The Athletic Hockey Show - NHL Draft recap, World Junior Summer Showcase analysis, early 2022 NHL Draft thoughts, listener questions, and more

Episode Date: July 30, 2021

First, Max and Corey recap all-things NHL Draft and discuss the biggest surprises, including Tyler Boucher going to the Ottawa Senators at No. 10, the Columbus Blue Jackets taking Kent Johnson and Cole Sillinger with their dual first round picks, the Detroit Red Wings and the Minnesota Wild trading up to take goalies Sebastian Cossa and Jesper Wallstedt respectively, the Montreal Canadiens selecting Logan Mailloux with the final pick of the first round, and more.Then, the guys give their analysis on Team USA’s 2021 World Junior Summer Showcase, which also includes teams from Finland and Sweden, currently underway in Plymouth, Michigan, and discuss the standout play so far of Aatu Räty, Thomas Bordeleau, Jake Sanderson, and others.Plus, early thoughts on 2022 NHL Draft eligible players including Shane Wright, Ivan Miroshnichenko, Danila Yurov, Logan Cooley, and Brad Lambert, as well as listener questions about realistic NHL timelines for Sebastian Cossa and Jesper Wallstedt, if the New Jersey Devils have amassed enough talent to be contenders within four years, the point of Central Scouting, and more.And, don’t forget, 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 again alongside Corey Prondman for another Friday prospect edition of the Athletic Hockey Show. The 2021 NHL draft has finally come and gone, and it was one of the wilder days, full action-wise, in the NHL in quite some time when you factor in all the trades that happened beforehand. We're going to recap that today. We're also going to break down what we have seen at the World Junior Summer Showcase happening right now in Plymouth and start looking ahead to the next draft class. It's also the first episode we've actually been able to do live in person together. So first of all, Corey, why don't you rate my dining room setup? You know, it's about average. I appreciate that you're still sticking to the scouting scale there.

No, that's all good. We're excited here. I mean, it's been fun times here. Corey has barely slept, so we're going to get them to say a whole bunch of wild stuff today. If all goes well, and we'll start that out on the 2021 draft class, Corey. what surprised you? So the draft was interesting because obviously this was a unique draft class in terms of how much live viewings there were, how many of the international events and major showcase events were canceled.

We had no OHL season whatsoever. And I thought, I think the common thought going into the draft was there's all this uncertainty surrounding this draft. Things are going to get really crazy. But frankly, when you kind of go through the first round, the second round, even into the third round, I didn't see a whole lot of crazy in there, to be quite honest. Not to say that there weren't some picks that were interesting or spark debate, but no more than I thought than a typical draft class where that happens every year. I thought the first two rounds, actually, most of the names we thought would go there, went there.

Now, there are a couple that were interesting. the first one would have been an Ottawa's pick at 10th overall Tyler Boucher from the NTP So Boucher is an interesting one because he didn't play much this season and not due to COVID reasons he was injured several times I remember getting a couple of texts

from scouts in the beginning of the season we didn't know when the NTDP season was going to start but when it did start They went to go play some in the NAHL teams. I think there were some Division III college teams thrown in there. And he started hearing from teams like, oh, you know, this Tyler Boucher guy is looking really good. Like he's this big, strong, crushing power for. He's showing a little bit of offense.

You're like, oh, that's intriguing. And then a couple weeks into the season, he gets injured. He misses like a month or two afterwards. And then I come back, I went to go watch the NTVP play live at Adrian College. I want to say it was either in December or January. It was Bouchet's first game back from his first injury. First shift of the game, he comes out absolutely crush as a guy. You're like, oh, yeah, that's what I've been hearing so much about.

Here's this big power forward. Second shift at the game, he goes out and tries to hit a guy hard again, their legs get tied up. He has to crawl off the ice. He's in crutches the next day. And that's kind of a lot of how his season went. And then he came back from that second injury, and I didn't think he was quite as good as in those first few weeks.

And that's kind of the profile you have on him, as well as what you had from him in his underage season. And I do like Boucher. I think on top of the elite physicality, I think he's got pretty good puck skills. Skating is where I wonder with him for the NHL. I could buy NHL average. My projection is slightly below NHL average.

That's kind of, you know, I respect what I was trying to do there. I didn't see personally enough attributes to get him into that spot of the draft, even though I think he is a unique player who does, you know, who the way he plays. plays, it's not easy to find in an NHL draft. But, yeah, so, like, I do like Tyler. I just don't know. I felt this was them shooting for their Tom Wilson and Milan, their prime, Milan, Luchich. And I just don't know if realistically you expect, I think Boucher will be a full-time

NHL player. I could see third-line wing. I think in the absolute best case, I could see second-line wing, but I don't know if you're going to get the big offense from him. Yeah, he's interesting because he's. He did only play what, I think it was 12 to 14 games this whole year. I think he's about a point per game player over that span at the program. Which is good.

Which is good. Yeah, but not amazing, but good. Yeah. And so if you think back in especially the team that drafted him, Ottawa, they go and they pick Brady Kachuk. And we're not necessarily seeing a Brady Kachuk ceiling here. Right. Yeah. Brady was a much better offensive player in the NTP as an underage there.

Yeah. He was BU in his draft year already. Yeah. B.U. in his draft year, which of the world junior is one of the best players there. Completely different kind of profile. I do like Boucher. I think he could be on this year's World Junior team.

