Blues 2024-2025 Prospect Thread

[BlueMed]

Let's not play mental gymnastics in convincing ourselves Jiriceks's stats this season have been good. He has not had a good statistical season for a prospect of his caliber in the league that he plays in. It's been a borderline lost season for him.

I don't think anyone is saying it's been a "good" season. People are trying to interpret his season with appropriate context including moving to a new country, speaking a new language with new teammates, and playing in a smaller-sized rink. Those all come with unique challenges. As far as number of games played, I'm not as concerned. Even college hockey players only play roughly 40ish games per year with only 2 games per week (usually Fridays and Saturdays). IMO, Jiricek playing 40+ games in the OHL and 7 games in the WJC would be considered adequate for this year. I don't recall people giving up on Jake Neighbours after he played in only 19 games in the WHL during his D+1 season. Most of us have recalibrated our expectations and don't expect to see Jiricek in the NHL until at least his D+4 season. It's important to keep in mind that he was one of the youngest players in his draft class and doesn't turn 19 until this June. To call this season a "lost season" is pretty hyperbolic and short-sighted.

 

[Drubilly]

Let's not play mental gymnastics in convincing ourselves Jiriceks's stats this season have been good. He has not had a good statistical season for a prospect of his caliber in the league that he plays in. It's been a borderline lost season for him.

Who’s doing that??

 

[Mike Liut]

When I was 17-18, I barely had pubes. These kids are 3-4 years away from being asked to contribute. A lot can happen between now and then.

 

[bleedblue1223]

I don't think anyone is saying it's been a "good" season. People are trying to interpret his season with appropriate context including moving to a new country, speaking a new language with new teammates, and playing in a smaller-sized rink. Those all come with unique challenges. As far as number of games played, I'm not as concerned. Even college hockey players only play roughly 40ish games per year with only 2 games per week (usually Fridays and Saturdays). IMO, Jiricek playing 40+ games in the OHL and 7 games in the WJC would be considered adequate for this year. I don't recall people giving up on Jake Neighbours after he played in only 19 games in the WHL during his D+1 season. Most of us have recalibrated our expectations and don't expect to see Jiricek in the NHL until at least his D+4 season. It's important to keep in mind that he was one of the youngest players in his draft class and doesn't turn 19 until this June. To call this season a "lost season" is pretty hyperbolic and short-sighted.

Who’s doing that??

BlueMed did that trying to compare his 12 points in 27 games in OHL to Faber's 12 points in 27 games in his freshman year in NCAA. Scoring for defensemen is going to be way down in college vs juniors. He has simply not proven to be a 2-way all-situations defenseman like BlueMed said he was, that's putting his season way too nicely.

Now, I'm not saying he's a bust or on track to bust, but this has not been a good season for his development and even statistically, it's not where we'd want him to be if he was a true 2-way all-situations defenseman.

And I don't know why games played and Neighbours is being brought into this. It's not just games played, it's the amount of injuries Jiricek has had and how that has impacted his development. Sure, compare to Neighbours, Neighbours excelled when he was on the ice, Jiricek hasn't.

 

[ChicagoBlues]

Nah brah!

 

[Drubilly]

BlueMed did that trying to compare his 12 points in 27 games in OHL to Faber's 12 points in 27 games in his freshman year in NCAA. Scoring for defensemen is going to be way down in college vs juniors. He has simply not proven to be a 2-way all-situations defenseman like BlueMed said he was, that's putting his season way too nicely.

Now, I'm not saying he's a bust or on track to bust, but this has not been a good season for his development and even statistically, it's not where we'd want him to be if he was a true 2-way all-situations defenseman.

And I don't know why games played and Neighbours is being brought into this. It's not just games played, it's the amount of injuries Jiricek has had and how that has impacted his development. Sure, compare to Neighbours, Neighbours excelled when he was on the ice, Jiricek hasn't.

I guess so, I just didn’t see anyone sporting leotards.

 

[bleedblue1223]

I guess so, I just didn’t see anyone sporting leotards.

If I say Ralph outproduced Brady Skjei in their D+1 NCAA seasons, the implication is that Ralph is on track to become what Skjei became.

 

[Drubilly]

If I say Ralph outproduced Brady Skjei in their D+1 NCAA seasons, the implication is that Ralph is on track to become what Skjei became.

You could think that way sure but speak for yourself duder.

 

[ChicagoBlues]

You could think that way sure but speak for yourself duder.

Dood mahn

 

[bleedblue1223]

You could think that way sure but speak for yourself duder.

Then why else compare Jiricek and Faber D+1 seasons?

 

[execwrite1]

Playoff schedule - Jiricek played April 10

1 Thu, Apr 10 Oshawa 2 Brantford 5
2 Sun, Apr 13 Oshawa Brantford
3 Tue, Apr 15 Brantford Oshawa
4 Thu, Apr 17 Brantford Oshawa
5 Sat, Apr 19 Oshawa Brantford
6 Sun, Apr 20 Brantford Oshawa
7 Tue, Apr 22 Oshawa Brantford

I believe you can listen to the games here

 

[Beninnola]

We have 2 callups available? Maybe one more prospect gets a debut this season.

