Speculation: Caps Roster General Discussion (Coaching/FAs/Cap/Lines/etc) | 2024-25 Summer Edition

[Silky mitts]

I think this should be it for Shepard. The goalie Chris Bourque ...

 

[895]

Said this before but I think they made a decision to fundamentally shift what they were looking for during those years. They had loads of top end talent with the big club and took guys that seemingly had lower ceilings but could provide solid organizational depth on cheap ELCs.

As for your time frame, Vrana could have been a home run pick in 2014 and looked like it if not for personal issues. Samsonov was widely considered one of the top prospects in the world at his position for years both leading up to and after his draft position so I don’t fault them there - teams are still betting on his talent level 10 years after he was drafted. Johansen and Alexeyev fit the bill of mobile puck moving defensemen who fit the way they like to play but have been underwhelming.

Starting in 2019 with CMM, seems like they went back to their old method of finding guys they think were undervalued with higher upside that maybe scared a few teams off. Also, go back and look at the 2019 draft class and tell me if there are any players better than him at all in the entire draft selected after 25. Bobby Brink, maybe? Shane Pinto, maybe? Maybe I’m missing someone but it looks like a brutal draft class as a whole. Lapierre seems like a great pick. They also got Fever and Pro in those drafts. 2021 seems meh but the last three classes are exciting.

I think the long stretch of getting guys like Green, Semin, Carlson, and Kuznetsov warped people into thinking that finding stars later in the draft was relatively straight forward and that finding guys like that was the norm and not the exception.

1)
I don't think it's fair to say it's gotten better recently.

Obviously you are going to be more excited about newer draft classes because they haven't started to stagnate yet. Everyone thinks their newest draft pick is gonna make it.

2) How is Lapierre a great pick? He's already d+4 and isn't guaranteed to make the roster. Plenty of players drafted after him have more GP and more points. He might end up better than those guys sure but he's absolutely not a great pick at this current point in time.

 

[Misery74]

1)
I don't think it's fair to say it's gotten better recently.

Obviously you are going to be more excited about newer draft classes because they haven't started to stagnate yet. Everyone thinks their newest draft pick is gonna make it.

2) How is Lapierre a great pick? He's already d+4 and isn't guaranteed to make the roster. Plenty of players drafted after him have more GP and more points. He might end up better than those guys sure but he's absolutely not a great pick at this current point in time.

He was one of our best players last year, and he just win the Calder MVP.

He is a lock for the lineup.

What the f*** are you talking about?

 

[qc14]

Obviously you are going to be more excited about newer draft classes because they haven't started to stagnate yet. Everyone thinks their newest draft pick is gonna make it.

2) How is Lapierre a great pick? He's already d+4 and isn't guaranteed to make the roster. Plenty of players drafted after him have more GP and more points. He might end up better than those guys sure but he's absolutely not a great pick at this current point in time.

Everyone thinks their newest draft pick is gonna make it because everyone dramatically overvalues the success rates of draft picks. It is not at all surprising that Johansen(28oa) and Alexeyev (31oa) have not become anything more than depth NHL players -- that's a pretty expected outcome out of two picks in that range. The same with McMichael and Lapierre -- solid NHL 3rd liners in their D+4 and D+5 is actually a pretty good outcome.

Look at the draft list from 2020 and count how many guys from Holloway at 14 to Faber at 45 that are definitively better than Lapierre? Guhle and Mercer were taken ahead of him and Peterka and Faber were taken after (and Faber wasn't even the first second-round defenseman taken by LAK that year!). Not an incredible home-run amazing pick but absolutely doing good with what you have at 22oa there.

As for their recent drafts while there overall success is probably too early to call, it's not too early to critique the process and I think it's very clear that they've shifted their philosophy quite a bit and consistently taken high upside swings in early rounds. Lapierre and Miro slipped in their DY because of huge injury concerns, Cristall and Hutson were analytical darlings that slipped because of their physical profiles, Parascek was a late bloomer and had insane DY production but scared scouts because he played Canadian HS in his D-1, Fehervary/Iorio/Muggli/Chesley are all of the same smooth-skating but low scoring defenseman that they have really excelled at developing but now are taking in the 2nd instead of the 1st. The only pick I would definitively say would still be made under the old philosophy was Leonard, and that's kind of an exception given 1) how good he is and 2) how insanely talented the 5-12 range of that class is.

I just feel like you can't have it both ways. Critique them all you want for going safe with Johansen/AA but then don't complain that high-risk swings like Lappy haven't paid off

 

[wickedwitch]

Lapierre is and was a very good pick. Two mediocre preseason games doesn't change that -- his good play versus the Rangers in the postseason is far more important. McMichael is also a solid pick and could turn into a great pick in the future. (Reminder: both had their development slowed by Covid, which is true for many of the players drafted those years.)

 

[wickedwitch]

Everyone thinks their newest draft pick is gonna make it because everyone dramatically overvalues the success rates of draft picks. It is not at all surprising that Johansen(28oa) and Alexeyev (31oa) have not become anything more than depth NHL players -- that's a pretty expected outcome out of two picks in that range. The same with McMichael and Lapierre -- solid NHL 3rd liners in their D+4 and D+5 is actually a pretty good outcome.

Look at the draft list from 2020 and count how many guys from Holloway at 14 to Faber at 45 that are definitively better than Lapierre? Guhle and Mercer were taken ahead of him and Peterka and Faber were taken after (and Faber wasn't even the first second-round defenseman taken by LAK that year!). Not an incredible home-run amazing pick but absolutely doing good with what you have at 22oa there.

As for their recent drafts while there overall success is probably too early to call, it's not too early to critique the process and I think it's very clear that they've shifted their philosophy quite a bit and consistently taken high upside swings in early rounds. Lapierre and Miro slipped in their DY because of huge injury concerns, Cristall and Hutson were analytical darlings that slipped because of their physical profiles, Parascek was a late bloomer and had insane DY production but scared scouts because he played Canadian HS in his D-1, Fehervary/Iorio/Muggli/Chesley are all of the same smooth-skating but low scoring defenseman that they have really excelled at developing but now are taking in the 2nd instead of the 1st. The only pick I would definitively say would still be made under the old philosophy was Leonard, and that's kind of an exception given 1) how good he is and 2) how insanely talented the 5-12 range of that class is.

I just feel like you can't have it both ways. Critique them all you want for going safe with Johansen/AA but then don't complain that high-risk swings like Lappy haven't paid off

I agree almost 100% except I'm not sure Muggli ends up as low-scoring. I think he'll be a 2-way defenseman.