I think he could be, you know, a good, useful to a good NHL player. But I just, like Brady has, on top of the elite physicality, he has great hockey sense. He has great skill. You watch him with Ottawa. He makes all kinds of plays. And I just don't know if Bouchet does that. So that's where my concern is that I just, I feel like if you wanted a hard element in a forward, you may not play exactly the way Boucher does, but I thought Cole Cillinger would have made the most sense.

Maybe even Brennan-Othman to an extent, but definitely Cole Cillinger would have made a lot of sense. So that one was a surprise to me for sure. We've been watching Boucher at the showcase here this week, and we'll get into more of this later. I've seen him make a couple of nice passes, but one of the questions you mentioned, that, you know, are they going for their Tom Wilson here? He's a very physical player. He's also 6-1. Yeah.

Like, can you beat Tom Wilson in the NHL at 6-1? Right. And I, you know, and Tom Wilson came out through junior hockey. Right. You know, Boucher is going to come up through college hockey. Can't fight. Right. Yeah.

And so, it'll be interesting. I respect a lot of what he brings. I think he's a unique player. I just, the upper half of the line the type of guy, the guy who plays, you know, provides up really large impact for an NHL team. I just, I like him. I just don't know if that's a realistic projection. But I do think he could help Ottawa.

I just don't know if he'll be the 10th best player in the draft. How good does he have to be, not to the point that he'll be the 10th best player in the draft, but to the point that five years from now, Senators' fans look back on that and they go, that's fine. If he became like a true, like, second line winger. 40 to 45 point.

Yeah, like I say, like a 20-20 guy. I think that's really the best case scenario to be quite honest, just my opinion. But I think that's one where you now, maybe they felt that was a piece of the puzzle they were missing, and you plug him into with Stutzland and Chuck and Sanderson and Josh Norris and Alex Formanton and Batherson and Berndstrom and all those guys. And then I think you can swallow a little bit more, but that obviously depends on what happens. after them. You know, if Cole Cylinder becomes, you know, my first line forward, a Sebastian coaster,

Jesper Wallstead, become, you know, true, you know, great NHL goal tenders, that will sting a little bit more. But to be fair, once those top nine skaters were off the board, the consensus varied wildly. That's why for months we were talking about Ottawa pick being rather pivotal, because we really didn't know where the draft was going to go after nine. Well, part of that pivot had to do with the two goalies. And we thought if Ottawa doesn't take one, there's a good chance at least one of them

starts to fall down the board a little bit. And it turned out both of them start to fall down the board. And part of that is because Chicago also. Yes, they traded out. That's right. So they trade out to Columbus with, we'll talk about Columbus as drafted. Actually, let's just do that right now. Getting to Columbus, they trade Seth Jones in the hours leading up to the draft.

They get a haul in return, and that hall includes swap. the Tampa Bay 32nd pick, which they already owned, dating back to the David Savard trade, up to 12. That puts them in position after Ottawa passes on Cillinger. And after they had picked on Kent Johnson earlier, or picked Ken Johnson earlier in the draft, they come out of that top 12 with two really potential top six forwards there in Johnson and Cillinger. Right. Depending who you talk to, they both could be top six centers. I said, some scouts may think Johnson might be a center or not. Some scouts might think Cylinder is a center or not,

but right now they're both centers, or at least listed as centers. I'm sure Columbus will do their very best to at least try to see if they would work in the NHL as centers. Now, like Kent Johnson is ahead of Cole Cillinger. Not surprisingly, he went ahead, and just for me, he's a notably better player. but now you that was a huge part of their depth chart that had a hole and now it'll take some a couple of years but you can now start to envision a future where Kent Johnson is your first line center yeah and Cole Cylinger is your is your second line center and will those two be able to fill that role on a on a you know a contending caliber team time will tell maybe maybe not but they're

really promising prospects and that was a huge organizational need that Columbus had going into the draft that was addressed. And they also had a need on defense after Trading Seth Jones. And even before Trading Seth Jones, they didn't really have many on-Defendment in their system. And I think Korson Coolman's, the Wisconsin commit has a lot of NHL assets and didn't really play much this season in the A.J.

He'll probably be a two-three-year college guy. But he's also, I think, you know, getting those three players adds a lot of talent to a farm system that frankly didn't really have much talent coming into the weekend. And it doesn't mean their rebuild is over. There's a lot more work to do there in Columbus. You know, who knows what's going to happen to say was Zach Rewinsky in the next couple of years,

for example. But this weekend, that's past weekend, mind you, was a really important step forward for that organization that's been taking its lumps in recent years. Well, you know, adding in course in Coolman's, like, that's another, you know, he's not replacing Seth Jones, who they traded away, but he is a player who on upside alone, like, you got a chance to really get a player there in terms of a big mobile defenseman who at some levels shows kind of offensive inclinations and at other levels looks like a solid defensive-minded player. You have the package for a complete defense manager that they get at 25. I don't know where Cillinger factored into that top 10 on pure upside that you did in our last

episode. I don't think he did. He didn't know. But he wouldn't have been too far outside of it. No, he wouldn't. And Coolman's is definitely in the 20. I definitely can understand why some teams would have been hesitant to do in the teams, but in the 20s it made a lot of sense.

I think those three players, and some of their day two guys I like to, but those three players are, that was an exciting combination to get. Really quick, you mentioned the possibility of Johnson and Cillinger as both centers in the top six. I also like him as complimentary players potentially in terms of if you wanted to play him on one line, maybe Cylinder in the middle and Johnson on the wing. You know, Cilinger can kind of be that retrieval guy and go into the corners and do some of those things that maybe you don't see Johnson do as much. Sure. He's a shooter. Johnson can be a playmaker for him. I like the complimentary fit of those two potentially too.

