Official 2025 NHL Draft Thread

[Larry44]

I don’t recall Florida or Vegas winning the cup with a small defence, the d man takin at 12 you are referring to, would be great on nhl 25. This is reality, not a video game.

Huh? You can have smaller Dmen and win, you just need some balance.

You don't have to look far, just at Florida. Probably their best Dman was Gustav Forsling, 6'0" 195 and Brandon Montour is 6'0 199. Both are Buium's size and we don't know if Buium will grow a bit more.

You don't have to go far down this list to realize that, although big D like Hedman, Pietrangelo, Ekblad are valuable, a lot of the best and most productive D are not huge, but in the 5'11 - 6'1" range.

NHL Stats

I have no problem with the Flyers having a couple decent smaller Dman, but to pass on Buium, a potential 1D, and take a 2C because you have York, Drysdale and Andrae in the system is just incompetent.

 

[BigToe]

Watched some more.

Desnoyers's brother looks good. Mooney is my favorite guy not named Hagens and someone is gonna steal him because he's small. Not really into Frondell , but I'll keep watching because he's a Swede.

 

[Wangstar]

Desnoyer, he will be in the mix for our pick.
I would go left wing,center with our laters 1sts, I have a few guys in mind,Nab a goalie early round 2, then I’d start tradings the remaining 2nds for 26 picks.

 

[IronMarshal]

Is it odd that I’d like to see the height, and physical make up of all the “faithful” that want the Flyers to be bigger?


Somehow I feel like there may be similarities

And the opposite is probably just as true.

 

[BigToe]

Pre-season top 10 for fun

Hagens

Martone
Misa
Ryabkin
Reschny
Desnoyers
Mooney
Potter
Spence
Fondrk

 

[LegionOfDoom91]

Pre-season top 10 for fun

Hagens

Martone
Misa
Ryabkin
Reschny
Desnoyers
Mooney
Potter
Spence
Fondrk

Like Moore from the US Program?

 

[BigToe]

Like Moore from the US Program?

He’s fine but I expected more. Potter, Fondrk and Mooney were better in the games I saw.

 

[BigToe]

Had .88 PPG in his D-1 in the J20

 

[deadhead]

Boumedienne is great. Him and Hensler are probably the top 2 right now.

Trethewey is also right up there.

Radivojevic, Sjöström and Kotajärvi are up there... BUT are all 5'10 so yeh... might be that all are going after 20 ahaha.

Then Aitcheson, Huang, Hamilton, Schaefer, Annborn and Mrtka seem roughly on track for 1st round.

Hallin has a lot of skill but he is 5'8.

Hilariously almost all the best Dmen are under 6'2. Boumedienne, Hensler and Mrtka are the only ones 6'2 and up.

If Briere was looking toward the 2025 draft, stocking up on bigger players in weaker drafts would make it easier to go for smaller players who drop next season.

If you have Bonk, Sotheran and McDonald in your pipeline, easier to play Drysdale, York and an undersized LHD. I think balance on defense is important to them.

At forward, I don't think size matters as much past a certain limit (i.e. 210 lbs or so), but size/speed/leverage matters to play an aggressive forecheck. To cycle the puck, you have to win board battles in the O-zone. So I think they have no problem with fast, short but stout forwards, but don't want too many small forwards who get bounced around.

They may also want size in centers playing a 2-3 on defense where the center is more like a 3rd D-man, where smaller wings can use quickness to harass D-men at the point but centers need to be able to handle traffic in front of the net.

 

[Beef Invictus]

We know that size argument is a mountain of horseshit when the Flyers two most important 23 and under defensive pieces, which they spent the highest value assets on, are both 5'11. And they acquired and tried to re-sign 5'11 Sean Walker. And the next best defensive prospect in the system, who Flahr called the 3rd best D prospect in his class (after Sanderson and Drysdale), is 5'9. Not even the Flyers believe a 6' defender is too small. They just committed cardinal sins like drafting fit over BPA, counting their chickens before they hatch, overvaluing their own talent, and not understanding that you solve fit from the top down.

Someone like Molendyk has a Forsling-like profile. But 6' LHD < 6'2 RHD. Can you imagine the lineup problems they'd have with Molendyk and Buium? Bullet dodged.

They have the luxury of drafting Michkov because they take things like Mann.

Balance!

 

[FLYguy3911]

@landsbergfan

https://x.com/i/web/status/1819148361938735257

 

[blackjackmulligan]

If Briere was looking toward the 2025 draft, stocking up on bigger players in weaker drafts would make it easier to go for smaller players who drop next season.

If you have Bonk, Sotheran and McDonald in your pipeline, easier to play Drysdale, York and an undersized LHD. I think balance on defense is important to them.

At forward, I don't think size matters as much past a certain limit (i.e. 210 lbs or so), but size/speed/leverage matters to play an aggressive forecheck. To cycle the puck, you have to win board battles in the O-zone. So I think they have no problem with fast, short but stout forwards, but don't want too many small forwards who get bounced around.

