2025 NHL Entry DRAFT Thread

Quick research seems to indicate it's a pretty low-quality class vs usual which doesn't yield many impact NHLers anyway

Kings have actually been MORE successful than the field with iafallo and lizotte

Maybe some AHLers with some upside, Kings seem to do good with the 'type' of player Brett Chorske is (andre lee, dwight king, sort of helenius) or a project-ish guy like John Prokop
 
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Kings are in a weird spot too if you're an NCAA guy

Not a big prospect pool, so you'd be close to the big shot

But next to no opportunities on the roster

"projects"/longshots make sense to me
 
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Wonder why you don’t see teams get creative when they don’t like a draft and kick a first rounder down the road to next year.

Wonder if the draft changes in terms of instinct and emotion with the remote situation.
 
I think the last successful collegiate free agents the Kings signed were Blake Lizotte and Alex Iafallo, and those signings took place quite a few years back.

They're not overflowing with an abundance of NHL ready prospects, but the Kings also don't have as many openings available as they did back when they signed Lizotte and Iafallo.
 
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Wonder why you don’t see teams get creative when they don’t like a draft and kick a first rounder down the road to next year.

Teams try but it takes two to tango. Last year Chicago offered an unprotected 2025 1st to Columbus for the #4 pick. Sounded like Columbus gave it a thought but decided it wasn't worth gambling on Chicago's pick yielding a better prospect.

Philadelphia had pick #32 and didn't like anybody, so they ended up trading it to Edmonton for a protected 2025 1st.

Unlike the NFL, a guy taken in the back half of the first round in the NHL is probably a 3+ year project. So there might not be many teams wanting to trade back in and risk yielding a better prospect the following year since there wouldn't be a ton of immediate benefit. With the NFL, coaches/GMs are on much shorter leashes so a guy they take in 20s could see significant snaps that year.

And if your team thinks it's a crummy draft, it might not be an industry secret and there may not be any teams looking to trade a future pick to get in.

At least with first rounders, a lot of the 2025/26 picks have already changed hands, so there might not even be a market to trade in like Edmonton did last year.

Teams might not want a future asset but could be willing to trade the pick for an already drafted prospect. Ottawa didn't like the available names at #16 in 2010 and traded the pick to St. Louis for David Rundblad who was drafted #17 the previous year; St. Louis ended up grabbing Vladimir Tarasenko.

I just read about this one: In 1989 the Devils staff was split between Bill Guerin and Jason Miller for the #5 pick. They chose Guerin but then Miller kept slipping so they wanted to trade in to get him. Eventually they found a taker with Edmonton at #18 and the Devils gave up 1988 1st rounder Corey Foster to get the pick.

Wonder if the draft changes in terms of instinct and emotion with the remote situation.

The teams had a taste of a decentralized draft when they got to stay home for the 2020 and 2021 Drafts. Seemed more or less like business as usual. Instead of making phone calls to each other on the draft floor, they could still call/text to ask about trades.
 
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