluding him, I think the, and you don't like the players as older being included. I think you just have to argue to the league to just make a stricter age criteria. You know, make it under 25, make it, you know, under 24, whatever.

You could find a different line to draw. I'm fine that if it's close between two or three guys, then you start getting into what the spirit of the rule is and this is supposed to be about the future of the league, the bright young stars, etc. But if Cypulkov has, you know, 20 goals, 50 points or whatever, and Stankov and ends like 35, you have to vote Cyplikov, I think. Yeah. Yeah.

And, you know, I go back, looking back in historically, I look at Aaron Ackblad's year as a real example where age was probably one of the most significant factors in that player getting the Calder Trophy. He beat out Mark Stone and Johnny Goudreau that year, who each had 64 points. Eckblad had 39 points, but the context was it was the highest scoring season since like Bobby Orr at 18 or something like that. And so that that context, I think, pushed him over the edge. Because I think I, that might have been, I feel like that might have been my first year voting. And I, or maybe it was of the following year. I'm not sure. But I remember, you know, that race and being like I probably, you know, I would have picked Goudreau that year.

You know, so that was, that was definitely interesting, that whole thing. But Eckblatt, obviously, he would, every, every caveat. that we used was about age in that one. And I lean more towards the, if you're eligible, are you the best player? And I think like the Panarin year, he was a significant contributor to a good team. You know, the other options were the best, the next best option to me was McDavid, but he had missed enough time. So I think it always, you know, it's something you have, you should consider.

I think it does make things more impressive one way or another. But, you know, so I think like a player like Sipakov, specifically, it's got to be a no doubter for him to do it. And I will say, I think Simukov actually has looked quite good when I've watched the Islanders this show. He's got, he's got a lot of skill. He plays hard. He's big.

Like, skating is amazing. But he's a, I think he's a legitimate top six forward in the NHL. And I think he's been even better than I think some who liked the player in the KHL thought he was going to be. So, you know, it wouldn't surprise me, honestly, if he would remain. in this conversation throughout the course of the season. One thing, Corey, that I'm always interested in is how to wait goalies in this. I don't even think I've been consistent about this as a voter.

I think some years I give goalies pretty high, put them pretty high on my list because they play such an important role on the ice. Other times, I have left them off my ballot entirely, even when there was a pretty good one. I never know how to treat goleys. And the goalie, I think, who's the most notable in this conversation this year is Dustin Wolf in Calgary. What have you seen from him so far? Obviously, some good success there in Calgary. And how do you kind of, how does he factor into this mix? I think with goalies, the two variables obviously are just, you know, how they look in general. And I think even more than skaters,

the sample of their games is very important, I think, and weighing just how impressive their seasons were, you know, because if a goalie's a backup boy where he gets lots of rest or he's, they're playing a true 50-50 split, you know, that's a variable in terms of just a wing, just how impressive their performance is because I think you talk to most people in the league, and they'll say that, you know, the ability to play 45, 50, 55 games is a much different skill than playing 30 games or playing 35 games. And in the case of Wolf, he's splitting starts right now with Vladish and he's doing really well, these first couple of games of the year. But, you know, and we're going to get to this when we talk about Sebastian Cosa later in the show. But, you mean,

goalie performances can really fluctuate and you can have some really, you know, great highs for a couple of weeks and then it goes hard the other way that week or two after, you know, a much different way than it is for skaters. Skaters have good games and bad games, but they're rarely, you know, the best player on the ice, one game, the most viable player on the ice. And then tomorrow, they're the least valuable player on the ice. So you want to, I think, you know, with Wolf, he's in the conversation. I think he's absolutely in the Calder conversation right now. He's a really, really good player. The question for me is, especially with goalies is you get to me like in December or January and let's see how it's really gone by then before we start talking about. Where does he really fit in this picture? Coachetkov for reference finished fourth last year, played 42 games with a 9-11 save percentage. I think he was fifth on my ballot. That feels like like what he's shooting for. If he can play half of their games, which he's trending to do. He's got to stay healthy, obviously, but he's been the better goalie in that tandem early on as they've split

starts through the first 10 games here. He's, I think he's up above 920. If he can be in that 910 to 915 range and play 40-something games, he's going to be, he's going to be on ballots. And at Big Mill, I think he got like 10, 15 games last year already.

