Prospect Info: Draft 2025: Is it too late to tank? Asking for a friend

[DesertPenguin]

I swear Pens get a top 2 pick 60% of the time on Tankathon

We're getting the 2nd pick and taking Misa. I will keep repeating this until I will it into existence.

 

[SEALBound]

This is outdated as Boston is well below us. 8th is unlikely but not impossible. Regardless as to what's being said here 9th is not where we wanna be. Too much sugar coating going on.

Well I know that, this was just showing everyone lottery odds at each draft position.

 

[Ryder71]

They might be the same. Honestly they might want Eklund at #4 and he might be available at #10 and they wouldn't risk trading down for him even if they were #4. My problem is assuming that there's no difference between the picks is foolish. They're very well could be a massive difference. Maybe if they got #7 from Carolina in the Staal trade in 2012 they would have drafted a quality player in Dumba instead of a bust in Pouliot. And there's countless cases like that every draft year. Unequivocally it is superior to be earlier with more options than later with fewer options.

Agreed, assuming there is no difference is foolish 100%!

If we're top eight we're guaranteed one of those players if we choose. If we're 9th maybe not. And IMO ''Maybe'' doesn't cut it.

Regarding the 2012 draft, we should have drafted Forsberg. Many in the ORG at the time agreed with me as well. Huge mistake.

 

[Ryder71]

Well I know that, this was just showing everyone lottery odds at each draft position.

I gotcha.

 

[Empoleon8771]

They might be the same. Honestly they might want Eklund at #4 and he might be available at #10 and they wouldn't risk trading down for him even if they were #4. My problem is assuming that there's no difference between the picks is foolish. They're very well could be a massive difference. Maybe if they got #7 from Carolina in the Staal trade in 2012 they would have drafted a quality player in Dumba instead of a bust in Pouliot. And there's countless cases like that every draft year. Unequivocally it is superior to be earlier with more options than later with fewer options.

Using that draft, you can easily point out that Forsberg went after their pick, so there were still great players available at their pick despite them making a bad pick.

 

[SEALBound]

I gotcha.

I believe the best overall outcome for Thursday is for Philly and Buffalo to go to OT with Philly winning and us losing in regulation to Washington. That would put us all at 78 points but both Philly and Buffalo would have the tie breakers over us...I think.

That would put us at 6th. With an 80% chance at 6/7 which will net us someone good. 15% chance at 1/2ov is sweet too.

 

[CheckingLineCenter]

I believe the best overall outcome for Thursday is for Philly and Buffalo to go to OT with Philly winning and us losing in regulation to Washington. That would put us all at 78 points but both Philly and Buffalo would have the tie breakers over us...I think.

That would put us at 6th. With an 80% chance at 6/7 which will net us someone good. 15% chance at 1/2ov is sweet too.

We can’t pass (or go below in this case) Philly - first tiebreaker is RW.

We’d be 7 in your scenario

 

[Ryder71]

I believe the best overall outcome for Thursday is for Philly and Buffalo to go to OT with Philly winning and us losing in regulation to Washington. That would put us all at 78 points but both Philly and Buffalo would have the tie breakers over us...I think.

That would put us at 6th. With an 80% chance at 6/7 which will net us someone good. 15% chance at 1/2ov is sweet too.

If we lose in regulation I'll eat a centipede with Ketchup.

BUF would have the tiebreaker not Philly. BUF win would be best.

 

[Ugene Magic]

I believe the best overall outcome for Thursday is for Philly and Buffalo to go to OT with Philly winning and us losing in regulation to Washington. That would put us all at 78 points but both Philly and Buffalo would have the tie breakers over us...I think.

That would put us at 6th. With an 80% chance at 6/7 which will net us someone good. 15% chance at 1/2ov is sweet too.

The Flyers would have 22 RW to the Pens 23 RW and Buffalo's 28 RW puts us at #7.

Like, I'd rather Buffalo won outright because they are the only ones who can affect their position.

If not that and the Flyers win, they need the Ducks to win to keep us at #8 if the Pens win.

 

[Goalie_Bob]

We can’t pass (or go below in this case) Philly - first tiebreaker is RW.

We’d be 7 in your scenario

Correct, the Pens can only finish 7th-9th.

We may know more tonight. If Anaheim wins in any fashion then the Pens will finish 7th or 8th.

