2009 Born for the 2025 OHL DRAFT

[OHL4Life]

holy clueless

i try not to generalize and i try to keep an open mind. and to be fair

-its not just hockey parents, my grand daughter is in competitive dance and its way worse then any hockey parent youll see.

-there are very, very good parents who do say 'you need to be better' to their kids and dont allow them to take the coop out. weather or not they make it in hockey its a life lesson that will make them better people down the road when they are once again faced with a situation that they need to push through. but little johnny only got drafted because hes related to the gm, well, sure but there were 299 other kids taken too, so you should have been 299th on the list, not 300th.

but for whatever reason, maybe because the passion and how important the sport is in canada, and because its been a 10/15 year finanical and emotional investment, when a draft happens and a player doesnt make it, a majority just cant say 'ya, that on my kid, he wasn't good' or 'well, im just a dad, i dont really have a background in player development, hockey or drafting, maybe im a bit to emotionally involved to see it how it is'. they cant detach themselves emotionally.

hilariosuly, some of them will be business owners or managers and hire their kid over a more qualified or suitable candidate int he business world, or put in a call to get their kid a job, and think that they are heling them. but if that happens in hockey, the system is broken. you cant have it both ways. you cant complain about favouritim in a draft but then use it a year or two later in the business world. simply hypocritical.

 

[AttackBeacher]

Not the point, intent, or context of the situation that was being talked about. But I like the humour. Lol.

The point was that some kids, who are good and are actually better than undeserving kids who routinely get drafted, and who the grand poo-bahs on here actually agreed are better than maybe the bottom 100 kids, will simply quit. Call them quitters or babies or whiners or whatever makes you feel like a big tough man. My point wasn’t that everyone should get an invite. It was simply that some won’t AND they’re better than the undeserving bunch of “favours kids”.

I get it - it’s a business and admittedly I’m thinking like a fan who has watched for many many years, but not thinking like an OHL exec.

This was fun. Cheers,

With all due respect, as a season ticket holder for a team, if taking a player in the 15th round allows them to get a better player in the 2nd, then I would be awfully upset if that team didn't agree to that. I think most fans would agree with that statement.

The Attack are generally pretty good with late picks, last year we started with a 12th round D who was in his 4th year on the team move on and signed a 14th round draft pick goalie who may end up starting. I have pretty solid faith that they can pull some talent out of those rounds. That said, the success rate of players drafted in that group is pretty minimal, less then 2/3 percent Id think even for a good team over the years, so if drafting an agents client is part of a draft day deal to get a better player down the road, I do it all day long.

Most teams can find or invite players that would be a 15th round pick in the U18 loop or even in the U18 draft where some talent seems to make its way into the league.

To echo what others have said, if not being drafted is what puts the player out of hockey for good, then I would think that he probably wasn't mentally strong enough or love the game enough to keep playing for the love of the game or to try to earn another shot.

 

[frontsfan67]

-its not just hockey parents, my grand daughter is in competitive dance and its way worse then any hockey parent youll see.

100% competitive soccer too id argue

-there are very, very good parents who do say 'you need to be better' to their kids and dont allow them to take the coop out. weather or not they make it in hockey its a life lesson that will make them better people down the road when they are once again faced with a situation that they need to push through. but little johnny only got drafted because hes related to the gm, well, sure but there were 299 other kids taken too, so you should have been 299th on the list, not 300th.

Exactly. Less of the damn participation medals for showing up.

but for whatever reason, maybe because the passion and how important the sport is in canada, and because its been a 10/15 year finanical and emotional investment, when a draft happens and a player doesnt make it, a majority just cant say 'ya, that on my kid, he wasn't good' or 'well, im just a dad, i dont really have a background in player development, hockey or drafting, maybe im a bit to emotionally involved to see it how it is'. they cant detach themselves emotionally.

Oh for sure. Big part of it and why former professional players- their kids usually do well because they can attest to when they were their sons(or daughters) age and some of the struggles they went through.

hilariosuly, some of them will be business owners or managers and hire their kid over a more qualified or suitable candidate int he business world, or put in a call to get their kid a job, and think that they are heling them. but if that happens in hockey, the system is broken. you cant have it both ways. you cant complain about favouritim in a draft but then use it a year or two later in the business world. simply hypocritical.

Yep happens all the time and crickets- because you can’t do anything about it. Unless it is unionized obviously but even then I’ve heard some stories there too.

The way I see it- the owner is the one paying out the money- he puts the gm in charge of making the selections- the scouts mainly give the feedback to the gms where they can contemplate the best way to build their team.

They’re the ones making the picks and once you make it you can’t go back- so complaining is just people wanting to hear themselves think. There’s usually reasons for why players go where they do.