He had some really bad games. So it just matters like, you know, which end of that spectrums are you going to be at more consistently over the course in the next few months. One guy who we're not talking about, in this conversation here because the season hasn't gone, I think how he would have drawn it up

or how his team would have drawn it up is Will Smith in San Jose, Celebrini's teammate. And I think there's a conversation to be had about kind of his struggles. And maybe we should start there. But I also think this is an interesting one, Scott, as it pertains to the world juniors,

because you know Team USA would love to get their hands on him. And yet it's kind of hard to see an NHL team saying, okay, we're going to send you there and you're going to come back to the NHL. How does the sequencing work, there in your mind? Can the San Jose need to decide what's going to happen for his broader season before his World Junior availability gets decided?

And what are you seeing when you watch Smith so far? It does feel like if his struggles continue with the way it's gone over the sort of first month of the season here for him, like the decision is going to be on the NHL demotion sooner than it sooner than the World Junior decision. Like it feels like it's already approaching a bit of a tipping point with Will. He just doesn't look like the player that we've seen. toy with teams in college and previously to that at the NTP. He doesn't look like a 70 point college player.

There were always questions about how his game was going to translate coming out. I think those were reinforced at men's worlds last year. And they've kind of lingered predictably. So I think lingered for him this season without the insulation of a good team around him. And he just he just doesn't look even comfortable really at the NHL level at the moment. So the World Juniors is going to come into focus here. He could be a game changer. Sort of one last swan song with Gabe Perrault and Ryan Leonard.

He could sort of completely change the look of that American team. I think we've mentioned it in the past, but obviously Greer is an American. I think Peter's mentioned it months ago, sort of half jokingly about how Greer is an American. That might not be nothing in the equation. So there's lots to consider. But it does feel like if you were asking me today whether Will Smith is going to play for USA at the world juniors, I would say yes. And now you move Hagan's to the second along, which I think is huge and just for that team

and how that offense is going to balance out. Yeah, it does change the entire dynamic of that lineup. And then you can start really playing with the lines a little bit more. And you've got two play driving centers on your top two lines. But the other thing I wanted to mention on the Will Smith discussion, as bad as San Jose is at the NHL level right now, their HAL, team has been quite good. The Barracuda have gotten,

like, and this is not typical for that, for that HL team. They have a good roster. Colin Graff is down there. Philip B. Stett is down there. You know, and so that is a thing. And obviously, you know, with the HAL being on flow hockey, of course I want

another star player in the league, but I did talk about this on my, on my podcast. The other thing is there's not just the confidence thing. Like, Will Smith has never not. produced. Zero points through this many games has probably never happened to this kid in his life. And so you start worrying about confidence. You start worrying about how does this compound. I think all of us had said previously, I don't know if this is the best move for him to go in now. As productive as he was at BC last year, as good as he was in college, the strength, the size, the pace, all of those things were concerns and have come to the four. It just doesn't look right. And I think you have to make that decision very soon. And I do think when you send your player to the HL,

your hope is that you're sending them into a situation where they're going to thrive, flourish, succeed. In years past, the barracuda were not set up that way. They are now. They have a number of veteran guys. They have a number of players. They have Ascarov down there right now. So it's been a very strong team and say, hey,

why don't we go chase a Calder Cup with, Will Will Smith the center of our team. I mean, like, I think that's far better for him. The optics seem to be the thing that teams just can't get with these top players. But the one guy I want to bring up, you look at the different ways that people, that teams fight, you know, like do their development and what they do with their players. You look at what the ducks did with Leo Carlson last year. They left, they managed his minutes.

They were careful about it. But let's look at what Seattle did with Shane Wright. I don't think his rookie season where they started in the NHL, then he went to the AHL for conditioning, then he went to the World Juniors, and then he went back to Junior was great. But then he spent all of last season in the AHL, and it did wonders for him.

He helped that team get to a Calder Cup final in Coachella Valley. And that, to me, is the model that maybe you should follow. And the good thing is that you don't have to send Will Smith to junior. You can send them right to the HL and keep him there. which I think is probably most beneficial to him at this point. I guess, and maybe Smith's struggles are kind of a part of this, Corey, but does it feel like this is, I don't know if I have too high of expectations or if we've been spoiled in the past couple

years, but is it a little bit of a down year, though, like rookie class overall for this group? Well, I think Celebrini's absence definitely looms large over the evaluation of this rookie class if he was playing and scoring and doing what the things we think Celebrity can do. I think we're talking about this a little differently. but I think it's one of the lesser rookie classes I can remember in recent years.

