HF Habs: 2024 NHL Draft Thread

[TesseractPrice]

The worst part about this draft is that the Sens will probably get a really good LD prospect

 

[Sorinth]

Was Slaf ready when he moved to the top line? Was Caufield ready when he moved to the top line? Opporutiny and investing in a player, especially on a losing team is much more important than gimme points to sub-par vets and catering to the fans who can't bear watching a team lose.

I think it's fairly safe to say that yes Slaf and Caufield were in fact ready and they proved it by producing. Being ready is always going to be a subjective evaluation and can only be proven right or wrong after actually being given the opportunity. We won't know for sure if Guhle is ready for #1 PP duties until he gets the opportunity on the #1 PP unit, but it's fair to say no one wants to see Guhle given that opportunity only to struggle with it so you have to be very confident or not have a choice due to injuries.

 

[Harry Kakalovich]

The calculus is always is the improvement of Dickinson vs Guhle (if there even is any) bigger than the improvement of the forward on basically Gallagher.

Trading a surplus for a need is a nice idea but again it's more rare than people make it out to be.

Another way to say this is it depends on how good the prospect is. IF the LD is a franchise player according to the scouts, they should take him. IF the LD is a bonafide #1 according to the scouts, they should take him.

Similar with if the player is a F. Depends on who the scouts like (#1C etc.).

Gallagher (and most Habs on the current roster) are irrelevant because drafted players typically take 2-3 years minimum to have a true impact, and the vast majority of those vets will all be gone by then.

 

[Habs Halifax]

Catton is at 5.11 , 175 now. 163 was many months ago. He said it twice already to French medias 3 weeks ago

A little better but I don't see him being a gritty skilled type. I doubt Catton get as physically strong as Suzuki has gotten with his development. We are talking about anomalies with Suzuki's focus on adding muscle.

If I'm wrong on Catton, I'll gladly eat crow on this. I just don't have him in my top 6 consideration.

 

[Habs Halifax]

And then we pass on him for Helenius.

Not with me. I think we got our Helenius with Beck and/or Kapanen. Doubt Helenius is that much better but it's always possible.

My targets are one of Dickinson, Demidov, Iggy, Lindstrom. Those are my BPA's from 2-5. Lindstrom being the wild card and someone like Buium is on par with Lindstrom.

 

[Ozmodiar]

Pick Dickinson, then trade Matheson and the late 1st to a team who missed, but were close to, the playoffs. Minny, Flyers, Detroit…

Dickinson Reinbacher
Ghule Mailloux
Hutson Xhekaj

Draft Sennecke, Eiserman, Helenius … someone in that top 15 before the “drop-off”.

 

[Kents polished head]

I'd go to war with you on this one. This is beyond stupid.

I know you don't like skill and small players but it's just as stupid to say Sennecke over Catton, or even Lindstrom (Unless the injury scare is real.)

There should be no scenario in which Sennecke is picked before any of the 5 top forwards. He's just not it.

When you always hear/read "He has not grown into his body just yet" as one of the primary reasons to be excited about the guy, you know there's a HUGE potential for it turning into a disaster.

That being said, I fully expect him to be our pick. This is the most Montreal Canadiens thing to do. Coming out of two consecutive top-5 picks with Reinbacher and Sennecke. WTFG.

 

[Mrb1p]

When you always hear/read "He has not grown into his body just yet" as one of the primary reasons to be excited about the guy, you know there's a HUGE potential for it turning into a disaster.

That being said, I fully expect him to be our pick. This is the most Montreal Canadiens thing to do. Coming out of two consecutive top-5 picks with Reinbacher and Sennecke. WTFG.

It's also ignoring that almost all these players haven't grown into their bodies yet. The only player that has grown in his body in the top 15 is Levshunov and maybe Dickinson. Cattom is a flyweight, Iginla is a tooth pick and still 17, Buium looked like my girlfriend from 30 years ago, etc. It's just a ridiculous notion overall.