Right, but just looking at their organizational death chart right now, I would imagine they would rather just have C-plugged that two C-hole in five years from now. Just looking at the young players, Leon Fudi, Kareil Marchenko, their wingers. I do like Voronkov a lot. He's a guy who's a mid-round pick, played for a Rush School Championship team. He's a guy I can envision as a third-line center in the National Hockey League. Second line might be a little bit on the high side,

but he's a promising player for them. and it's starting to see a little bit of it coming together in terms of how their organization could look good again in a couple of years, but there's still a lot more work left there to be done, I think. Yeah, all right, we tease the goalies, let's get back into that now. By the 14th pick, both of them were still on the board,

where Buffalo took Isaac Rosen. That put Dallas on the clock at 15, and Detroit ultimately is the team that trades up. They give up 23, a second rounder, a fifth rounder, to go up and they take Sebastian Kosa. You had thought there was a pretty good chance coming into the draft that Kosa could be the first goal he picked. And that's where Detroit went.

They took the swing on the WHL kid with an unbelievable statistical season this past year and more size, maybe a little bit more athleticism. Is this the higher upside pick ultimately with the goal that Detroit made? Yeah, I never thought there was a separation between the two of them. I had Kosa at rate personally I had a wool step but I never I thought it was always a bit of a 50-50

call depending on what you valued in terms of the pure tools the track record if you valued hockey sense more there's you could have gone in either way with them but I think if you wanted to ask me you know who has the most pure like talent between the two of them it would be COSA just because it's as we discussed before it's so easy to look at the six six gold tender who moves in the net the way he does and envision a future where he is an upper echelon goaltender in the National Hockey League. It doesn't mean he will, just like a lot of the guys in this draft. Kosa hasn't really played a full season in quite some time.

He's played parts of seasons. He got almost every start for the Oil Kings this season, but it was a very abbreviated WHOHL season. So I think there's still some questions to be answered. How is he going to do over a full WHL season? He'll probably can to start in goaltender at the World Junior. How does he do there? Then obviously when he turns pro,

but like I said, I can understand why some may not be 100% sold on him, but I just think there's just so much talent there that, you know, I respect the bet. I respect why Detroit did it. And, you know, not only to address a clear organizational need, but once you got to that point in the draft

around the 15th slot, I didn't think there was another better pure athlete on the board there than COSA. So I understand why they felt. them need to get aggressive, even if it's for a position and goaltender that has some risk. Yeah. When you move into the second goal, then next with Walshstead, we thought 20 kind of seemed like a true floor in this draft for goals, and we thought that because Edmonton was picking there.

Ultimately, 20 is where Walshstead goes, but it happens because Minnesota trades up to Edmonton's spot to pick Yes for Wollstead. Yeah, and Minnesota is an organization. As we mentioned on the last episode of the podcast, there are an organization I've had, I've all, we've talked about for the last three years in terms of trading a goalie. You know, they were an organization that was speculated with Spencer Knight. They were an organization that was speculated with Yaroslav Ascarov. And then this year, despite, you know, it's seen really unlikely they would end up with a goaltender.

They do end up with one of the two premium goalie prospects in Ypresby Walsda, because like Detroit, they get aggressive. And I think we've, you know, going into this draft, that was kind of the thought that, given just how big a separation there was between Walsden. and COSA, the next best goalie. I think the next goalie was Ben Cudrowy win in the third round, I believe. That if you really wanted one of these, you were going to have to, you know, make a move to go get one because there wasn't that next obvious guy to add to your farm system in this class. And so I respect why Minnesota did that.

You know, we'll see what happens with the organization the next five years. They're kind of stuck in a little bit of a middle area where you're not sure if they're a rebuilding team or are the contending team. but at least in terms of their young players, you now have a decent group of forwards, an decent group of defensemen, and now a goal tender of the future where you could kind of see some promise coming out of the sponge system right now. For what it took to get up to 20, or I guess what it took for Edmonton to move back to 22,

were you surprised that they didn't just grab Walsett? Like, they get a third round pick out of this. Are you surprised they didn't just take them themselves? And this is the reason why Walshed, who I think a lot of, of people expected to go top 10 top 12 there was a reason why he went there in 20 is i that was one of the ones and the days and the weeks leading to the draft you started hearing from teams getting cold feet about this guy they didn't like how his season ended we've talked before about how one guy had the amazing first half one guy had the amazing second half in kosa in the latter

example teams were scared off by by how is how a season ended um you know reports came out you know that his fitness wasn't great. He was up by like 15, 220 pounds. And given that he's not the most quick athlete already, because his game is pure fundamentals and hockey sense, I think that scared teams off a little bit. And you probably

could find some teams that had him top 15, top 12 on their board at all. It only takes one. I'm not meaning to say that there weren't a lot of scouts who absolutely love this player, because there were. But that didn't shock me that team, like say, Evanton didn't want to do it because I think there were plenty of

organizations going into the draft that had just concluded they just didn't want to go down that path with Walsdett. Yeah. We talked about one of the surprise picks earlier on with Tyler Boucher. Earlier in the second, Riker Evans from Seattle, another one, not a player I was particularly familiar with. What should I know about Riker Evans? More importantly, what should the people of Seattle know about Riker Evans? Evans was a second year eligible prospect of late 2001, who was the best defenseman in his WHL division in their abbreviated

season with Regina. He was a guy who personally when I watched I wasn't enamored. I saw a 5-11 defenseman with good hockey sense. He was competitive. I just thought he was kind of vanilla. He was a point in game this year, but I didn't really see standout speed and skill

when I watched him personally. But he's another guy when started making calls after the draft was over. Some scouts agreed with me. They didn't really buy them. I talked to some. There were definitely more than one team, obviously including Seattle, but other teams as well that I would talk to would be like, no, like this guy is an elite skater.

