LW Patrik Laine - Tappara, Liiga (2016 Draft) X

[JA]

Patrik Laine:
Birthdate: April 19, 1998.

2015-16 Liiga Rookie of the Year.
2015-16 Liiga Rookie Goals Leader.
2015-16 Liiga Rookie Points Leader.
2015-16 Liiga Playoff MVP and Champion.
2015-16 Liiga Playoff Goals Leader.
2015-16 Liiga Record Setter for Most Playoff Goals By a Rookie.
2016 World Junior All Star Team.
2016 World Junior Gold Medal.
2016 World Junior Goals Leader.
2015 U-18 All Star Team.
2015 U-18 Silver Medal.
2015 U-18 Goals Leader.
2016 World Championship MVP.
2016 World Championship Silver Medal.
2016 World Championship All-Star Team.
2016 World Championship, IIHF Directorate Award for Best Forward.
2016 World Championship, Award for Top 3 Player on Team.
2016 World Championship Goals Leader.
2016 World Championship Record Setter for Most Goals by a Player in First Year of NHL Draft Eligibility.
2016 World Championship Record Setter for Most Points by a Player in First Year of NHL Draft Eligibility.
Second-Highest Point Total by a U-19 Player at a World Championship Tournament (behind only Sidney Crosby, 2006).

http://www.eliteprospects.com/player.php?player=221667

-------------------------------------------------------

A demonstration of some of Laine's skills with his stick:



Between Liiga, the World Juniors, Champions Hockey League, U20 Four Nations, the World Championship, and several exhibition games, Patrik Laine played 104 games in total during the 2015-16 hockey season (breakdown: http://hfboards.mandatory.com/showpost.php?p=118558927&postcount=976).

On the left, all of Patrik's goals from the 2015-16 Liiga (Finnish Elite League) regular season and other highlights in chronological order.

On the right, Patrik's 2016 Liiga playoff goals, and playoff shift highlights as well, in chronological order.



Liiga Championship post-game celebration: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HPra8YF0bcE

Laine's 2015 IIHF U-18 tournament highlights (August 2015):

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=445JOZMdxSY

Laine's 2016 IIHF U-20 World Junior Championship highlights (December-January 2016):

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iwf64yOB1wo

Televised World Junior Gold Medal Celebration in Finland [YLE TV; Patrik Laine interview at 48:49 of video] (Finnish language): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t2JsZLpjYVo

2016 World Championship highlights (May 2016):

OT shift in exhibition vs USA: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ws--uda8eGU
Goals #1 and #2 vs Belarus (0:24 and 1:06 of video): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eYXRD7D33ZE
TSN's Finland-Belarus post-game feature: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vIyk1JgyW4E
Goal #3 vs Germany: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xpJ-kuXHUIE
Goal #4 vs Germany: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b_a2Vk9cQ2M
Crossbar vs USA: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XAcNREnabHE
Playmaking shift vs USA: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zo-z15QccV0
Goal #5 vs France: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VMc9GaQL4nE
Goal #6 vs Slovakia: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5c2JIw8lmEk
Record-setting assist vs Hungary (1:43 of video): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=13J2qm7mifU
Goal #7 vs Denmark (Quarterfinals): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Ca3s-rZxU0
Game-winning assist vs Russia (Semifinals): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3m1QxSlkqWY
Shift highlights from Laine's big performance vs Canada (Round Robin) (considered to be his best game of the tournament): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aBOOiCZRXZc



-------------------------------------------------------

Due to the length and breadth of information provided in the previous OP, there likely would not be enough space in this OP to continue to provide updates if I simply carried over all of that information into this post. As such, I will link to the previous OP here, where a plethora of useful information may be found. You may use it as a resource to learn more about Patrik Laine:

http://hfboards.mandatory.com/showpost.php?p=118557191&postcount=1

Below are the table of contents you will find in that post.

Table of contents:
1. Highlights.
2. Scouts' comments.
3. Additional commentary about Laine's 2015-16 Tappara season -- linemates and scoring logs.
4. Concerning his skating, and Hannu Rautala.
5. Select interview clips.
6. Comparisons in style to Mario Lemieux from scouts and former players.

Click to read more...

 

[Kelly]

https://video.twimg.com/ext_tw_video/732660766155800577/pu/vid/640x360/0aSvHuEiQGov9P9D.mp4

 

[Skinnyjimmy08]

10 pages??? geeze

 

[BusQuets]

Wow this guy is by far the most talked about prospect. How many pages did Mcdavid get?

 

[sniper81]

Honestly he is a rare Package, not often do we his size and skillset. That factored in with the Resurgence in Finnish Hockey (which Hockey desperately needed) and you get that many posts.

 

[Canucks LB]

Talks a big game, cocky, arrogant, and lets see if he can back it up.

 

[Woodhouse]

Wow this guy is by far the most talked about prospect. How many pages did Mcdavid get?

I looked two weeks ago and Laine's thread pace was +1 ahead of McDavid and +5 ahead of Eichel at that time (XIII).

 

[BB88]

Talks a big game, cocky, arrogant, and lets see if he can back it up.

Can I ask you the name of the prospect you are talking about?

 

[bogostick]

Can't wait to watch him on the Jets!

 

[The Thin White Duke]

McDavid game wasn't really controversial, there's not much to talk about with him. Laine has more areas of divided opinions.

 

[Tigerscout]

McDavid game wasn't really controversial, there's not much to talk about with him. Laine has more areas of divided opinions.

This

Talks a big game, cocky, arrogant, and lets see if he can back it up.

I believe the word you are looking for is CONFIDENT.

 

[Canucks LB]

This




I believe the word you are looking for is CONFIDENT.

Overconfident can also be used.

