Toronto has the best prospect pool because they sent Nylander to the AHL, Marner back to Junior, and won a lottery (that they tanked for). These were highly touted top ten picks with nice stats. No argument from anyone they are a nice group.
Take out Tkachuk from Calgary's pool, and Toronto's pool is still by far inferior to Calgary's.
A guy like Nielsen might have a comparable projection to a guy like Andersson, yet is a left shot D when right shot D are more highly valued in the NHL.
A guy like Dermott's ceiling is not close to Kylington's ceiling. A guy like Kulak's ceiling and floor is currently higher than Dermott's ceiling or floor. You write off Brandon Hickey as a dime-a-dozen prospect because stats are dime-a-dozen, but are unaware that his package of size, skating, and defensive ability trend towards a shut down guy like Gardiner - who BTW actually had a similar dev curve thus far, maybe better offense but within deviations.
Maybe Brown does turn out better than Shinkaruk/Mangiapane, but a betting man would take the players who score more actual goals at every level/age and are superior skaters with more time to develop all-around before it's Hit-The-Road-Jack. Nothing he's done is anything Flames fans haven't seen very recently from prospects like Max Reinhart and Markus Granlund. A short little NHL stint with inflated on-ice SH% doesn't mean he's dominating the NHL. Even if Brown is a sure 3rd liner, even 2nd liner, what does that really mean? A 12 goal, 25 assist winger who kills some penalties? You can get vets like that on PTO. Heck we just let an RFA like that go as a cap casualty and no one is batting an eye. Shinkaruk is the guy with the high-end skillset where he could legitimately be an NHL goal producer (25+).
You might think Kapanen is a highly valued piece teams are drooling over, but every team has one of him too. And honestly even though I badly want right handed shot winger prospects for the Flames who have almost none, Poirier's package of explosive first step, heavy build, and agitator style is more rare and unique. Even though I am terms with the fact that Poirier will have been a successful pick if he becomes a 3rd liner, his ceiling still exceeds Kapanen. Kapanen was 19 his rookie year? So was Poirier, for most of his. Kapanen was one of the youngest AHLers? Kylington was THE youngest AHLer. Kapanen scored a World Junior winner? Laine Aho Rantanen Juolevi and Puljujarvi were the only reason he got the chance.
It goes on. What makes Bracco a better prospect than Matthew Philips? Everybody has one of those. We however have actually
had some success with "those". Timoshov? Another guy who got plenty of assists but very few actual goals, in fact we have a training camp invite who fits the exact same bill in Brayden Burke, I'd love to hear what Timoshov has over Burke. Guys like this just hit a wall at the next level. The best shot a Timoshov has to make the NHL is to be the next Paul Byron. As Paul Byron's biggest fan on HFBoards I can assure you, no one is actually hoping their prospect ends up the next Paul Byron.
And that's just skaters. There are maybe two or three teams that would not trade their top 3 goaltenders for our top 3 goaltenders, and they are the teams with guys like Demko and Hellebuyck in their pools. Gillies and Parsons both stonewalled their teams to championships and McDonald must be doing something right to have been the #2 on Team Canada, albeit in a throwaway season where he was recovering from a knee injury and not up to his usual level until February or so. Your best goalie prospect is Woll, who would be our fourth best goalie prospect.
You might think that all the pointz the Marlies put up are indicative of players who will be productive in the NHL but let's face it. Pointz in the AHL can't be compared across divisions, teams play the same seven or eight teams over and over and over again and there is no attempt at resembling parity.
My team does not have the best prospect pool in the NHL. Our 2014 first rounder is no longer a prospect. Our 2015 first rounder, which a lot of GM hints pointed to would-have-been Kyle Connor, was traded for an NHLer. We didn't win a draft lotto even once in our franchise history never mind twice. We've never drafted top 3. Matthews, Marner, and Nylander blow Tkachuk, Jankowski, and Kylington away. Doesn't mean your prospect depth is the best in the league.