We thought he was one of the highest rated skaters in the draft. And like that was a differentiator for him. The skating really popped over the last couple of years with him. And that makes him an exciting prospect. Time will tell. you know, because he's a late at 1, chances are he's going to sign rather soon. He might play in the American League right away for Seattle. So maybe they have something there.

Maybe they don't, but we'll probably find out, you know, quicker than other prospects, given that he'll probably play pro right away. And we'll get to see kind of get a gauge of, you know, how close does he look to being an NHL caliber player? But yeah, that was one more interesting one. Like Josh Don't is re-entry in the top 40. didn't surprise me. He's a guy we've heard a lot about coming up into the draft.

One of the best players in the USHL this season. Whether you agree with it or not, it's a reasonable debate, but that one didn't surprise me. The Evans won. I had watched him this season, and I just didn't see that one coming, but that's part of the fun of the draft. And then the most surprising moment of probably the entire draft weekend

comes right at the end of night one. That's when Montreal selects Logan Mayhew. He actually had asked a few days before, before the draft that no one draft him. So I didn't even realize at the time that they call his name that this was an eligible pick. Obviously, Mayu was convicted in a Swedish court for taking a photo of a woman performing a sex act

without her consent and circulating it among some teammates. And so to hear his name called at the end of the first round was surprising to me. Was it surprising to the NHL community as a whole? I don't really think anybody really knew what was going to happen. You had heard, like, rumors that teams were still looking at it despite the facts that you just pointed out, because unlike, say, the MLB draft or the NFL draft, you can't declare

for the NHL draft, and you can't undecl for the NHL draft. The CBA does not kind of have those stipulations. The eligibility is based purely on age. So I didn't know, honestly, going in what was going to happen. It was really uncertain. We have to be prepared for the instance that he was and that he wasn't because it was such a unique situation. And we're not going to go too much into the facts of what happened with him in Sweden.

Katie and I have reported it and you all can go read it and write up your own opinions. He wasn't on my draft list just because that was my opinion that if I was running a team, I probably wouldn't have done it. But he is an NHL prospect now when we'll try. treat him as an NHL prospect now going forward. And just frankly, from what I watched him the previous season and this season, I didn't really see a player that I thought was worth the first round investment. He's played one OHL game in his entire life.

Other than that, he played in, like, Junior B League in Ontario. He played a hockey enton, a third division pro league in Sweden. And he's intriguing athlete, six, you know, he's six, three, six, four, whatever he is, right shot D with really good hands. He's a big shot. he's physical. I thought the skating was a bit of an issue personally when I watched him. The question is going to be whether he has enough, you know,

pure playmaking ability in offense to translate to higher levels, which you don't know if he's only played one at which I'll game. He played like five, six minutes in that game for London two seasons ago. He's definitely a pro prospect, but I'm even just taking aside what happened with him in Sweden, I wouldn't have probably been inclined to make that bet. But time will tell on a variety of things with this case. Because, you know, the hockey side aside, obviously it's a case that has resonated with the public in a really unique way. All right.

Let's get into now the World Junior Summer Showcase. It started, well, really started the day of the second day of the draft in Plymouth with Sweden and Finland's teams there. It's stretched into this week. That's why you are in Detroit here this week. What has stood out to you so far where I think we're three games. days in, really, that you've been here for? Yeah, I mean, this camp is a little different because typically Canada would come in for the second half of this tournament, which they won't.

They're having a joint camp with their U18 team in Alberta right now, and we would usually have USA make cuts around now, which they're not going to do to maintain four competitive teams in this tournament. So you're really just getting a deeper understanding of USA's player pool here. Some guys that probably would have been cut today. You're now going to see a couple more games of. And the disappointing thing is for Sweden is three of their top prospects, William Eklund, Simon Edwinson, and the Esper Walsditt all didn't participate in this camp.

It would have been nice to see them. I'm sure for Detroit fans, they would particularly like to see an Edwinson come to this thing. But Finland has most of their top group, so it's been interesting to see how some of those guys have fared. and for some of the, for the USA players, the USHL players, particularly, it's been interesting to see how they've been able to perform at this level, or even like a guy who's played high school most of the season, the guy like Scott Morrow, feeling able to step in and I think been surprisingly good considering I thought real expectations would have to have been rather modest for him, given that he hasn't really played much high-level hockey before.

To me, that some of the guys that have stood out so far on the American team, a couple of the kids that Mackie Sam Miskevich was drafted to Florida late in the first round. You have on the finish team Atu Ratu, who at one point was it was a really high pick projected in this draft. He ends up going at number 52. Anybody from this draft class in particular who's really popped? Yeah, I think Ratu would be one of the obvious ones there that you would have to say, you know, at least in terms of, I don't think he's like surprised me in terms of.

in terms of how he's played, but his draft season was just so bad. And it wasn't just the games that you watched in league. You're like, oh, he's not getting it done right now versus men. You go to watch his junior games, too, from this season. And just looked rather ordinary at that level. Good, but you weren't just blown away by this guy. Like, oh, he's a no-doubt, like, first-round pick or something along those lines. So he teased you with flashes, but overall, it wasn't a really inspiring season.

