Confirmed with Link: Flyers trade Cutter Gauthier to Anaheim for Jamie Drysdale and 2025 2nd round pick

[GKJ]

(EDIT)

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[deadhead]

Bonk doesn't project as a top pairing defenseman. Every scouting report I've seen had him as a top 4 (one had him as bottom pairing) and that he doesn't have any particular skills that stand out, but was the "safest" defensive pick in the 1st round.

Of course, he can always develop and become a top pairing defenseman over time. But nothing to date says that it is a likely outcome.

He's been playing with Dickinson for two years, I think as a pair they'd be fine, and that would give you 2 solid pairs that could eat the lion's share of defensive minutes. You don't need a true #1 if you have two pairs that can hold their own in any situation and play big minutes. See Florida.

I think Briere would like to find a LHD to pair with Bonk who can play 22-23 minutes a night.
Doubt it's Andrae, and no one else in the system.

If Seeler/McDonald - Drysdale is your 3rd pair, you can shelter Drysdale and use him to best advantage (the way teams use Ghost the last few years). If he doesn't work out, replace with Gill or another RHD. It's much easier to fill out a 3rd pair playing 12 ES minutes in sheltered situations than one playing 15-18 ES minutes.

 

[trostol]

I think if Dickinson fell, they would have jumped on him.
More of the prototype 1D, and a perfect pairing with Bonk.

Luchanko is probably their prototype top 6 center, full sized, elite speed, two way player who can cover for scoring wings with defensive issues. I think next season you'll see Luchanko and Michkov joined at the hip.

Ideally, they land another top six center in the 2025 draft, make Frost the 3C (if they keep him) and move Couts to LW in a couple years.

that's terrifying

 

[thedjpd]

Copium.

Forget equivalents, I think I would rather take my chances with TK actually playing defense over Drysdale. That’s how bad it’s been.

And no, Buium was a much better and more accomplished prospect than Drysdale entering the draft. Yes he played on a stacked team, but he led the country in TOI as a draft eligible defenseman. They were stacked in large part because of his impacts (especially in the playoffs).

Oh and he scored more per game in college hockey as a defenseman than the player they picked in the first round as a 1C in the OHL. In no way shape or form was that an “easy choice”.

It’s not hard to find articles pre-draft that call Drysdale a #1, elite player based on production and projection.

Jamie Drysdale - 2020 NHL Draft Prospect Profile - The Hockey Writers NHL Entry Draft Latest News, Analysis & More

We profile Erie Otters' defenseman Jamie Drysdale. He is among the best defensemen available in this draft class. How high will he go?

thehockeywriters.com

Thinking otherwise is just revisionist history. Buium has all the same hype now, still pre-NHL, but still somehow taken 6th in his own draft class.

Are NHL GMs infallible? No, absolutely not. But the trend lately is to hype up prospects like crazy before they make the NHL, reaching to the far side of their upside.

Even over talented players only have a small chance to reach that upside, so treating Buium as high likelihood to reach those goals is in itself disingenuous at best. He can; but so can a lot of players at 18-19.

 

[FLYguy3911]

It’s not hard to find articles pre-draft that call Drysdale a #1, elite player based on production and projection.

Jamie Drysdale - 2020 NHL Draft Prospect Profile - The Hockey Writers NHL Entry Draft Latest News, Analysis & More

We profile Erie Otters' defenseman Jamie Drysdale. He is among the best defensemen available in this draft class. How high will he go?

thehockeywriters.com

Thinking otherwise is just revisionist history. Buium has all the same hype now, still pre-NHL, but still somehow taken 6th in his own draft class.

Are NHL GMs infallible? No, absolutely not. But the trend lately is to hype up prospects like crazy before they make the NHL, reaching to the far side of their upside.

Even over talented players only have a small chance to reach that upside, so treating Buium as high likelihood to reach those goals is in itself disingenuous at best. He can; but so can a lot of players at 18-19.

I'm not looking for articles. I'm going off of what I saw.

The Hockey Writers? Surely you can provide a better source than that. Even so, the same people that were calling him a future #1 then are the same people that were comping him to f***ing Scott Niedermayer post trade (ftr I am pretty conservative with my projections and even I wouldn't call Buium a future #1, decent chance yes, but that's a ridiculously high bar for any prospect not named Dahlin). Prospect opinions are hard to change. There's also a decent chance without the Covid shutdown that Sanderson would have surpassed him by the time the u18s rolled around. He was on that trajectory. That was also a bad defensive class. I only had Sanderson and Drysdale as certain first rounders. That certainly pushed them up the board. This most recent class was relatively strong with defenders, especially at the top.

I watched Drysdale pretty closely his draft year including the entire Hlinka tournament in one sitting and while he was good, he always left me wanting more. Saw him play as an underager in the u18s, and came away much more impressed with Thomas Harley who was not much older (Bo Byrum the year before was much more impressive as an underager). The skating, while less impressive now, was always the standout trait and gave him a much bigger edge at that level than he has at this level. Drysdale was never a great defensive player but the hope was his feet would allow him to at least be a decent rush defender and transition guy and that hasn't happened. And when that doesn't happen you better be one heck of an offensive talent, and I never thought he had gamebreaking skill.

Production? It's not really that close. Drysdale's production was good but nothing special, which is part of the reason I wasn't too bullish on him. He was a great puck rusher, but he didn't create as much as you would expect at the OHL level given his tools. A lot of dead-end plays. And he didn't have to fight for much opportunity on that Erie team.

Here's their NHLe by Bader's model.

There is way too much made out of where he went in the draft as proof he wasn't a good prospect? How many times do we need to see smaller defensemen drop in the draft and excel post draft before we stop appealing to authority? Look at how many defensemen under 6 foot were taken in this most recent draft (Hint: you can count on one hand). It's really not hard to see how a league of size queens let him fall.

