C Will Smith - San Jose Sharks , NHL(2023, 4th, SJS)

[Pavel Buchnevich]

No World Juniors I guess. Too bad.

 

[Stewie Griffin]

Scored a nice wrister in his hometown game. Apparently has 150-175 family/friends in attendance.

 

[Pavel Buchnevich]

Seems to be having an okay rookie season, all things considered. Other than Michkov, who many teams screwed up not taking, it's at least looking like they got the right guy, otherwise.

He's no Celebrini, so he's gotten overshadowed this season, but should be a good 2C, and possibly better.

 

[coooldude]

When he has space and time, he can be very dangerous. Very quick release - most of his goals are snipes, but he also has a few goals where he's charging to the blue paint, so good on him for that. And he has set up his teammates for a lot of SOG's, often HDCF.

The major improvement areas are related to his age: 1) he's still immature and forces hollywood passes through multiple players leading to turnovers, or misses critical but simple breakout chips etc. as a winger 2) He needs to be stronger, he loses most puck battles and gets knocked down constantly... and maybe most of all, 3) needs to be faster. EDGE data has him as <50%ile in all skating metrics. He may never be a burner but he's gotta get more speed. If he's never going to have speed, then he needs to get a lot stronger and learn how to play e.g. Pavelski by always being in the right spot despite being slow and short-ish.