So it's just a really interesting development to see him come here and be the guy that you saw two, three years ago. Skating still doesn't look great, and that was a primary concern among NHL teams. But he is showing his skill, he is showing his playmaking and his scoring ability, and he is showing a strong compete level. I think when you're watching Ratu right now, it inspires some confidence at the very least that there is more to this player than what we watched last season. Doesn't mean he's all the way back. Doesn't mean all the concerns are gone.

We need to see how he's going to do in Liga next season as well and see if he really can bring his stock back. But this has definitely been an inspiring week from him. I mentioned Scott Morrill before. The fence still isn't the best, But then you have a 6-2 defenseman who can skate has this kind of skill. He's making plays. And that's a very interesting player and a guy who's looked rather exciting here.

I've liked Matt Nyes too. I think he's done well here. The Toronto pick. Yes. Second round pick. This is the second time at this camp. He was here last year or two. And hasn't blown you away.

But he's been really involved in the offense. He's scoring. He's competing. well, I would say that's been a strong point from the least. And from the guys from this drafts, those are like the immediate ones that would come to my mind. Other guys are talking flashes like Lucius, Coronado have had flashes, Broz has had flashes. I wouldn't say all of them have been consistently good in terms of being a true standout

players. Tyler Boucher has had some flashes too. But, you know, this camp is usually a camp. for the older players, and so it's no surprise that you watch a guy like Thomas Borlowe, who was excellent in college this season, and a guy like Jake Sanderson, who was part of the gold medal winning team the previous year, be among the top players at this camp. They were expected to, and they've delivered. They've probably been arguably, it's been between Ratto and Borlau for the best forward here,

and I would say Sanderson's been clearly the best defenseman here. Yeah, I would agree with that, especially on the Sanderson port. I think he's been the best player for me through the tournament so far, although I agree, Borderlo has been very good. And Ratu certainly I think has looked very impactful. What I always struggle with when watching, especially the younger players at this camp, is we're used to watching these guys,

especially in their draft year, for most of them. Some of them have played pro, especially the Europeans, but they've been at a level where they can really dominate. And it can be hard to assess immediately, like, okay, this team, Tyler Boucher, for example, teams to take him 10th overall. What should a reasonable expectation be for the kind of impact he makes

at this U-20 showcase level? If you're a 10th overall pick, and let's presume Tyler Boucher is the 10th best player in the draft, if you're the 10th best player in the draft at this kind of camp, you're not expected to be the best player, but you're expected to look like you belong. you're helping your team

on a rather consistent basis. You may not be standing out every single night because, you know, Boucher will have another year to do that. He'll be back the season after that. But guys who go in that range are expected to basically be helpful players, good players on a consistent basis. If you're a true high-echelon prospect, that is.

You look at like Luke Hughes here, and he hasn't been the best player every night. He's made some mistakes on the ice, but you notice him. His skating and his skill, he jumps out at you. And I think that's a realistic expectation for a high pick. Another thing that we are getting a little bit of a look at at this summer showcase is a couple of the players who we think could factor in pretty high a year from now in the NHL draft. And as you know, I think you had the article out one day after the 2021 draft ends, 2022 draft cycle.

Really, it's already begun by the time the 2020 draft is taking place. But it's in full swing already one day after that draft ends. A couple of the guys at this tournament, Logan Coley and Brad Lambert, we think both of those have top ten potential in this coming draft. You put the article, I'll just kind of turn the floor of view here. What's the shape of the 2022 draft right now? Right. And not just those two.

We have Ken as U18. Kent's already going on. As we speak, the check had a team had a U. 20 camp not too long ago. David Yerechek, top prospect was a part of that camp. And of course, the Clay Kogretzky starts in a couple days after this podcast will publish,

which will feature many of the top prospects for the 2022 and 23 drafts at that tournament. So, yes, we're turning the page rather quickly. No surprise that the number one prospect for next year's draft is Shane Wright. Anybody who watched the U-18

Wurlsers paid vague attention to junior hockey at Woll. have known this name as a guy who, if your team needs a foundational number one center, he's no guarantee to become that, but he's got a pretty good shot. And that's a player that a lot of teams would do a lot of stupid things for. So even though you only have a 25% chance,

is it 20% or 20% chance? I think it's one of those two. I think there might be some misaligned incentives going into this year's draft, depending on how the regular season goes, to give yourself the best chance to get that kind of prospect. And then after that, I would say it gets a little bit more wide open. I don't think there is a defined next group of players after right. I'm sure some will argue for Brad Lambert, like you just mentioned,

or Matthew Savoy, who played in Dubuque and will play in the WHL this season. But I'm not convinced that they've separated themselves. Maybe three years or two, three years ago they were, but time has passed and the situation has changed. And I would say most scouts I talk to right now around the league have Ivan Miroschenko as the second best prospect in this draft who was absolutely outstanding at the U18 World Championships for Russia. They would also mention Danila URov right at the top of the draft, another Russian, who played the U18 World's late birthday to play Magnitogor's next season.

I really like Yerichuk. I just mentioned. I really like both the two top Slovaks who played the World Championships. the season before they were draft eligible. I was just a wild thing to see. Unique World Championships, mind you not always the best players. And that's Simon Nemek and Yerz Lakovsky. Yes.

You know, they played there as 16-year-old. That's, you know, a really unique thing to happen for, you know, even a semi-major nation. And then you have Logan Cooley, who you just mentioned, who I think will definitely be in the mix of it. And there's some others there too. but Cooley, between him and Lambert Cooley's, I thought, been the most impressive of the two here at the World Junior Summer Showcase. He's a really well-rounded forward, I think. Five foot 10, but I think he's got everything else.