 

[WeThreeKings]

I think it's a bit too black and white to say only his mock drafts are influenced by what he hears. I think there is a mix of both. Like Yakemchuk being so high on his list all year to me screams he heard something from nhl scouts.

Fair enough, let's say there is definitely some bias from what he hears from scouts. It's natural to do that, but I'd say that his mock draft based on what he is hearing is a more accurate representation of how the draft will go vs. how he has his list structured.

He does have a big thing for Yakemchuk and did say some scouts have him as the best D in the class and others aren't sold on the skating and IQ.

Another way to say this is it depends on how good the prospect is. IF the LD is a franchise player according to the scouts, they should take him. IF the LD is a bonafide #1 according to the scouts, they should take him.

Similar with if the player is a F. Depends on who the scouts like (#1C etc.).

Gallagher (and most Habs on the current roster) are irrelevant because drafted players typically take 2-3 years minimum to have a true impact, and the vast majority of those vets will all be gone by then.

Basically what I would challenge everyone to think through on the BPA vs. positional need argument, when people are saying just take the BPA and it's X LHD.

Do people honestly think the Habs would pass on someone they thought is a 1D or a franchise defenseman because he's a left shot UNLESS they had the staunch belief that they already had that in Guhle or Hutson?

The logical answer to the thought exercise is that either the scouting staff isn't as high on the LD in this class as some people are or they are that high on what they have in house.

They can and could be wrong, but it doesn't mean the process is wrong.

When you always hear/read "He has not grown into his body just yet" as one of the primary reasons to be excited about the guy, you know there's a HUGE potential for it turning into a disaster.

That being said, I fully expect him to be our pick. This is the most Montreal Canadiens thing to do. Coming out of two consecutive top-5 picks with Reinbacher and Sennecke. WTFG.

I didn't know Reinbacher busted and just a year ago people were kicking their dogs over taking Slaf at 1 instead of Wright/Cooley and saying that is the most Montreal Canadiens thing to do.

If we get Sennecke, you will probably have his jersey at some point during his career.

 

[SannywithoutCompy]

Fair enough, let's say there is definitely some bias from what he hears from scouts. It's natural to do that, but I'd say that his mock draft based on what he is hearing is a more accurate representation of how the draft will go vs. how he has his list structured.

He does have a big thing for Yakemchuk and did say some scouts have him as the best D in the class and others aren't sold on the skating and IQ.



Basically what I would challenge everyone to think through on the BPA vs. positional need argument, when people are saying just take the BPA and it's X LHD.

Do people honestly think the Habs would pass on someone they thought is a 1D or a franchise defenseman because he's a left shot UNLESS they had the staunch belief that they already had that in Guhle or Hutson?

The logical answer to the thought exercise is that either the scouting staff isn't as high on the LD in this class as some people are or they are that high on what they have in house.

They can and could be wrong, but it doesn't mean the process is wrong.



I didn't know Reinbacher busted and just a year ago people were kicking their dogs over taking Slaf at 1 instead of Wright/Cooley and saying that is the most Montreal Canadiens thing to do.

If we get Sennecke, you will probably have his jersey at some point during his career.

I wasn't a huge fan of the Reinbacher pick (to put it lightly), and Sennecke is 9th on my board but his potential is as high as any of the other forwards in his tier (Catton, Lindstrom, Iginla)

 

[ReHabs]

Buium looked like my girlfriend from 30 years ago, etc. It's just a ridiculous notion overall.

I'm so sorry for you

 

[Kents polished head]

I didn't know Reinbacher busted and just a year ago people were kicking their dogs over taking Slaf at 1 instead of Wright/Cooley and saying that is the most Montreal Canadiens thing to do.

If we get Sennecke, you will probably have his jersey at some point during his career.

This is the same organization that drafted Mesar before Kulich and made many very "discussable" picks last summer.

This is the same organization that based pretty much all of their arguments for picking Reinbacher last summer on "but but but... RHDs ARE HARD TO FIND".

And this is the same organization that has Martin "Biceps Club" Lapointe and Nick "Lias Andersson/Vitali Kravtsov/Kaapo Kakko" Bobrov as the guys calling the shots at the draft.