If we are able to clinch prior to our final game you’d think we’d rest as many as we can.

 

[Beauterham]

We have 2 callups available? Maybe one more prospect gets a debut this season.

If we are able to clinch prior to our final game you’d think we’d rest as many as we can.

I believe we still have 1 call-up If I'm correct. Bolduc > Dvorsky > Dvorsky again.

 

[Beninnola]

I believe we still have 1 call-up If I'm correct. Bolduc > Dvorsky > Dvorsky again.

I’d guess Alexandrov would get the icetime and that sounds right.

 

[ezcreepin]

I don't think anyone is saying it's been a "good" season. People are trying to interpret his season with appropriate context including moving to a new country, speaking a new language with new teammates, and playing in a smaller-sized rink. Those all come with unique challenges. As far as number of games played, I'm not as concerned. Even college hockey players only play roughly 40ish games per year with only 2 games per week (usually Fridays and Saturdays). IMO, Jiricek playing 40+ games in the OHL and 7 games in the WJC would be considered adequate for this year. I don't recall people giving up on Jake Neighbours after he played in only 19 games in the WHL during his D+1 season. Most of us have recalibrated our expectations and don't expect to see Jiricek in the NHL until at least his D+4 season. It's important to keep in mind that he was one of the youngest players in his draft class and doesn't turn 19 until this June. To call this season a "lost season" is pretty hyperbolic and short-sighted.

I think the sentiment is that Jiricek had a lost season because of injury troubles and hasn't shown the ability yet to stay healthy. He is unquestionably one of the younger players in his draft class, so at this point in time I'm not concerned (YET) about injury issues. Ovechkin destroyed his shoulder in the KHL as a 17 or 18 year old and has remained one of the most consistent and durable players this sport has seen. Jiricek has time to fill out and I honestly don't care if his first NHL game is at 24 years old - that's plenty of time to have a great career. What I'd like is for him to focus on building strength, eating calories, maintaining a strong lower center of gravity, building up his legs, stretching and developing lots of flexibility. He clearly has talent and I don't see any reason why he can't become a top 4 in this league if he works hard. His biggest hurdles at this point are playing smarter to avoid dangerous on ice situations and getting 20 more pounds on that frame. Once he can do that, the sky is the limit with this kid.

 

[execwrite1]

Playoff schedule - Jiricek played April 10

1 Thu, Apr 10 Oshawa 2 Brantford 5
2 Sun, Apr 13 Oshawa Brantford
3 Tue, Apr 15 Brantford Oshawa
4 Thu, Apr 17 Brantford Oshawa
5 Sat, Apr 19 Oshawa Brantford
6 Sun, Apr 20 Brantford Oshawa
7 Tue, Apr 22 Oshawa Brantford

I believe you can listen to the games here

April 13 - Not bad
Jiricek, Adam 1G +5

Brantford wins 8-5, leads 2 games to 0

 

[Blanick]

I can't remember a time when a prospect has been so quickly given up on by a fanbase as Jiricek with us? Yes he has injury concerns but we are looking at D+3 or D+4 before he arrives in the NHL. I think there is still plenty of time for him to reach his potential.

 

[PerryTurnbullfan]

I can't remember a time when a prospect has been so quickly given up on by a fanbase as Jiricek with us? Yes he has injury concerns but we are looking at D+3 or D+4 before he arrives in the NHL. I think there is still plenty of time for him to reach his potential.

I would agree.

 

[Beauterham]

I can't remember a time when a prospect has been so quickly given up on by a fanbase as Jiricek with us? Yes he has injury concerns but we are looking at D+3 or D+4 before he arrives in the NHL. I think there is still plenty of time for him to reach his potential.

I think people have legitimate concerns, but I haven't seen anyone gave up on him yet? As I see it now, his development has been pushed back a year. He needs to have a healthy full season next year to get back on track.

 

[MortiestOfMortys]

I think people have legitimate concerns, but I haven't seen anyone gave up on him yet? As I see it now, his development has been pushed back a year. He needs to have a healthy full season next year to get back on track.

As one of Jiricek's more vocal supporters here, I can tell you that some folks absolutely have already thrown the towel in on him. People were doing that as early as training camp last summer. I don't think those are legitimate concerns; a lot of it is lingering resentment from not getting Buium. Which I agree is a shame but it's not really a valid concern because he was long gone when we picked.

There's legitimacy in saying "man, this guy seems to be getting hurt a lot, I don't know if it will work out." Perfectly reasonable. I share those concerns. I don't think that's where the people who have fully given up on him already are coming from though. Some of it is just jockeying for position so they can say they were right all along vis-a-vis Buium vs. Jiricek. Other people are just looking at the box stats and not really thinking about what they mean before taking a hard position on it. I'm a lot more sympathetic to that group: not everyone has the time or desire to "do the work" on prospects we won't see for 3-5 years.