 

[JojoTheWhale]

You don't need a true #1 if you have two pairs that can hold their own in any situation and play big minutes. See Florida.

Whoa. I know some people got carried away with Forsling and started arguing he was top 5, but he's easily a top 20 guy who played at the absolute top of his game for that run.

Off the top of my head, he'd probably be top 15 but we know how these lists go. You don't know until you make them. Given that you subscribe to the counting teams style of making these lists, asserting that he's not even top 32 is wild.

 

[deadhead]

There is way too much made out of where he went in the draft as proof he wasn't a good prospect? How many times do we need to see smaller defensemen drop in the draft and excel post draft before we stop appealing to authority? Look at how many defensemen under 6 foot were taken in this most recent draft (Hint: you can count on one hand). It's really not hard to see how a league of size queens let him fall.

Uh, how many D-men under 6'0 are starting in the NHL?

And it's not discrimination at that level, after a year or two in the AHL, teams can identify short D-men who are NHL capable. Someone will claim that player on waivers and play them if they're good.

Looking at NHL.com, lists 25 D-men under 6'0. 32 are 6'0.
However, this includes a lot of marginal players, best short D-men:
Spurgeon 5'9 #156
Casey 5'9 #46
Hutson 5'9 #62
Grzelcyk 5'10 #85
Girard 5'10 #47
Brannstrom 5'10 #15
Q Hughes 5'10 #15
Zellweger 5'10 #34
Barrie 5'11 #64
Orlov 5'11 [214] #55
Ghost 5'11 #78
Clifton 5'11 #133
Carrier 5'11 #115
Fox 5'11 #66
Walker 5'11 UDFA
Sandin 5'11 #129
Spence 5'11 #95
Drysdale 5'11 #6
Malinski 5'11 UDFA

Bold are "workhorse" D-men (20+ minutes a night).
One problem is outside of Orlov, most are not just short, but slight of build, so they can't use leverage as easily to compensate.
Spurgeon is a complete outlier, as is Fox.

 

[JojoTheWhale]

And it's not discrimination at that level, after a year or two in the AHL, teams can identify short D-men who are NHL capable. Someone will claim that player on waivers and play them if they're good.

When all roads lead to arguing in favor NHL orgs always getting things right, that should probably be a sign something has gone wrong.

 

[deadhead]

When all roads lead to arguing in favor NHL orgs always getting things right, that should probably be a sign something has gone wrong.

Revealed preference.

A short player who performs in the AHL will get a shot at the NHL at some point, maybe a year or two later than a taller player, but Guorde still ended up with a pretty good career. So the lack of short NHL players suggests it is a liability, all else held equal.

The relative scarcity of short D-men suggests size does matter, since the distribution in the general population peaks around 5'10.

This lists suggests NHL teams are pretty rational, one should only draft a D-man under 6'0 in the top 20 picks if he's otherwise exceptional. Drysdale was clearly over drafted.

However once past pick #40, I'd gamble on offensively talented short D-men until the cows come home, since I can shelter them on 3rd pairs and get value on the PP.

 

[JojoTheWhale]

Revealed preference.

A short player who performs in the AHL will get a shot at the NHL at some point, maybe a year or two later than a taller player, but Guorde still ended up with a pretty good career. So the lack of short NHL players suggests it is a liability, all else held equal.

The relative scarcity of short D-men suggests size does matter, since the distribution in the general population peaks around 5'10.

This lists suggests NHL teams are pretty rational, one should only draft a D-man under 6'0 in the top 20 picks if he's otherwise exceptional. Drysdale was clearly over drafted.

However once past pick #40, I'd gamble on offensively talented short D-men until the cows come home, since I can shelter them on 3rd pairs and get value on the PP.

Revealed preference assumes rationality or logic or whatever other phrase you would like to use. I think you know I'm not willing to go that far with NHL orgs.

Please consider that when things happen in a player's development matters quite a bit. You do it all the time when talking about how rushing players can hurt them, but never in the other direction.

 

[FLYguy3911]

The obsession over height for a game played at ground level will never not amaze me.

Also some guys do grow slightly post draft.

Also also NHL listed heights and weights are generally buffed.

And I just remembered there is a weirdo on the prospect board that will literally obsess over a prospect breaking the 6' barrier as if that is significant.

 

[deadhead]

Whoa. I know some people got carried away with Forsling and started arguing he was top 5, but he's easily a top 20 guy who played at the absolute top of his game for that run.

Off the top of my head, he'd probably be top 15 but we know how these lists go. You don't know until you make them. Given that you subscribe to the counting teams style of making these lists, asserting that he's not even top 32 is wild.

When people talk about you have to have a 1D to win a Cup, they usually mean an elite D-man who plays 25+ minutes in all situations and double shifts at times. Hedman, Pronger, etc.

Forsling was a 5th rd pick, traded for Clendening, 4 years later traded again to FLA.
Injuries, up and down until he got to Florida at 25.
Looked like crap on Chicago - but this is interesting:
xGFrel:
Chi: -7.81, -8.88, -4.21
FLA: +2.57, -2.47, -3.23, 3.13
So some of that improvement was illusory, from playing on a much better team.

Either he had hidden superpowers, or he's in the right situation in Florida.
More likely it's a matter of chemistry and fit, a good player whose game was elevated by being in the right situation.

 

[Magua]

Where do 5th overall value, fringe NHL offensive defenseman who don’t create offense rank on the “Win a Cup” scale?

If you want to bet on the next Forsling, I’m taking Tanner Molendyk on Nashville. Another player they had ranked below Bonk. 6’ and left handed….yikes. Not the fit they needed.