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Post by bookboy007 on Sept 8, 2022 19:35:53 GMT
Lotta content here, good stuff. I generally disagree with the scoring system as, like you often say, if a team really knows the players why don't they take them in the first round? IE, nailing late first rounders should get as much "value" as 2-4 rounders. Maybe more, since it shows they really identified a player. Also, I give entirely 0 value to potato picks, picks like both McDavid (first rated, first pick) or even Kessel (undisputed 5th rated with 5th pick). I DO give value to high picks that go against consensus (Drysaddle instead of either Sam, Barkov) even if it's just a small reach. I give points on both quality and quantity but don't really care what round they player comes from beyond the autopicks at the very top. On that criteria when I looked at this some time ago, I found that Boston was around top-5 in terms of total drafting (total value of picks taken INCLUDING the potatoes) but a likely first in the league if you remove potatoes. Teams that have drafted a tonne of talent wit Potatoes include Edmonton, COL, TOR, TB, and Boston coming up probably just behind. Removing potatoes had them at #1 for quality and quantity, though I didn't go back as far in time. Probably stays the same though, since it brings in guys like Marchie. Looking at your evals a couple jump out: BOS 2-4: Lucic, Marchand, Grz, Donato, Heinen, Carlo, Lauzon, Vladar, Lindgren Isles 2-4: Hamonic, Czikas, Koskinen, Nilsson, Mayfield, Pelech, Toews, Sorokin. I just don't see how they both get 3 points. Machand has scored a hundred fucking points in a season. No one on that list is even close. None have scored even as well as Lucic, the second best scorer. And while Pelech is great and Toews and Hamonic are good, Carlo, Lingren and Gryz are all top-4 D, and Lauzon is good too. Boston has volume and star value here. Marchand is an absolute grand slam of a pick, a guy who could be a first overall. Similar for the first round, Isles get huge cred for Pullock and Barzal, but are they really anywhere close to Pasta and CMac, guys who would be top-2 picks in a redraft for their year? I just don't see how NYI can be rated higher. The team that really does stand out on par with Boston is Tampa though. TBL 2-4: Killorn, Panik, Gudas, Kucherov, Paquette, Point, Cirelli, Joseph, Colton. Wow. You'd swear they had Marty's Almanac. Two franchise players and a bunch of other good ones. But they come up short in the first when you take away potatoes. Connolly, Namestnikov, Vagisilievsky, DeAngelo are solid, but again it's really hard to match the Pasta-CMac franchise cornerstones taken outside the top-10. I make no claim on the methodology being overly scientific - quick and dirty as the basis for discussion was my objective, so fire away at the scoring system. There's a couple of bigger questions. One is how do you treat the first round. The gap between 1 and 15 is probably about the same as 16 and...50? 90? I mean, in 2015, the gap between McDavid and Matt Barzal is huge - Connor has more than 2x Barzal's points (extra 120 games, but still). Tampa got Cirelli at 72 that year, and he has about half the points Barzal has and some would say the gap in their overall games is close to nil - though very different players. Making the right pick in the top 10 is less about finding the right guy and more about avoiding the wrong one. You set me up for a good example mentioning Kessel. CSS's final rankings? He was behind Derrick Brassard on the list of NA skaters. Small difference btw 5 and 6 but that potato would have taken Brassard, so credit for not falling into potatoland has to factor in somewhere. You know, if you're Kevin Costner in Draft Day, the genius move was not taking the obvious guy. So do you split the first round into 1-10 and compare actual picks to CSS or some other reliable benchmark and then to actual performance? So top ranked player available was X, they took Y, and 10 years later Y has outscored X by 100 points. Or Y is the top goalscorer from that draft year and X never played above the AHL? Lot more work there; it would be interesting to see how much it changed the results. The other option would be to do a round one redraft and you get/lose points for every first rounder who moves up or down. I did factor in some of this. I didn't give as much credit for making the chalk pick in the top 10, for example, and I gave more credit for