The Athletic Hockey Show - NHL Draft: which teams got it right?, Danila Yurov slides to the Wild on Russia concerns, surprise picks, and more, plus an early 2023 NHL Draft lookahead and listener questions

Episode Date: July 11, 2022

First, on a special Monday edition of The Athletic Hockey Show Prospect Series, Max and Corey look back at this weekend’s NHL Draft and discuss why they liked what the Montreal Canadiens, Seattle Kraken, San Jose Sharks, Winnipeg Jets, Minnesota Wild, and Buffalo Sabres did with their picks.Then, the guys talk about Danila Yurov sliding to the Minnesota Wild at No. 24, seemingly the only Russian prospect to be impacted by the uncertainties surrounding Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and the potential complications coming to play in North America, as well as surprising picks beyond the first round.Plus, the guys close things out with a very early look at the 2023 Draft and answer listener questions about where Kirby Dach would fit in the 2022 class, how the guys would spend their hypothetical fixed goalie budget, where Simon Nemec ranks amongst top defensemen picked in recent drafts, if the Columbus Blue Jackets should’ve gone with Frank Nazar over Denton Mateychuk, and what were the guys’ favorite food and drink spots during their time in Montreal.And, right now, you can get a 6 month subscription to The Athletic for just $1 a month when you visit http://theathletic.com/hockeyshow Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Hey everybody, Max Bowman here alongside Corey Prunman for another episode of the Athletic Hockey Show's prospect series. If you're wondering, why did we just hear from you guys? You're already back again. Well, in the immortal words of Gary Bedman, we have a trade to announce. We have acquired the rights to today's episode for scheduling duties to be named later. So we do appreciate that from being in Haley. But we just wanted to do a full wrap on the draft. Obviously, we talked about round one on the floor Thursday, Friday was maybe not quite as busy as the Thursday events, but a lot more picks were made.

And with some hindsight, we wanted to just dive right in and give you the full wrap, starting, Corey, with a few of the drafts that we like the most. And I know for you, that starts right at the very top. Right. Yeah. And, you know, the draft, at least the draft class I liked the most, was that of the Montreal Canadiens. And obviously, a large part of when I, I think you want to get down at those grades at the

at the end of the draft is mostly due to the high picks and who has the most high picks tend to tends to be a strong correlation. But if it was just about just the number one overall pick, I Slovkovsky, they wouldn't have just gotten that high grade just purely on that. The Montreal had a lot of picks. I think it was 12, 13, 14 picks. I forgot the exact number they had coming into the draft. And I don't know if they made all of them.

Regardless, it's Slavkovsky, who I really believe in and think has a chance to be an impact player. It's his Slovakia, U-18, teammate, Philip Messier, who I think has a strong chance to become a top-nine winger in the NHL, Owen Beck, who I think has a strong chance to become a bottom six four in the National Hockey League.

It's Lane Hudson. The often debated Lane Hudson, who dropped to a predictable range in the draft due to his size as a defenseman, but who I think has the potential to become a useful power-played defenseman in the national hockey

league and even beyond those guys there were a couple of picks that I liked and I think have chances to help their team down the line and well they took your your big swing right in Turney they took them in the seventh oh yeah they took it to the seventh so obviously a little a little um lower than I am rated and I thought that if he was at if he was going to drift if it all is going to be in the six or the seven then I but you know I had war on my list at an inch on my list had Cetra ginda on my list uh you know they picked a lot of guys that I like so you know it doesn't mean I'm right or they're right but And in terms of just overall whose draft I like the most and who I think added the most talented organization this past week, it was the Montreal Canadians without even getting into Kirby Duck.

Yeah. Seattle, I thought, was another interesting one. And, you know, they get some of the names, you know, Yanni Neiman, Jaggerfurkis, in addition to having Shane Wright drop into their lap. Those are a couple of guys who I think a lot of people maybe in the public sphere were also excited about. And this is a team when you're starting a farm system from scratch. and they very much still are. They finally kind of had the big pick-heavy first three rounds this year that they didn't last year. And they come out of this really good too.

They've now got a really good foundation in place here. This is one of the top five probably drafts of the weekend. Yeah. For me, it is obviously, again, start the top, Shane Wright. That's the big reason why you're excited about this draft class. But in the same way I kind of do with Montreal, you look at Jagger-Fercus. and I think he's got a pretty good chance with him a top nine winger.

I think Yanni Neiman has a good chance to play. You know, then there's a couple of other guys throughout the draft. Tyne Ellison, Ben McDonnell, Tucker Robertson, David Goyette. None of them, I think, are locks to make it, but at least have chances to play. And they,

Tepai's laying in from Finland was the first goalie off the board of 41 to Buffalo. The second goalie off the board was Nicholas Coco, the backup goalie in that age group, to Seattle there in the 50s. I didn't have him on my list, but I appreciated the athlete. Six-three moves really well. His performance was inconsistent, but he was a,

I know he was a guy that was desired around the league. And I think, yes, you look at the totality, this looks more like an expansion team, NHL draft where they invested in the future and got lots of assets. And they still need a lot more. The farm system is done being built. But I think you look.

look at, you know, Wright and Jagger-Fercus combined with many of the years, combined with Ryan Winterton, combined with Riker Evans. And I think that you're starting to at least get a little bit more of a future foundation being built there right now. So there was a trade that happened on Thursday night that in the chaos of everything around it happening, I don't know if got quite enough attention. And that was at number 11, the trade down by San Jose. Arizona comes up.

They take Connor Geeky. We didn't talk about that too extensively, I don't think, on the Thursday episode. I don't think we talked to head at all, actually. And to your point, it's not that we overlooked Arizona in San Jose. It's just a lot of things happened. And we were pressed for time and it was getting late. We had an early turn around the next day. No excuses, though.

We got to give this trade. It's fair air time here. And I thought that was one of the most interesting moves looking back now in hindsight. because it kind of begs the question, if you were Arizona or San Jose, do you prefer 11 or do you prefer 27, 34, and 45 looking at the players San Jose got and the player Arizona got or could have gotten with that pick? And if you look at Dom Lus Chichens' player draft value chart, I think San Jose does come out on the better end of this deal. Is that right in the abstract, even before you get to the players? Yeah, that sounds right to me. and just my personal opinion.