Except an encouraging 50 points season from Slafkovsky they have done absolutely nothing to warrant the blind confidence many fans seem to have towards them. I really don't get "well they deserve our confidence". Urhm. For what exactly? For having a 1st overall pick having a 50 points season? Wow. High standards we got here.

And there's absolutely no noise on Sennecke being picked THAT high at the draft anywhere except in Montreal. McKeen's and a ton of other scouting websites/magasines have the guy as low as 14th-16th.

So yeah. There's absolutely no scenario in which this fanbase should not be at least a little uneasy with getting out of two consecutive top-5 picks with;

A) A guy who regressed in his D+1 year
B) A guy who struggled putting up a point per game in junior this season.

This is extremely underwhelming to put it lightly, and a lot of things have to fall perfectly into places for it not backfiring one way or another.

Not writing down one of these two guys as busts, far from it. But if that's what I was told 3 years of tanking was going to net us a couple of years ago, I would have been depressed as hell.

 

[Jaynki]

This is the same organization that based pretty much all of their arguments for picking Reinbacher last summer on "but but but... RHDs ARE HARD TO FIND".

Its a fact tho,

I know a team not far from MTL that would trade their 90 point small winger for any top pair RD but there is no such trade available to them.

 

[overlords]

The worst part about this draft is that the Sens will probably get a really good LD prospect

They'll ruin him if that makes you feel better

 

[ReHabs]

Its a fact tho,

I know a team not far from MTL that would trade their 90 point small winger for any top pair RD but there is no such trade available to them.

As of his D+1 Reinbacher is not a 'top pair RD' but we both know D+1 is not D+2, so let's see

btw, regarding Sennecke...

Ranked #19 by CONSOLIDATED RANKING
Ranked #9 by ELITEPROSPECTS.COM
Ranked #19 by TSN/BOB McKENZIE
Ranked #12 by TSN/CRAIG BUTTON
Ranked #27 by THN/FERRARI
Ranked #30 by THN/KENNEDY
Ranked #29 by MCKEEN'S HOCKEY
Ranked #21 by FLOHOCKEY/CHRIS PETERS
Ranked #20 by FCHOCKEY
Ranked #17 by DAILY FACEOFF
Ranked #13 by NHL CENTRAL SCOUTING (NA Skaters)
Ranked #29 by ISS HOCKEY
Ranked #14 by SPORTSNET/COSENTINO
Ranked #18 by SPORTSNET/BUKALA
Ranked #45 by RECRUIT SCOUTING
Ranked #20 by DOBBERPROSPECTS
Ranked #22 by DRAFT PROSPECTS HOCKEY
Ranked #25 by SMAHT SCOUTING

 

[SannywithoutCompy]

As of his D+1 Reinbacher is not a 'top pair RD' but we both know D+1 is not D+2, so let's see

btw, regarding Sennecke...

Ranked #19 by CONSOLIDATED RANKING
Ranked #9 by ELITEPROSPECTS.COM
Ranked #19 by TSN/BOB McKENZIE
Ranked #12 by TSN/CRAIG BUTTON
Ranked #27 by THN/FERRARI
Ranked #30 by THN/KENNEDY
Ranked #29 by MCKEEN'S HOCKEY
Ranked #21 by FLOHOCKEY/CHRIS PETERS
Ranked #20 by FCHOCKEY
Ranked #17 by DAILY FACEOFF
Ranked #13 by NHL CENTRAL SCOUTING (NA Skaters)
Ranked #29 by ISS HOCKEY
Ranked #14 by SPORTSNET/COSENTINO
Ranked #18 by SPORTSNET/BUKALA
Ranked #45 by RECRUIT SCOUTING
Ranked #20 by DOBBERPROSPECTS
Ranked #22 by DRAFT PROSPECTS HOCKEY
Ranked #25 by SMAHT SCOUTING

Should look at where Scheifele was ranked towards the end of the year. 16th for NA Skaters on central scouting.

