GDT: 2023 Caps NHL Draft Thread
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SecretaryofDefense5
Registered User
Wouldn't have hated if they were able to acquire Yamamato for the price of nothing.
- Jun 25, 2018
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Especially a scouting mechanism that only considers points, age, and league played in. Of course that's going to chronically underestimate guys who can contribute away from the puck like Leonard and overrate the little guys who rack up points but don't do anything else like Cristall. I'm still happy with the Cristall pick cause he's almost certainly got the highest upside of anyone left on the board there, but I just can't take the NHLe model seriously.
Carlzner
Registered User
Some of the comments from the USNTDP guys on the prospect board who have always had good takes were that Leonard was the play driver on his line and elevated Moore when placed on the 2nd line, and his puck possession was frequently praised.
He actually seems like a twabby guy if it wasn't for that one graph that ruined it
He actually seems like a twabby guy if it wasn't for that one graph that ruined it
- Jun 25, 2018
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No interest at all in Yamamoto. Anybody who can only put up 25 points in 58 games while playing exclusively on either Draisaitl or McDavid's wing should not be playing in the NHL. He's a younger but much worse Sheary.
twabby
Registered User
- Mar 9, 2010
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Some of the comments from the USNTDP guys on the prospect board who have always had good takes were that Leonard was the play driver on his line and elevated Moore when placed on the 2nd line, and his puck possession was frequently praised.
He actually seems like a twabby guy if it wasn't for that one graph that ruined it
He's fine! I don't hate the pick! It was above average but not exceptional.
Huh, kind of like Tom Wilson when you think about it.
Here's TSLH's *extensive* scouting report for Cristall, for anyone interested. It doesn't feature fancy stats or charts (it's much more eye-test oriented), but the person watched him a lot. It's... not glowing. But whatever!
Andrew Cristall:
Cristall is quite possibly one of the greatest enigmas of the entire 2023 draft. Appearing inside several top 5 throughout the season, he was also ranked towards the end of the first round by an equivalent number of people. If his talent does not leave anyone perplexed, his efficiency on the ice, leaves many uncertain.
Cristall is first and foremost an offensive player who advocates a spectacular and ‘Fancy’ style of play. His puck handling is excellent and easily rivals the best in this draft. That being said, he too often fell for me into the category of players who bring flash, but lack substance. I detect in him a certain lack of maturity in this regard when he tries to display all his abilities, without necessarily choosing the opportune moments.
It happens regularly to see Cristall bait the first player towards him and manage to beat him with a deke, the problem is that he will skate directly into the 2nd player and lose the puck. Although his handling of the puck is excellent, his plays often do not materialize.
Often within a quality, one can observe other attributes of the player that come to work in conjunction with the primary asset. In the case of Cristall, I have not often seen in his handling of the puck an ability to adapt to the pressure that has arisen on him. The vast majority of the time, he will take advantage of junior defensemen who will play the puck rather than the body. For me, he doesn’t have the explosion in his lateral skating stride to avoid the big defensemen in the NHL who will play the body instead.
When I talk about inefficiency and profusion of turnovers, here is an example:
In overtime, Kelowna has a power play (4 against 3), Cristall is at the top of the left circles with the puck.
He will look to fake a shot, change his angle to the outside and maraud with the puck, all that to end up nailed in the corner of the rink by the defender.
All this while he had all the space and time in the world !
Cristall’s playmaking talents are often sold as the main draw of his offensive game, yet that’s not what I’ve observed over the season.
Of course, he shows good vision and is able to orchestrate some good offensive sequences, but for me, the frequency of these plays does not manage to compensate for the number of turnovers he commits.
He is dangerous on the power plays when he moves in possession of the puck since he can shoot from anywhere, he draws defensive coverage on him.
Similar to what was apparent with his puck handling, Cristall sometimes has difficulty properly gauging when the pressure is closing on his passing options, it has happened time and time again to see him pass to a teammate he believed to be alone to finally see that he wasn’t.
