Prospect Info: Florian Xhekaj

[Walrus26]

Was torn here as A lifer Knights fan and Habs fan. Old school bomb fest rarely seen in Jr anymore.
Old school fans will recognize the Knights player last name Boulton.

Boulton looked pretty handy in that fight, fair play to him.

 

[Adam Michaels]

I'm all for him dropping the gloves and fighting at times. I like that he plays with sandpaper, but he needs to be smarter. He has truly played 2 full games out of Brantford's 7.

He was suspended for 2. Out of the remaining 5, he was ejected in 3 of them.

He's still 3rd in points 2nd in goals on the team. It helps to still be among the top scorers on one of the worst teams in the OHL so far. Imagine if he calmed down just a bit and played the full games.

 

[WinterLion]

Imagine being one of the hundreds of skilled players the Habs looked over to draft this hopeless fighter with a 4th round pick

Bobrov: we believe in buckets, that’s why we draft for bucket-need and not the best prospect we can identify.

Did you see what Tanner Jeannot was traded for last year?


What percentage of those "skilled" players taken at his pick or after do you think will even play 100 games?

I don't disagree with your overall sentiment, but at the same time I do feel like it is important to draft many different skill sets... and toughness is a needed skillset on a winning team.

 

[DAChampion]

First player I see wear a tie on his hockeydb profile pic.

 

[badfish]

I had used the wayback machine to find Arber's height and weight at the same age as Florian, I don't think they were far off. I have a hard time picturing what a forward with Arber's dimensions would be

 

[ReHabs]

Did you see what Tanner Jeannot was traded for last year?


What percentage of those "skilled" players taken at his pick or after do you think will even play 100 games?

I don't disagree with your overall sentiment, but at the same time I do feel like it is important to draft many different skill sets... and toughness is a needed skillset on a winning team.

Young players who have hockey skills should be prioritized over mindless PIM magnets.

I love a good energy guy, I think The Sheriff is a promising young player who I like very much, but with that said we don’t need to spend draft picks on PIM magnets over skilled youngsters who could one day be skilled NHL players.

Using a draft pick on this reckless penalty magnet seems increasingly ridiculous.

 

[Deebs]

Was torn here as A lifer Knights fan and Habs fan. Old school bomb fest rarely seen in Jr anymore.
Old school fans will recognize the Knights player last name Boulton.

Good fight. Love that he wants to be physical with fights and hits, nothing wrong with it. Soon enough though he'll need to learn about positioning, forechecking properly and being responsible. If he can be an energy guy, ala Kolesar in Vegas, that's perfect for this team moving forward. He has a couple of years to get it together but as they say, better to have the problem of reeling a kid in then having to push him everyday to be more into the game.

 

[Pompeius Magnus]

Good fight. Love that he wants to be physical with fights and hits, nothing wrong with it. Soon enough though he'll need to learn about positioning, forechecking properly and being responsible. If he can be an energy guy, ala Kolesar in Vegas, that's perfect for this team moving forward. He has a couple of years to get it together but as they say, better to have to problem of reeling a kid in then having to push him everyday to be more into the game.

Kolesar is a pretty good model IMO, it's exactly who he should try to be at the next level.

 

[Tyson]

The younger Xhekaj needs to learn how to play hockey and stop trying to emulate his big brother.

 

[MXD]

Young players who have hockey skills should be prioritized over mindless PIM magnets.

I love a good energy guy, I think The Sheriff is a promising young player who I like very much, but with that said we don’t need to spend draft picks on PIM magnets over skilled youngsters who could one day be skilled NHL players.

Using a draft pick on this reckless penalty magnet seems increasingly ridiculous.

The Sheriff would probably have been drafted in 2020 had he not played his first season on a old (in junior terms) defense and he certainly would go in the first round of an eventual 2019 redraft.

 

[loudi94]

The younger Xhekaj needs to learn how to play hockey and stop trying to emulate his big brother.

Whatever he's doing down there, it sure isn't emulating his big brother. That laundry list of infractions won't get him a sniff in the NHL.

 

[Tyson]

Whatever he's doing down there, it sure isn't emulating his big brother. That laundry list of infractions won't get him a sniff in the NHL.

Yep, hard to develop your game with fights, slew foots and instigator penalties.

 

[ReHabs]

The Sheriff would probably have been drafted in 2020 had he not played his first season on a old (in junior terms) defense and he certainly would go in the first round of an eventual 2019 redraft.

First of all, of course an established NHL player would be drafted high in any redraft. But for every tough fighter who makes it to the NHL are hundreds who don’t. It’s not a good gamble even with a 7th round pick.

Secondly, Arber was a much better prospect than Florian at the same age. Have you seen Florian’s OHL stats? If is safe to say he is never going to be a NHL player.

