There's no such thing as a surefire NHLer. Well, there are ... if they remain healthy and on the right track, "certainties" but those are few and far between. The elite of the elite, which I don't think this draft has, or if it does, those players go maybe 2 deep. But I am skeptical even of that, Bedard looks good. Should be a very good NHLer. But he could pull a Wright this year for all we know. Unlikely, but not implausible. Everyone else are different levels of crapshoot. There certainly aren't any more or less in this draft than others. This draft does come with lot of hype though. Like the 2021 draft, except that was all negative hype really, and from the looks of it, 2021 will turn out better players than 2022.... or at least more of the good one.
We here at this board have been here sooo long that we've long since left out the semantics. Naturally, nothing is surefire. But we make statements like this in the grand scheme of things.
In other words, for the 2023 draft, what I'd be saying is that aside from Bedard, Fantilli, and Mischkov at the top, we've got another 37 guys who are looking like MacTavish and Heiskanen style prospects as far as their NHL upside is concerned.
That's to point out just how massively promising this 23 draft is looking overall.
Anyway, I think Dallas have... reasonably high expectations this year with Oettinger making huge strides last season, Bourque, Johnston and/or maybe Stankoven coming in to the team. March was a good addition.
But they needed a safe RD prospect I think. And I think they want him for this season, to play. I'm still not a huge fan of NIls. Not that I don't think he can become a top pair D man and possibly a top PP player, but I think his ceiling is fairly limited, with a higher floor. When the heart of your team is on the verge of retirement, Seguin, Benn, Pavelski etc It might make sense to make a move, take a risk for the hear and now, rather than relying on an unknown and unverifiable "best draft in decades".
Dallas should be going for it now. Naturally. They also have a real nice prospect system.
Interesting though, to compare such things.
Dallas sent a non-top-10 pick in the heavily touted 2023 draft AND at least a 4th in 2025 for a very interesting and promising player in Lundkvist, who has what, 25 NHL games under his belt? And Lundkvist was demanding a trade.
The Islanders sent the 13th overall in a run-of-the-mill draft for the already established Romanov AND an early 4th rounder (Isaiah George, who we're starting to gush about already). And it wasn't like Montreal was dealing with a Romanov who wanted out.
They're both 22.
Interesting.
At least as far as I'm concerned, this draft isn't so different from most.
For each his own, but this assessment is counter to what we're all hearing from the big publications and independents in the scouting world. And as opposed to most fans, these agencies have access to extended materials to place all these players under the microscope with.
It's a special draft. Look forward to it!
People making predictions that will never come true, people forgetting those predictions they failed at, only remembering those they were correct about, just immense hype and unrealistic expectations. So if they thought right now that a 1st round pick isn't worth quite as much as the hype suggests, which I also believe to be the case, then they sold highish and god an NHL ready young RD with a wicked shot. Not so bad..
It's fine. The hockey world knows what Lundkvist is for a prospect at the moment.
There's no telling who Dallas could have or might have picked next summer. So, they have a lot more certainty at the moment and the sky is surely the limit for Lundkvist - and many other youngsters in his shoes.
Whether Dallas paid too stiff a price won't be known for many years now and largely depends on Lundkvist's development and the NYR scouting staff.