hitting homers in later rounds...especially if they did it more than once. Once is a fluke, or it's as likely to be a fluke as it is a sign of drafting excellence. In a couple of cases, a team had a pattern of making surprisingly good picks after the first round, and often positionally, like someone had a pulse on goalies or D. But quick and dirty means that it wasn't exactly quantitative. I didn't want to over-rate blind squirrels. The more of this I did, though, the more I came back to the questions I raised for Philly and often mention about Ottawa's expansion team years. You can't draft Connor McDavid just because you have the #1 pick unless it's 2015. If Chris Phillips is the best player in the draft class, you take Chris Phillips but then you try to figure out another way to score some goals. Your ability to find players depends on who was getting busy 18 years ago, and that's true both for the first round and the whole draft. You won't catch much fishing in a swimming pool. It's hard to go too far the direction you've gone without punishing the teams for where they drafted. On the Boston v the Isles: Hamonic has faded but was once a good top half D, Mayfield is a very good 3-4 and Pelech and Toews are 1-2 (though neither is Cale Makar). To me, those 4 D are better than the Grz, Carlo, Lindgren and Lauzon 4some. And Sorokin is close to Vez level. If you're looking for All Star Team (not All Star Game) guys, I think Sorokin can be team 1 or 2 just like Marchand. The Bolts: Kucherov is second only to McDavid in points/game over the last 5 years. Point is third in playoff points over that time and one of the best two way C in the game. Vagisil is the best goalie in the game and he was drafted three spots later than McAvoy. They've whiffed on some...but have you heard about this 2015 draft? I think you have to do some real gymnastics to say Boston is better.
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Post by The OC on Sept 8, 2022 20:52:05 GMT
Lotta content here, good stuff. I generally disagree with the scoring system as, like you often say, if a team really knows the players why don't they take them in the first round? IE, nailing late first rounders should get as much "value" as 2-4 rounders. Maybe more, since it shows they really identified a player. Also, I give entirely 0 value to potato picks, picks like both McDavid (first rated, first pick) or even Kessel (undisputed 5th rated with 5th pick). I DO give value to high picks that go against consensus (Drysaddle instead of either Sam, Barkov) even if it's just a small reach. I give points on both quality and quantity but don't really care what round they player comes from beyond the autopicks at the very top. On that criteria when I looked at this some time ago, I found that Boston was around top-5 in terms of total drafting (total value of picks taken INCLUDING the potatoes) but a likely first in the league if you remove potatoes. Teams that have drafted a tonne of talent wit Potatoes include Edmonton, COL, TOR, TB, and Boston coming up probably just behind. Removing potatoes had them at #1 for quality and quantity, though I didn't go back as far in time. Probably stays the same though, since it brings in guys like Marchie. Looking at your evals a couple jump out: BOS 2-4: Lucic, Marchand, Grz, Donato, Heinen, Carlo, Lauzon, Vladar, Lindgren Isles 2-4: Hamonic, Czikas, Koskinen, Nilsson, Mayfield, Pelech, Toews, Sorokin. I just don't see how they both get 3 points. Machand has scored a hundred fucking points in a season. No one on that list is even close. None have scored even as well as Lucic, the second best scorer. And while Pelech is great and Toews and Hamonic are good, Carlo, Lingren and Gryz are all top-4 D, and Lauzon is good too. Boston has volume and star value here. Marchand is an absolute grand slam of a pick, a guy who could be a first overall. Similar for the first round, Isles get huge cred for Pullock and Barzal, but are they really anywhere close to Pasta and CMac, guys who would be top-2 picks in a redraft for their year? I just don't see how NYI can be rated higher. The team that really does stand out on par with Boston is Tampa though. TBL 2-4: Killorn, Panik, Gudas, Kucherov, Paquette, Point, Cirelli, Joseph, Colton. Wow. You'd swear they had Marty's Almanac. Two franchise players and a bunch of other good ones. But they come up short in the first when you take away potatoes. Connolly, Namestnikov, Vagisilievsky, DeAngelo are solid, but again it's really hard to match the Pasta-CMac franchise cornerstones taken outside the top-10. I make no claim on the methodology being overly scientific - quick and dirty as the basis for discussion was my objective, so fire away at the scoring system. There's a couple of bigger questions. One is how do you treat the first round. The gap between 1 and 15 is probably about the same as 16 and...50? 