It's unfortunate we passed over the sure thing at pick #28.
Who were those guys again?
No one knew O'Reilly would be as good as he is at that time. He was thought of as a safe pick, kinda like Landon Ferraro, with a questionable ceiling which is why he fell so far. Ferraro busted though, maybe not like Paradis who was one of the worst 1st round picks of the decade. The late 1st/early 2nd is still a crapshoot.*cough*
6 picks later.
Pardais was ranked as a 3rd rounder by most. He was way, way off the board. IIRC, most here wanted O'Reilly or Landon Ferraro, who were the best two centers on the board.
Booth and Helvig in net too.I can't help but Aho made smooth transition to center position, Wallmark graduated as good two-way center... and we have Necas, Suzuki, Geekie, Luostarinen, Rees, Roy, Drury and Murray in the system in the middle. Not your typical Canes prospect pool.
Mattheos, Puistola, Gauthier, Slepets and Wall as RW.
Saarela, Tieksola, Kuokkanen, Rizzo as LW.
Bean, Sellgren, McKeown, Honka, Fensore, Webber as D.
Ned and Kochetkov.
Best Canes prospect pool ever?
You've got to think that some of those guys are going to get moved out for other players/assets.Aho-Suzuki-Svechnikov
TT-Rees-Necas
Nino-Staal-Geekie/Gauthier/Mattheos/Puistola/etc.
Top-9 in a few years. I want Suzuki succeed just to see just how good that 1st line could be.
He always did, just hampered by injuries. I'd say with trading Pono (and Koivunen) we should likely keep him as first callupThis guy clearly has skill.
I think we need to preach patience. He still has top 6 upside.