 

[BB88]

Overconfident can also be used.

If you have followed Laine you can't with him, but I'm not surprised by that comment honestly.

The NHL guys for one say Laine has confidence but he's not arrogant, he's not cocky.
Lawless spend good amount of time with him and said he's very polite.

Laine and Matthews have both said they are friends, he and Pulju are good friends and making jokes about each other constantly.

Laine hasn't said anything crazy,
But it's always more fun to try to make up stuff out of nothing.

 

[The Winter Soldier]

Here is what Red Line Report from USA today wrote about Laine a day ago in their mock draft, not to be confused with their value board.

2. Winnipeg — Patrik Laine. The Jets are the first winners of “Draft Lotto Jackpot” and move up four spots under the new rules to snag this beast of a winger. The NHL needs finishers and Laine could be a future Rocket Richard Trophy winner.

Some high praise for Patrik. And I do not disagree with Redline here if the Jets have the chance to draft Laine.

http://www.usatoday.com/story/sport...tthews-patrik-laine-jesse-puljujrvi/85575694/

 

[Lempo]

Overconfident can also be used.

Well, this far he has been pretty much good for the confidence shown; got what he went after in FEL and in WJC, and the missed gold in WHC mayhap could rather be put down to the other guys' lack in scoring.

 

[IamherefortheFinn]

If there is one old saying that captures the bare essence of the Finnish people, it has to be "pessimisti ei pety" meaning "a pessimist does not get disappointed".

So when half the Finns here are absolutely crazy about this guy and the rest cautiously optimistic, it means that we truly have a special player in our hands.

 

[Jetabre]

Prepare to lose!

 

[ijuka]

On the topic of this video:

First of all, it's really annoying. The cuts are way too quick. It's so difficult to see anything, how the plays begin... It seems like every cut begins when the skaters are almost at the offensive zone and then doesn't show the actual counter attack.

Well, looking at 7:41-7:44 there's not that much issue with the lack of time and space. It's actually very open and a typical NHL-style 3 on 3. 8:13-8:14 is a similar one. Still, just terrible cuts, cannot see anything.

I think that the lack of open time and space and faster tempo thing just is due to the players in general being better, faster and more skilled. The play itself tends to be significantly more open and stretched out than FEL. I don't think that he'd have any issues with the north american game at the AHL level at all, for instance. And I think that his skating would be serviceable in NHL even as is.

 

[teravaineSAROS]

Talks a big game, cocky, arrogant, and lets see if he can back it up.

he already has

* huge part of the WJC gold
* the sole factor to Tappara finally managing to beat Kärpät
* well-deserved MVP of the Liiga playoffs
* WHC silver
* MVP of the WHC (not that i agree with him winning, but it's not like he won it for no reason and deserved to be nominated)

how many players have managed that by the time they just turned 18?

 

[JFG]

If there is one old saying that captures the bare essence of the Finnish people, it has to be "pessimisti ei pety" meaning "a pessimist does not get disappointed".

So when half the Finns here are absolutely crazy about this guy and the rest cautiously optimistic, it means that we truly have a special player in our hands.

I really don't think that applies to the finnish HF posters. "You" (this doesn't necessarily mean you IamherefortheFinn) guys are the inofficial world champions at hyping up players from your country.

 

[teravaineSAROS]

McDavid game wasn't really controversial, there's not much to talk about with him. Laine has more areas of divided opinions.

exactly this

 

[Ippenator]

I really don't think that applies to the finnish HF posters. "You" (this doesn't necessarily mean you IamherefortheFinn) guys are the inofficial world champions at hyping up players from your country.

Every country has hypers, and I find it only a good thing. Those people are happy and proud of a player and they want to share their enthusiasm over here. But there definitely are at least 4 of these more pessimistic Finnish posters consistently writing on this thread. These people do represent in my opinion quite well the quite common Finnish type that thinks "pessimist will not get disappointed".

I guess this approach is otherwise fine, but sometimes it is strange to me that they get so angry at the "hyping" people, and make pretty bitter comments on them or the player that they are hyping. I don't think this is really needed.

 

[Plural]

I really don't think that applies to the finnish HF posters. "You" (this doesn't necessarily mean you IamherefortheFinn) guys are the inofficial world champions at hyping up players from your country.

Absolutely.

 

[ijuka]

I really don't think that applies to the finnish HF posters. "You" (this doesn't necessarily mean you IamherefortheFinn) guys are the inofficial world champions at hyping up players from your country.

Not just -any- player. How many posts did Barkov's pre-draft thread get?

 

[Halberdier]

I really don't think that applies to the finnish HF posters. "You" (this doesn't necessarily mean you IamherefortheFinn) guys are the inofficial world champions at hyping up players from your country.

It depends. We are also inofficial champions at bashing our own players, as you can see already in this thread. There have been several Finns downplaying Laine in ridiculous ways, though some of them have finallly shut it up after FEL playoffs domination.

And about hyping, even the most hyping posters such as IFK have very modest expections about Laine's rookie season, namely something around 15 goals and 30 points.

Please compare that to several Toronto fans, that expect Matthews to have 50 to 70+ points on his rookie season. Let alone sayin he will be TOP 10-15 center in NHL (thus in the world) even at start of the season. And that he is like Kopitar, but just better in about every respect.

Now, who is hyping most?

Stylistic comparisons to Lemieux and tongue-in-cheek posts about Laine needing 152 points in his WHC final match to beat all time WHC point records and stuff have really not understood by HF members, I'm afraid.

If you skip couple of the most blatantly overhyping posters, you really cannot find any overhyping.

I agree 100% with analysis made by Scheifele about Laine. He did watch all plays by Laine and did play twice against him in WHC. Maybe Scheifele was also just hyping?