 

[Mrb1p]

Its a fact tho,

I know a team not far from MTL that would trade their 90 point small winger for any top pair RD but there is no such trade available to them.

Does that team also have a top pair LD at 22 yO? Does the team struggle to score goals, or is it one of the better team at doing so? How many ppg+ players does that team have? Is the number zero?

 

[Kents polished head]

Does that team also have a top pair LD at 22 yO? Does the team struggle to score goals, or is it one of the better team at doing so? How many ppg+ players does that team have? Is the number zero?

You can even make it "How many surefire NHL forward prospects does that team have?"

This is what is most concerning to me. Right now there's absolutely nothing coming up at forward in the pipelines. I know people like to swing for the homerun. I get it. I really do.

But at some point you need projectable NHL prospects up front. Not just guys who "will be dominant if everything falls into place".

 

[Habs Halifax]

There should be no scenario in which Sennecke is picked before any of the 5 top forwards. He's just not it.

Agree with you on this one. And I like Sennecke. He's just not in my top 10. 10-13 range yes. I think he's got top 6F in him. Batherson type

 

[Saundies]

Was Slaf ready when he moved to the top line? Was Caufield ready when he moved to the top line? Opporutiny and investing in a player, especially on a losing team is much more important than gimme points to sub-par vets and catering to the fans who can't bear watching a team lose.


I'd go to war with you on this one. This is beyond stupid.

I know you don't like skill and small players but it's just as stupid to say Sennecke over Catton, or even Lindstrom (Unless the injury scare is real.)

There should be no scenario in which Sennecke is picked before any of the 5 top forwards. He's just not it.

I fully expect it to happen just because it's the Habs and it feels like a Habs at the Draft type move. We're like the Raiders of the NHL Draft.

 

[Jaynki]

As of his D+1 Reinbacher is not a 'top pair RD' but we both know D+1 is not D+2, so let's see

btw, regarding Sennecke...

Ranked #19 by CONSOLIDATED RANKING
Ranked #9 by ELITEPROSPECTS.COM
Ranked #19 by TSN/BOB McKENZIE
Ranked #12 by TSN/CRAIG BUTTON
Ranked #27 by THN/FERRARI
Ranked #30 by THN/KENNEDY
Ranked #29 by MCKEEN'S HOCKEY
Ranked #21 by FLOHOCKEY/CHRIS PETERS
Ranked #20 by FCHOCKEY
Ranked #17 by DAILY FACEOFF
Ranked #13 by NHL CENTRAL SCOUTING (NA Skaters)
Ranked #29 by ISS HOCKEY
Ranked #14 by SPORTSNET/COSENTINO
Ranked #18 by SPORTSNET/BUKALA
Ranked #45 by RECRUIT SCOUTING
Ranked #20 by DOBBERPROSPECTS
Ranked #22 by DRAFT PROSPECTS HOCKEY
Ranked #25 by SMAHT SCOUTING

We will see for Reinbacher. He was pretty good in Laval tho.

As for Sennecke, i don't really care about rankings. Especially since most of them are out of dates. In his case, it's all about growth and ceiling.

When i watch Demidov, Iginla, Lindstrom and Sennecke, i see player in the same sphere of prospect. All of them have things going for them and things against them. Sennecke might have better hands then Demidov and i do believe he has the biggest upside of them all, but he is also the one that needs the most polishing.

From what i have seen and from what i know, i would pick all three ahead of Sennecke, but there is not a lot of difference between them all and Sennecke has tremendous potential. I see many similarities with a player like Jakub Voracek in him.

 

[Habs Halifax]

You can even make it "How many surefire NHL forward prospects does that team have?"

This is what is most concerning to me. Right now there's absolutely nothing coming up at forward in the pipelines. I know people like to swing for the homerun. I get it. I really do.

But at some point you need projectable NHL prospects up front. Not just guys who "will be dominant if everything falls into place".

This is why I like Iggy a lot. Late riser yes but then you look at his resume and you just see top 6F at a min. He has a real shot at being a top line asset and I really like how he is trending and being one of the youngest.