He's a great skater. He's really a skilled playmaker. He's highly competitive. I think he's got a real shot to make the final World Junior team. Will he, will he not? We'll see how his season go and other people's seasons go. But given that he's such a well-rounded two-way guy, I definitely see a spot there in the bottom part of the lineup that he could crack.

And Brad Lambert will be on Finland's team. He was on the last year. Although, no guarantee he was on their team two years ago and didn't make it this past season. So he's got to earn it. But realistically, while last year's Will Jr. really lacked a draft element. I would bet this year's won Will. I would imagine Wright, Lambert, Miroznychenko, Yorov, Yerechek, Slavkoski, Nemich. I imagine they'll all be at the World Juniors this year.

Reputationally, 2022 draft has gotten a lot of fanfare and years ahead. I mean, we know how this goes. The best player in the draft two years from now is always the best player, right? This class, like you mentioned, there has kind of been reputationalally a triumvirate of of Wright, Lambert Savoy. So it sounds like that's shifted a little bit. Reputationally, how does the 2022 draft as a whole compare to 2021 coming in here? Like, for example, we talk about Logan Cooley.

Matthew Baneers made the U.S. World Junior team last year. How does Logan Cooley at this time compared to Matthew Baneers a year ago? Probably a little bit below him, but not dramatically below him. I think when I talk to Scouts around the league, there's a little bit more excitement for the top of this year's draft with the, with the major caveat that a lot changes in the period of a year, a lot could change from now to next June, provided we actually now have a somewhat normal full season in all the major leagues. You know, a lot of new information come in. We don't even know who the best Ontario players are other than Shane Wright.

That's a mystery that needs to be solved, to be quite honest. So that's going to be something we're going to need to see play out over the next season. I sent my list around to a bunch of scouts. I didn't get much pushback for having Mirosacchenko at 2. I didn't get much pushback for having Lambert at 4 or Savoy at 7. I think Savoy was really good in the USHL this season for Dubuque. I didn't get a sense from a lot of people who went to go watch him. They came away just raving that this guy is the next Patrick Kane or something, something like that.

I think he's considered a really good player. Probably closer to like a Cole Perfetti, Lucas Raymond. in high, high skill IQ type player who was undersized and not an amazing skater for that size. So that's a great prospect to have. I didn't know the sense that there's like these three like, you know, future, no doubt all stars. I think there's one. And then there's, I would call this a rather large pool of really, really good players.

A larger pool than the one we just had. Yeah. Go a year ahead. But we'll see how the next year plays out, obviously. but a lot of them are listed as centers like Lambert and Savoy elizade at centers. Lambert's been on the wing at the showcase here. Yeah,

and that's the kind of thing. Will it be centers and odds? The one guy that we didn't mention would be Connor Geeky. I really like Connor Geeky. He was really good when I watched him the W.HL. He's a guy I think it could be a center in the NHL. I think Kooley could be a center in the NHL. And the rest, you know, we'll see.

But this definitely looks like a much more forward-heavy class a year in advance anyways. All right. Now let's get into the mailbag, and obviously we do have some team-specific questions that we'll get into more here. Teams, everyone wants to know about their new top prospect. This one, I think, though, is kind of broadly applicable because Thomas J.S., I know goalies take time to develop, but with a highly touted prospect like Walsett, what's your prediction on his timeline to the NHL? I think we could lump-cosa right into the same kind of conversation. Are they different?

No, I would say they're probably, given how similar I would say they are in terms of talent, I would say you're looking at two to three years, I would say. You look at Spencer Knight, for example, he played in the NHL this season. That was, I thought the best case scenario, it took two years. And it looks like he'll get an opportunity there to play next season. So you're talking about basically three years, year three since the draft. Voselowski played two extra years in the KHL. Then he played a year in the American League.

And then he was up. John Gibson played two extra junior seasons. an American League season, and then he was up. So those will be the most recent premium goalie prospects. Maybe you can go out to Robert Lainer's year. It was kind of the same thing, I believe, that we can think of, of premium goalie prospects taking about three years. And now COSA and Walsett are both late birth dates.

Maybe then in the best case, now you're looking at two extra years. COSA doing one year of more year junior than a year in the American League, Walsett doing another year, whether it's in Sweden or possibly in Canada and then maybe a next year in the American League before he was ready. But I think that'd be realistic. Nam-D-Nan wants your thoughts on the month that Bill Armstrong and the Arizona Coyotes had. He says it feels like the Coyote's accumulation of futures assets in such a short period of time is unprecedented. If it fails, what will be the reason?

If it's succeeded, it will be the reason. We can just kind of talk broadly about the Coyote's weekend, though, because I think right now, as things stand, we just talked about the 2022 draft, I believe they have two firsts and five seconds right now. going into that draft and we're still a year away from it. Yeah, I think what that tells me is they, the new management group came in, they assessed their roster, they assessed their farm system, and they concluded we can't probably be a contender out of this group. And they probably got the blessing from their ownership that, you know,

we need to bring in more future assets. It doesn't mean that Clayton Keller and Jacob Chikrin and Barrett Hayden and Victor Sodorstrom and. And some of the other pieces there are not really good players. I know Hayt didn't have the best season, but I personally believe he'll be better next season. I still think he's going to be a good NHL player in time. I think Keller and Chickren are really good players. But it's fair to say they came in and concluded, we need more.