Connor Geeky wasn't the highest guy I had right on my list. That would have been Yo Kim Kamel and Jonathan Lekomacki and Daniel Yereov, one of those three. But let's just say they had picked Kamel there at 11. I would probably prefer Philip Beistet and Cameland and Matthias Havelet over Camel, over Lechromackie, and over and over Geeky. Arizona, I'm guessing, feels differently there if they made that move to go all the way up from 27 to 11, to get geeky. They were probably in the camp of where a lot of people were a Conrary Geeky around December and January, I felt around the league where like,

okay, this guy is going to be a premium top two line, big, heavy center who provides offense. I wasn't there, and I think that opinion dwindled as the year went on, but obviously I knew people who still believe that, and they definitely believe that to make that move. Well, and certainly when you come out of this now from Arizona, you look at it and you say they now have a coolly geeky, one, two punch to look forward to down the future. Those are different kinds of players. I think that's a good thing for them. Depending what happens with Barrett Hayton, too, right?

Right, exactly. And if Barrett Hayton is better than one of those two guys, and all of a sudden, geeky's your three-see, and I think you're pretty happy about that, all things considered. So I don't mind this move from Arizona standpoint, and I don't mind the pick even from Arizona standpoint, but I do like it from the shark standpoint, value-wise. And in terms of your list, I know these are all players you had,

reasonably high in Philip. Is it Bistet or B-Stat, Cam Lund and Matias Havillan? Yeah, and that's kind of where I fall is that I wouldn't take any one of those players over Conner Geeky, but I think in totality I like getting all three of those guys. Those are all three, you know, especially B-stead and Lund are two-fours with size that really didn't exist in the shark system whatsoever. Those were big upside place. They were, you know, they're both, whatever it is, six-two, six-six-old.

three great skaters have legitimate offensive skill. When we did the upside ranking, I think both of them were top 15 or top 20. I could recall the exact one, but they were both high up there. It's interesting looking back on that article I did, and I think a lot of the questions our readers had is why is Joachim Kamel and Jonathan Lekharamaki not in here? You got the answer to that question on Thursday night, is that they're not that big or that great skaters, or in the case of Lekaramaki, that physically. So you're basically just left with their skill and their shots.

And I think what push came to shove, a lot of NHL teams concluded that's not enough in the top 10. Both of those two guys were in the top 18. And for what it's worth, Geeky was 21 on that list. So from that standpoint, kind of speaks to your point. Yeah. All right. Moving on to Winnipeg, another draft. So they're an interesting one.

They had two picks, one in the middle of the first round, and one at the very end of the first round. And then on day two, I think they kind of just had their usual. clip of picks. They come out of it with Rucker McGority. I think I'm not going to say there's no upside there. There is upside there, but also a very, you know what you're getting player. They come back with a big swing on Brad Lambert. And the next day, their first pick on day two is Alia Salmanson, who early in this draft cycle would have probably been projected a little higher than this when you look at the physical toolkit here. So a nice blend, I think, there for Winnipeg. And same thing with Danny Jolkin, who stock kind of fell, but started off higher, higher on a

this, it's funny when you look at Winnipeg's draft, I think you look at Rutger McGrody and Brad Lambert, and those two couldn't be more opposite players if you tried, where both are very skilled offensively, but Rutger is this high, high-end compete. Arguably, you could have said the most competitive player in the draft with significant skating issues, skating issues that, when talking about the league, they didn't even think they would take him in the first round through those skating issues. And then you have Brad Lambert, who was arguably the best skater in the draft, and among the top prospects anyway, had one of the lowest compete levels. So it's a really interesting kind of dynamic of very, very different

players with their top two picks. I also think this maybe isn't, this isn't high level analysis, but the goalie that Winnipeg picked late, were you in the, on the draft floor still on the risers when they made that pick and the reaction in the crowd for that? I heard it. I mean, I wasn't looking directly at it, but I heard the yells in the background. That was one of the cooler moments of draft day. And this is one of my favorite things in general about covering the draft is when it starts to get late and it starts to get really real for some of these kids who aren't, you know, haven't been picked yet. And that part's not my favorite. But the part that's my favorite is when one of them does get called, the response is amazing. I think you could

kind of see teams like looking over their shoulder like, wow, look at how many kids this guy brought. I thought that was amazing. Dom DeVicentis and out of North Bay. It was a really cool moment. I think Mr. Irrelevant, Ivan Jigalov to Colorado, actually had a contingent in the stands too when he was picked as the very last pick in the draft, although in my opinion, I mean, kids and parents can do whatever, can do what they want, but if you're an agent, if you don't know for sure if your kids can get picked, I would recommend not setting them, because it's cool when that happens, but I hate to see the faces on the kids when that doesn't happen. But going back to the Jets for a second, it's on top of McGorady and Lambert. I just look at

Salvinson, I think he didn't have the best season, particularly with his international play, but there is a lot of assets there where, like you can envision him becoming at least a third pair defendant because he's mobile and he's physical and has some puck-moving skill, and if Gilkin kind of finds a way of turn around, this guy has all the talents become a real NHL forward. They didn't have a lot of picks, but, you know, Brown, it's a mobile defenseman, Wagner competes hard, he can skate, Fabian Wagner, that is, and Garrett Brown. So in totality, I thought even though they didn't have a ton of picks, I kind of liked what they did in the blend of guys they got with those picks. Minnesota was another team with multiple picks in the first round, and we talked ahead of the draft about kind of the idea of, you know, kind of playing the draft board a little bit.

And they were a team with picks at 19 and 24. Mike Russo wrote a great story about this. two of the guys they wanted, Liam Ogren and Danila Yurov. And they decided to try to play the board a little bit here. And they take Liam Ogrin first. I haven't seen their board. I can't say for a fact who was higher, but I felt like the implication there was they felt like of the two, the one they were more likely to get at 24 was Danila Yurov. They take that chance.