I mean, obviously, Mitch Kov is a great prospect, for example, but if you really look at who these top names are, these top scorers, it's not like a lot of like, you know, high high picks. You know, the second leading rookie goal score right now is Seamus Casey, who's in the American League at the moment. You have, you know, the highest scores. You know, we've talked about, you know, obviously Stan Kovin and Mitch Kov and Hudson, and then you get to Sipelikov and you've got like, you know,

Victor Mancini, who was a third pair of defenseman, on the Rangers. You have Jackson Blake, who's like a third, fourth line player on Carolina. And they've had impressive starts, impressive camps, no doubt about that.

But I think overall, looking at this rookie group, it just hasn't been inspiring first month from this crop. I will say, and I think, you know, all the co-host will agree with this.

I don't think Cutter Gochi is going to go 0 for 21 on his shots, on a consistent level going forward here. So I think he's a guy who's going to get going here and when he catches fire. I think he could change the conversation there a little bit in terms of like the consensus top names. But overall, I don't know if Scott disagrees, but I don't think this is the sexiest rookie group I've ever seen. No, I was going to go to, I was going to go to Cutter's sort of slow start there. It's the list of the high-end names coming in.

You've got one who's injured. You've got another in Smith who's struggled. You've got Cutter who's still waiting to get going. Wayne's had his defensive struggles at times. It just hasn't been that glossy sort of sexy start for a lot of those kids. I think Michikov, maybe Wolf, despite not only playing a handful of games and Stankovin excluded. And I think what Stankov is going to be interesting is he's playing very well. And I think we all love Stancovin as a player.

He's so likable. He's so talented. But he is not really a go-to guy on that team. And I kind of wonder as we keep getting deeper into this season, as if he's going to be able to maintain with Mitchcoff scoring-wise, even though the caliber of teams they're on is different. I think that's a variable you have to consider. But I kind of expect if Mitchcoff stays healthy and Stancovin stays healthy,

that at some point Mitchcoff is going to have some separation there in terms of scoring. Corey, you made the point before we started recording. The second highest scoring rookie in the NHL right now is not even in the NHL. It's Seamus Casey just riding that really hot start that he had with the devil. So maybe what we need to spice this race back up is for either the devils to call Casey back up or somebody to make a play for him and put him in their lineup. And we can get a little more fireworks here. The devil's defense situation is pretty interesting because you have Casey who had a very impressive camp.

And then Hughes and Pacey coming back, they can't find a spot for him. They can't even find a spot for Simon Nemich right now. I think this is kind of like this log jam that we all kind of saw coming from a mile away over the last year or two. and it'll be really interested to see how it plays out there in New Jersey. What I don't think any of us saw coming was that it would be Jonathan Kovicevich who was boxing out a Nemich, right? Like I think we all saw for Casey because of all the puck moving D. But Kovicevich has been good for them.

Keefe, I saw a press conference there. He really likes what Kovosevich has done. And that's the guy who I think is thrown this even deeper into chaos. He's been calling him Kovetschkin. Well, I do like that. I can't argue against that. I could argue a little bit against that. All right, let's take a quick break right there.

We'll come back. We'll do a mailbag. All right, it's mailbag time, fellas. We had to let Chris Peters duck out for an important meeting. So we will get right to it with Charlie Douglas's question. Do you think Porter Martone will make it a genuine debate at number one? And what do you think his weaknesses are as a prospect, Corey? Well, I don't think it's just Martone.

I think unless Hayans just rips up college hockey end or has a huge. huge world junior. I think it's going to be Martone and possibly a couple of other players based on my early conversations with Scouts, where I think this is kind of one of, this might be one of those years, kind of like the Wrights-Levkovsky year, where it's not a clear, clear cut number one. I still think it's Hagen's at one right now. You know, I thought it had to change my assessment based on four or five games into the

year. But I think, you know, you look at poor Martone is doing nearly two points a game. He's six-three. He skates well. He plays. He's hard. He's super skilled. To answer the question, I don't think it's hockey sense, it's super high end. That'd be my one real concern there with him.