 

[MXD]

First of all, of course an established NHL player would be drafted high in any redraft. But for every tough fighter who makes it to the NHL are hundreds who don’t. It’s not a good gamble even with a 7th round pick.

Secondly, Arber was a much better prospect than Florian at the same age. Have you seen Florian’s OHL stats? If is safe to say he is never going to be a NHL player.

... Same thing for skilled players.

AT the same age, Arber had just finished his first full OHL season, in which he scored 2 goals, had 1 assist in 58 games, along with a -28 differential. You're free to call this "better" than Arber if you want.

 

[ReHabs]

... Same thing for skilled players.

I’d rather buy a lotto ticket than just throw loose change into the bushes.

Rather spend a draft pick on skill than a PIM addict.

AT the same age, Arber had just finished his first full OHL season, in which he scored 2 goals, had 1 assist in 58 games, along with a -28 differential.

And he was not drafted.

 

[MXD]

And he was not drafted.

The question was whether Florian had better stats than Arber, with a reasonable provision for the fact that Florian is a F while Arber was (mostly) a D.

It's not even far-fetched to suggest Florian could end up with similar production to Mesar on his D+1 season in the same league (and I'd argue the OHL is a bit stronger this season than last season). Of course, Florian really has to tone down on stupid shit.

 

[DAChampion]

Young players who have hockey skills should be prioritized over mindless PIM magnets.

I love a good energy guy, I think The Sheriff is a promising young player who I like very much, but with that said we don’t need to spend draft picks on PIM magnets over skilled youngsters who could one day be skilled NHL players.

Using a draft pick on this reckless penalty magnet seems increasingly ridiculous.

It's always ok to make gambles in the late rounds, in my opinion, by which I mean rounds 4 to 7 but am open to thinking rounds 3 to 7.

Florian somehow grew 2 inches over the summer (rare for people that age), and is also off to a good scoring pace so far this year. It's not so bad.

But I'm not impressed with the slew foots.

 

[ReHabs]

The question was whether Florian had better stats than Arber, with a reasonable provision for the fact that Florian is a F while Arber was (mostly) a D.

It's not even far-fetched to suggest Florian could end up with similar production to Mesar on his D+1 season in the same league (and I'd argue the OHL is a bit stronger this season than last season). Of course, Florian really has to tone down on stupid shit.

My mistake about ages.

I don’t think either Xhekaj would have shown enough to earn being drafted by the NHL but in the later rounds you see strange things.

The dirty plays are disgusting and indicate poor character.

 

[WeThreeKings]

It's always ok to make gambles in the late rounds, in my opinion, by which I mean rounds 4 to 7 but am open to thinking rounds 3 to 7.

Florian somehow grew 2 inches over the summer (rare for people that age), and is also off to a good scoring pace so far this year. It's not so bad.

But I'm not impressed with the slew foots.

I'm not either but at the same time, I do kinda like having someone who is capable of being nasty.. like when Gudas was unhinged, I appreciate in a meaningless regular season game that Florian would go and slewfoot his ass and fill his face in.

 

[ReHabs]

It's always ok to make gambles in the late rounds, in my opinion, by which I mean rounds 4 to 7 but am open to thinking rounds 3 to 7.

Florian somehow grew 2 inches over the summer (rare for people that age), and is also off to a good scoring pace so far this year. It's not so bad.

But I'm not impressed with the slew foots.

Maybe the Habs found a hidden gem.

 

[Naslundforever]

Good fight. Love that he wants to be physical with fights and hits, nothing wrong with it. Soon enough though he'll need to learn about positioning, forechecking properly and being responsible. If he can be an energy guy, ala Kolesar in Vegas, that's perfect for this team moving forward. He has a couple of years to get it together but as they say, better to have the problem of reeling a kid in then having to push him everyday to be more into the game.

Xjekaj got pommeled there ouch did Boulton ever land good punches straight to his head. Watch the brain kid, we don’t know how to heal those.

 

[Team_Spirit]

First player I see wear a tie on his hockeydb profile pic.

He's learning from the best

Spoiler

 

[MadMslm]

He needs to tone it down a little bit.

You can’t put your team in trouble every game, it’s a recipe for disaster.

Other than that, he’s having a good season with 5pts in 6 games to start the year. He did show some good things at camp and can definitely play hockey. Keeping up that pace would give him a better point total than Pezzetta had in his fourth year.
We’ll see soon enough if he has the same progression curve as his brother. Would help to have a physical fourth line that could chip in here and there a bit like Vegas.

 

[tnq]

The question was whether Florian had better stats than Arber, with a reasonable provision for the fact that Florian is a F while Arber was (mostly) a D.

Florian had the same stats as Josh Anderson in D year

 

[angusyoung]

First player I see wear a tie on his hockeydb profile pic.