90? I mean, in 2015, the gap between McDavid and Matt Barzal is huge - Connor has more than 2x Barzal's points (extra 120 games, but still). Tampa got Cirelli at 72 that year, and he has about half the points Barzal has and some would say the gap in their overall games is close to nil - though very different players. Making the right pick in the top 10 is less about finding the right guy and more about avoiding the wrong one. You set me up for a good example mentioning Kessel. CSS's final rankings? He was behind Derrick Brassard on the list of NA skaters. Small difference btw 5 and 6 but that potato would have taken Brassard, so credit for not falling into potatoland has to factor in somewhere. You know, if you're Kevin Costner in Draft Day, the genius move was not taking the obvious guy. So do you split the first round into 1-10 and compare actual picks to CSS or some other reliable benchmark and then to actual performance? So top ranked player available was X, they took Y, and 10 years later Y has outscored X by 100 points. Or Y is the top goalscorer from that draft year and X never played above the AHL? Lot more work there; it would be interesting to see how much it changed the results. The other option would be to do a round one redraft and you get/lose points for every first rounder who moves up or down. I did factor in some of this. I didn't give as much credit for making the chalk pick in the top 10, for example, and I gave more credit for hitting homers in later rounds...especially if they did it more than once. Once is a fluke, or it's as likely to be a fluke as it is a sign of drafting excellence. In a couple of cases, a team had a pattern of making surprisingly good picks after the first round, and often positionally, like someone had a pulse on goalies or D. But quick and dirty means that it wasn't exactly quantitative. I didn't want to over-rate blind squirrels. The more of this I did, though, the more I came back to the questions I raised for Philly and often mention about Ottawa's expansion team years. You can't draft Connor McDavid just because you have the #1 pick unless it's 2015. If Chris Phillips is the best player in the draft class, you take Chris Phillips but then you try to figure out another way to score some goals. Your ability to find players depends on who was getting busy 18 years ago, and that's true both for the first round and the whole draft. You won't catch much fishing in a swimming pool. It's hard to go too far the direction you've gone without punishing the teams for where they drafted. On the Boston v the Isles: Hamonic has faded but was once a good top half D, Mayfield is a very good 3-4 and Pelech and Toews are 1-2 (though neither is Cale Makar). To me, those 4 D are better than the Grz, Carlo, Lindgren and Lauzon 4some. And Sorokin is close to Vez level. If you're looking for All Star Team (not All Star Game) guys, I think Sorokin can be team 1 or 2 just like Marchand. The Bolts: Kucherov is second only to McDavid in points/game over the last 5 years. Point is third in playoff points over that time and one of the best two way C in the game. Vagisil is the best goalie in the game and he was drafted three spots later than McAvoy. They've whiffed on some...but have you heard about this 2015 draft? I think you have to do some real gymnastics to say Boston is better. I didn't remember CSS putting Brassard ahead of Kessel at the end. I followed that draft closely all year, and most of the time Phil was #1 or 2. At the end, Toes and Stall creeped up with a lot of people saying they were better all-around players in the Crosby mold, and that Phil was lazy and/or hard to work with. But I still remember TSN draft day coverage calling it a "big 5" with a significant drop off after. Phil had some questions, but most still thought he was the most talented player in the draft. When it comes to first round potatoes, it varies by year. Sometimes you a "big 5", a Taylor vs Tyler, or an "elite 10". Anything that is an "autopick" at the top of the draft, I give low to 0 value