1) One of the youngest and hottest trending.
2) He already has good size/weight and was 1.5 months away from being in the 2025 draft. This is a huge plus for me because physical strength at an early age is a good indicator of how much hard work they are putting into it.
3) His shot is already NHL quality
4) Certainly not going to be just a perimeter skilled type
5) Skating is good. Cross overs and edge work is great.
6) Hard worker. You can tell he is working at the parts of the game that translate to the NHL well.
7) Ability to navigate in traffic and along the boards is very mature for someone his age.
8) Hockey IQ is very good from what I see.

I do like Dickinson and Dimidov equally as good. They also have top pairing and top line potential and their fall back is stable (top 4D or top 6F). Lindstrom is a wild card for me. I can see a monster and I can also see a bust. Catton and Buium with honerable mention but they are in the waive after.

 

[Habs Halifax]

We will see for Reinbacher. He was pretty good in Laval tho.

As for Sennecke, i don't really care about rankings. Especially since most of them are out of dates. In his case, it's all about growth and ceiling.

When i watch Demidov, Iginla, Lindstrom and Sennecke, i see player in the same sphere of prospect. All of them have things going for them and things against them. Sennecke might have better hands then Demidov and i do believe he has the biggest upside of them all, but he is also the one that needs the most polishing.

From what i have seen and from what i know, i would pick all three ahead of Sennecke, but there is not a lot of difference between them all and Sennecke has tremendous potential. I see many similarities with a player like Jakub Voracek in him.

Bob's ranking is not out of date. Sennecke is 14th

Bob McKenzie's NHL Draft Ranking: An 'unpredictable ride' after Macklin Celebrini | TSN

Ten out of 10 NHL club team scouts surveyed in the past week by TSN have Macklin Celebrini as the undisputed No. 1 draft prospect. Beyond Celebrini, though? Buckle up.

www.tsn.ca

McKeens ranking is not out of date. Sennecke is also 14th.

Home

On Elite Prospects, his consolidated ranking is 19th but that may be out of date. I personally have him 10-13 range. The 3rd waive of talent in this top 13.

McKeen's rankings in their top 5 is exactly my top 5. I had that ranking before I seen their list. And their top 13 or top 15 is very close to how I see the talent in this draft.

 

[WeThreeKings]

This is the same organization that drafted Mesar before Kulich and made many very "discussable" picks last summer.

This is the same organization that based pretty much all of their arguments for picking Reinbacher last summer on "but but but... RHDs ARE HARD TO FIND".

And this is the same organization that has Martin "Biceps Club" Lapointe and Nick "Lias Andersson/Vitali Kravtsov/Kaapo Kakko" Bobrov as the guys calling the shots at the draft.

Except an encouraging 50 points season from Slafkovsky they have done absolutely nothing to warrant the blind confidence many fans seem to have towards them. I really don't get "well they deserve our confidence". Urhm. For what exactly? For having a 1st overall pick having a 50 points season? Wow. High standards we got here.

And there's absolutely no noise on Sennecke being picked THAT high at the draft anywhere except in Montreal. McKeen's and a ton of other scouting websites/magasines have the guy as low as 14th-16th.

So yeah. There's absolutely no scenario in which this fanbase should not be at least a little uneasy with getting out of two consecutive top-5 picks with;

A) A guy who regressed in his D+1 year
B) A guy who struggled putting up a point per game in junior this season.

This is extremely underwhelming to put it lightly, and a lot of things have to fall perfectly into places for it not backfiring one way or another.

Not writing down one of these two guys as busts, far from it. But if that's what I was told 3 years of tanking was going to net us a couple of years ago, I would have been depressed as hell.

• I didn't know that Mesar busted and Kulich made it. They also took Beck at 33, Hutson at 62, got Engstrom in the 3rd round, all of which are looking very good. Do you think it's common that scouting staffs, even elite ones, hit on every pick? Tampa took Slater Koekkoek ahead of Vasilevskiy, a pick ahead of Filip Forsberg. Dallas took Dellandrea at 13 ahead of Joel Farabee, K'Andre MIller, etc. You cannot find an elite scouting staff that didn't have a miss. You are going to be woefully unsatisfied with every scouting staff ever if that's your barometer. You'll also want to have a word with yourself because I bet if you hold yourself to that standard, you'd fail, and if you don't, you might wanna start working on trying to get a scouting job because you'd be the highest paid scout in world history if you didn't miss, ever.