That's my favorite part about this forum though: there are people that are able/willing to do that. Together we sort of spread the work out a bit.

 

[bleedblue1223]

I don't know if there are many that have written him off, but the reality with Jiricek is that he was always a pretty boom/bust prospect. Prior to his injury in his draft year, there was talk of him being a potential top 5 or top 10 pick, but even at that time, there were still questions around what his offensive game would look like. He was one of the best players at Hlinka, kind of gets lost in the sauce in the Czech pro league compared to his peers playing in juniors, and then he gets hurt almost immediately at WJC.

If you look at any other draft, you'll always find names that go into a season highly touted and then fall due to performance. Jiricek fell because of injury, so it's really unknown if he would've maintained his hype from Hlinka or if he would've fell. It's too bad he didn't move to say Sweden like Dvorsky and then could've had a more proper draft season against a peer age group, but it is what it is. With Hamara moving on, Jiricek should have a larger opportunity next season with Brantford, so hopefully he stays healthy and his offensive game begins to blossom.

I do think Jiricek is still clearly our highest upside defensive prospect in the system, just based on raw potential. I think Lindstein is the safest, and Fischer might be climbing on highest upside.

On some level, I could see comps with Thompson. Jiricek doesn't have the same height as Thompson, but both were drafted as being very skinny guys, and it took time for Thompson to get a NHL body and then figure out how to use it effectively. Injuries will have slowed Jiricek's physical development, so in a sense he could be a late bloomer, but with him, it's really about getting consistent game time and then figuring out what kind of dman he really is.

I do think part of our motivation with Jiricek was because he was RD and I do think he has higher upside, even if he's riskier, but it will be interesting to compare how Jiricek and Solberg compare to each other in a few years. Not being able to get Buium is what it is, but I was more comfortable with Solberg over Jiricek. After we got Ralph and Fischer, it made more sense that we went RD in the 1st, but I'll be disappointed if Solberg outperforms Jiricek.

 

[Spektre]

I see a lot of people saying Dvorsky doesn’t look close to ready for the NHL. There’s few kids who can join the NHL and not have a rocky transition.

When Schwartz joined the team, it looked like he was going to get killed every time he got hit.

Snuggerud has some of the same. When he gets hit he goes down fairly easily.

Tarasenko is the only young forward prospect I can think of who really fit in right away. He already had the strength and athleticism . It probably helped him out playing in the KHL against men.

Snuggerud is almost 21 (June 1), while Dvorsky will be 20 on June 15. Dvorsky looks stronger on his skates than Snugg so far.

Every organization has to decide if playing in the NHL is what’s best for the player. Can the player grow his game more in the NHL than the AHL, or other league.

The one player I was absolutely proved wrong about was Tage Thompson. I legitimately didn’t think he would survive in the NHL. I’m normally on the side of giving young players plenty of rope or time to get acclimated, but to me he looked beyond horrible. His skating was extremely clumsy and he looked lost. Kudos to him for figuring it out.

Dvorsky’s confidence, patience, and control of the puck is what impresses me. This will probably be his best attributes in the NHL. It’s similar to Thomas, and Pietrangelo. He’s never going to skate like Thomas and I don’t think that’s a big deal.

I would bet on Dvorsky being a full time Blue next year.

 

[Stupendous Yappi]

I don’t know if Jiricek can attain his potential, but I agree with the strategy to draft a high ceiling riskier pick at this point when he was available.

 

[bleedblue1223]

For me, it was between Hage, Solberg, and Jiricek. I would've been fine with any of them, but for very different reasons. That was also my worst case scenario because I would've selected everyone that went 1-14 ahead of those 3, and could see the reasoning with Brandsegg-Nygard, he just isn't needed based on what we already have.

 

[Majorityof1]

As one of Jiricek's more vocal supporters here, I can tell you that some folks absolutely have already thrown the towel in on him. People were doing that as early as training camp last summer. I don't think those are legitimate concerns; a lot of it is lingering resentment from not getting Buium. Which I agree is a shame but it's not really a valid concern because he was long gone when we picked.

There's legitimacy in saying "man, this guy seems to be getting hurt a lot, I don't know if it will work out." Perfectly reasonable. I share those concerns. I don't think that's where the people who have fully given up on him already are coming from though. Some of it is just jockeying for position so they can say they were right all along vis-a-vis Buium vs. Jiricek. Other people are just looking at the box stats and not really thinking about what they mean before taking a hard position on it. I'm a lot more sympathetic to that group: not everyone has the time or desire to "do the work" on prospects we won't see for 3-5 years.

That's my favorite part about this forum though: there are people that are able/willing to do that. Together we sort of spread the work out a bit.

Reminds me of Bolduc. Nobody wanted him at that spot. Then every seemingly negative thing they latched on. When he was cut from a stacked Canadian WJ team, when he didn't wow at training camp at 19 or 20. He was constantly in trade proposals. Hell, not even proposals, just "we need to trade Bolduc"..."for who?"....<shrug>. Then suddenly he is having some success in the NHL and everyone has always known he'd be great.