It's funny that is what we all are saying.
Untill they get to the big club no one knows.
Marincin hall and Sparkes look grt for the Marlies. Suck in the NHL .
Moore did anyone see this from him on the Marlies .
Yes, I saw this from Moore. I watched in mid 2017-18 Moore playing on the fourth line for the Marlies and said he should be on the first line. By the end of the season he was on the first line and in the playoffs looked like he would follow Johnsson's trajectory (if there was room for him to get a call up).
Marincin, Hall and Sparks were great on the Marlies, and, as you said being great on the Marlies is no indicator of NHL success. So Liljegren looking great on the Marlies means nothing.
You can say that we don't know until they are on the Leafs, but the organization doesn't believe that. They didn't see how good Nielsen would be on the Leafs before they traded him. They recognized, without putting him in the NHL lineup that he didn't have what it took. They didn't try Dermott out on the Leafs until his showed he could dominate on the Marlies - dominate production wise. What we have as a good indicator of success is production. It is not perfect and there are outliers, but they are rare, and it is a bad idea to assume that a prospect you like will be an outlier.
Sticky said that Gordeev's production was low and he shouldn't get an ELC.
Everyone responded emotionally saying that Sticky hadn't watched Gordeev play, and Gordeev was really good defensively and in transition, and that points don't mean anything etc.
Nope, of course that wasn't the case. Because people are rational when it is not one of their favorite prospects.
Liljegren's production is very low. It has been for 110 AHL games now. It has been for 3 years now, including his time back in Sweden and International competition. It was not before that time. I watched Liljegren play games in the SuperElit at 16. I don't mean highlight clips. I mean full games. He was completely dominant. He was on a bad team. When he was not on the ice it was completely tilted against his team. When he was on the ice it was completely tilted for his team. Didn't matter who he was on with or against. Almost all those players were 2 - 3 years older than him. Same goes for International tournament games when he was 16. The question always is does the player have the ability to take that to the next level? For the last several years the answer has looked less and less promising. Liljegren has plenty of tools. I already knew that from watching him when he was 16 and watching him last year. Does he have the toolbox? Wish he did, but at this point, it doesn't look that way.
But when people say that, others loose their minds. Wheeler and Pronman are two prospect evaluators who are very predisposed to love a player like Liljegren. But as they have become less and less enamored with him they have received nothing but invective from the mob. They were completely right in their assessment. Dubas talked up Liljegren last December - saying that before the injury they had been hoping that he would have been challenging for a spot in the spring. At the same time, according to Friedman the Leafs were down on Liljegren, and it appears Dubas was offering Liljegren in a trade, but the Kings were down on him too. I would say that it is 50/50 that the Leafs trade Liljegren before he plays a game with the big club. Makes more sense then subjecting him to fan expectations as a first rounder that he can't meet. The reassessment on him by Leafs fans in the weeks after a trade are going to be amazing.