But he's off to a great start. Michael Mesa, I think he's over a goal per game right now in the OHL. He's a great skater. Yeah, I mean, he's just being, he's been outstanding. And it's kind of funny when I talk to NHL people, and you talk about Mesa's year. You talk about Martone's year, like, Asmar, they're the main challenger to Higgins right now. They'll be like, actually, I think some of them will say, yes. Some of them will even say Matt Schaefer might be even a bigger challenge.

There are people who had more Matt Schaefer and think he's absolutely in the first overall conversation as a potential number one defenseman in the NHL. And up until he got injured, I thought, you know, he looked at the start. Roger McQueen was having him, Brandon's 6' 5 center who could skate and he was lining it up there. I think he had a lot of people intrigued as a potential challenger to Hagen's too. So again, we're only in October. Nowhere close to June yet, thankfully. So he got a lot of hockey left to go and a lot of information left to process here with these players. But I think for me, Martone is absolutely in the conversation with Hagan's.

I think you look even like going back to the U18 worlds, I thought their performances were pretty equal. Hagen's is a better skater, but I think Martone is just obviously five inches taller. He's really powerful overall player with a ton of skill. And I think it's going to be a very interesting race to see who gets that top spot in this draft. Seeing as this is the athletic hockey show, I'll plug to that as this episode comes out on Friday, we now have a Porter Martone feature up today at theathletic.com. What do you think as weaknesses are, Scott? That was the other part of the question here.

Like, if a team's going to not want Porter Martone, what's the reason? I think Corey's point about the hockey sense is probably the most common one that you hear. Coming into the season, I didn't think that he was going to be the challenger in the way that he has been. He scored 33 goals and led that then-Mississauga Steelheads now, Brampton Steelheads team in goals last year. was second on that team in points, has been a top player for hockey Canada. But there were games I showed up to in Mississauga last year where I left thinking he had very little impact on the game.

He disappointed me. I think part of that was just me showing up to some of his off nights. But this season, I've seen him play three times live since the start of this year already, and he has been a force. Like taking over games, big plays and big moments. Physical, a couple of weeks ago when I was up in Barry, he scored two, created two goals on the same shift.

And then a couple of shifts later was scrapping with Gabriel Elias. And we've talked about a lot on this podcast and is a terror out there. Scouts just love him. I keep hearing Corey Perry, the Kachuk brothers, like scouts love him as that sort of competitive winger who can make plays, score goals. He's legit. He's, he has looked this season and frankly all the way back to the last season as well, by and large, especially at U-18s where he was riding shotgun with Gavin McKenna,

he looks right there for me. And I do think the decision-making on the puck, he'll make mistakes on the puck, he'll force things, he'll make a bad read. That's kind of where his game has to come. It kind of reminds me a little bit of, I mean, Sam Dickinson's a defenseman, but there's a little bit of that. There was a little bit of that with Sam Dickinson last year where the talent and the athletic attributes and the size were so close.

clear and then he just had to sort of figure it out and some of that's just maturity and getting more touches and playing more games i've heard kachuk with him i'm not sure i see kachukh brothers in him i actually thought more of slepkowski a little bit when i've watched more tone which turns of the athletic profile the skill the skating the big frame and then i think of hagen's i think a lot of cooley so i i think there's differences there in terms of the caliber of talent and all between those analogies. But I thought a little bit about the Kooley versus Slavkovsky debate with those two players at times. Yeah, one of these days we'll have to have that Kooley versus Slavkovsky debate on the podcast.

That's probably unexplored territory for us. We'll go right back to Scott with this one. Joe Rosen says, what do you think about Michael Hage's start to his college career? Is he playing better than you expected and how do you see him going forward? I think he's been on par with sort of what I expected. I expected him to be an impact guy for that team and a front of the lineup player for that team. If those who followed that Michigan roster closely this season, it's a much weaker in terms of the glossiness of the talent than we're used to seeing for the Michigan Wolverines.

