Pick Three Middle Six Youth Prospects for the Habs to Keep

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DAChampion

Registered User
May 28, 2011
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As recently as a year ago the logjam in the Habs' system was on D, but now it's arguably in middle six forwards. The list in the poll is pretty big !

Notes:
- This poll deliberately excludes Anderson, Gallagher, Dvorak, and future draftees.
- This poll assumes that Suzuki, Caulfield, Slafkovsky, Dach, Laine, Demidov are the future top six.
- This poll assumes that Xhekaj, Tuch, Davidson, etc are really in competition for the 4th line.

If you reject one of these assumptions, please explain it.

I picked Beck, Hage, and Heinemen. I think ideally a third liner needs to be able to play on the second line in case of injury. Hage and Beck are showing a lot this year and have great IQ. Heinemen is showing size and intensity this year.
 
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Hage and Beck are no brainers.

After that, I went with Kapanen but Heineman is also a good pick. I went with pure upside (more potential offense, can play center, can PK) but guys with EH's size, speed and shot are hard to find, even if the offensive upsideis somewhat limited.
 
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I don't feel Hage belongs on that list tbh.

For that reason Beck Evans and Heineman
I wouldn’t put Hage in the same category as the others tbh. He projects to be a top 3/6 forward. If he’s included though, I ended up voting for Hage, Evans and Heineman. Beck was a really close 4th.

Hage has a good shot at supplanting Dach, and eventually one of the six mentioned will be injured.

But I also assume that Hage will start on the third line and spend a year or two there. So in the timeline of this poll Hage fits. Longer term this year's firsts and seconds will compete as well.
 
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I really think Montreal has room for at least 4 players on that list (Beck, Evans, Hage, and Heineman) in the upcoming seasons, especially if they can move on from Gallagher in the last year of his contract or they trade Newhook. The other question is when will players like Beck and Hage be ready for the NHL. Does Hage play one more year at Michigan then go to the AHL for a season? If that happens both Anderson and Gallagher’s contracts finish and there is two more spots open.

If I had to pick 3 though I guess I would pick the 3 centres in Hage, Beck, and Evans.
 
I really think Montreal has room for at least 4 players on that list (Beck, Evans, Hage, and Heineman) in the upcoming seasons, especially if they can move on from Gallagher in the last year of his contract or they trade Newhook. The other question is when will players like Beck and Hage be ready for the NHL. Does Hage play one more year at Michigan then go to the AHL for a season? If that happens both Anderson and Gallagher’s contracts finish and there is two more spots open.

If I had to pick 3 though I guess I would pick the 3 centres in Hage, Beck, and Evans.
I think Hage returns to college as per Hughes presser
 
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Same as OP. Hage, Beck, Heine. But let's just keep Evans as well if the price is right.

Gally and Donkey can stick around as well as far as I am concerned after their contracts. They are veteran players that competing teams want to have. Their cap hits just need to be halved on their next deals to reflect their decreased roles.

Top 6

Slaf - Suzuki - Caufield
Demidov - Dach - Laine
Heine - Beck - Hage
Anderson - Evans - Gally

First PP

Hutson - Suzuki - Laine - Caufield - Slaf/Demidov

First PK

Evans - Donkey - Guhle - Xhekaj
 
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Newhook is underrated here. Within two years, I think he will make himself essential to what we are building. To me, there are 4 people here that are above the rest:
Newhook
Beck
Hage
Heineman
 
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Excluding Evans (@28 he's not a youth or a prospect) & Hage (he's more likely to compete for a top 6 spot than middle 6 imo).

Went with Beck, Kapanen & Newhook. Mesar & Roy are curious ones as they may well have the highest ceilings of the bunch (outside Hage)but both face a big uphill battle to turn that potential into NHL impact.

It's fascinating how so many are sold on Heineman over Newhook at this point...

Despite both being 2001's (Newhook is 10 months older), statistically speaking,

one has:
256 NHL games, 109 career points.

The other:
41 games, 17 career points.

More importantly:
24-25 TOI/game 15min
Vs
24-25 TOI/game 11min

I get that it's about what they will do in the next 3-5years, but to suggest Heineman will be the better player going forward, one has to either assume that Heineman has a large likelihood of considerable improvement while Newhook will either stagnate or regress... Or that MSL is clueless and is making a major mistake in his current player evaluation.

Neither seem like a convincing argument to me, though I'd be thrilled if Heineman managed to take his game to a level where the coaching staff trusted him to handle 15-16min/night consistently as his style of game is fun to watch.
 

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