They get both of these guys. These are two really important wingers now, potential top six wingers in the Minnesota Wilde system. Yeah, we'll talk more about Yurov and the fall there than the next. segment. But yeah, my suspicion is from just the buzz around the draft floor is I think you were correct that Yorov was ahead of Ogrin on their list. I can't say that for certain though, but yes, they end up with both of them. They ended with Ogrin. It was this really competitive, skilled goal score and Yorov was one of the most naturally talented players in the draft. You know, obviously those two can just together make for a very interesting, potentially strong draft class.

And now, you know, Uroft's fall. You're kind of hoping where you fall. You're kind of hoping this is the next Skivty Kuznetsov kind of situation there for the Minnesota Wild. But you still look at, you know, Hunter Hage. I wasn't as big on him, mostly because of the skating. The pushback, I kept getting people around the league after the pick was they felt he was a better skater than I was giving him credit for. So, so they may have to go back and look, but I wasn't as big on him. But I did like Rieger-Loren.

They liked Mikey Millie where they got him. Healy wasn't on, Ryan Healy wasn't on my list. But he was the, I think I had him as the, what I think of top. five overall skater in the draft top three. So I get the bet there. He was absolutely on my list in the first half of the season. I had him as a top. I thought it would be a top two or three round pick, to be quite honest,

doesn't go that much later in the fourth round. So it's an interesting draft class and definitely with those two first round picks, a lot of potential to become impact forward for that organization. But I like Milne where they got him too. I mean, he is a late 2002 birthday, and I get that's a little weird. but I think if this was a player that you had drafted in the third round a year ago, because that was his first year eligible, and he had turned in the year that he had this year. You'd be really happy.

So I like that one as well. He was injured in his draft season, too. On top of that season being truncated, he actually got hurt. So I think there's, you know, there's all kinds of hypothesis as we've heard about the COVID year, how much it affected. But this is definitely a guy who's played very little hockey in that season. And definitely, you know, in his draft season, mind you. This was definitely one of those rare cases we've seen in the CHL where a guy truly popped after the COVID year.

You know who's I really liked whose draft? And maybe no surprise they had three first round picks, which always helps. But I really liked what Buffalo did. And I liked it on day one. I also liked it on early day two. They come out of this. They get Topias Lenin, your top goalie in the draft. They get Victor Neuchev, who I believe was on your upside list.

Matt Lindgren, these are guys who are top 40, top 45 or so guys for you, who they're picking up in the third. and fourth round, and that's on top of what they did in the first. They got Matt Savoy, Noah Osland and Yuri Coolidge, all of whom I think have a chance to play in the top nine of Buffalo in a few years. This is a really good system stocking draft for the Sabres. Yeah, I agree. And it's kind of interesting if you look at the Kevin Adams era over the over his first three drafts. It's a lot of bets on skill. You go back to Jack Quinn and JJ Pertrke. You look at Isaac Rosen and Poker, Ropulte Tal-Avah, and Kisikov, the prior season.

And this draft, too, doesn't mean there's just pure skill. There isn't there isn't gritting a lot of these players. There isn't skating a lot of these players. I would argue in all Savoy, Osloch, and Kulich, they're all good to very good skaters. But they've definitely done a notable effort in what I can see in adding high-end skill through their last couple of drafts with this one being no exception. And I think you might, you know, if you kind of maybe lock those guys in a room and try to get them some truth soon, they probably would say they prefer a little bit more size than some of their forward picks right now.

But in general, I think you have to like a lot of the talent is coming into Buffalo right now because they do have size in knowing power. They drafted a 1-1 last year, a lot of size, mind you. And, you know, Dylan Cousins is a great big center down the middle who I know didn't have the best season, but I love to dual championships. I think that guy is going to be a real impactful NHL player for a long time as he matures. And yes, overall, I think you look at the Buffalo system right now and things look like they're on the up and up. And also pretty good. I know what you're saying, like it's a lot of bets on skill.

But these are also kind of complementary. You got Savoy as kind of the small but still gritty and he skill, but he scores forward. You got Ocelain who's kind of the slippery playmaking type. And you got Coolich, who I loved your comp on him in the rankings as a Ross Colton. and these can be complementary pieces. These aren't redundant players here. No, yeah, I agree. And I think, you know, I think Jack Quinn works hard.

I think Paterka works hard. Isaac Rosen maybe is a little bit more kind of a soft skill type of player with the goal-scoring ability. But no, I think that's, I don't mean to disparage these players to say that they can't, you know, win balance in national hockey. Especially all of Kulich, Ocelain, and Savoy. I think they all compete hard. And it's just an observation of mine that there's definitely prioritized skill and bringing in, you know, skill, scoring ability with these high picks. Okay, Corey, let's talk about a couple of the surprises through the draft.

And I guess the first surprise that comes to mind, we talked about Danila Yorov dropping, and that was sort of expected coming in. But there was a moment, I think sometime around the middle of round three on Friday, that I messaged you. And I was kind of like, it doesn't seem like any of the rest of the Russians have been affected. It affected maybe just specifically Urov in the first round. And I get the value of the first round picks probably explains that. But in rounds two and three, we saw plenty of Russians going off the board.

Yeah, it really feels like, in my discussions with people around the league, they echoed this, is it really it feels the Russian factor with the war in Ukraine, everything like that, really only affected one guy. It was Danila Urog. I think Pavel Mitchikov goes right where he puts him to the go, maybe even high. where he expected him to go. I have Yvonne Morostochenko, all the things is there with his health,

goes kind of right around where you expected him to go, which was right around the 20 spot. And it was only Daniel Yorov. I think many people in the league considered a top 12th, a 15 guy on talent, and a minimum, maybe even higher,

ends up going the 24th overall spot to Minnesota. But then I think you look at those day two and three picks, whether it is Artim Duda, Glebrenov, Avesander Parival, Demet Mischelnikov,

Viktor Wichov, Arsani Koramislav. A lot of those guys, guys are going roughly where I expected them to go on talent. I think I might get some pushback on that from our listeners. I think I think Glepp Trichazov got a little bit more public hype than what I think people in the league actually thought of the player. I think most people in the league thought he was a second, third round pick, and that's ultimately

where he ends up going. But yet, it really feels, and it's interesting from Minnesota a while perspective, both from the team and from a fan perspective. It feels like the only player who really got screwed by this was Danila Yurov, at least when it comes to a draft slot perspective. And I ultimately think, Danil Urov, as much as I'm sure from a pride standpoint, from a, you know, being picked where you think your talented standpoint, I don't know how that was for him. But I think this is a good landing spot for him. So even insofar as he kind of was the one to take the brunt of this, I like the landing spot for him quite a bit, honestly. And I'm sure the wild do because I think they can use Kiril Kaprizov as a recruiting measure. You know, they're probably going to get Murakuz Nadinov over at some point, too. I think you're kind of envisioning. So there's at least some camaraderie there for those Russian players when they arrive.

