Leafs not drafting well ?

[nuck]

It seems to take about 5 years to evaluate a draft. Lots of players show their colors earlier but by year 5 most of the busts have busted and the late bloomers have shown up. Looking at the 2014 and 2015 drafts we have a pretty good idea of a players value. With 2016 we are still just sorting out guys like Stanley, Kyrou and Puljujarvi. Benson and Brooks will maybe be ready for full time use next season or they may struggle.

I am not certain if Hunter's drafts were his preferences or Lou's in terms of wanting size or older guys that might be pros quicker but I assume Hunters list and Lou's trend, same as Dubas would tell Lilley what the organization wants more of but the head of scouting still makes a general list. Speltz and Lilley both worked under Hunter as well so they helped create his lists and Kyle's.

FWIW I blame/nominate Hunter for the Korshkov pick as no way a GM goes that far out on the 31st pick without the strongest recommendation from his DOS that the guy is some kind of a steal. I am not saying but for Eygor they have a Girard or Debrinbcat, but maybe a Kyrou or Katchouk. Beyond that I think the types of players were heavily flavored by Lou but the general lists are going to look similar to what Kyle might use because the area scouts do most of the populating and a lot of them were carried over. It would be way too early to judge the more recent drafts although 2017 is looking like a wasteland for almost all teams after the top 40 picks.

As far as the recent draft tendency if the little danglers pan out they can be traded for what the club needs but that works better if the emphasis is on guys with best pro potential rather than guys with the highest pure skill. It costs a lot to trade for Muzzins and Folignos if you don't ever try to draft them but that is maybe Kyle's plan, to use the draft wins as currency to buy what they need as he perhaps feels its easier to pick right with the heavy skill bias. He seems to have learned that all dangle doesn't work all that well in the show, but for his draft scheme to really succeed, he has to be prepared to push out his most costly guys once there is a potential lower cost replacement. I don't know if he thinks that way but it is certainly possible that he would move a Mitch or a Willie if Abruzzese and Miettinen were knocking on the door in a couple of years.

 

[Menzinger]

He picked some nice talent in the later rounds though -- Connor Brown and Carter Verhaeghe were both picked under his guidance.

Since Dubas has taken over though, I haven't seen a single player he has drafted that has made any type of impact yet, especially any player taken outside of Round 1 but in fairness, I don't think I've seen any player drafted outside Round 1 from 2018 onwards be very impactful for any team yet.

I've seen tons of European forwards drafted under Kyle's leadership though - Fins to be exact.

There is seemingly a strategy with the Leafs mid to late round picks under Dubas to target European and NCAA types since they can be a bit more flexible with when they need to sign them with an ELC. Which to me makes sense given most guys taken outside of the 1st round tend to be longer term development projects anyways.

Personally I really liked a bunch of those later picks from the '19 and '20 draft classes, though early days still on how they will turn out. Dubas' 2018 draft seemed a bit over the place, but that perhaps is understandable given he only got the GM job a month before it

 

[TheScandal89]

I'd say our 1st rounders have been 50/50 although we haven't kept most (Steen, Rask, Boyes,etc.)

But our 2nd/3rd round picks have been disasters

Matt Finn, Brad Ross, Rinalt Valiev, Jeremy Bracco, Andrew Nielsen, Emeleli Rassanen, J.D Greenway, Joseph Woll, Martins Dzierkals, Greg Mckegg, Sondre Olden, Kenny Ryan, Jesse Blacker, Jamie Devane.

Most of those guys never made it and probably won't and those that did barely cracked line ups.

As a rough estimate you would hope
75% of your 1sts make NHL as a regular
50% of your 2nds make it
25-30% of your 3rd

We are at probably 50% of 1sts, 5% or less of 2nds/3rds. Now Robertson and Hirvonen look like decent 2nds while Niemla and Kokkenen look like decent 3rds, but its still early. SDA is also on the fringe of joining the list but he's still got time. These rounds you get your depth and unlikely stars sometimes. Look at Verhaghe, we would have loved to have kept a guy like that as a top 6 LW/C right now..