Sure a guy like Debrincat who went undrafted was a guy teams missed but how many of those guys are there really every year? And among those kids how many generally make the NHL? Lots of stuff goes into it and I won’t personally lose any sleep for Andrew Raycrofts son being drafted by the fronts.

 

[OMG67]

Not the point, intent, or context of the situation that was being talked about. But I like the humour. Lol.

The point was that some kids, who are good and are actually better than undeserving kids who routinely get drafted, and who the grand poo-bahs on here actually agreed are better than maybe the bottom 100 kids, will simply quit. Call them quitters or babies or whiners or whatever makes you feel like a big tough man. My point wasn’t that everyone should get an invite. It was simply that some won’t AND they’re better than the undeserving bunch of “favours kids”.

I get it - it’s a business and admittedly I’m thinking like a fan who has watched for many many years, but not thinking like an OHL exec.

This was fun. Cheers,

I don’t think anyone is truly suggesting that the top 300 kids get drafted every year. If the top 300 kids aren’t drafted then there will always be players that “should have” been drafted that weren’t.

That is not the issue.

The issue is when the draft consists of way too many rounds, the distribution curve starts to flatten and the degree of variance between skill of players starts to flatten with it. By the time we get to round 11, the variance in skill or projected skill tightens. The difference between player 200 and 400 is less than the difference between player 100 and 150.

This is why I am saying that bickering over who should be a 14th round pick is virtually meaningless. No one should be picked after round 10 anyway. For the most part, I don’t think many can argue that there are players picked in round 14 that should have been top 10. Not many. Where the bickering begins is the players picked in round 12 are too close to players that would have been picked in round 17 had there been 17 rounds.

Rounds 11 through 15 are a combination of politics picks, risky hard to sign Americans, and local kids that help fill out a training camp roster that may turn out to be something if all the stars align perfectly. One in about twenty-five of those players play multiple seasons. And maybe one in fifty play a meaningful role.

So, the issue is trying to make it an accomplishment to be drafted in rounds 11 through 15 when the picks for the most part are relatively meaningless. If there is an emphasis of being drafted in those rounds as if it is a rubber stamp on a hockey career, it is the absolute wrong message to send. I understand that it is somewhat of a feather int he cap of a player but it is not like that kid is going to run around at age 30 saying they were a 13th round pick of the Kitchener rangers and went to a couple training camps at 16 and 17. Sure, it may be a good experience but at the end of the day, the real prospects are the ones drafted in rounds 1 through 5. 6 through 10 have a shot depending on the depth of the franchise they were picked by. 11th and later is at best a crap shoot in a good year. If they were drafted by a piss poor team (or a Contender that graduates 15 players), then maybe the needs dictate scraping the bottom of the barrel so an opportunity may present itself.

But the reality is, good players will always be uncovered. Some kids mature later and are given an opportunity through the U-18 draft. Some play well in Jr B as a 16 year old, graduate to a JrA club and things click at 17 and they end up int he league as a free agent after a great 18 year old training camp as an invite. It happens. Players that quit usually have a second sport they are really good at so they transition. We are talking about tremendous natural athletes so moving out of a VERY expensive sport like hockey and into something else makes a lot of sense and it frees up some additional social time. Some focus more on school. Whatever the reason, if a player is really good at something else and they get drafted in the 14th round and that motivates them to keep playing, they are being motivated for the wrong reason. Being a 14th round pick shouldn’t be the deciding factor to keep playing at a high level.

 

[Isaac Nootin]

The point was that some kids, who are good and are actually better than undeserving kids who routinely get drafted

Who decided these drafted kids were undeserving? You? The kid that went undrafted? The Parent?

 

[bobber]

Who decided these drafted kids were undeserving? You? The kid that went undrafted? The Parent?

OHL scouts have seen enough of these players over the years. Players that get drafted deserve to get drafted. After the first few rounds it's mostly a crap shoot hoping for a diamond in the rough. Some players drafted in the very late rounds might be for favours. These players will never get a sniff of OHL but can brag they were drafted.

 

[DraftGuyyy]

I posted on here way back, it seems like it was eons ago. I can add whatever context for some from an admitted parents perspective.

My son is an 08, drafted last year albeit late. He played on a sub par to poor team and generally had some good lets call it hype around him heading into the year.

As stated previously, my background is in engineering so perhaps im a bit more steady and unemotional vs some of the other parents and posters on here, maybe not as I hate to assume anything.