And as a result, he's immediately the guy there and has immediately looked like the guy and played like the guy and made plays. And he's obviously the focal point on their power play. But I think what's been more impressive about Michael Starr is just his impact on games. at even strength. He's driving a line. Some of the questions about Michael throughout last season were just sort of a competitiveness element, whether he was going to be able to be a center or whether he was going to have to transition to the wing at the professional level. And the big thing for me with Michael this season has just been how involved in games he's been and how consistently good he's been. I haven't watched all of their games, but when I've watched him, he's been really solid.

And I think the coaching staff there is really happy with him as well. So credit to him. He looks like a legit, legit prospect. All right. Scott, another one for you. Jose Cedro says, curious to know at this point in the evaluation, how would you rank and tier Caleb Denoiae among these centers drafted latent lottery from the last three drafts? Nate Danielson, Marco Casper, Michael Hage, Dahlivore Dvorsky, Jett Luchenko, and Consta Hellenius. How would Denoye slot into that group? I think he's a comparable prospect to all of those kids.

If I look back on my evaluations of those players, I probably, if I were slotting them, would have Consta Heleneas based off where I was at on each of those players, sort of at the slight front edge of that group. And then after that, you're into Dvorisky and Danielson and Casper and Dainoyet. And Dainway feels like he sort of fits into that group nicely for me. I don't think there's a lot of differentiators between where he's at as a player and where those guys are at.

Casper, I think there's some parallels in terms of style of play, both well-rounded players. Caleb, like his older brother, has already been a reliable off-puck player at the Q level. There's some similarities there for sure. So you're telling me I need to start doing a lot of work on this guy. He's going to be the Red Wings pick at number 12 this year? He is definitely one of their types, I would say. Yeah. can never have too many effective middle six centers, I guess, or at least the red wings are prepared to test that theory.

I was just going to say, they're going to find out one way or another. All right, we're into the Corey answers for his crimes section of the mailbag now, and no surprise the origin of this first one is coming from Montreal. Do you regret putting Demidov so low on your rankings already, Matthew wonders, Corey? Yeah, I guess it depends which ranking he's talking about. He's talking about the draft ranking I published, I think, in April or May, I think where he was 8th. And then I think after I told you, I think after I did the U23 list in the summer, I bumped him up a little bit. Because I mentioned that I, you know, when I met the kid, I saw he was a lot bigger than he was listed.

And I made a little bit of a tweet there. I think he was like, now he was like four or five, I think, on the 24 draft list after that point. So I guess I'm not sure which particular ranking he's talking about and regretting. But I think either way, I don't think the answer is, I think for a lot of players, unless you try to change your evaluation too much based on a couple of weeks of hockey or a month of hockey, unless something is dramatically, you know, surprising to you in a positive or negative direction. And even for the scouts who were super, super high on to meet off or maybe thought he was a little bit overhyped going into the draft, I think everybody thought this is a hell of a player, his offensive skill is elite. and he's probably going to have a really nice year in the KHL. And, I mean, he's doing that. He's helping Skoll win games.

He's a middle 6'4 on that team. You know, he's been very impressive. So, but, you know, Beckett Seneca has been, have been on a tear since he's gone down to the OHL, for example. And I don't know, like, you know, Yakimchuk's had a good couple of games. Eve Boyham has made on a scorching hot start, but he's been good. Sam Dickinson's been good in London to start the year. I don't know if you can take a.

couple of weeks of data and start just moving guys all around all of a sudden. You've got to weigh a little bit more. So I guess may not the answer that the person wanted to hear, but I'm probably not changing my opinion on really anything unless, you know, something really strange happens over the next month or so. It's not quite to the pace, for example, that Michkov was on last year in the KCHL. It's not too far off, but it's not quite to there. And I think that was always the debate. It's how far off Mitchcoff, is he? Right, and Michikov wasn't on a good team. Demidov's on a really good team.

I think what Demidov's doing this year is more impressive than what Mitchikov did last year, at least from what I can see. But it's still really early. I always do an updated prospect list in January. I think at that point, you get enough data. They've played international tournament, be it the world juniors, the November tournaments, national team stuff, you know, whatever. You got a couple of months of junior hockey under your belt.

I think when you get closed December, January, where you can start saying, okay, what's really changed here? October, I would hope you're not really changing too much. All right. This next crime is a shared crime for both you and Scott. Beer League Chump wants you to revisit your COSA take from our very recent U23 draft episode, where I think Scott took Devin Levi over COSA. And I think there was just a general question of if my, but this is all in the context of the U23.