 

[Jeffrey Pedler]

We've seemed to hit on our first rounders the past 10 years, except for the 2011 draft. It seems that drafting after the first round could be improved.

 

[keonsbitterness]

Matt Finn, Brad Ross, Rinalt Valiev, Jeremy Bracco, Andrew Nielsen, Emeleli Rassanen, J.D Greenway, Joseph Woll, Martins Dzierkals, Greg Mckegg, Sondre Olden, Kenny Ryan, Jesse Blacker, Jamie Devane.

That's a depressing list.

 

[Carltons Cup]

Since we only have 3 draft picks this year, Dubie is gonna have a lot of extra time playing Fortnite on the draft floor....

 

[Stonehands1990]

The Hunter drafts really killed us. It seems like Dubas plan was to pay the stars and insulate them with ELC depth.
I believe Dubas is an excellent drafter but I’m not sure he’s gonna have time to see his plan out because of how poorly Keefe coaches the team

 

[banks]

It's going to be really hard to judge Dubas on drafting. He was the guy in charge starting with the 2018 draft. Before that was almost all Hunter, with the known exception of Dubas pushing for Marner (which was a good pick).

2018 seems pretty pedestrian. Sandin should be maing an impact this coming year, as a high 1st rounder. Flilip Karl might be a sleeper from round 5.

It's still early to know how well the 2019 draft went, but it looks good. No 1st rounder (Muzzin trade) but 4 players taken in rounds 2-4 (Robertson, Kokkonen, Abramov, Abruzzes) could end up making the NHL. That's a pretty successful draft.

2020 was a pandemic-caused guessing game. Dubas went after players from leagues that actually played, hoping that meant their progress wouldn't be stalled. We still don't know if this strategy worked out yet.

Dubas clearly prioritizes skill in the draft, believing that things like size and leadership can be added with trades and free agency.

 

[banks]

...

Matt Finn, Brad Ross, Rinalt Valiev, Jeremy Bracco, Andrew Nielsen, Emeleli Rassanen, J.D Greenway, Joseph Woll, Martins Dzierkals, Greg Mckegg, Sondre Olden, Kenny Ryan, Jesse Blacker, Jamie Devane.

Ugh! What a dismal reminder this list is. You can add Carl Grundstrom, Egor Korshkov, too. Both busts.

Then add in the fact that a few guys we've given up on ended up making the show somewhere else. Like Verhaeghe and Leivo.

In the years between the Steen/Stajan draft in 2002, and the Nylander draft in 2014, there's only like 5 notable players drafted by Toronto. Rask, Kulemin, Reimer, Kadri, and Rielly. 11 years, and only those 5 guys worth talking about.

 

[IPS]

Drafting small guys like Robertson and Sandin will limit team performance .. but even worse we did not draft FAST guys .. we drafted small men with SKILL .. not small men with SPEED .. Dubie fails to understand da importance of SPEED in playoff hockey .. we need to draft guys first and foremost who have SPEED .. then SIZE .. and then SKILL .. Dubie as a non player just does not get it .. da Leafs have too many skilled players who lack speed and size

Seeing as Dubas is trading away draft picks at an alarming rate to try and preserve his job I don't think we're going to have many ELC impact guys coming out of the draft anytime soon.

"Dubie as a non player just does not get it" - maybe he wants to try and prove that small and unathletic guys can cut it as pro athletes too.

 

[JT AM da real deal]

The problem with them drafting for speed is that Keefe's system negates it. He preaches the stupid turn back all the time and most players are just doing loops in the neutral zone waiting...so that kills any speed you might have. As an added bonus...the guys that are doodling around in the neutral zone are not good puck retrievers on dump ins (which ends up happening 70% if the time) because ....they are smaller than average. So in reality, we have the worst of both worlds.