• They didn't base their argument on finding RDs is hard. They based their argument on the kid, the player, the tools, and the fact that it is an ingredient that most cup winning teams have that we don't have. I always find this amusing that once every couple of weeks we have someone, who apparently follows the draft heavily, and then comes in and throws shade on this pick. It's like people willfully ignore the evidence. Reinbacher was going 5. He was going 5 if Arizona was picking there. He was going 5 if Nashville succeeded in trading up with us. He was going 5 if Philadelphia succeeded in trading Gauthier to us for the pick. Even the team that took Michkov at 7, was going to take Reinbacher at 5. So is Montreal just stupid, or is it just more conceivable that the majority of the NHL was very high on Reinbacher. You know, the kid who had a historic season as a draft eligible defenseman in the NLA which is one of the better pro leagues in the world? You know he might actually be a very good prospect, certainly nothing in his AHL season indicated he isn't one.

• Bobrov wasn't the head scout of the Rangers so Andersson/Kravtsov were a decision made by the entire scouting staff, etc. No one was drafting anyone other than Kakko at 2. The reference to the biceps club just shows that you have a particular agenda against the group. Why not evaluate the group under Hughes and Gorton only, as that is the dynamic they are currently operating under?

• They deserve the benefit of the doubt because everyone sat around here crying that we passed on Wright, and kicking their dogs when he had a difficult year 1, but it's proving to be the right decision. When you get heavily scrutinized and determined to be idiots, and then you are turning out to be right, does that not allow them some leeway to wait and be judged? Or do we have to ignore that, go to picking on something else and constantly be in a negative, toxic environment because the team didn't see the BPA the same way we did and that we may not be as good at judging talent in the draft as we think we are? Not to mention, there's very little to be critical of, they are two drafts in and for all the crying about Volokhin, Florian Xhekaj, Konyushkov and other picks, they've looked to be on to something more often than not, no?

• That's not true re: Sennecke. Grant, as much as he's an idiot and blowhard, has NHL scout connections and he was telling people that he was rising in the draft. People called him an idiot and making shit up and then Bob's pre-draft lotto rankings came out and 3 teams had top 10 grades on him, including one that had a top 5 grade on him. So there's 3 NHL teams that have him in their top 10 out and others just outside of it. Yet we are to accept Iginla as not a reach despite not a single scout gave him a top 5 grade? Pronman talking to NHL teams confirmed that he's being seen as a top 10 pick and he himself ranked him 7th. Basu and Godin talking to NHL teams and sources are confirming there's legitimate top 5-10 billing on the kid now. So who are we to accept as authority here, NHL scouts and people we know who talk to NHL scouts, or scouting websites? Seems like a confirmation bias to me to discredit a legitimate riser.

• You can be uneasy all you want, I personally don't care but it's laughable to be angry about it and act like it's a foregone conclusion that they f***ed it all up. Especially since one guy they haven't even picked yet! But I do find it amusing that if you gave Sennecke his back end stats and playoff stats over the full season, he'd be exactly what you and others would be yelling from the rooftops about.
• It might be underwhelming to you, but it isn't to me, and it isn't to a number of other people, including like the Montreal Canadiens. But right now it looks like a lot of what you are angry about is them not taking your guy because there's nothing to discredit who they have actually taken yet.

