Adam Larsson potential

[Benedict Parisechuk]

LOL. I think my confidence in Conte is destroyed after reading all these names'

 

[Bleedred]

LOL. I think my confidence in Conte is destroyed after reading all these names'

I think he sucks to be honest with you. To be perfectly blunt with you he's less than useless in the year 2013. Though when I called him out a few months back on here I was jumped on by a bunch of people. I cringe at the possibility people think he could be GM, although I don't think he ever will be.

 

[Unknown Caller]

I strongly disagree with you that his O ability wasnt being sold....I just went back and read the scouting reports on him and the majority of them tout his offensive ability and scarily his skating which IMO is holding his entire game back. . Here is one scouting report almost all of them are similar...As has become an annual tradition, the best defenseman coming out of Sweden must be compared at some level to Nicklas Lidstrom. Perhaps the most telling compliment to Adam Larsson’s versatility is that International Scouting Services has him listed as one of their best offensive defenseman and one of the best shutdown defenseman.....

So yes he was being sold as a solid two way but also as a very very good Offensive D man. I think he could be come the latter but I have seen nothing to make me think he will be anything but a 30 pt max D man and thats not what we were lead to believe AL would be.

He was touted as a PMD not an OFD. It was all about his strong passing (both outlet passing and offensive zone passing) and solid shot that gets to the net from the point. This is a PMD. This is what he was always about. He was never a guy with great speed (there's a difference between a fast skater and a strong skater), the ability to go end to end, or some prolific ability to find the back of the net like Doughty, Karlsson, Murphy, etc. He's a strong skating (not fast), positionally sound two-way defenseman with great outlet passes and a shot that finds the net. He was never billed otherwise by legitimate scouts. Defenseman who play Larsson's game take a lot longer to develop than Karlsson or Doughty who can just step in and let their speed/offensive skill take over.

If you watched one of his games in the WJC this was evident without even reading a scouting report. The more people talk about Larsson the less I think they really understood what type of player they were getting in the first place.

 

[CerebralGenesis]

I expect the same from Merrill once people watch and realize how he plays the game.

 

[devilsblood]

Come on, using hindsight to blast draft decisions is stupid.

Guess what? We're not the only team that wishes they could have drafted different player. That's why they hold the draft in the first place.

Actually it is opposite. It is only by using hindsight that we can truly evaluate a draft.

 

[Oneiro]

If you watched one of his games in the WJC this was evident without even reading a scouting report. The more people talk about Larsson the less I think they really understood what type of player they were getting in the first place.

Ding, ding, ding. The truth.

This type of player always takes time to develop.

 

[AfroThunder396]

Actually it is opposite. It is only by using hindsight that we can truly evaluate a draft.

Are you saying that if we could get into a time machine, every single team would go with the exact same players?

Of course not, it's a crapshoot. You're judging 18 year old children based on how good you think they'll be in 5-10 years. You get an idea of who to pick based on the information at the time, and you make an educated guess.

Even all-time greats like Lidstrom and Hasek were shunned at the draft multiple times.

 

[devilsblood]

Are you saying that if we could get into a time machine, every single team would go with the exact same players?

Of course not, it's a crapshoot. You're judging 18 year old children based on how good you think they'll be in 5-10 years. You get an idea of who to pick based on the information at the time, and you make an educated guess.

Even all-time greats like Lidstrom and Hasek were shunned at the draft multiple times.

It's not a crapshoot if you are using information and making educated guesses. It's a difficult job, but it is not picking names from a hat.

I mean if it is such a crapshoot then people should be cool with Conte. Dude's just been unlucky.

 

[Richer's Ghost]

why do scouting ranking change so much in less than 6 months time then? oh, more time to evaluate, more experience and the skills are a moving target... You mean like 2-3 years worth of data after the pick has been made. I would hope things would be more obvious at that point.

an entire team of scouts who's only job it is to evaluate players and yet as a group they jump/drop a player's ranking 30-50 slots in one ranking period because new information has come to light.

let's not act like the plane has crashed into the mountain here.

 

[aboriginal]

these pretzels are making my thirsty

 

[Devils86]

He was touted as a PMD not an OFD. It was all about his strong passing (both outlet passing and offensive zone passing) and solid shot that gets to the net from the point. This is a PMD. This is what he was always about. He was never a guy with great speed (there's a difference between a fast skater and a strong skater), the ability to go end to end, or some prolific ability to find the back of the net like Doughty, Karlsson, Murphy, etc. He's a strong skating (not fast), positionally sound two-way defenseman with great outlet passes and a shot that finds the net. He was never billed otherwise by legitimate scouts. Defenseman who play Larsson's game take a lot longer to develop than Karlsson or Doughty who can just step in and let their speed/offensive skill take over.

If you watched one of his games in the WJC this was evident without even reading a scouting report. The more people talk about Larsson the less I think they really understood what type of player they were getting in the first place.

We will agree to disagree. Even if everything you say is correct, I still believe that the 4th pick in the draft, no matter what his position, needs to be either dynamic of dominate someway on the ice. I just don't see anything in his game that makes me thing AL will be great in anything. Good at where he was drafted isn't good enough.