And I get your argument on the value perspective. It's why we figured there was going to be a drop for these KHL signed players, is that at least early in the draft, if it's you versus some other player who is also very good, and these are the guys you need to come in and play and make a difference in your organization, I understand leaning the other way. I always just figured when you got to like the third of the fourth round, the differences between the players are so minute, theoretically.

I always just figured teams would just lean to the other guy. But what I think happened is, I do think there were quite a few teams in the league who were out on the Russians. I know I've talked to teams who were out on the Russians. But my understanding is there was a sizable contingent that were in that cam. There was a sizable contingent that were. saying themselves, we'll take them only when it makes perfect sense. And there was a sizable contingent that just didn't give, that I just didn't care.

And I just think there were so many of that people in that third pool that the Russians were just going where they belonged on talent because these teams were just seeing them available. And they were thinking, oh, well, he's, we would have picked in the second round and he's there. And let's just go do it. Well, how much, too, does the slide of Lekar Maki and Kemel play into that for a year of? because all the sudden, you know, if you were a team that wanted a really offensive, you know, high upside winger, I know he's a different, Europe's a different profile. He's got a lot more size and power to his game. But at the end of the day, we saw a potential top 10 on talent, like Karamaki slide to 15, a potential top 10 on talent,

Yolkum Kamel at 17. Like, those things can play into that too very easily. Right. And when you consider which organizations were, we're not going to take a rush, and we'll never know for sure exactly why he got 24, what every single team thought of him. There was a couple of teams that talked to in the lead up to the draft, who just actually were to sold Nirov as the player so that all these things are possibly variables. But it is just, it should look at the totality of the draft and seeing where the Russians ultimately go and seeing that I just don't think there was as big. I think we might have overplayed these issues a little bit in the lead-up discussions to

the draft. So to that end, you mentioned a couple of them already. If anything, early on day two, there were a couple of Russians who maybe went earlier than we thought. And the first of those was at 36. Artem Duda, this was one of the picks that Arizona got by taking Shangasaspera from Philly. What's the book on Duda here? I had heard that there was some hype for him in the league leading up to draft day, but I thought it was going to be mid-late two, early three, maybe mid-two was the highest.

And there he goes to 36 to Arizona. What people like about him is he's a six-two defense man with really good offensive skills, playmaking ability. He has legitimate offense. Skating always worded me a little bit, so I'm not really sure. So the question is, is the offense high end enough? Even he's probably not going to be this amazing defender in the NHL. But like I said, there was kind of this rise with him among teams. And so I wasn't shocked that he went at 36, even though I thought that was a little on the high side for any more when I was hearing from the buzz around the lake. Were you shocked by Dmitri Bachelnikov at 52?

I thought he was going to get drafted. I thought he might even get drafted. I don't know where I'm in the 7-round rock. It might have been the fifth of the six rounds. I thought I knew there was some buzz, and maybe it goes in the third, maybe it was in the fourth. The second, yeah, I did not see that one coming. When Detroit was announcing Scaz as the team, I thought, okay, this is Korimislav probably. And when Bucelna Cod goes, I thought, okay, wow, because they believed.

They watched that guy in the junior games. and I think he was a week or two weeks away from being first year eligible for this year's draft. I could be mistaken on that. Yep. September 6th or something like that. Yeah. So this is a guy who was one of the leading scores in the MHL, a big part of one of the top junior teams in the MHL. Great skill.

Offensive IQ we could shoot it. My concerns were always the 5-9, 510 frame and not an amazing skater for that size. So I thought that he doesn't probably go top two rounds. but they believe, they believe in that skill, and they stepped up to take him because that was their guy. After watching a little bit of video, full transparency, I did not know anything about this player. So I'm immediately, this is the team I cover frantically,

okay, what do I need to know here? The skill does really pop. I mean, it's the hands, it's the ability to take it in tight, which I know is very important to Detroit. They don't, obviously nobody's looking for perimeter players, but this guy can finish a little bit, and he obviously is the second leading squad. in the MHL this year, you look at him.

He looks like he's about 13 years old, so I think you can understand why, you know, maybe this year is a little bit of a jump for him as he continues to bloom. So this wasn't off the radar one for me, but I think I get what they see here. Yeah, like I said, I mean, you can make the argument. If he was whatever, he always always used to the guys who are the September birth dates, I was here as one.

If he was one week older, if he was one week younger, so you can do this with this. If Bocelnikov was one week, younger, you know, going into last year, he was now he was first year eligible. I think people would have been, you know, really hyping this kid up. So I get the argument. Like I said, the skating concerns for me are still kind of legitimate, but we'll see what happens with time. How about Matthew Poitris at 54 to Boston?

So Poitris was a guy who coming into the season in the first half of the season. There was a lot of interest in. He was an A-rated player with Central Scouting. He got off to a really hot start with Guelph. People talk about how competitive he is, their skill, there's a really good hockey sense. And then he really kind of cooled down to the second half of the season. You watch him, he's not that big, he's not that fast, and he's not scoring at this huge rate. So I thought that the attention to him would dwindle a little bit.

