I like Dickinson but takeover offensively, I don't see that.. I think his offensive potential is higher than Guhle, mainly due to the shot, but outside of that, he's not a creative playmaker or puck mover.
This is the last very valuable pick in the chamber of the rebuild, I don't think pushing Guhle down to pairing 2, Xhekaj to 3, and basically banishing Hutson, Engstrom and Struble from the future of the team makes the most sense.
There's a hole up front and Lindstrom or Demidov fill that and can be part of the core growing in D+2.
He is not a Cale Makar or Quinn Hughes but he is way more dominant offensively than you give him credit for. As you mentioned his shot is very good, he also has great mobility and he is a beast defensively. His profile is exactly what people want from a legit #1 defender, good size, good physicality, good shot, good skating and making smart decision. Contrary to what some here seem to believe these type of player can completely turn around a franchise.
At SOME point we'll have to pick up a high end forward... Something has to give. We cannot go forward with our team build without another F piece, it's glaring. It's evident when you watch our 3 other lines on the ice in the current make up of the team; nothing happens.
We don't have another piece to play with Dach (hoping he can stay healthy btw), we are lacking in that department.
At some point, it's about having the best players. I do want more offense believe me and I would love a dominant forward or at least a more balanced offense that being said it is not so smart to ONLY fix ourself and pigeon hole ourselves into selecting a forward at all cost. We already made similar mistake in the past by focusing on drafting a Center at all cost and overlooking way better player that could be core pieces now.
Again, as always, people make this look and sound SOOO easy..
You yourself call them 'lesser defenseman' so by default the 'offensive help' youre trying to miraculously obtain and becomes a top6 player won't be as good as what we could possibly draft in one of these forwards in this very draft
I really hate to break it to some people lol but they are NOT drafting a defenseman
It's pretty clear
I do not make it soooo easy as you pointed out but I do believe this fixation on drafting a forward at all cost is clouding some people judgement on the players available. I never claimed we should draft a defenseman and ignore a forward for the sake of it. It's about making sure we get the best player out of this draft and not look at this draft specifically but the bigger picture, we need a core piece that is a very valuable piece and a franchise defenseman is one. I did not claim all other defenders in this draft are like that, I pointed out ONE guy that clearly stand out above all which is Sam Dickinson.
I will clarify some thoughts.
1 - I would rather get a franchise forward than a franchise defenseman (I also have like the majority of you a ton of good forwards in mind for this year)
2- As of today I have Celebrini and Dickinson as both on a class of their own as franchise defining players. (franchise C and franchise D) with Demidov potentially taking over Dickinson with the remaining months (I want to see him versus better opposition)
3 - Demidov and Lindstrom have a lot of great qualities and I would love them to be part of the habs but they are not perfect and yes watching Demidov skate around MHL/VHL defenders like they don't exist is a fun watch but I have some questions marks about him playing versus more structured opposition. I would LOVE the habs to draft a forward to bring some excitement like I wanted Michkov or Leonard last year but the Habs decided to go a different route. I think Dickinson for instance is twice the player that is Reinbacher but that is my opinion as for the left handed versus right handed it does not mater if you can draft a franchise defenseman.
4- Trading a D for help offensively is not easy but some people here make it seems like it is the hardest thing to do ever which is not the case, just look at some of the trade of the past few seasons, Reinhart, Tkachuk, Kadri, Duchene, PLD, Laine, Zibanejad, Eichel, Stone, Hagel, Verhaeghe, Marchessault even our own top forward like Suzuki were attained through trades at some point.
5- As for the lesser d talk it is bit rhetorical and quite contradictory to say why would anybody would want one of our "lesser asset" while praising we have a good enough pool of defenseman. It's one or the other, if we have a good pool of defenseman than other team would love to acquire one of them and on the opposite if we don't have a good defense pool we should look to improve it. I personally do not believe that quantity > quality, it's not because we have the like of Harris, Hutson, Trudeau, Engstrom, etc that we cannot find better defenseman and refuse to potentially get a franchise defenseman.
