Donnie740
Registered User
- May 28, 2021
- 1,767
- 2,487
If you have Ritchie and Roobroeck back, plus griffin, Delisle easily slots in as 4C, and while I think he’s better than Costello, I don’t think it’s a massive gap by any means. Costello would be a fine 4C. He has some size, skates well and is a very good PK’er. Say only one of Ritchie and Roobroeck return, than a Delisle is 3C. You could quite easily replace that via trade between now and the trade deadline. I don’t worry about ranking players 1-9 as a lot of it is contingent on position. Franssen and Rogowski both look like they’re everyday OHL players as well, and once you had Barlow, Sennecke, Ritchie/Roobroeck, they get pushed further down the lineup and can play against other teams bottom 6, third pair D. A Paquette from Guelph or a Foster from Ottawa would be two potential C’s I’d look to add, and they shouldn’t cost an arm and a leg to acquire. Plenty other options as well. They also have the chance to do what they did last year and upgrade Stewart to Punnett, with Torrance or D’Amato. They could flip Torrance plus a pick or two for a Van Steensel, Wakely, Allard, Swick type. We will also have additional 2nds and 3rds to work with even after acquiring Barlow, plus the option of Smith as a trade chip. I don’t understand your negativity. You are super high on Brampton, who I believe is a good team, but they’re thin as well outside their top 5 players. Martone, Rehkopf, MacDonell, Misa and Sova and then a bunch of mid level OHL players. Von Richter is solid, I’ll give you that.
Costello has ZERO chance of getting any ice time on a championship contender. Maybe in a couple of years, but definitely not this year.
Let’s use London as an example since they’re the best team money can buy and the gold standard of the OHL - - did they have any Shawn Costello types playing last year? No, of course not.
William Nichol was a bottom six player for London last year. Who? Then he ends up getting drafted by the Oilers. There’s a better chance of my pet goldfish getting drafted than there is of Costello getting drafted this year. That’s not being “negative” my friend - - it’s just the factual reality.
If Oshawa has Ritchie, Roobroeck, Griffin and Delisle on the roster this year one of them will shift to the wing because all four are legitimate top nine forwards on a contending team.
Just like last year when they had Ritchie, Roobroeck, and Lockhart as centremen - - they all played on the top two lines. And you never saw Griffin or Delisle sitting in the press box last year because there was only one spot for a fourth line centre behind those three.