I personally find him more dangerous as a shooter. His wrist shot is quite impressive. The puck hits the target with great velocity.
The quality of his hands comes out a lot in the way he uses his shot, he is able to raise the puck from the backhand, even being very close to the goalkeeper. It remains, however, when he wins the center of the ice that he is at his most dangerous. It is mainly on the powerplay that he will be able to take advantage of a static defensive coverage, we see him exuding confidence and challenging his opponents. He has the puck handling as well as the passing options at his disposal to sell his intentions to his opponents and that’s why he is so dangerous.
Unfortunately, Cristall was playing on the left on the power play, being left-handed himself, he did not have the luxury of being able to win the center of the offensive zone on his forehand. He has, however, developed a kind of shot all his own, as he will sell the wrist shot from the left side, then change the angle to the outside, step to the side and unleash a shot without having the defenseman in front of him to block the shot. What is impressive is how good the shot is despite the fact that he is far from an ideal body position to make such a shot. Cristall’s balance on his skates is still impressive.
He uses this kind of shot quite regularly, the problem is that even if it’s impressive, he changes his angle to go outside rather than to attack inside and also, in the train of thought that with his hands, when it works, it’s taking advantage of a cheating junior goaltender. I highly doubt that will work in the NHL.
Cristall’s decision-making seems to be a constant that emerges within each of his individual abilities. I’ve scratched my head several times seeing some of his plays, not to mention some execution errors on a few trivial plays.
He is the typical case of a player who tries to do too much and mismanages his risk-taking, for example, going in front of his net with the puck when he already has a player chasing him. He plays quite individually.
One thing that constantly resurfaces with Cristall as well is that he constantly needs to slow down the play when he wins the offensive zone. This causes some concerns as to whether he can be as good offensively when the game is played at a high pace. Also, he doesn’t have the physical strength to protect the puck and he doesn’t have the acceleration in his skating to draw a player in one direction and explode in another.
Not only does Cristall have to slow down the game, he also has this annoying habit of constantly turning his back to the play when he has the puck. He does this kind of play to assess if he doesn’t have any options that come up in the 2nd wave, but the number of times that translates into a turnover….
We have an example here
(Cristall is in white at the top of the screen, in possession of the puck)
The worst thing is that just before, he had a clean look to send his teammate on a breakaway !
It is a play that he performs several times per game!
Even in the neutral zone when he has the puck with the other team backchecking hard, he has to slow down the play, navigate, handle the puck, to finally pass it out of reach to a teammate or send the puck in an open-space in the offensive zone while his teammates had to slow down to avoid being offside. The worst thing is that it happened several times to see Cristall do this kind of play and stop skating afterwards.
This is also an aspect of his game in which he has been very inconsistent and which also raises concerns, his involvement and his work ethic.
At his best, he plays with a chip on his shoulder, looks hungry, backcheck and finishes his checks. But on other nights, his compete-level is just appalling. He’s nowhere to be found in the defensive zone, cheats offensively and if you give him a pass that’s a little out of reach, he doesn’t even skate to chase the puck. His defensive game is often non-existent.
It is not only defensively that Cristall’s involvement left something to be desired during the season, his desire to engage the body was also one.
There is an example here: the opposing team loses control of the puck in the neutral zone and one of Cristall’s teammate goes to recover the puck. Cristall has the center of the ice and he has an advantageous position on the defenseman. The interior is conceded to him and he could get a very good chance to score.
Instead, he looks right away to get to the other side behind the defender.
He could have physically competed for a chance, but he didn’t. Of course going to huddle behind the defender for a 2 on 1 was not a bad idea, it even shows the player’s awareness of his own weaknesses (acceleration and physical strength), which I myself consider to be a quality. But in this case, the play closed on him and he was never a viable passing option, and this is just one of many examples of similar plays.
It’s very common that when he skates to the corner with the puck, he just sends the puck towards the net, simply losing possession for his team.