I've heard the clip that people are referencing. year is where like you guys say I'll have a hard time stopping. Kosa will have a hard time stopping your team's forwards. I think that would probably be true of all of our goalies considering the kinds of forwards we were drafted. Yeah, that's fair. Also, I was looking at the stats right now. You know, Nikita Artaaminov, it was the second round picked by Carolina last year is out scoring Demidov. That's the one where like, I didn't expect that this year. So that'd be one where you're looking at that like, okay, that's a really hot start from Mark Taminoff. Like maybe he should have gone a little bit higher in the draft and where he went.

That's kind of an example of what I'm talking about. In terms of COSA, though, we mentioned this in the Wolf conversation. I hate to kind of be a cold water guy constantly right now. I'm not getting like these really sexy hot takes right now. Yeah, he's been awesome. And I like Sebastian COSA. I've kind of projected him as a tandem goal in the NHL. I think he's a legitimate NHL goalie.

A guy he's going to help Detroit. But it's a couple of games. Like it's not really that much data that, year like if you didn't like the player now all of a sudden you think he's an NHL player or if he thought he was an NHL goalie now you think he's going to be a legitimate number one NHL goal you no questions about it I don't think we've seen enough from COSA even though it's been a very impressive first couple of games to you know revisit that I think one of the questions we didn't leave on

as someone asked me if they want to revisit my opinion from 2002 on COSA which is just kind of funny I think that was right around with that his ECHL year that was that right around that time is ECHHHH year was 22, 23. Yeah, so maybe I said I thought he was having, I was concerned by how his time in the ECHL was going. I might have lowered his projection that year, for example. But that's kind of the funny part about Scott and I, in our job is, you know,

NHL teams usually get evaluated on one decision or if they trade the guy, maybe a second decision, for example. But we have to update our evaluations costly throughout the course of the year. So you can kind of, you know, go through our list and find times where I had COSA, I think I had him as a top 10 prospect going into his draft. class. And then there were times I lowered him a little bit and I really lowered him and then I kind of bumped him back up and there's, you know, you go through those waves. You know, for example, you know, I was known as like this big Cole Cawfield supporter going to the draft and after the

draft and, you know, the year or two after even. But then I think it was like the year, his first year in the NHL wasn't really going so well that first couple of months. And I kind of voiced that, hey, I think there's some concerns about how this is translating. I lowered his projection a little bit. and then that rebounded quickly, you put it back to what was before. So, anyway, I just think that's,

it's a funny part about our jobs and people who can go back and find these little, you know, clips of what we've said or things that we've said. And it's always a very fluid process. So I don't,

I don't know if either of you or Scott has changed your opinion on Sebastian COSA or your, I think the conversation was not framed about COSA. I think it was framed about COSA versus like Devin Levi or something, right? and Fowler. Oh, Fowler.

Revisiting my take, I took Devin Levi over and had mentioned that I probably would have, I had on the list that I'd sort of built for our podcast episode that I had Jacob Fowler sort of fifth. There were the four goalies who were clear to me and then Fowler fifth and then COSA 6. So I mentioned that I probably would have taken Fowler over COSA. Fowler is off to a tremendous start in college hockey, for example. So all of these things have to be measured side by side. obviously Levi's got a safe percentage under 900.

So does Zucco Pecalucan. I think that's always important context when we're talking about goalies is where they're playing. Just opened Grand Rapids Griffin's stat page here while we were recording. Billy Huso has played two games. He's undefeated with a shutout with Grand Rapids. Carter Islander has started a game. One, all three of them have very high save percentages. That team is one of the top teams in the H.L.

At the moment, now certainly Sebastian Kosa has been excellent for them is a big part of the reason why they have such a winning record. But I do think that is important context. I think what's happening in front of Devin Levi and Ococke-Lukinin with the Buffalo Sabres and the NHL is important context. So there's all sorts of layers to this. At the end of the day, all three of Devin Levi, Jacob Fowler and Sebastian Kosa are amongst the best young goleys on the planet right now.

So we're talking about three very, very, very good, talented players. Having watched some of Kosa earlier this year, the thing I'd say that that stands out is I think he looks a lot more comfortable, a lot more in control in the crease. I don't think it's as much of these heavy pushoffs that almost overextend him the other way, and he's having to recover so much. It's happened a little, and he's done it well when it has. He's recovered well, but I think he just looks a lot more under control. And that's the real area of growth that you wanted to see from COSA two years ago.

