F Porter Martone - Mississauga Steelheads, OHL (2025 Draft)

[Corso]

I think Martone is almost certain to take an NCAA year, which will help him. Harder to hide effort levels/poor off-puck habits in a league that only plays like 2 games a week. He'll also be playing next to other top recruits which might help keep him accountable.

He is certainly not ready for the NHL or even AHL.

 

[jtechkid]

It will be interesting where he slides in the draft . The only reason he is 4-5 th is because it’s not a great draft year and who do you take in front of him .

 

[Anardil]

I'll admit that I have not seen any of his OHL games, but whenever I have seen him in a Canadian jersey, he impressed me. (I will not hold the recent WJHC against him, as Canada traditionally doesn't play underagers in optimal positions unless they are special).

If the Habs pick ends up at #4, I would not dislike this pick. He would add much needed size and skill in the Habs top 2 lines.

My only criticism I have is that I would hope that he improves his skating.

 

[Briser la glace]

I’m curious… If he hadn’t been compared to Tkachuk and Perry earlier this season, would he still be getting all this criticism?

I get that he’s not living up to those expectations of being the next pesky power forward, but he’s still one of the best CHL players this season, and he's still getting into more post-whistle scrums than 99% of draft-eligible prospects. I also believe he's made real progress compared to last year, his playmaking has improved a lot in my opinion.

His habit of slowing the tempo in transition seems to be often mistaken for a lack of pace just because of his size. I'm not saying it's a good habit, but I feel we’d be praising his vision and IQ if he was a few inches shorter.

 

[NikF]

I think his playmaking is very good in OZ, the set-ups he does are clearly scoring line quality in NHL. Will he be first on pucks as often, will he have so many broken plays and coverages to exploit in the NHL as he does in juniors? Can he get into and bully his way into thoss prime spots in the NHL as often as now? How is his patience with the puck, possession game? Can he see something is not available, circle the offensive zone or make a play back to the point? Are those passing lanes in OZ he's so adept at exploiting available in the NHL at the same rate? What percentage of those plays are him being a big body that can quickly exploit junior-level breakdowns in defense? Those are my OZ questions. But he's clearly a very high pick based on OZ play.

Then I think an experiment to make would be to place a blanket over the OZ, so every time you see him pass into OZ stop watching. Watch only defensive zone and neutral zone, how many top 5, top 10 plays does he make there? How many will he need to make in the NHL before his OZ game becomes effective?

I'm not saying this as either a negative or positive remark. It's what I've been asking myself when trying to project his game and I think you're going to get a sliding scale of opinions on these questions.

 

[frontsfan67]

9pts in 2 games for the week. Will 100% get the OHL player of the week avg of 4.5pts.

Always plays well against Kingston. 2G 2A today, Ivankovic who also plays well got the shutout

Edit:

Michael Misa 11pts in 3 games never mind MM winning it

 

[Tasty Biscuits]

Pretty quiet thread atm for a seemingly consensus top-5 pick.

 

[Pavel Buchnevich]

Pretty quiet thread atm for a seemingly consensus top-5 pick.

Not having an amazing statistical year, so there's not as much excitement. That tends to be what people get excited over. His team also is a little disappointing this year and he's their captain, so he'll get caught up in that.

I don't really care that he's having a good, not great year. Don't care either how his team does. I'm not a Steelheads fan. I think Martone is a great prospect, and to me he's top 3 and has never left my top 3.

 

[landy92mack29]

Not having an amazing statistical year, so there's not as much excitement. That tends to be what people get excited over. His team also is a little disappointing this year and he's their captain, so he'll get caught up in that.

I don't really care that he's having a good, not great year. Don't care either how his team does. I'm not a Steelheads fan. I think Martone is a great prospect, and to me he's top 3 and has never left my top 3.

I'm not sure how one can view 6th in league scoring(3rd in PPG) as not being a amazing statistical year in their draft year(even as a late bday). Also weird how you have him 3rd despite the opinion he's only been good, not great in league play. I agree with him that high BTW as he's 4th on mine, just think he has had a amazing statistical year.

 

[Pavel Buchnevich]

I'm not sure how one can view 6th in league scoring(3rd in PPG) as not being a amazing statistical year in their draft year(even as a late bday). Also weird how you have him 3rd despite the opinion he's only been good, not great in league play. I agree with him that high BTW as he's 4th on mine, just think he has had a amazing statistical year.

Well, it's not amazing in the sense that it's worse than Misa statistically. It's considerably worse than Misa statistically. He was ahead statistically of Misa last year. I think people want to see players absolutely dominate and be the best player in their league. Martone has been good. There's nothing wrong with his season, but it's not been dominant. I don't think that has to be a bad thing, but his season isn't going to get people excited in the same way as Misa.

Is he a better prospect? That's a different question and why I don't really care who averages more PPG this year in the OHL. That's not dispositive of who will have a better NHL career. I tend to think Martone has a more projectable NHL skillset. Maybe it doesn't suit a run and gun junior hockey game as well, but I think overall in an NHL setting his skillset projects better.

 

[landy92mack29]

Well, it's not amazing in the sense that it's worse than Misa statistically. It's considerably worse than Misa statistically. He was ahead statistically of Misa last year. I think people want to see players absolutely dominate and be the best player in their league. Martone has been good. There's nothing wrong with his season, but it's not been dominant. I don't think that has to be a bad thing, but his season isn't going to get people excited in the same way as Misa.

Is he a better prospect? That's a different question and why I don't really care who averages more PPG this year in the OHL. That's not dispositive of who will have a better NHL career. I tend to think Martone has a more projectable NHL skillset. Maybe it doesn't suit a run and gun junior hockey game as well, but I think overall in an NHL setting his skillset projects better.

That's a very stupid way to look at things when Misa has the highest PPG for a draft eligible since McDavid and will be a top 2 pick along with Schaefer so kind of hard for him to beat. That's like saying Marner in his draft year didn't dominate because Strome had more total points or McDavid had a higher PPG.

 

[wickedwitch]

I’m curious… If he hadn’t been compared to Tkachuk and Perry earlier this season, would he still be getting all this criticism?

I wonder that too. His coach also brought up them as a comparison; it did Martone no favors IMO.

Martone has his strengths as a player, but he was never going to be Tkachuk or Perry. So if you watch him looking for him to be that type of player, you're going to be disappointed.

That said, there are many ways to use size as an NHLer, so he doesn't have to be a Tkachuk/Perry to be a really good player.

(As someone who had him a clear 4th back in November (aka not close to the top 3), it's been interesting to watch people's opinion on him change when, IMO, his play has been pretty consistent.)

 

[Juxtaposer]

Martone has been really good in February. Better all-around for sure.

I don't get anyone dropping him any lower than 4th. I know the luster of a potential Tkachuk has worn off, but Martone's skill level is just so much higher than anyone not named Schaefer/Misa/Hagens that I feel like I'm going insane when people rank him lower than guys like Desnoyers and Frondell. I know Martone's got some warts in his game, but he has star level skill that you just can't get past 4 in this draft. He may have the most raw offensive talent of them all.