As for his skating, Cristall moves well overall, but for a player of his size, he lacks separation speed.
I don’t really like to see him as an option in transition since he doesn’t have that necessary speed and also because he slows down the game too often and plays in an individualistic way.
Cristall demonstrates good agility on the ice, we often see him using the ’10-2′ technique where he skates heel-to-heel to make space and to mask his intentions. The problem is that in junior he is given more space than he will get in the NHL and he does not have the physical strength to protect the puck with his body.
The analysis may seem quite scathing to some, but it should be noted that I have no personal agenda, I only share what I observe in my viewing. I agree that Cristall has quite a talent and he definitely has the ability to make those who rank him too low look bad. That being said, by virtue of all the questions I have about his game, I can hardly see myself recommending his selection to my general manager. A player’s faults are to be taken into consideration, and in the case of Cristall, we are not at a single flaw to determine his eventual success in the NHL or not, there is simply too much variable in the equation to make me rank him too high.
Numbers of games watched: 28
Cristall is quite possibly one of the greatest enigmas of the entire 2023 draft. Appearing inside several top 5 throughout the season, he was also ranked towards the end of the first round by an equivalent number of people. If his talent does not leave anyone perplexed, his efficiency on the ice, leaves many uncertain.
Cristall is first and foremost an offensive player who advocates a spectacular and ‘Fancy’ style of play. His puck handling is excellent and easily rivals the best in this draft. That being said, he too often fell for me into the category of players who bring flash, but lack substance. I detect in him a certain lack of maturity in this regard when he tries to display all his abilities, without necessarily choosing the opportune moments.
It happens regularly to see Cristall bait the first player towards him and manage to beat him with a deke, the problem is that he will skate directly into the 2nd player and lose the puck. Although his handling of the puck is excellent, his plays often do not materialize.
Often within a quality, one can observe other attributes of the player that come to work in conjunction with the primary asset. In the case of Cristall, I have not often seen in his handling of the puck an ability to adapt to the pressure that has arisen on him. The vast majority of the time, he will take advantage of junior defensemen who will play the puck rather than the body. For me, he doesn’t have the explosion in his lateral skating stride to avoid the big defensemen in the NHL who will play the body instead.
When I talk about inefficiency and profusion of turnovers, here is an example:
In overtime, Kelowna has a power play (4 against 3), Cristall is at the top of the left circles with the puck.
He will look to fake a shot, change his angle to the outside and maraud with the puck, all that to end up nailed in the corner of the rink by the defender.
All this while he had all the space and time in the world !
Cristall’s playmaking talents are often sold as the main draw of his offensive game, yet that’s not what I’ve observed over the season.
Of course, he shows good vision and is able to orchestrate some good offensive sequences, but for me, the frequency of these plays does not manage to compensate for the number of turnovers he commits.
He is dangerous on the power plays when he moves in possession of the puck since he can shoot from anywhere, he draws defensive coverage on him.
Similar to what was apparent with his puck handling, Cristall sometimes has difficulty properly gauging when the pressure is closing on his passing options, it has happened time and time again to see him pass to a teammate he believed to be alone to finally see that he wasn’t.
I personally find him more dangerous as a shooter. His wrist shot is quite impressive. The puck hits the target with great velocity.
The quality of his hands comes out a lot in the way he uses his shot, he is able to raise the puck from the backhand, even being very close to the goalkeeper. It remains, however, when he wins the center of the ice that he is at his most dangerous. It is mainly on the powerplay that he will be able to take advantage of a static defensive coverage, we see him exuding confidence and challenging his opponents. He has the puck handling as well as the passing options at his disposal to sell his intentions to his opponents and that’s why he is so dangerous.