They may also want size in centers playing a 2-3 on defense where the center is more like a 3rd D-man, where smaller wings can use quickness to harass D-men at the point but centers need to be able to handle traffic in front of the net.

Not if those bigger players are not very good and longshots to make the NHL.

One is not like the other 2.

 

[deadhead]

Yeh, Florida with their D that was marginally below league average height ahahahahahaha.

Last 10 cup winners D average height (most common 6 D):

2015: Chicago, 186.8 cm (6'0.9)
2016: Pens, 185.7 cm (6'1.1)
2017: Pens, 186.5 cm (6'1.4)
2018: Caps, 185.5cm (6'1.0)
2019: STL, 191.3cm (6'3.3)
2020: Tampa, 189.2cm (6'2.5)
2021: Tampa, 189.8cm (6'2.7)
2022: Avs, 185.2cm (6'0.9)
2023: Vegas, 190.3cm (6'2.9)
2024: Panthers, 187.5cm (6'1.8)

Average NHL Dman (40+ games) last season was 72 inches... so 6'2.

So:

6 of the last 10 winners had below average height D...

4/10 were unarguably some of the smallest D groups in the league.

Uh. Hope no one is paying you to do financial analysis.
Last time I checked, 72" is 6'0. (I know, that metric/English conversion gets you every time!)

The average of those 10 teams is about 6'2.

Buium is going to end up 6'0 200 lbs or so, since when was that "small." Whatever reason he fell in the draft, size wasn't the reason. Now Ghost at 5'10 185 was small.

If you have Sanheim, McDonald, Bonk and Sotheran (assuming Attard and Ginning are gone), that's plenty of size.

 

[pit]

I love how when players fail on the Phantoms they were late round picks that you shouldn't expect to succeed.

But when said prospects are still in the minors, they're penciled into a future NHL top six to justify passing on a skilled player in a fit style fashion.

 

[Beef Invictus]

I love how when players fail on the Phantoms they were late round picks that you shouldn't expect to succeed.

But when said prospects are still in the minors, they're penciled into a future NHL top six to justify passing on a skilled player in a fit style fashion.

For a team that never errs the results sure are poor

 

[Appleyard]

Uh. Hope no one is paying you to do financial analysis.
Last time I checked, 72" is 6'0. (I know, that metric/English conversion gets you every time!)

The average of those 10 teams is about 6'2.

Buium is going to end up 6'0 200 lbs or so, since when was that "small." Whatever reason he fell in the draft, size wasn't the reason. Now Ghost at 5'10 185 was small.

If you have Sanheim, McDonald, Bonk and Sotheran (assuming Attard and Ginning are gone), that's plenty of size.

It was a mistype. Average NHL D height is 74, so 6'2.

And while a decent mathematician with okay quals in the area I would rather jump of a bridge than do financial analysis ahaha.

I mean... the Flyers themselves talked about Buium and size and part of the reason they passed being height lmao. Hence why it came up here!

Believe Briere or not (size it was probably deflection about Overhardt)... but yeh... "size wasn't the reason" tell Briere that, who indicated part of the reason they passed on him was size! Ahahaha.

 

[landsbergfan]

@landsbergfan

https://x.com/i/web/status/1819148361938735257

How happy should I be?

 

[FLYguy3911]

How happy should I be?

He’s 7 foot? Does it matter?

 

[Alex K]

The best scorer of the Nikolay Maslov Tournament right now is Maxim Kalinin. 18 years old Center, 6'5", 223 lbs. Eligible for the 2025 draft.
Flyers' 2nd round pick?

 

[BigToe]

 

[Wangstar]

I don’t think size is any kind of factor in terms of scouting.
It’s like Craig button said yesterday, during the Czeck, USA game, Benak is 5-7 and he can create offence with his skill that a large guy can’t.
I’m just saying, Florida and Vegas had enough size on D, to punish their opponents

 

[BigToe]

I don’t think size is any kind of factor in terms of scouting.

It's definitely a factor. It's just overvalued.

 

[Wangstar]

Yah, that sums it up.
Seriously, all scouts are checking out, Benak, Cole Reshny a 5-9, c/w from Marlin, SK, Victoria, 5-8, Cole Schmidt RW, Vancouver, I would trade picks to get this guy for our 2nd pick, and Caleb Desnoneyer. All those guys should be in our wheelhouse. Then Roger McQueen, the dub has another strong draft class.

 

[LegionOfDoom91]

The US squad is rough this year. Granted they don’t send the US NTDP to the Hlinka so it’s never really that good but they typically have at least a guy or two that could legitimately be a first rounder on the team. Not sure they have that this year.

 

[BigToe]

The US squad is rough this year. Granted they don’t send the US NTDP to the Hlinka so it’s never really that good but they typically have at least a guy or two that could legitimately be a first rounder on the team. Not sure they have that this year.

One of the EP guys thinks Fiddler will go top 10.