And with this, we need a better foundation here to build around. And that's going to take time. As anybody who's been part of a rebuilding organization knows, and coyote's fans are in the same spot, it's going to take time, but that seems to be the direction they're heading in right now. When you look at a team that has this many picks, I mean, what's the best, what's the smartest way for Arizona to go about this? Should they try and package these to get kind of like, like what Columbus ended up with with a couple of picks, or three, three picks in the first round and hope you get the right things to fall? Should they take five dart throws in the second?

I mean, it's hard to speculate. I tend to think markets are rather efficient. And obviously the thing we always think about when it comes to really, rebuilding teams is you need the star. You need the star number one center, the number one defenseman. You need the really hard pieces to get. But it's not easy to get them. That's Shane Wright, and Shane Wright will be gone, the first pick into next year's drafts, which they could get, by the way.

They could, unlikely, but they could. But, you know, at that point, the draft becomes just calculated bets. And whether you'll have a better chance at 10 than you will at 30, but you will have maybe the same odds if you have if you have shots at 25, 30, and 50. So as you would if you just had what a 10. So the math, I think, tends to be rather efficient. You just, as they do, you just accumulate the assets

and you do your best to try and get the best players. And frankly, the draft's a lot of praying, to be quite honest. You know, we all do a lot of work on these kids. and we try to really understand them and try our best to project them. But at the end of the day, you can draft a guy who looks terrible and all the side he looks great two years later or vice versa. So that seems to be the direction they're heading. It's just trying to get as many future assets as possible to build a better foundation there.

From a team that is just getting into the thick of a rebuild to a team that maybe starting to kind of crawl out of it, Craig wants to know, do the devils have enough talent amassed to be Stanley Cup contenders within the first four years of Dougie Hamilton's brand new contract that he just signed at start a free agency. He says assuming trades are free agent signings for some top six forwards, which feels like a pretty big caveat here. Yeah, because, I mean, just realistically looking at this team without any external additions. With Dougie, Jack Hughes, Nico Heeshire, Alex Holst, Dawson, Mercer, Shakio for Kamuddin. I think I did not.

I'm not sure if I mentioned Ty Smith or not. you have no one foot there too. It's a good foundation. I would be pressed to say that looks like a Stanley Cup contender at least until we see

the next steps from Luke or Nico. Maybe he sure never becomes a true high echelon player. I still think he has a lot of talent. I wouldn't bet against him to becoming a really really good player. at least production-wise.

Until, and I believe a lot in Jack Hughes, I think he is going to be a star-caliber player. But until he does that, and that's only one star. Now you have two, Archby with Dougie. It's hard to see contender. Can this become a better team, a playoff team, maybe even a good team?

You're starting to see the pieces. I would probably stop short of, calling this core group, even with external additions of, let's say, a second line four, a second pair of defensemen here or there, a Stanley Cup contending group just quite yet. Let's dig in on a couple of the pieces that are on the wings right now just to feel for what they have come. Because what I like about New Jersey is that they have used their high picks to get the really hard pieces.

They've got two top six centers. Even in people who are a little lower on Hichler, I think would agree. He can be a pretty good second line center. they've now used a top five pick on Luke Hughes. They have Ty Smith, who they've developed, they've brought in Dougie Hamilton, they've traded for Ryan Graves. I like the center and D look of their makeup for the next few years.

Can Blackwood be the guy, though? That's a good question. It's a fair question. I don't know the answer. He's still young. I like him. I'm not like, if you told me he became a top 10 goalie in the league,

I'd be surprised. Yeah, I do think he can be a helpful NHL goalie, but that's one where I think there's still a bit of a question. Not that he's not a good player, but that's a question for me. Holton have the best season. But we still like him as a top six wing. Yeah, yeah, yeah. He's a really good player.

I really like Dawson Mercer too. Top six caliber. Yeah, I think he can be. And because they have Jack and Nico there, the question when Mercer is he going to be, is he going to be your third line center? Yeah. To be a great third line center, I think.

Or do you push him onto the wing to give him more opportunity? to score. Like I said, I think there is a foundation here to be a good team. To be a playoff team, I think there are better days ahead for New Jersey. I just,

contenders are really high bar. You go watch the Stanley Cup finals this year. You go through Tampa's roster. You can kind of like check off the boxes and what you think you might have in the absolute best case scenario. And they had a lot of pieces. Now I think Tampa's roster was constructed

in a world where absolutely everything went right for them almost. Like, you know, they get the most valuable player in each draft. I have like three or four years running. They get a bunch of undrafted guys who become really good players. A lot of things went really right for them. And not every Stanley Cup contender looks like that. But I still think the path, there's a little bit more still for New Jersey to bring in before they're at that level. Real quick on New Jersey.

Igor Sharon Govich, Jesper Brad, Papelzaka. how many true top six fours on a contender do you see out of those three? Probably. Maybe Brett. Maybe. But maybe zero. Maybe zero. Zaka had a better year this year, which was inspiring.

I thought I like Sharon. He's a leading score. Yeah. Yeah. You know, I haven't probably dug in him as much, but he's a good player. I can buy Brat. I can buy Zaka. I like Sharon Govich.

He's not a, like, but in that caliber, he's like, I would want him. If you're a contender, he's. He's a bottom six guy for you, I imagine. So if you're New Jersey, you want to still go get that top-end goal. And it was probably harsh on Zaka. Like, you could- Yeah. At the season he had, he probably should have been discussed right there with Bron, if not ahead of him.