Good points .. no one enjoys that circle back and reload plan to always control puck .. it is a risky strategy which often leads to puck turnovers in your own end which you can't recover from .. same as skate around perimeter of net and not attack da net another waste of time move .. i think we do all of those things on ice because we have a ton of players with great edges and hand skill and they can make those plays work most of time .. but in playoff hockey it does not work .. everyone fore checks and back checks at full speed in units of 5 so capitalizing on guys who do not do that full out in regular season does not occur .. you need that extra gear in playoff hockey to make defenders nervous and errors will occur with blow byes and forechecking .. people do not understand this on here but reason why Kerfoot and Willy were successful in playoffs is they both have blow bye speed and forced defensive errors .. Matty got doubled by a defender and a centre (usually Weber and Danault) but even he needs to gain more speed as Danault should not be able to neutralize him

 

[Pucker77]

Which years were Dubas and which were Lou ?

If I remember correctly, I believe Dubas and Hunter worked in tandem for 2015 (Marner Draft), Lamoriello and Hunter were the figureheads for years 2016 and 2017. Then it has been all Dubas since 2018.

It is funny how obvious the difference in philosophy is between the groups. Dubas takes the most skilled players despite their position, Hunter/Lou took the bigger guys despite their skill.

2015 (Dubas/Hunter): Marner, Dermott, Bracco, Nielsen, Dzierkals, Lindgren, Timashov, Desroscher, and Korostelev.
2016 (Lou/Hunter): Matthews, Korshkov, Grundstrom, Woll, James Greenway, Brooks, Middleton, Bobylev, Walker, Mattinen, Chebykin.
2017 (Lou/Hunter): Liljegren, Rasanen, Scott, Kara, Gordeev, McGregor, O'Connell
2018 (Dubas): Sandin, Durzi, Der-Arguchintsev, Stotts, Hollowell, Kral, Holmberg, Bouthillier, Kizimov.
2019 (Dubas): Robertson, Kokkonen, Abramov, Abruzesse, Koster, Loponen.
2020 (Dubas): Amirov, Hirvonen, Niemela, Akhtyamov, Villinueve, Ovchinnikov, Miettinen, Rindell, Miller, Fusco, Schingoethe, Tverberg.

If you look up the names from each draft class you will see "big, strong, needs work on skating" for a lot of Hunter/Lou picks and a lot of "speed, skilled, undersized" for a lot of Dubas picks.

For drafting I tend to lean toward the Dubas side because skilled players have a better shot to make the NHL than a weak skater. Those skilled guys can even give you better trade chips in the future.

 

[SeaOfBlue]

Since we only have 3 draft picks this year, Dubie is gonna have a lot of extra time playing Fortnite on the draft floor....

People do realize that Dubas is almost 40 years old right?

 

[SeaOfBlue]

Two things to keep in mind in regards to only have 3 picks the next 2 years:

1) The Leafs will probably add some picks this year. There are some guys the Leafs are likely moving this offseason and they will likely supplant their pick pool that way.
2) They made a ton of picks last year and are not exactly "thin" in regards to young talent coming through the pipeline. They can go a year or two without a ton of picks, especially since 2021 is a pandemic year where they may not have confidence in the prospects (even though I think 2021 is a good year).

 

[rocketman588]

The Hunter drafts really killed us. It seems like Dubas plan was to pay the stars and insulate them with ELC depth.
I believe Dubas is an excellent drafter but I’m not sure he’s gonna have time to see his plan out because of how poorly Keefe coaches the team

Keefe is his coach he's brought him to 3 separate jobs lol.Acting like the dude has nothing to do with Keefe is hilarious

You'd think that he would know the organizational depth enough after 3 years here to not make the JT gamble if the elc game was his play

 

[Stonehands1990]

Keefe is his coach he's brought him to 3 separate jobs lol.Acting like the dude has nothing to do with Keefe is hilarious

You'd think that he would know the organizational depth enough after 3 years here to not make the JT gamble if the elc game was his play

Apologies if it was interpreted that way. My viewpoint is that I like Dubas as a GM but the fact that he hired such a horrible coach is a huge black mark for me. He didn’t even interview and Gallant and Q were both unemployed

 

[rocketman588]