And that is, I think, starting to come to fruition. All right. Next one is our last one from Nick H. Corey, if you could be in person for one tournament or showcase event per year, what would it be and why? I think the answer is it's fairly easy. It's a world junior gold medal game. With the caveat that it has to be like a competitive game,

I think that is the pinnacle of our industry, industry being the hockey prospect world, obviously not all of hockey. There's Stanley Cup finals and whatnot. But in terms of what we cover, which is the amateur world, it's the world juniors. The showcase games, like the All-American game, the CHL Top Prospects game,

calling a spade of spade, those are bad games. Those are not entertaining. They're not even useful information typically from a hockey perspective. We go to it because it's expected of us because there's a lot of good players there. But those are usually rough hockey games to watch. The international games are where it's at. And it would be nice if the U18 level can rise to that same stratosphere. I think that you think of the talent level that is in there is really talented players

and it can be very chaotic like junior hockey is. But when you have really talented junior players and you have the chaos of junior hockey, you have the stakes of international hockey, and then you add a packed building into the mix where you kind of feel the emotions. Like, you know, you go to Gothenburg last winter and it's a packed Swedish house to watch Sweden play USA for the gold medal. Or you go to, you know, when you're in Halif, facts and Slovakia is pushing Canada to the brink in the quarterfinal and

Connor Bedard does something heroic and overtime to win the game like those moments are just special and especially you know if it's a really good gold medal game against the two best teams in the tournament for us that is I think the pinnacle of this job and frankly nothing comes close hell the draft doesn't even come close yeah I'm in the same boat when when I saw this question in our sheet sort of for the show pre-show and I got thinking about what are the best games I've seen live as a reporter in eight years at the Athletic in a couple of years before that. They're almost all World Junior's games. William Dufour scoring four goals to lead St. John to the Memorial Cup was unbelievable.

I will never forget that night. I will never forget Gardner McDougal and the way he talked about that game afterwards and his press conference that he had. I thought the U-18 final this year with Trevor Connolly's five-minute major and the way that game swung and Gavin McKinna's plays in the third period was as good at a U-18s final as I've seen. But the U-18s just with the CHL playoffs ongoing, I've been to some good Frozen Four finals, but they just never seem to get that feel

of New Year's Eve at the World Juniors or the gold medal game at the World Juniors. And I mean, Corey mentioned Baderd against Slovakia, but Akil Thomas in Ostrava, Mason McTavish pulling a goal off the goal line in Edmund, It just feels like the world juniors does it every single year. There's a moment that we remember from every single tournament. And the stakes are just so much higher at the world juniors than they are at U-A teens.

It's what these kids, especially the Canadian kids, but I think increasingly the American kids as well, it's what these kids play for. It's really their first Stanley Cup. And it feels that way when you're in the building. I thought you guys would say the whole world U-18s. But I guess if we're lowering it to one game, maybe that's the difference. I kind of read it as like what event. And I just thought like World U-18, you don't get the top Canadians,

but you get so many looks as late as possible to the draft. And I kind of thought that's- It's still the world junior. If you stretch it out to a full event, the U-18 can be real valuable in terms of just helping, you know, try to shape up where guys fit in the draft. But there's a lot of bad games at that tournament. And there was even when Russia was in it. I mean, there's been more bad games with the World Juniors and the U-18s with Russia out. But I think with World Juniors, the amount of talent that's in it, both from the draft and the drafted players' perspective,

and then you just think about the stakes. And I think you know when you're watching the U18 games that there's a very small section of the hockey public who are watching this games with you. So you can kind of pick things of perspective. But when things are going on for like a Team Canada or Team USA game, you know there's thousands of people watching. watching these games and you have to try and frame what's going on here. And I think it's just a whole different level of excitement of, of emotion. And it's for us, I think it's the pinnacle of this job. All right.

Good stuff. That's going to do it for us. Thanks for listening to this episode of the athletic hockey show Prospect Series. You can catch more of Chris over at Flow Hockey and on his podcast Talking Hockey Sense. I'll be back on Monday with Laz and Chris Johnston. Talk to you guys then. Thank you.