Unfortunately, Cristall was playing on the left on the power play, being left-handed himself, he did not have the luxury of being able to win the center of the offensive zone on his forehand. He has, however, developed a kind of shot all his own, as he will sell the wrist shot from the left side, then change the angle to the outside, step to the side and unleash a shot without having the defenseman in front of him to block the shot. What is impressive is how good the shot is despite the fact that he is far from an ideal body position to make such a shot. Cristall’s balance on his skates is still impressive.
He uses this kind of shot quite regularly, the problem is that even if it’s impressive, he changes his angle to go outside rather than to attack inside and also, in the train of thought that with his hands, when it works, it’s taking advantage of a cheating junior goaltender. I highly doubt that will work in the NHL.
Cristall’s decision-making seems to be a constant that emerges within each of his individual abilities. I’ve scratched my head several times seeing some of his plays, not to mention some execution errors on a few trivial plays.
He is the typical case of a player who tries to do too much and mismanages his risk-taking, for example, going in front of his net with the puck when he already has a player chasing him. He plays quite individually.
One thing that constantly resurfaces with Cristall as well is that he constantly needs to slow down the play when he wins the offensive zone. This causes some concerns as to whether he can be as good offensively when the game is played at a high pace. Also, he doesn’t have the physical strength to protect the puck and he doesn’t have the acceleration in his skating to draw a player in one direction and explode in another.
Not only does Cristall have to slow down the game, he also has this annoying habit of constantly turning his back to the play when he has the puck. He does this kind of play to assess if he doesn’t have any options that come up in the 2nd wave, but the number of times that translates into a turnover….
We have an example here
(Cristall is in white at the top of the screen, in possession of the puck)
The worst thing is that just before, he had a clean look to send his teammate on a breakaway !
It is a play that he performs several times per game!
Even in the neutral zone when he has the puck with the other team backchecking hard, he has to slow down the play, navigate, handle the puck, to finally pass it out of reach to a teammate or send the puck in an open-space in the offensive zone while his teammates had to slow down to avoid being offside. The worst thing is that it happened several times to see Cristall do this kind of play and stop skating afterwards.
This is also an aspect of his game in which he has been very inconsistent and which also raises concerns, his involvement and his work ethic.
At his best, he plays with a chip on his shoulder, looks hungry, backcheck and finishes his checks. But on other nights, his compete-level is just appalling. He’s nowhere to be found in the defensive zone, cheats offensively and if you give him a pass that’s a little out of reach, he doesn’t even skate to chase the puck. His defensive game is often non-existent.
It is not only defensively that Cristall’s involvement left something to be desired during the season, his desire to engage the body was also one.
There is an example here: the opposing team loses control of the puck in the neutral zone and one of Cristall’s teammate goes to recover the puck. Cristall has the center of the ice and he has an advantageous position on the defenseman. The interior is conceded to him and he could get a very good chance to score.
Instead, he looks right away to get to the other side behind the defender.
He could have physically competed for a chance, but he didn’t. Of course going to huddle behind the defender for a 2 on 1 was not a bad idea, it even shows the player’s awareness of his own weaknesses (acceleration and physical strength), which I myself consider to be a quality. But in this case, the play closed on him and he was never a viable passing option, and this is just one of many examples of similar plays.
It’s very common that when he skates to the corner with the puck, he just sends the puck towards the net, simply losing possession for his team.
As for his skating, Cristall moves well overall, but for a player of his size, he lacks separation speed.
I don’t really like to see him as an option in transition since he doesn’t have that necessary speed and also because he slows down the game too often and plays in an individualistic way.
Cristall demonstrates good agility on the ice, we often see him using the ’10-2′ technique where he skates heel-to-heel to make space and to mask his intentions. The problem is that in junior he is given more space than he will get in the NHL and he does not have the physical strength to protect the puck with his body.
The analysis may seem quite scathing to some, but it should be noted that I have no personal agenda, I only share what I observe in my viewing. I agree that Cristall has quite a talent and he definitely has the ability to make those who rank him too low look bad. That being said, by virtue of all the questions I have about his game, I can hardly see myself recommending his selection to my general manager. A player’s faults are to be taken into consideration, and in the case of Cristall, we are not at a single flaw to determine his eventual success in the NHL or not, there is simply too much variable in the equation to make me rank him too high.