 

[Guins71]

Some people around here don't seem to get that. They're laying down foundations for a false narrative as if 6th and 9th are the same. they are not. This draft has EIGHT really good players according to most in the know, NOT nine. Maybe one slips, maybe not, but it's certainly (at best) a precarious position to be in. And it could have been avoided. PIT had to go out of their way to not be in the top six!

They were too busy rooting on meaningless goals and wins that have already been forgotten about as they watch a team pick a guy they wanted right in front of them

 

[Empoleon8771]

You guys have been screeching since the deadline how the Penguins were destroying their draft position and would end up drafting like 14th in the deadline, only for their pick to end up going from like #6 to #7/8/9 since the deadline. I don't think you're in a position to be criticizing anyone for what they're posing on here.

Since your "they're going to go on a hot streak and finish outside of the top-10" nonsense didn't end up true, now you're acting like their pick is going to finish #9 while there are only 8 good players in the draft, or that they'll somehow still fall out of the top-10 by having 2 lottery wins of teams behind them.

 

[Jacob]

You guys have been screeching since the deadline how the Penguins were destroying their draft position and would end up drafting like 14th in the deadline, only for their pick to end up going from like #6 to #7/8/9 since the deadline. I don't think you're in a position to be criticizing anyone for what they're posing on here.

Since your "they're going to go on a hot streak and finish outside of the top-10" nonsense didn't end up true, now you're acting like their pick is going to finish #9 while there are only 8 good players in the draft, or that they'll somehow still fall out of the top-10 by having 2 lottery wins of teams behind them.

2 more losses and we’d be 4th overall. 9th to 4th is a big jump.

 

[Empoleon8771]

2 more losses and we’d be 4th overall. 9th to 4th is a big jump.

Don't see what that has to do with my post.

Obviously losing an additional few games to improve their draft position would have benefitted them. But there's been a pretty obvious group who have been doomsdaying the entire time in these threads acting like the draft is going to be ruined because of completely unrealistic or nonsensical things. And it always changes based on the worst case scenario of what can happen at the time.

 

[CheckingLineCenter]

Bro I post here daily and anyone with a head has not been “screeching” they’d draft 14

In THIS class- as of TODAY (and likely draft day)- it is a big deal to go from 4 to 6. And 6 to 9. Because it feels like such a universal top four/five guys. Relative to other seasons where it’s a bit flatter.

Long term that probably won’t be the case. We can absolutely get lucky and get a better player at 8th/9th etc than what Martone or Misa end up being. It won’t be a big 4 in 10 years. But it’s still not a great feeling to be discussing Jake O’Brien vs Brady Martin vs Eklund vs Smith

instead of being top 4 with much better odds to win the lotto and being in a spot to pick Hagens/Martone

or being in a spot at 5th, 6th where one of those two may fall.

So I think there’s a valid sense of loss around how close we were to finishing 4th.

 

[Empoleon8771]

Bro I post here daily and anyone with a head has not been “screeching” they’d draft 14

In THIS class- as of TODAY (and likely draft day)- it is a big deal to go from 4 to 6. And 6 to 9. Because it feels like such a universal top four/five guys. Relative to other seasons where it’s a bit flatter.

Long term that probably won’t be the case. We can absolutely get lucky and get a better player at 8th/9th etc than what Martone or Misa end up being. It won’t be a big 4 in 10 years. But it’s still not a great feeling to be discussing Jake O’Brien vs Brady Martin vs Eklund vs Smith

instead of being top 4 with much better odds to win the lotto and being in a spot to pick Hagens/Martone

or being in a spot where one of those two may fall.

So I think there’s a valid sense of loss around how close we were to finishing 4th.

Do you have Ryder on ignore or something

Let me clarify, my post was directed at Ryder and Guins71 for the "they're too busy cheering on meaningless goals" and "there are only 8 good players in the draft" posts.

 

[CheckingLineCenter]

Do you have Ryder on ignore or something

I do actually so that makes some sense

Idk why anyone entertains him

 

[Big Friggin Dummy]

The issue is, and always has been, that they could've made up ground in the race to finish top 4 or 5 in the draft but instead they just sat treading water. It's the same issue if the team were fighting to snag a WC spot but kept losing games when they could've been gaining ground.

Teams always go off the board early, happens pretty much every year. Even being out of the running for a Schaefer or Misa, you really want to finish top 5 because if a couple of teams take guys like Frondell, Desnoyers, or McQueen early, then you're in position to snag somebody that falls. I think 7th is maybe still in the range, but probably the limit. I don't expect three teams ahead of the Pens to go unconventional with their picks. Maybe two, probably one.