I thought he'd still be a, you know, maybe a mid-round pick, but seeing him going at 50 to Boston, that caught my eye. You know, you look, say, at another OHL pick of Paul Ludwinski, who didn't have really high scoring rates, but he's an excellent skater, and so at least you can kind of see the argument. You can make yourself, oh, okay, well, he may not be a score, but he can be a bottom six-four because he skates really well and he competes. With Poitras, I think it's just to compete. I don't think the feet are there.

So, like I said, I get the argument, and I've heard from people during the season, points during the season who really liked this player. I just think this guy, he's got a long path, become someone who helps an NHL team night in and night out. You mentioned Chicago. They had two third rounders that I thought, were of note.

Samuel Savoy, Aidan Thompson. What's the story there? Savoy, if you might recall, was one of the highest rated players on my top skaters list. I remember I talked to somebody after the draft. He described to me as like a little missile where he's just, he's an incredible skater.

He plays with pace. He competes hard. And I think those are all things you hear and you like a lot. The downside is he's about five, what is it, five nine, five nine and a half. Off top my head, what do you have, like 25, 30 points last season in the QMJHL. So, I mean, those are, I thought he was going to get drafted for sure, just a third round I thought was really interesting. It seems like Chicago in their draft really prioritized skating and speed. You know, we talked about it in the first round picks.

Obviously, Kortchinsky, great skater. Frank Mazar, great skater. Sam Rinsok can skate. that Winski can skate. Ryan Green skates really well. And you have Samuel Savoy, who is an excellent skater. And then you go to Aidan Thompson at 90 overall. As a third year eligible in the U.S.HL, he's one of the top scores in the U.S.HL, you're not the biggest guy like Savoy, but also a very strong skater with a high

compete level, kind of like Savoy. Even though he scored this year as a third year eligible in the U.S.L, I do have some quentin on the offense long term. It did seem like they have a type. They wanted to get faster. It really, I'm not sure if they talked about that post-draft or not, but just from observing their draft picks Dominic James 2 as a burner, it just felt like something they were targeting and maybe sacrificing offensive skill at times in their ability to get faster. I think the other one that we wanted to talk about here was a late second rounder, Ottawa, Philip Nordberg, the left shot defenseman out of Sweden. Yeah, and I think Philip, you know, Ottawa has made a concerted effort.

in their drafts unless you used to get bigger and they get the big defenseman Phil of Norberg, a six four defenseman. I think he has some good puck moving ability. The skating worried me a little bit. It's kind of funny when we did that seven-round mock a few weeks ago. I actually gave Nordberg to Ottawa. I think it wasn't the fourth round, though. I'm not sure if I remember there's one exactly or not, but I thought that was kind of funny

when that happened. So I get, I understand why they went after this guy. because he's big. I think he competes well. And I think there is some offense there. But because of the feat, I think there's going to be a lot of work for him to do become an everyday NHL player. Okay, Corey, because I don't believe in giving you vacations now that we've finished the 2022 draft. I'm going to take you right in here at 2023.

I know you've got your list out now. So you're ready for this anyway. But let's start looking ahead. I mean, we've heard for years now that Connor Bedard is the guy here and as well as Montevay Michkov, and no surprise, you've got them one, two. How big of a jump in terms of the difference between the one, two, this year, and one two next year are we looking at? I think it's a rather significant difference in terms of the pure talent. I think you're looking at two guys in Conradar and Mathé Michikov, who have the pure talent level to be true difference

makers predicted legitimate star forwards in the National Hockey League who can have at least a chance to be true scoring leaders in their personal. crime with the one caveat in, you know, we, I think the, with, in the 2022 draft, the big debate was who's going one, Shane Wright, who is, is there a challenger? I felt like we were discussing that for the entire time. I have, based on where we are right now, it's hard for me to imagine somebody emerging and challenging Connor Bedard or Montefed Mitch Covent in those one, two spots. Things could happen. I've talked to some minority of skeptics. We feel like Fantilli can get to that mark. But at least

at least on a pure talent level though, I find it hard to believe. The discussion for me going into the next draft is what do you do about Bach May Mitchkov if you are an NHL organization? Because man, is that a fun dilemma? It'll be even more fun if maybe Conradar has an

amazing season but it's not as amazing as you thought it was going to be. And if Mitchcov just goes off in the KHL and puts up historic numbers and we get to this point next year and you're like, oh, shit. I think Mitchcoff's the best player, and I think he's the best player by a considerable margin, but I really wish he wasn't on a KHL contract for the next three

seasons following next season. So I feel like that's going to be the big debate in next year's draft. We've talked for a while now on this show about kind of that top three, Bedard, Mischkov, and Fantilli. If I told you there was going to be one player to interrupt that trio, who were you taken? he's not even among the top five or top seven in my list I don't think because he didn't score a huge rate and didn't really get as many games but it would be Charlie Stramel would be the one who would come to mind I think he's kind of a that freak athlete really big great skater has skill highly highly competitive I could see a scenario where he just pops in at the University of Wisconsin next season goes to the world juniors is great that's the one of the one who would be somewhat obvious to me as a potential guy to do something like that. But I think, you know, my top five other candidates, Zach Benson, Dalboard Dvorsov, they would be in that mix too. But Stramel seems to be the upside guy to me among that pool.

I'll make the call on Dvorsky as that guy for a couple of reasons. Number one, you know, young birthday, six foot one center playing pro hockey. It's in the Alsfenskine, not the SHL, and I know that may end up coming into play for him. But to me, that profile, if he is able to pop, that's going to speak to NHL teams. Maybe I'm just riding the Slovakia

love coming out of this draft where they had both of the top two. But when you think about the puck skill at that size, you know, the skating isn't, I don't see as a huge enough problem to keep him out of the very top of this draft. If he is able to produce against men,

I think he's the guy that we're talking about. Maybe it doesn't happen until late in the draft. I think he's the guy that we're talking about challenging Fin Tilly. Yeah, and I think that's going to be a really interesting guy to follow. I think it's been interesting right away, too, because to my knowledge, he is not going to Link of Gretzky. He is going to that canceled World Junior. So his draft cycle is going to start off in a very interesting way next season.