Numbers of games watched: 28
Last edited:
NobodyBeatsTheWiz
Happy now?
It seems the model drastically punishes Leonard for his USHL production. It's not like the dude didn't produce at an elite clip for the program. Guys who have scored more goals in a season for the USNTDP: Caulfield, Eiserman (who's a likely top-5 pick next year), Mathews, Perrault, Kane, Kessel
Carlzner
Registered User
Gonna go out on a limb and say the model has no way of differentiating production based on Leonard's different opponents this past season.
From his prospect thread:
"His stats vs NCAA D1 teams are 14G 14A 28Pts in 17GP."
Granlund being a cap dump or buyout already makes this draft great no matter who the Caps pick.
SecretaryofDefense5
Registered User
NobodyBeatsTheWiz
Happy now?
The other thing about models, that gets consistently ignored, is that they only work over large sample sizes. That's how they (presumably) account for contextual differences in character, work rate, development environment, system usage, etc.
When considering a handful of prospects, the models can fall apart. Really easy to find counterexamples. They should be used as merely one tool of many to evaluate prospects.
When considering a handful of prospects, the models can fall apart. Really easy to find counterexamples. They should be used as merely one tool of many to evaluate prospects.
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SecretaryofDefense5
Registered User
Corey Pronman did not have kind words for Cristall. I like the pick but saying he is better than Leonard....is nuts.
Hivemind
We're Touched
He’s going to play NCAA hockey for at least one year before turning pro. His pro readiness is one of his more distinguishing factors, so hopefully he can jump into mostly NHL duty once he does go pro. But it could still be 2-3 years away, and possibly some split NHL/AHL time initially.
It’s rare that 18 year olds play in the NHL.
- Jun 25, 2018
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- 1,979
Just anecdotally from examples people have posted in this thread, it seems like the model has a lot of trouble with the smaller leagues too. It missed big time on Stutzle and Seider coming out of the DEL. The USHL being a major talent pipeline for the NHL is a pretty recent development, so I even if you believe in the methodology they might just not have enough of a sample size yet to properly evaluate guys coming from that league.
I want him just for his name. Do it for the Caps PR team, make their jobs easier!
Melkor
Registered User
My very first thought after watching this kid's tape. He seems like a more exciting prospect
You normally need to suck hard to find those guys. That, or get a steal in the draft (Brayden Point or Sebastian Aho) or find one through an acquisition (Mika Zibenajad or Jack Eichel). Strome is a serviceable 1C especially if he has a high end 2C/low end 1C supporting him. There is time for them to figure out their next 1C and who knows what Iorio or Chesley turn into. The Knights just won the Cup and most of their key players were acquired through trades and their best defenseman was a free agent acquisition.
The last two drafts have been encouraging. I think they nailed their first three picks last year (Miro, Chesley, Suzdalev) though I think Lane Huston might have been a better choice than Chesley. Their prospect pool has really turned around the last few years.
Could have added Malenstyn too who looks like he could be Hathaway 2.0.
Hivemind
We're Touched
Benson is 5’10” 170 at 17/18. He’s not nearly as small as you’re making him out to be. He’s bigger than Michkov, and not much behind Bedard. Jonathan Marchessault (5’ 9” 174) just won the Conn Smythe. There’s tons of “smaller” NHLers thriving in the league currently. Brad Marchand, Alex DeBrincat, Johnny Gaudreau, Yanni Gourde, Viktor Arvidsson, Cam Atkinson, Mats Zuccarello, Cole Caufield, etc.
HecticGlow
Registered User
NobodyBeatsTheWiz
Happy now?
Heavy on the Euros and college-bound guys with the later picks, please. That seems to be where the most resounding successes for late round picks come from.