to. McDavid. Crosby. I would give some value to teams that make smart choices with high picks that could have gone awry - Drysaddle, Barkov. I would give moderate value to teams that draft well in the top-10 and get high talent even without the top-3 type selection. But I give huge value to teams that find players - especially elite players - outside the lottery picks. Essentially if you can contend for the playoffs AND draft NHL talent, you are killing it as an organization. As far as the two comparos, let's rank the players: Bos NYI Marchand Pelech Lucic Toews Carlo Hamonic Lindgren Sorokin Grizz Koskinen Heinen Czikas Lauzon Mayfield Vladar Not sure how that's a win in any matchup for the Isles. Strong argument for Sorokin, but he's only one season in. If he's a true #1 that's great, but few would deal any other player 1 for 1. Now with TB: Bos TB Marchand Kooch Lucic Point Carlo Cirelli Lindgren Killorn Grizz Panik Heinen Gudas Lauzon Paquette Vladar Joseph Colton Now that's an impressive group. I view Marchand and Kuchie as a wash, but Point is friggin awesome. The remainder is fairly even I'd say, and Tampa also produces an extra player. But if we look at round 1, sans potatoes: BOS TB Pastrnak Vagisilevsky McAvoy DeAngelo Hamilton Connolly DeBrusk Namestnikov Colborne Frederic Zboril Subban Caron I don't see how this is even close. Boston in a landslide. Also, you can bitch at Boston for 2015 when they goofed #15 (the other two were and are fine), but one guy not mentioned in your analysis is Drouin #3 overall for TB. Total dud, especially when the picks after him were Jones, Lindholm, Monahan, Morrissey, Pulock, Wennberg, ..... etc. Ouch! At least they were able to flip him for Sergachev. If you combine the two lists and ignore the arbitrary 1/2-4 divide, the two teams both have great results but Boston comes out on top in both quality and quantity.
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Post by bookboy007 on Sept 9, 2022 0:26:17 GMT
When it comes to first round potatoes, it varies by year. Sometimes you a "big 5", a Taylor vs Tyler, or an "elite 10". Anything that is an "autopick" at the top of the draft, I give low to 0 value to. McDavid. Crosby. I would give some value to teams that make smart choices with high picks that could have gone awry - Drysaddle, Barkov. I would give moderate value to teams that draft well in the top-10 and get high talent even without the top-3 type selection. But I give huge value to teams that find players - especially elite players - outside the lottery picks. Essentially if you can contend for the playoffs AND draft NHL talent, you are killing it as an organization. As far as the two comparos, let's rank the players: Bos NYI Marchand Pelech Lucic Toews Carlo Hamonic Lindgren Sorokin Grizz Koskinen Heinen Czikas Lauzon Mayfield Vladar Not sure how that's a win in any matchup for the Isles. Strong argument for Sorokin, but he's only one season in. If he's a true #1 that's great, but few would deal any other player 1 for 1. Now with TB: Bos TB Marchand Kooch Lucic Point Carlo Cirelli Lindgren Killorn Grizz Panik Heinen Gudas Lauzon Paquette Vladar Joseph Colton Now that's an impressive group. I view Marchand and Kuchie as a wash, but Point is friggin awesome. The remainder is fairly even I'd say, and Tampa also produces an extra player. But if we look at round 1, sans potatoes: BOS TB Pastrnak Vagisilevsky McAvoy DeAngelo Hamilton Connolly DeBrusk Namestnikov Colborne Frederic Zboril Subban Caron I don't see how this is even close. Boston in a landslide. Also, you can bitch at Boston for 2015 when they goofed #15 (the other two were and are fine), but one guy not mentioned in your analysis is Drouin #3 overall for TB. Total dud, especially when the picks after him were Jones, Lindholm, Monahan, Morrissey, Pulock, Wennberg, ..... etc. Ouch! At least they were able to flip him for Sergachev. If you combine the two lists and ignore the arbitrary 1/2-4 divide, the two teams both have great results but Boston comes out on top in both quality and quantity. I got there with the Isles because I would rank the Isles players differently. Part of that is not punishing them because Marchand's 13 years into his career vs early in theirs. In his first 6 years, no one would have said Marchy was a superstar or a guy who could have gone first overall. Marchand's a first line, year-end AS LW candidate. Rarely #1 with Ovechkin around. Panarin. Kreider. He gets Hart votes. Sorokin, in