 

[Kents polished head]

• I didn't know that Mesar busted and Kulich made it. They also took Beck at 33, Hutson at 62, got Engstrom in the 3rd round, all of which are looking very good. Do you think it's common that scouting staffs, even elite ones, hit on every pick? Tampa took Slater Koekkoek ahead of Vasilevskiy, a pick ahead of Filip Forsberg. Dallas took Dellandrea at 13 ahead of Joel Farabee, K'Andre MIller, etc. You cannot find an elite scouting staff that didn't have a miss. You are going to be woefully unsatisfied with every scouting staff ever if that's your barometer. You'll also want to have a word with yourself because I bet if you hold yourself to that standard, you'd fail, and if you don't, you might wanna start working on trying to get a scouting job because you'd be the highest paid scout in world history if you didn't miss, ever.

• They didn't base their argument on finding RDs is hard. They based their argument on the kid, the player, the tools, and the fact that it is an ingredient that most cup winning teams have that we don't have. I always find this amusing that once every couple of weeks we have someone, who apparently follows the draft heavily, and then comes in and throws shade on this pick. It's like people willfully ignore the evidence. Reinbacher was going 5. He was going 5 if Arizona was picking there. He was going 5 if Nashville succeeded in trading up with us. He was going 5 if Philadelphia succeeded in trading Gauthier to us for the pick. Even the team that took Michkov at 7, was going to take Reinbacher at 5. So is Montreal just stupid, or is it just more conceivable that the majority of the NHL was very high on Reinbacher. You know, the kid who had a historic season as a draft eligible defenseman in the NLA which is one of the better pro leagues in the world? You know he might actually be a very good prospect, certainly nothing in his AHL season indicated he isn't one.

• Bobrov wasn't the head scout of the Rangers so Andersson/Kravtsov were a decision made by the entire scouting staff, etc. No one was drafting anyone other than Kakko at 2. The reference to the biceps club just shows that you have a particular agenda against the group. Why not evaluate the group under Hughes and Gorton only, as that is the dynamic they are currently operating under?

• They deserve the benefit of the doubt because everyone sat around here crying that we passed on Wright, and kicking their dogs when he had a difficult year 1, but it's proving to be the right decision. When you get heavily scrutinized and determined to be idiots, and then you are turning out to be right, does that not allow them some leeway to wait and be judged? Or do we have to ignore that, go to picking on something else and constantly be in a negative, toxic environment because the team didn't see the BPA the same way we did and that we may not be as good at judging talent in the draft as we think we are? Not to mention, there's very little to be critical of, they are two drafts in and for all the crying about Volokhin, Florian Xhekaj, Konyushkov and other picks, they've looked to be on to something more often than not, no?

• That's not true re: Sennecke. Grant, as much as he's an idiot and blowhard, has NHL scout connections and he was telling people that he was rising in the draft. People called him an idiot and making shit up and then Bob's pre-draft lotto rankings came out and 3 teams had top 10 grades on him, including one that had a top 5 grade on him. So there's 3 NHL teams that have him in their top 10 out and others just outside of it. Yet we are to accept Iginla as not a reach despite not a single scout gave him a top 5 grade? Pronman talking to NHL teams confirmed that he's being seen as a top 10 pick and he himself ranked him 7th. Basu and Godin talking to NHL teams and sources are confirming there's legitimate top 5-10 billing on the kid now. So who are we to accept as authority here, NHL scouts and people we know who talk to NHL scouts, or scouting websites? Seems like a confirmation bias to me to discredit a legitimate riser.

• You can be uneasy all you want, I personally don't care but it's laughable to be angry about it and act like it's a foregone conclusion that they f***ed it all up. Especially since one guy they haven't even picked yet! But I do find it amusing that if you gave Sennecke his back end stats and playoff stats over the full season, he'd be exactly what you and others would be yelling from the rooftops about.
• It might be underwhelming to you, but it isn't to me, and it isn't to a number of other people, including like the Montreal Canadiens. But right now it looks like a lot of what you are angry about is them not taking your guy because there's nothing to discredit who they have actually taken yet.

Ok. Cool.

So you're basing your whole "I fully trust them to pick the best prospect" off of;

- A good half season from Slaf.
- A good 12 games in the AHL from Reinbacher.
- Florian Xhekaj, Volokhin and Konyushkov not turning into complete duds.
- Mesar not having fully busted yet.

Good for you.