It seems like I’m a total outlier here but I actually didn’t think he looked all that good in the two Slovak games I saw, including the one vs. Germany. Of course, this is all relative to what I’d expect from a potential top-10 NHL pick.
The good: His puck control and shiftiness through traffic looked excellent. No flashy highlight-reel toe-drag type stuff, just good puck control with quick hands. Plus, and this is the big one, he knows how to get to the right place at the right time – which is how he scored all of his goals vs. Germany. I also like his shot.
The bad: He frequently carried the puck into pressure and failed to create anything from the shifty puck-carrying mentioned above. I didn’t get the feeling that he made the players around him better. I also didn’t see him take over a game in the sense that he created chance after chance for himself and his teammates. That’s what I’d expect from a guy who could be drafted as high as 5th overall.
For me, he’s probably around 15-20 right now, behind:
Bedard
Carlsson
Fantilli
Michkov
Benson
Moore
Smith
Leonard
Sandin Pelikka
Reinbacher
Then there’s a tier with
Willander
Lindstein
Simashev
Barlow
Sawchyn
Honzek
Dvorsky
Sale
and probably some others.
So while he’s been good, there’s a lot of strong competition for the top 15 spots too.