A couple other guys that I want to ask it if there's any chance they can climb up your board. Another one, Leo Carlson. I don't know if I've got like a Sweden fascination here or something, but it's another big skilled centerman. Why is this not a top 10 player? He's already playing in the SHL as an underager. He's in the mix. He's not that far out of there,

so I can buy the argument. Skating on him is a notable concern for me from the live games I've seen and watching him on video as well. But I love the skill. I love to compete. I think he's an excellent prospect. Like I said, he's a little bit on.

He's a late birthday, so he's a little bit on the older side too. So just things to consider. but I do the excellent prospect. I can buy if he really plays well in the SHL next season, he can climb into that range. And usually one of the top program guys is in this mix in the top 10, too. I think we're a few years in a row now where the top program guy is going top five. I get Stramel counts as that, kind of, because he's just a little old,

so he's going to be in college already. But when I saw Will Smith this year, I liked him as a guy who I think has top 10 potential as a scorer and a guy who can play center as well. Yeah, he is the top guy. from the program, I'm on the 05 program guys going into next season. I don't think that that age group on the NTDP is all that strong. I mean, you know, there's several names listed there in my first round with him and Oliver Moore,

like Ryan Leonard, Gabriel Perrault. It's not the best age group reminds me more of that age group we had from, like, that's, you know, Jake Sanderson aside with that four group with Bordolo and Luke Talk and Dylan Peterson. I think it's closer to that that maybe the one we saw this past season. But Will Smith is definitely a guy who has big fans in the league,

very dynamic skill, playmaking ability. You can skate well, you can score. I didn't see that player consistently enough to get him into that range. But I can definitely

buy that argument. One thing that stood out to me about your preliminary list, it is not heavy on defensemen. I think the first one is at number nine. That's Cam Allen from Guelph. I know you do like him as well as Mikhail Gulliyev, who checks in at number 12 here.

Is this a situation where we're just waiting for a D to emerge? Or is this regarded as a pretty weak D class? Yeah, it was interesting when I was kind of going through my process and looking at the guys I'd like throughout the season as the underageers. I really wasn't finding many defensemen that that I was checking in. This was just, this wasn't a thorough draft. Obviously, this is the very, very early a lot could have changed. Don't take it too seriously list. But with that being said, I noticed that I wasn't checking off a lot of defendants, so I sent it around to some scout friend. And I was asking, hey, is there somebody super obvious that I'm missing here? And the answer was usually no. Everyone had their pet favorites.

The odd person mentioned Tanner Mollandik in Saskatoon. The odd person mentioned Hunter Bershevich with the program. But not everyone was convinced those guys fit also. So I didn't feel like was missing consensus, high-end defense prospects. But I'm sure as the season goes on, you'll see guys emerge, especially with the national teams. And I'm sure there'll be quite a few more defensemen I plug in this time next year into a first round grade of 23 draft class. But in my first look, it was really hard to find defensemen to get excited about beyond those two who are very exciting, dynamic puck-moving defensemen. All right. Well, then on that note, let's move to the mailbag, and we'll go back to some questions listeners had about this past draft, starting

with Lutsenheiser, who wants to know, where would Kirby Doc have had fit? Had he been eligible for this draft, and where would he have fit in your rankings with the scouting report you had for the 2019 draft? Obviously, Doc effectively gets traded for the 13th overall pick here. So he's going to go to Montreal. Montreal could have made the 13th pick, though. So where would Kirby Doc have fit into this mix, I guess, with what you know about him today, and where would he have fit in with what you knew about him in 2019? I get Kirby Doc did not have the best season. And I know you expected more of him coming into the season.

But man, Kirby Doc still a lot of hockey player. He is a 6'4 right shot defenseman who can skate. He has playmaking skill. I've seen him be a two-way player at times over his career, but not consistently. I could be wrong There's like cap gymnastics in this You got to pay him at some point I get all that stuff

It feels like he's more valuable than a 13th overall pick Never mind I know they got 13 plus one other pick there But it feels like he's a He's like a legitimate still top town In the NHL And you look at the list that I did For this past draft And I had the tiers where it was kind of broken down

You had the high in the lineup guys Which was Logan Cooley Simon Nemich and David I would argue he fits into that group maybe as you can argue with the group behind him at the very top of it I would say but I I would probably lean towards the group with Nemmich Kule and Yerichick at least on pure talent before you bring cap implications into the mix I'd still take Kirby Doc top 10 in this class and ultimately when you by the time you look at the picks who are coming off in the top 10 I think it's enough of a toss up I think if you asked you know The Red Wings picked Marco Casper, and I think the question there is, what is Marco Casper, a 2C, a 3C?

The Red Wing certainly feel it's more the former and maybe even a little higher. But I think that's still the same ultimate projection that you have on Kirby Doc there. I don't think I would have traded the eighth pick for Kirby Doc, and I was fine with them taking Casper there. So I guess I lean Casper, but I don't think it's a huge gap. And I think, especially by 12, 13. Ultimately, 13 ends up being Frank Nazar. So I guess that's the question here. Are you taking Nazar or Doc?

I think I'm still betting on Doc, but you get the extra runway with Nazar, which I get fits for Chicago. So I think he's still comfortably, you know, 13th or better. But I think, you know, fringe top 10 is probably what I would have done. Yeah, I think if I'm Montreal, I'm taking Kirby Doc over Frank Nazar all day. How many years are you waiting for Frank Nazar to become what Kirby Doc is right now in the NHL? It's, I think it's going to be quite a few years. And I get Doc has issues in his game. his consistency has been an issue dating back to when he was a junior.

People might remember that he went third overall. We might have some Ryans and some markets we were having over the last couple of months. His production wasn't very good for a high pick. And then he comes in that first year. He's amazing. And we think, oh, he's going to be a star. Here it comes. What a great pick.

And then it doesn't come as much. So these frustrations have existed for a long time with Kirby. but I still like I said there's just so much player there it's man like unless he dropped Chicago the wrong way which I can buy happening based on maybe the you know the gossipy you know stuff that's been said about Kirby over over over his time as a hockey player I still think this is a really good player I think this is a guy with with his size of skating he'll be a two-way player he has skill to score in the national hockey league as I, if you're Montreal-Canadian fan, I'm excited by that trait.

