2nd best. Pretty often. Just last year Carlsson, Michkov and Leonard. Carlsson might end up a center. Still two. The year before that had Slafkovsky, Gauthier and Savoie. Gauthier may end up a center, but not if Carlsson does. Call it 2.5 per draft the last two drafts. The year before that it was Eklund, Johnson and Guenther. Three. The year before that it was Lafreniere, Raymond, Holtz, Quinn and Perfetti. So five.
Add Iginla and it’s a pretty good list that you can almost sort in just about any order after Celebrini. I’ve not landed on a ranking but I like to do mocks and sometimes I have him at 5, other times 13 so not sure how to answer your question.
Regarding size, it's much more important for a defenseman than it is a forward. Obviously guys like Makar, Hughes, and Fox make it work, but they possess elite attributes that Buium doesn't.
I have Iginla 11-12, but I would easily draft him over Eiserman and I believe there are a lot of GMs who has Iginla over Eiserman on their draft list. And I believe some of them can prefer him over Yakemchuk and even Parekh because of his high floor and low floor of those defensemen.
Its not all that true. He is losing his zone in D, often he is moving to the partners space where he is blocking his partners by that move, often he is losing his guy in d zone and doesn't monitoring around. You mentioned backcheck too. On my eye he positioned himself on the wrong distance or play passive where he could be aggressive, because when he is doing right, he is very effective in defensive gorecheck. His skating and speed isn't very good, its not bad, but I would call it average or little above average.
Every year there are players that rise. And when they are selected, the names of those who shuffle down just become fact. Right or wrong.
Like I said I see only three forwards who are visually better - Celebrini, Demidov and Lindstrom. We can argue about other, but there are no real big separation arguments for Nygard or Chernyshov or Helenius etc. So I can easily see him as 4th forward on this draft. I just understand that a lot of teams will like and will draft big mobile defensemen over average sized winger. This is just what it is in NHL. And there are many teams in the bottom of the draft who hardly needs in defensemen or centers, reason why I see Iginla lower than 5-7 spot.Every year there are players that rise. And when they are selected, the names of those who shuffle down just become fact. Right or wrong.
If a team thinks Tij can become a Matthew Tkachuk or Scheifele then they will take him despite how many Juoelevis, Puljujarvis and PMDs who are perceived to be ranked higher.
I’m not saying it’s right or that it necessarily will happen or that Tkachuk is the perfect comparable. But GMs are going to value the bloodlines and noteworthy developmental season. And that he is lighting it up in the WHL playoffs indicates he plays in the big moments.
Then again, this draft seems absolutely stacked. So of course I get your point
Do you think Iginla is as good a prospect as Tkachuk or Rantanen were?
He’s not the 2nd best forward and more often than not there’s 2 wingers at most in the top 10 and they’re all better prospects than Tij is. Carlsson was not drafted as a winger, neither was Perfetti. Tij is a winger prospect through and through. His profile as a center would be top 10 worthy.
You said winger. He’s the 2nd best winger. There are usually three wingers in the top ten. There are always at least two. Carlsson played every single game of his draft year on the wing.
I do not think you will find a single pre-draft reference of Carlsson projecting as a winger. He was drafted as a center and should be considered as such in your analysis.
He played literally every game as a winger in his draft year. And he’s playing as a winger in the NHL.
I think if you looked at it hard enough you could even argue Demidov has question marks. To most, he looks like as sure of a thing as Iginla, just with higher ceiling.Criminal is it?
Demidov sure but Catton and Lindstrom have plenty of question marks themselves.
Carlsson has been playing as 1C all year and was never looked at as a winger. He only played there because his SHL team forced him to.