my mind, is a top tier #1. Yeah, he could prove to be a flash in the pan. But until he does...he was sixth in Vez voting as a second year goalie. Marchand has more resume, but if you look at both at their peak value, I think this is pretty even. Lucic was a different beast from other power forwards for the first half of his career. Pelech, to me, is like Slavvin. Last year, he was +20 on a team where only one other defenseman was above the water and that was Z. Only two other players on the team were better than even. He put up 28 points - 26 ES and 2 SH. That's a very, very good player. Carlo takes a lot of flak, but I still think he's got a long career as a defensive stopper. Toews fed off of Makar, but he went some obscene number of games without being on the ice for a goal against in any situation. Mayfield is a big, physical D who does a lot of the same things as Lindgren...but he's bigger. Before his decline, Hamonic was a horse for the Isles averaging over 22:30, decent offensive production largely at ES. Grz can't hold a candle to his two way game and while their scoring rate is basically identical, Grz is bolstered by the PP and plays specialist minutes - 4 min less per game than Travis. Czikis over Heinen. Heinen's a 0.44 point/game player who has nearly washed out of the NHL. Cizikas scores less but is the C of one of the most lauded physical/checking combos in teh game over the last decade. Koskinen and Vladar are a wash - I don't know what I'd say to distinguish them. Lauzon gives Boston an extra who they let go in expansion to a team that moved him on within a year to a team that signed him to be the 5-6. For the Bolts, I looked at the misses for Boston then changed my mind about doing it throughout. Tampa had a few duds including Howden, Koekkoek, Carter Ashton and Riku Helenius. I don't know how to rate Drouin. I mean, his issue isn't that he's not a talented player. He has a 53 points season under his belt, which is at least one metric where he beats JDB, and overall, his career and JDB's aren't that far apart in a lot of ways. So sure, take Stamkos and Hedman out and factor in the deadweight and yes, absolutely Boston's group is better, but putting almost all the weight on two picks. But I wanted actual results to matter. I don't like taking the potato picks out completely because they matter to the team's performance in pretty significant ways. And ultimately, the measure of draft success is wins on the ice. The Bolts have parlayed a large volume of drafted players into Cups. It's what Boston did in 2011 to some degree, and if this was 2000 forward, the Bruins might do even better.
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Post by The OC on Sept 9, 2022 1:00:50 GMT
When it comes to first round potatoes, it varies by year. Sometimes you a "big 5", a Taylor vs Tyler, or an "elite 10". Anything that is an "autopick" at the top of the draft, I give low to 0 value to. McDavid. Crosby. I would give some value to teams that make smart choices with high picks that could have gone awry - Drysaddle, Barkov. I would give moderate value to teams that draft well in the top-10 and get high talent even without the top-3 type selection. But I give huge value to teams that find players - especially elite players - outside the lottery picks. Essentially if you can contend for the playoffs AND draft NHL talent, you are killing it as an organization. As far as the two comparos, let's rank the players: Bos NYI Marchand Pelech Lucic Toews Carlo Hamonic Lindgren Sorokin Grizz Koskinen Heinen Czikas Lauzon Mayfield Vladar Not sure how that's a win in any matchup for the Isles. Strong argument for Sorokin, but he's only one season in. If he's a true #1 that's great, but few would deal any other player 1 for 1. Now with TB: Bos TB Marchand Kooch Lucic Point Carlo Cirelli Lindgren Killorn Grizz Panik Heinen Gudas Lauzon Paquette Vladar Joseph Colton Now that's an impressive group. I view Marchand and Kuchie as a wash, but Point is friggin awesome. The remainder is fairly even I'd say, and Tampa also produces an extra player. But if we look at round 1, sans potatoes: BOS TB Pastrnak Vagisilevsky McAvoy DeAngelo Hamilton Connolly DeBrusk Namestnikov Colborne Frederic Zboril Subban Caron I don't see how this is even close. Boston in a landslide. Also, you can bitch at Boston for 2015 when they goofed #15 (the other two were and are fine), but one guy not mentioned in your analysis is Drouin #3 overall for