 

[Empoleon8771]

I do actually so that makes some sense

Idk why anyone entertains him

Yeah my post was directed at the "they're going to go on a hot streak and finish outside of the top-10" posts, which are now "there are only 8 good players in the draft so picking #9 is a failure".

Yes, losing an additional game or two would have absolutely benefited their draft position. I'm not arguing that. I'm just saying that the group that has been consistently wrong throwing out doomsday scenarios with the draft pick should be shit talking anyone for what they're posting in here. It's literally just "the worst possible thing that can happen will happen, and when it happens it will be a failure".

 

[CheckingLineCenter]

Yeah my post was directed at the "they're going to go on a hot streak and finish outside of the top-10" posts, which are now "there are only 8 good players in the draft so picking #9 is a failure".

Yes, losing an additional game or two would have absolutely benefited their draft position. I'm not arguing that. I'm just saying that the group that has been consistently wrong throwing out doomsday scenarios with the draft pick should be shit talking anyone for what they're posting in here. It's literally just "the worst possible thing that can happen will happen, and when it happens it will be a failure".

yeah I mean it’s legit pointless to interact with certain posters dude

 

[SEALBound]

We can’t pass (or go below in this case) Philly - first tiebreaker is RW.

We’d be 7 in your scenario

I was looking at wins, not RW. You're correct.

7 is better than a poke in the eye.

Rangers likely coming in at 11ov. Super interested to see what they do there. They're still gonna get a good player at 11.

 

[Empoleon8771]

The issue is, and always has been, that they could've made up ground in the race to finish top 4 or 5 in the draft but instead they just sat treading water. It's the same issue if the team were fighting to snag a WC spot but kept losing games when they could've been gaining ground.

Teams always go off the board early, happens pretty much every year. Even being out of the running for a Schaefer or Misa, you really want to finish top 5 because if a couple of teams take guys like Frondell, Desnoyers, or McQueen early, then you're in position to snag somebody that falls. I think 7th is maybe still in the range, but probably the limit. I don't expect three teams ahead of the Pens to go unconventional with their picks. Maybe two, probably one.

This is actually something I think is hard to get a good grasp on, just because of how little there seems to be a difference after Schaefer and Misa. Hagens and Martone had pretty mediocre ends to the season while guys like O'Brien and Eklund thrived. Hagens still seems to be pretty safely locked in at the #3 spot, but Martone has seemingly slid a bit.

I think the big thing is that I'm not sure who in the 10-15 range may jump into the top-10. But I think the #3-#10 range has gotten super murky because both the top guys didn't play that well while the bottom guys finished the year strong.

 

[Big Friggin Dummy]

I know it's been beaten to death but trading Rakell at the TDL removes that much more talent from the lineup (a PPG since the TDL iirc), gives you another 1st+prospect, and probably ends up with the team losing another game or two over the course of the rest of the season.

Razor thing margin for error. Just happy that this isn't a draft where they're potentially missing out on a potential superstar slated to fall like Michkov or Demidov.

 

[Empoleon8771]

I could see about 13 guys going in the top-9, those guys would be Schaefer, Misa, Hagens, Martone, Frondell, Eklund, Desnoyers, O'Brien, McQueen, Smith, Mrtka, Martin and Lakovic. Obviously some of those guys are more/less likely than others, Lakovic and Martin feel more like a #8/9 at best pick, but it wouldn't really surprise me.

I think there is a difference between where the Penguins could have picked had they lost a few more games (so #4/5/6) than where they're going to end up picking (so #7/#8/#9). I don't think there's really that much of a difference where they're going to end up picking, though. You'd prefer #7 just because it's the highest pick and gives you the most options (plus a slim chance at someone in the #4/5/6 range falling to #7), but you're probably still pulling off 1 guy you like even if you're sitting at #9.

My bold prediction right now: I think Lakovic goes before Eklund in the draft. Eklund feels like he slides beyond #10 due to his size, just a gut feeling I have.

 

[Tasty Biscuits]

2 more losses and we’d be 4th overall. 9th to 4th is a big jump.

In this alternate reality they're just then as likely to have won some of the games they lost, if we're swapping prior wins into losses. Instead of winning a couple games then sucking they lose a couple games and then win a couple. Mentality and all that. So it's fairly pointless, IMO, their record very likely remains the same regardless how they got there.