The year started off on a different tone then normal. Alot of the normal parents on our group seemed to get wrapped up in the Draft Year hype. They would be all about scouts and rankings and talking about where their kid would be taken. Im not really a hockey guy but did strike up a friendship randomly with one scout, they did not draft my son for what its worth. It was refressing only in the fact that I could have someone to throw things off and kill alot of the outside noise. I didnt ask and he didnt give feedback on my kid, I think I was pretty good with keeping an even keel with his projection. But I would talk to him about some of the other players on the team, never slagging or anything, if nothing else I would somewhat pump their tires, and he would give feedback on why he would or did not like them. Almost every time what the parents were suggesting as far as 'draft stock' was way off base on what he felt. Half to three quarters of the team felt like they would be a top 5/6 round pick, and we were a bottom end team. That doesn't make logical sense to me, but I never really brought it up.

Come draft day, some outside lists said my kid would be a top 5 round guy, another player on the team a top 5 round guys as well (the scout that I knew said he didn't see him as a draft pick). My son went in the late rounds, that player did not go at all, not many if any other players on the team were drafted.

As the draft moved on, the parent group chat was more about complaining, calling things fixed, accusing other parents from other organizations of paying to be drafted. It was incredibly toxic. I didn't think that this group that I had known for years was capable of this stuff, but here you go. I later learned that the player who did not get drafted who was rated by the third party as a top 5 pick father later accused me of paying to have my son picked, which to be frank i have no idea how I would even broach that subject, let alone do it.

My general point is that as some others have said, parents get really, really emotional and weird around the draft. Its a rather large investment for them both financial and emotionally and when someone says their son is not ready to be drafted yet, it takes a hit. I don't know if they are capable of detaching themselves emotionally from everything.

Secondly regarding being drafted late, I would like to hope that my son, if he was a late pick or not, would continue to play the game he loves just because he loves it, not to try to justify or placate some third party draft that he has no really say over outside of his ability to play hockey. He started playing for the love of it, that should be unchanged regardless of the draft. If he was undrafted, and told me he wanted to quit because of it, id be pretty disapointed that he was not as mentally strong and have the fortatude that I thought I had taught him at an early age. Maybe im programmed a bit differently then some othes? Who knows.

 

[I Loveallsports]

I posted on here way back, it seems like it was eons ago. I can add whatever context for some from an admitted parents perspective.

My son is an 08, drafted last year albeit late. He played on a sub par to poor team and generally had some good lets call it hype around him heading into the year.

As stated previously, my background is in engineering so perhaps im a bit more steady and unemotional vs some of the other parents and posters on here, maybe not as I hate to assume anything.

The year started off on a different tone then normal. Alot of the normal parents on our group seemed to get wrapped up in the Draft Year hype. They would be all about scouts and rankings and talking about where their kid would be taken. Im not really a hockey guy but did strike up a friendship randomly with one scout, they did not draft my son for what its worth. It was refressing only in the fact that I could have someone to throw things off and kill alot of the outside noise. I didnt ask and he didnt give feedback on my kid, I think I was pretty good with keeping an even keel with his projection. But I would talk to him about some of the other players on the team, never slagging or anything, if nothing else I would somewhat pump their tires, and he would give feedback on why he would or did not like them. Almost every time what the parents were suggesting as far as 'draft stock' was way off base on what he felt. Half to three quarters of the team felt like they would be a top 5/6 round pick, and we were a bottom end team. That doesn't make logical sense to me, but I never really brought it up.

Come draft day, some outside lists said my kid would be a top 5 round guy, another player on the team a top 5 round guys as well (the scout that I knew said he didn't see him as a draft pick). My son went in the late rounds, that player did not go at all, not many if any other players on the team were drafted.

As the draft moved on, the parent group chat was more about complaining, calling things fixed, accusing other parents from other organizations of paying to be drafted. It was incredibly toxic. I didn't think that this group that I had known for years was capable of this stuff, but here you go. I later learned that the player who did not get drafted who was rated by the third party as a top 5 pick father later accused me of paying to have my son picked, which to be frank i have no idea how I would even broach that subject, let alone do it.

My general point is that as some others have said, parents get really, really emotional and weird around the draft. Its a rather large investment for them both financial and emotionally and when someone says their son is not ready to be drafted yet, it takes a hit. I don't know if they are capable of detaching themselves emotionally from everything.

Secondly regarding being drafted late, I would like to hope that my son, if he was a late pick or not, would continue to play the game he loves just because he loves it, not to try to justify or placate some third party draft that he has no really say over outside of his ability to play hockey. He started playing for the love of it, that should be unchanged regardless of the draft. If he was undrafted, and told me he wanted to quit because of it, id be pretty disapointed that he was not as mentally strong and have the fortatude that I thought I had taught him at an early age. Maybe im programmed a bit differently then some othes? Who knows.

Good read. Thx for sharing