Well, and you kind of probably hope a new coach maybe can help get through to, you know, from that standpoint, too. I mean, with, with Doc, there's not even the question of can he do it at the NHL level because we've seen it. It's just can he do it, like you said, consistently. From that standpoint, sometimes change the scenery can kind of be a shock to the system and can help with that. So I still, yeah, I agree with you. Next one is from Sport Crunch, who says, wants to talk about goalies with a fixed goalie budget. would you prefer an expensive number one and an inexpensive number two or to split the money between a 1A and 1B goalies? I'm going to like kind of put in a side caveat on this here because I don't, I think we need to exclude the like Vasilevsky tier from this because that's an elite elite player.

Right. If I had to pay Shastark, if I had to pay Vasilevsky or whatever the top premium goalie is ever in the league at a given time, you pay that guy whatever you, whatever you think you need to. even though Vasaleski's performance has not always been perfectly consistent season to season, obviously in a Hall of Fame goalie, he's in the playoffs, he's made difference year after year. But I would in the, presumably we're talking about in terms of an expensive number one goal, we're talking about maybe. Like a John Gibson type. Yeah, the fifth to 15th best goalie in the league or something, like something like that. I would probably lean to the split the money between the two just because I feel like if

if the expensive guy falters and if you know anything about goalies in the NHL, it's they are inconsistent. There is no such. There's, it's very rare. I'm sorry of watching, I think, Henrik Lungfist in his career.

They ever see a goalie kind of put up consistent numbers year after year after year. If that expensive goalie starts to struggle, like say, Sergey Mabrovsky in Florida, you're really stuck because they're paid so much money and nobody wants to take on that contract. Whereas I feel like even if you take on the least expensive 1A but a more expensive 1B,

it provides you flexibility options on what to do with them. And even though you may not be getting the premium name, I would argue the difference between maybe the 8th and the 18th best goalie is not that significant to take on that kind of kind of risk. Well, sure, and you never know to your point when you're going to be able to get a top 10 year from a goalie who you may call an 18th best goalie or whatever. If you want to look at Nashville and Pittsburgh this year, I don't think there's, you know, maybe Jari, maybe Soros have had stretches where you could say, you know, I think Soros, I guess probably this year had maybe a top five season, but I wouldn't call him a top five goalie in the NHL. I think he's more in that like eight to 15 range. Yeah, no, I would agree.

with that. But I don't think you're expected if Sorrow ever wanted to get paid like a top five goalie, I think you probably move on for him, correct? Yeah, I think so, yeah. Especially the Jeff Yianoslav Ascroft coming up the pipeline. Hopefully. Yeah, time will tell. Not to put too much fear into. Yeah, well, well, he's, I believe he signed already. I could be mistaken, but I think

the issue is more of his performance this past season wasn't all that good. Yeah. Yeah, yeah, for sure. All right. The next one is from Chris B, who says, it was so fixated on Zavkovsky or right for New Jersey. I didn't put enough thought into Simon Nemich. I'm curious where you would rank Nemich in relation to the defensemen taken in the past few drafts. Where would you put him on a list of power? Luke Hughes, Brent Clark, Jamie Driesdale, Jake Sanderson, Detroit fans.

I'm just reading the list, he said. It's not a snub at Simon Edmondson. We can put Edmondson in there, though, you'd like, so that you're a Detroit fan. are not as insulted, but we don't have to as well. I think it's... Do my Twitter mentions a favor.

Let's do that. Um, I think Nemich, I guess, would kind of be towards the bottom part of that range. And I do love Nemech. I just, I would guess that,

I would say that power, Hughes, Sanderson, they're just more dynamic hockey players because they have the offensive ability, maybe not as much offensive ability. of Simon Nemich, but they are, you know, big, explosive, skating players. I wouldn't call Power Skating Explosive, but Hughes is and Sanderson's are explosive,

and Power is quite a good skater for a 6,66, 67 defenseman, and to go with the offense, whereas Nemich, I think, is if he's going to be that kind of impact in the NHL, it has to be through the offense. I don't think he's going to be a, what I would call an elite, elite defensive player in the NHL. And I would rank him up above Brian Clark because he is, he is. even though his skating isn't amazing. I think it's a strong skating element,

and that's kind of the issue of Clark is. He has great offense. I'm not convinced he has more offense to Simon Nitch. In fact, interesting enough, I think, you know, you look at, you know, you wouldn't have imagined this a couple of years ago where you're comparing two premium prospect, defense prospects production in the Slovakia League.

But if you look at Ryan Clark's production in his draft season versus Simon Nemich's, it's actually quite a stark difference. It's interesting, too. I think I agree with you. I think for me, I would say the top three is the three you said. And then I would go Edvenson, followed by Nemich closely, and then Drysdale Clark. I think that would be my order.

So probably for me, I might even put Sanderson one, but I don't know. I'm not there yet. But I could see the argument. He's definitely in that mix. And I might have to be one too in a year. I mean, he might win the hobby this year. Yeah. Yeah, I mean, I might have Drysdale a little bit higher than you because I really like how you play versus men.

I get the tool kit isn't as sexy as the other ones. I think you can imagine those other players having just more offensive upside than Drysdale, but Drysdale has looked very good versus pros the last couple of years. So I would probably lean to him over Evanston over Namich until those two do that in the NHL. All right. Jonathan Barnes says he likes the Blue Jackets pick of Denton Matechuk. I know you did as well. but I'm concerned that his skill set is a bit redundant there since they have Werenzky and Bokfus locked in for the next few seasons.

Kind of wish they've gone, Frank Nazar. What are your thoughts on that? This is a topic we've talked a ton about on this show where we all like these really dynamic young defensemen, but only one of them gets to be on your top power play. Right. And is Bokfus even on the top power play in Columbus? I'm sorry, I'm sliding Columbus fan. No, I think Werensky is, right? I think Werencki is.