TB. Total dud, especially when the picks after him were Jones, Lindholm, Monahan, Morrissey, Pulock, Wennberg, ..... etc. Ouch! At least they were able to flip him for Sergachev. If you combine the two lists and ignore the arbitrary 1/2-4 divide, the two teams both have great results but Boston comes out on top in both quality and quantity. I got there with the Isles because I would rank the Isles players differently. Part of that is not punishing them because Marchand's 13 years into his career vs early in theirs. In his first 6 years, no one would have said Marchy was a superstar or a guy who could have gone first overall. Marchand's a first line, year-end AS LW candidate. Rarely #1 with Ovechkin around. Panarin. Kreider. He gets Hart votes. Sorokin, in my mind, is a top tier #1. Yeah, he could prove to be a flash in the pan. But until he does...he was sixth in Vez voting as a second year goalie. Marchand has more resume, but if you look at both at their peak value, I think this is pretty even. Lucic was a different beast from other power forwards for the first half of his career. Pelech, to me, is like Slavvin. Last year, he was +20 on a team where only one other defenseman was above the water and that was Z. Only two other players on the team were better than even. He put up 28 points - 26 ES and 2 SH. That's a very, very good player. Carlo takes a lot of flak, but I still think he's got a long career as a defensive stopper. Toews fed off of Makar, but he went some obscene number of games without being on the ice for a goal against in any situation. Mayfield is a big, physical D who does a lot of the same things as Lindgren...but he's bigger. Before his decline, Hamonic was a horse for the Isles averaging over 22:30, decent offensive production largely at ES. Grz can't hold a candle to his two way game and while their scoring rate is basically identical, Grz is bolstered by the PP and plays specialist minutes - 4 min less per game than Travis. Czikis over Heinen. Heinen's a 0.44 point/game player who has nearly washed out of the NHL. Cizikas scores less but is the C of one of the most lauded physical/checking combos in teh game over the last decade. Koskinen and Vladar are a wash - I don't know what I'd say to distinguish them. Lauzon gives Boston an extra who they let go in expansion to a team that moved him on within a year to a team that signed him to be the 5-6. For the Bolts, I looked at the misses for Boston then changed my mind about doing it throughout. Tampa had a few duds including Howden, Koekkoek, Carter Ashton and Riku Helenius. I don't know how to rate Drouin. I mean, his issue isn't that he's not a talented player. He has a 53 points season under his belt, which is at least one metric where he beats JDB, and overall, his career and JDB's aren't that far apart in a lot of ways. So sure, take Stamkos and Hedman out and factor in the deadweight and yes, absolutely Boston's group is better, but putting almost all the weight on two picks. But I wanted actual results to matter. I don't like taking the potato picks out completely because they matter to the team's performance in pretty significant ways. And ultimately, the measure of draft success is wins on the ice. The Bolts have parlayed a large volume of drafted players into Cups. It's what Boston did in 2011 to some degree, and if this was 2000 forward, the Bruins might do even better. I'll need to see Sorokin do it without NoNeck, and beyond one season to say he's anywhere close to Marchand. And yeah, if you bump everyone down a notch they look better, of course. But even if Soro is legit top goalie, hard to compete with the career of Marchand. And we all know star goalers are a waste of money and can be replaced on the cheap. Pelech is awesome, and easily their best pick. That's why I vs him with Marchand. He's also part of why it's hard to rank Soro so high, just yet #goalieparadise. Another factor of why Potato Picks are pointless in discussing drafting skill (beyond the fact that your scouting team has no involvement) is that there is so much luck. Luck to win the lottery. And even moreso, luck to get a suck-pick in a good year. Seguin and Hedman were both #2's. Should TB get credit for taking Hedman instead of Seguin? Of course not. Should Boston's drafting be hurt because the team didn't suck enough to get a #1 overall. No. So just throw away the taters and see what the team does when the scouts and management have to earn their money.