But, yeah. So you're still looking for that top-end goal. You probably want a first-line caliber winger. If you're going to go out and you're going to say, I'm bringing in a now first-line winger, that could be a really big piece that they need to add still. Yeah, I mean, like, it's just there isn't yet the guy. guys you have on this team. We were like,

these guys, I know, are upper echel on NHL players. There's a lot of hope still, but we don't have a lot of certainty yet. Peter K. This is a good one. I think this is because to me, in baseball, you always talk about what's a number one pitcher, what's

an ace, blah, blah, blah. Peter wants to know, what's your definition of a number one center? Seems like every year half the league is looking for a true number one when really everyone has someone playing on their first line. Right. And I think you have these debates with hockey people

of you have certain types of centers who you'll say I think he could be a top 30 center in the league he may not be the number one center on a contender you know

we had this discussion with Matthew Baneers I don't think there were a lot of NHL teams telling me I think Baneers is going to be a top 10 center in the national hockey league so you would often hear

oh he's number of two on a contender. But you also hear people say, like, you could all say in the same vein, then then Matthew Beneers is a first-line center. But I think when you hear about number one centers, you're talking about guys who pretty much have it all. You're talking about players who have just,

their attributes just rise to such a level that they are among the best forwards in the league. You're talking about guys who are, like, like Kirby Doc. They're six, you know, there's six three, six four, can skate have great skis. skill, or even if they don't have the big skating or size variables, they have unreal skill in playmaking, like a Nicholas Baxter, for example.

Those are the guys who are just their attributes just rise to such a level that it's clear they're a driving force in the NHL. And I realized kind of what you said, you know, there are theoretically 32 number one centers, just like in baseball, there are theoretically 32 number one pitchers. And you don't always need to have a true number one center to be a contender. I think Vegas is a fantastic team, and I don't think William Carlson, I would call him a true number one center. Chandler-Stevenson, same deal. Yeah, or whoever we would call the first line center on their team.

Montreal is Nick Suzuki a true number one? No. Yeah. Yeah. I think he could be kind of what I just said there. I think he could top out as like a lower half of the league. Well, they're not playing the same way as Benares. Of course. But like that's a little level.

Like the 25th to 40th, like best center in the league or something like that. Like that's kind of what I think you're hoping for out of him. But yeah, no, I think it's not a prerequisite, but it's a highly correlated over the years that you, that true top 10, 15 center in the league, tends to correlate rather strongly with success. Yeah. All right.

Scott asks, it wants to pull us right back into the 2022 conversation. I love that. He wants to know, so in a year that, he wants to know who you think will be the top draft year plus one prospect in the 2022 draft. He also says,

and how will Chicago still get him? But I think it's a really good question because the answer might be a lot of guys. There might be a ton of guys who pop. Yeah, I think any scout you would ask that question, too, the answer is going to be, I don't know who it is, but it's going to be somebody in Ontario. Yeah.

There's just going to be some guy that none of us have ever heard of before that's going to step into the OHL next season and have like a point in a half per game and be a leading player in that league. And I could not even begin to discuss who that could be right now. We have some guesses. Maybe some of the guys who went on draft from the Erie Showcase. Maybe it's like Tucker Robertson or something like that

or somebody along those lines who has a lot of skill but didn't actually get drafted. But it's really hard to say. I think the OHL is going to be really fascinating to watch next season. How high can a kind of reentry prospect reasonably expect to get in this draft? Like I want to say Chinikov was a reentry prospect. Yes. He goes 21. What would be like, like, let's say a guy goes out and has like a Jack Quinn kind of year,

but he's one year older. What's the highest he could reasonably expect? expect to go. Oh, wow. Like, that would be, that'd be so fun. Like, I mean, that would, that would, they have, like, that kind of discussion, like, because there could be more than one of them. Yeah. There could be, like, you could be looking at a scenario where you got, like, two or three of those guys that we don't really, that, where it's Jack Quinn or it's, or it's, like, a Tyson-Forster year. Or, never mind, if there's another country, like the United States or something like that, or in Europe, keep in mind, you know, most of

Sweden's junior league didn't get to play this season. Right. There's, that's a variable in there. That could be a variable that we're looking at going to next year's draft, but it's, it's unpredictable. So it's hard for me to say, you know, how high that can be or the caliber of the players. I don't even know who these players are yet. All right. Last one is from Jared Brown. I think it's an interesting one. He kind of wants to know, you know, teams have their own list.

Sure. We see the NHL Central Scouting list come out. How do teams use the Central Scouting list? Do they use the Central Scouting list? Central Scouting has a lot of different utilities for teams. I think the actual lists, you know, so they'll send them lists that don't always get published early in the year. Like, for example, they would have been sent by now at a list for 2022 saying like, here are some of the top guys. It provides them with, you know, just a list of names that they would already have had their guys' work is to do underage work as well to flag underragers that are interesting.

But it's an extra set of eyes on that to help get the. their year started. Their early season list, their mid-season lists tend to be looked at by teams and tend to start discussions and debates a little bit on, are we too high or are we too low on guys? Typically by the end of the season, I would say the utility for teams has run out by then teams that typically have their list pretty set and they're not really relying on central scouting for guidance on players by that. That's probably more for the public at that stage, the mid-season and particularly the end-of-season list is more of a media thing, a public information vehicle.

The central scouting also has other utilities throughout the season. They're often sending schedule changes, injury updates to teams. They're, you know, anything that they would need in no regards to major events. They're usually flagging for them. They also are in charge of getting official heights and weights. They're in charge of running the NHL Combine. So there's a bunch of utilities for, for NHL Central scouting,

aside from the actual list-making process, which is still important for them. That's going to do it for us. Thanks for listening to this episode of the athletic hockey show Prospect Series. Please also follow the athletic hockey show on your favorite podcast platform

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