Apologies if it was interpreted that way. My viewpoint is that I like Dubas as a GM but the fact that he hired such a horrible coach is a huge black mark for me. He didn’t even interview and Gallant and Q were both unemployed

Makes sense thanks for the clarification. I agree although he obviously needs some work at aspects of the GM role ( obviously contract negotiations etc)

 

[barilko05]

We've been drafting fine recently. Matthews was a no brainer, Sandin is young but looks promising. Dermott is a decent NHLer. Marner...great regular season yet to show up in the playoffs. Nylander was a great pick, Rielly was a good pick. Amirov is too early but looks good, Robertson was a steal, Connor Brown was a fantastic pick, Kadri was great as well. We've been hitting with the 1st round pretty well. The later rounds haven't been the best.

I guess beyond the first round has sucked. In the last decade only Dermott, Robertson, Brown.

Also very curious, how much of that should be attributed to drafting vs development ? A lot of responsibility lands on the trainers and coaches for how a player turns out.

They're were a couple of others: Johnsson, Verhaege, Leivo, Engvall, even Gregg McKegg has managed to scratch out almost 200 career games. But you're right. On the whole, our later round drafting has been...underwhelming. Or has it just been our developmental system? I think our goalie development has been the worst, actually. We haven't drafted and developed a true number 1 stopper since maybe Felix Potvin. Reimer looked to have potential, but he was really just a future career backup masquerading as a #1. There was one guy who looked real good when we drafted him, but our crack management team at the time decided he wasn't going to cut it. What was his name again? Rust? Trask? Whatever. I wonder whatever happened to him, anyway? Oh...right...

 

[AvroArrow]

Apologies if it was interpreted that way. My viewpoint is that I like Dubas as a GM but the fact that he hired such a horrible coach is a huge black mark for me. He didn’t even interview and Gallant and Q were both unemployed

Gallant should've been hired or offered a job without interview imo.Insane how we didn't even talk with him.

 

[Stonehands1990]

Gallant should've been hired or offered a job without interview imo.Insane how we didn't even talk with him.

You know what they say. You make your own bed and then you lay in it. I believe Dubas wanted a coach that would implement analytics based strategy without pushback. And it appears Keefe is going that.

 

[SeaOfBlue]

Gallant should've been hired or offered a job without interview imo.Insane how we didn't even talk with him.

That is ridiculous. He has made one Cup Finals with an expansion team. Good for him. The rest of his record is average at best.

Also, he was still Vegas' HC when we hired Keefe, so he was not an option. In fact, there really were not many options available when Babcock was fired; most were fired a few months after Babcock.

 

[Cleetus]

People do realize that Dubas is almost 40 years old right?

so you are saying 40 year olds don't play video games lol!

 

[The Iceman]

Romanov
Akil Thomas
Hoglander on a quick look

Depends on your definition of impact I guess

YEAH, Akil Thomas and his zero goals, zero assists in zero games wouldn't make my grade.

 

[WestCoastLeafs]

It's going to be really hard to judge Dubas on drafting. He was the guy in charge starting with the 2018 draft. Before that was almost all Hunter, with the known exception of Dubas pushing for Marner (which was a good pick).

2018 seems pretty pedestrian. Sandin should be maing an impact this coming year, as a high 1st rounder. Flilip Karl might be a sleeper from round 5.

It's still early to know how well the 2019 draft went, but it looks good. No 1st rounder (Muzzin trade) but 4 players taken in rounds 2-4 (Robertson, Kokkonen, Abramov, Abruzzes) could end up making the NHL. That's a pretty successful draft.

2020 was a pandemic-caused guessing game. Dubas went after players from leagues that actually played, hoping that meant their progress wouldn't be stalled. We still don't know if this strategy worked out yet.

Dubas clearly prioritizes skill in the draft, believing that things like size and leadership can be added with trades and free agency.

Other than Sandin, who seems to be a Dubas-influenced pick, I'm not sure how big Dubas' role was in 2018. He took over very late in the game so they couldn't really change gears to much. At most his philosophy might have influenced a few close calls.

 

[Jozay]

The Hunter era was f***ing awful outside of those top picks.