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Post by bookboy007 on Sept 9, 2022 1:59:08 GMT
I got there with the Isles because I would rank the Isles players differently. Part of that is not punishing them because Marchand's 13 years into his career vs early in theirs. In his first 6 years, no one would have said Marchy was a superstar or a guy who could have gone first overall. Marchand's a first line, year-end AS LW candidate. Rarely #1 with Ovechkin around. Panarin. Kreider. He gets Hart votes. Sorokin, in my mind, is a top tier #1. Yeah, he could prove to be a flash in the pan. But until he does...he was sixth in Vez voting as a second year goalie. Marchand has more resume, but if you look at both at their peak value, I think this is pretty even. Lucic was a different beast from other power forwards for the first half of his career. Pelech, to me, is like Slavvin. Last year, he was +20 on a team where only one other defenseman was above the water and that was Z. Only two other players on the team were better than even. He put up 28 points - 26 ES and 2 SH. That's a very, very good player. Carlo takes a lot of flak, but I still think he's got a long career as a defensive stopper. Toews fed off of Makar, but he went some obscene number of games without being on the ice for a goal against in any situation. Mayfield is a big, physical D who does a lot of the same things as Lindgren...but he's bigger. Before his decline, Hamonic was a horse for the Isles averaging over 22:30, decent offensive production largely at ES. Grz can't hold a candle to his two way game and while their scoring rate is basically identical, Grz is bolstered by the PP and plays specialist minutes - 4 min less per game than Travis. Czikis over Heinen. Heinen's a 0.44 point/game player who has nearly washed out of the NHL. Cizikas scores less but is the C of one of the most lauded physical/checking combos in teh game over the last decade. Koskinen and Vladar are a wash - I don't know what I'd say to distinguish them. Lauzon gives Boston an extra who they let go in expansion to a team that moved him on within a year to a team that signed him to be the 5-6. For the Bolts, I looked at the misses for Boston then changed my mind about doing it throughout. Tampa had a few duds including Howden, Koekkoek, Carter Ashton and Riku Helenius. I don't know how to rate Drouin. I mean, his issue isn't that he's not a talented player. He has a 53 points season under his belt, which is at least one metric where he beats JDB, and overall, his career and JDB's aren't that far apart in a lot of ways. So sure, take Stamkos and Hedman out and factor in the deadweight and yes, absolutely Boston's group is better, but putting almost all the weight on two picks. But I wanted actual results to matter. I don't like taking the potato picks out completely because they matter to the team's performance in pretty significant ways. And ultimately, the measure of draft success is wins on the ice. The Bolts have parlayed a large volume of drafted players into Cups. It's what Boston did in 2011 to some degree, and if this was 2000 forward, the Bruins might do even better. I'll need to see Sorokin do it without NoNeck, and beyond one season to say he's anywhere close to Marchand. And yeah, if you bump everyone down a notch they look better, of course. But even if Soro is legit top goalie, hard to compete with the career of Marchand. And we all know star goalers are a waste of money and can be replaced on the cheap. Pelech is awesome, and easily their best pick. That's why I vs him with Marchand. He's also part of why it's hard to rank Soro so high, just yet #goalieparadise. Another factor of why Potato Picks are pointless in discussing drafting skill (beyond the fact that your scouting team has no involvement) is that there is so much luck. Luck to win the lottery. And even moreso, luck to get a suck-pick in a good year. Seguin and Hedman were both #2's. Should TB get credit for taking Hedman instead of Seguin? Of course not. Should Boston's drafting be hurt because the team didn't suck enough to get a #1 overall. No. So just throw away the taters and see what the team does when the scouts and management have to earn their money. I think if you do that, you have to then go one step further and factor in total picks as part of looking at the volume of players. Boston's list looks better for having Hamilton and Seguin thanks to a trade for those picks; it could look a lot better if they hadn't traded away so many of their own picks. I'm thinking that if you take out the potato picks, then it should be like taking a walk - it doesn't count as an at-bat.
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