 

[DEVILS ALL THE WAY*]

We will agree to disagree. Even if everything you say is correct, I still believe that the 4th pick in the draft, no matter what his position, needs to be either dynamic of dominate someway on the ice. I just don't see anything in his game that makes me thing AL will be great in anything. Good at where he was drafted isn't good enough.

I kind of agree... but it's not as if we missed out on a better player cause outside of that top #3, there's not another player who had a bigger impact so far in their shorten career.

If we passed on Huberdeau to pick Larsson, I'd agree with you but that isn't the case. There's Hamilton that looks real solid but it's wayyyyyyyyyyyyy to early to say who'll have the better career down the road.

 

[Devils86]

why do scouting ranking change so much in less than 6 months time then? oh, more time to evaluate, more experience and the skills are a moving target... You mean like 2-3 years worth of data after the pick has been made. I would hope things would be more obvious at that point.

an entire team of scouts who's only job it is to evaluate players and yet as a group they jump/drop a player's ranking 30-50 slots in one ranking period because new information has come to light.

let's not act like the plane has crashed into the mountain here.

They get so caught up in measurables sometimes that they fail to see the player. His CORSI is good he must be a great player. doesnt always work like that and I said before go back and look at the last 10 years its amazing how few impact players after pick 50 there is.

 

[Devils86]

I kind of agree... but it's not as if we missed out on a better player cause outside of that top #3, there's not another player who had a bigger impact so far in their shorten career.

If we passed on Huberdeau to pick Larsson, I'd agree with you but that isn't the case. There's Hamilton that looks real solid but it's wayyyyyyyyyyyyy to early to say who'll have the better career down the road.

I agree with everything you said. Larsson may turn out to be the best of the rest and then the arguement is moot but that said I still do not see the player some do.

 

[MoonDragn]

I'm wondering at how much real development our prospects really get. Aside from playing the game, how much do they get coached? Do they have to practice a certain way? If you ever see that show oil change, you see these drills that players go through. Do they have special drills for our prospects to work on their weakpoints?

Something like shooting into a milk crate that Souray used to do from Lemaire?

Why is it that our prospects seem to develop into much better offensive players outside of our organization?

 

[Volodya Krutov]

I see a kid being an NHL dman at 20. No reason to be concerned yet. It'll be a different story if he doesn't improve in the next 2 seasons.

 

[NJDevs26]

Detroit's drafting makes us look peewee.

Of course the last 4 years won't yield much yet, the kids aren't even out of their minor leagues yet. Although I'm ok debating if its drafting or developing cause we're slacking somewhere since 2000.

Not recently they haven't.

http://www.hockeydb.com/ihdb/draft/teams/dr00005492.html

 

[AfroThunder396]

It's not a crapshoot if you are using information and making educated guesses. It's a difficult job, but it is not picking names from a hat.

I mean if it is such a crapshoot then people should be cool with Conte. Dude's just been unlucky.

In a way, yeah, he has been. Could Conte have known that Frazee, Corrente, and Josefson all would have had their careers sidelined by multiple injuries? Or that Ben Johnson would be arrested for sexual assault? Or that Matteau would get kicked off his junior team? Or that Brent Sutter would refuse to play prospects from Europe?

These things all happened after they were drafted and have nothing to do with quality of talent. He's not picking names out of a hat at all. Guys like Bergfors and Tedenby were highly coveted prospects at the time of the draft, and they were taken at a time when we had little to no skill at forward. At the time, they were both reasonable picks.

 

[Volodya Krutov]

How many legit NHL players Toronto has developed after 10 consecutive years without playoffs ?

 

[Feed Me A Stray Cat]

Not recently they haven't.

http://www.hockeydb.com/ihdb/draft/teams/dr00005492.html

Yes they have.

Frk, Jurco, Sheahan, Jarnkrok, Pulkinen, Mrazek, and Tatar are all good prospects.

 

[AfroThunder396]

How many legit NHL players Toronto has developed after 10 consecutive years without playoffs ?

Tyler Seguin, Dougie Hamilton, etc.

 

[Unknown Caller]

Yes they have.

Frk, Jurco, Sheahan, Jarnkrok, Pulkinen, Mrazek, and Tatar are all good prospects.

They haven't even played a single NHL game? How do you know that they'll pan out to be better NHL players than any other prospect? There's no way of knowing.

 

[Feed Me A Stray Cat]

They haven't even played a single NHL game? How do you know that they'll pan out to be better NHL players than any other prospect? There's no way of knowing.

Because we can assess how good a prospect is before he hits the NHL? Kind of like he know that Reid Boucher is a good prospect after his performance in the OHL this year?

Obviously there is no way of knowing for sure, but those players have shown a lot of promise thus far for Detroit. Obviously the jury is out until they prove it at the NHL level.

 

[Baemon Severson*]

Who the hell would you have taken at 4 at the time? Hamilton is a healthy scratch for Boston (a year older than Lars was last year), Zibby, Couturier, Brodin (lol). Larsson was/is the best choice

 

[NJDevs26]

How many legit NHL players Toronto has developed after 10 consecutive years without playoffs ?

Tyler Seguin and Dougie Hamilton. Oh wait