Yeah, yeah. Yeah, that's what I would imagine. Rwensky, I don't think, is in that same vein. He has more size. He's a great skater. But he's still taking that top power play spot. Right. So I guess the question becomes more or less about power play time

and more about how many sub-60-5-11 defensemen can you ice at the same time. And we discussed this with the Rangers going into last season about Zach Jones, Niels Lundfist, and Adam Fox. And lo and behold, neither Niels-Lunfifist or Zach Jones end the season on the roster. It's Braden Schneider. and I guess now the question is, can Denton Mette, Chuck, and Adam Bokevis exist on the same blue line?

And my argument to that would be, I feel like Adam Bokefist is the more replaceable one, if I had to guess, even though he had a lot of offense this season, and I think he had a good season. I think he's kind of gotten his shift, fair share of criticism after he didn't really work out in Chicago, but I think he scored a lot.

Yeah, yeah, he had, whatever, it was 11 goals and 22 points this season, which is very good for defense. but he's only playing, I think he played, you know, third pair of minutes because that defensive game, as it always has been with him, is a significant issue. I don't think with Matejuk is going to be that kind of an issue. I think you look at Matejuk, because he's such a good skater, which is a better skater than Bokfus, and a little bit more competitive than Bokfus, I think you can imagine him taking even strength shifts a lot more reliably. And I think now we'll

see how Bateechuk develops and whether he becomes a good pro. But I can see him putting pressure on Bochfifist to basically keep him out of the lineup to keep him away from his power play time. But I can, because, yeah, but I think Matejok is just so talented that I'm fine with that pick. And I get that maybe there'll be a time where it has to make a decision just like how I think right now the Rangers have to make a decision on what they do with Neal's Lugfist and Zach Jones going forward. But that decision will be years down the line and we'll have a much better idea what Bochfist is in two or three years' time.

The point I was making on the power play, though, was more. about like if you have one of these guys and you need them to do a lot of their damage there, right? Sure. It's not just, you know, I'll come back to Bogovs in a second here, but you also got David Jurecheck, who I really want on my power play. You know, he may be able to play a flank because of the shot, but I think it just diminishes the ways that you can kind of shelter those guys to, because the argument for, certainly for

a Bochrist is, yeah, okay, he's not going to give you the big defensive, but if he gets you 30 to 40 points, even if they come on the power plate, he's really helping. you still. To me, that's where that comes in. Now, I will say with Bokvest, his shooting percentage this year was 17%. So when we talk about those 11 goals, you may not be seeing half of them on a consistent basis, and that would really scare me if I were Columbus. Right. His shot's a big asset, but that's a really high shooting percentage for a thorough defense. But I mean, there were, I think, I think in his OHL, his last OHL season, he had just as many goals as assist, if I recall, or something like a lot of, he had a big playoff where he scored a lot of goals. But it's always been a

major asset, but yeah, that's definitely probably not sustainable. You made a great point about your check, something I do. I probably should have mentioned in that I think you could probably still say that Bokefus is better on the power play. I can't even buy Matechuk to be better at the power play, but I can't say that with confidence. Yeah, I think, you know, Yerichuk does seem like a very poor typical second powerplay defenseman, and teams roll two defensemen on the power play, on a second power play usually, so you can envision yearich, Bokefis, Yerich, Meteich, Meteich, Bokevis, in some kind of combination at different points. But now I think you go from with Columbus where they didn't

really have many great undefencemen in the organization. It was Boeufist and Andrew Peak essentially. And now you'll have some competition brewing and at least give you some flexibility at that position, which I think is fine. I'm still a course in Coolman's believer too. I know you're not quite as high. Right. Right. I missed him. And actually when I said that, I think I said it in the biggest needs call him, I said they had drafted a defenseman in the first second round in quite a few years. And people point out to me that I also missed Corson Coulment in that article. Okay, they made so many picks. It was impossible to keep up.

Which is funny because I'm a Corson Coulamins fan. I've consistently been, I think, among the more, you know. Yeah, you had him in the top 20 last year. More vocal believers of him. People are writing about him. So I don't hate Corson Coulamins. These are just mental slips. Don't come after me Columbus fans, at least over that.

Fair enough. Last one will end on a light one. Andrew Hamilton, what were your favorite food and drink establishments that you visited Montreal? I got to say, Corey, I think I did a lot more drinking than eaten over the course of the last week. Yeah, no, I go to Montreal quite a bit, you know, because of hockey reasons. So I'm not sure I was, you know, was looking to go on a, you know, a food. tour when I was there. I think the athletic and the entire national hockey league spent quite a bit of time on Crescent

Strech. Yes, we did. And, yeah, yes, we did. I like, on the food side, I liked Duns. I didn't make it to Schwartz's, but I had smoked me at Duns twice. I liked the food. I also like the vibe quite a bit. I didn't steal a bite of Dom's Poutine, which maybe I should have done, but he polished it

off quick enough that I don't know if there was going to be any to spare. I also like there's a dumpling spot. So whenever I go to Canada, I love eating Chinese food there. It's honestly way better than we have in the States. And there was a dumpling place, Sammy and Soup Dumping that I went. And I really like it. Soup dumplings are my favorite, one of my favorite foods. So it's on my must list whenever I get to a major Canadian city.

All right. That's going to do it for us, I think, Corey. Time for you to get a well-deserved break if you've got it in you. Thanks everybody else for listening to this episode of the Athletic Hockey Show in the Prospect series. you can subscribe to the Athletic Audio Plus on Apple Podcasts to get all the bonus content from our entire network. Start with the 30-day free trial,

and then it's just 99 cents a month after that. And of course, right now you can subscribe to the Athletic for a dollar a month for six months when you visit theathletic.com slash hockey show. Yes, the draft is behind us, but free agent frenzy is about to pick up. You're going to want in for that too. And this time last year,

we would have been signing off for a while and saying, enjoy your summer, and we'll see you. it in a few months, but not this summer because we have a world junior. We got a world junior hockey championship is less than a month away. So we'll have coverage of that and the Huyenka Gretzky Cup coming up shortly on this show. With that, we will get to all that in the coming weeks. Thanks for listening.

We'll talk to you soon.