Where did Yzerman go wrong with the rebuild?

[Nnowski]

Using your logic, all teams are bad at drafting. Yzerman scored some of the best players available in the 1st round in 2019 and 2020. 2021 is looking pretty amazing as well, esp when you add in Cossa.

So yes, fact is Yzerman's drafting has been good. We can judge that based on Seider and Raymond alone. We can look at how good ASP and Cossa look. And Kasper has been helping DRWs win NHL games.

When drafting at #4 and #6 the expectation is a top of the lineup player. Plenty of teams have had non 1st rd picks okay NHL games since 2019. And I like Kasper, but he has 1 secondary assist in 7 games

terrible trolling. be better

There are 16 teams with more NHLers playing on their team that were drafted 2019 and after.

 

[Gniwder]

Off the top of my head , Raymond, Finnie, Lombardi are all SFY drafted scoring forwards. So there's that.

Finnie isn't a goal scorer, and Lombardi bloomed his D+1 season in the OHL. Even Ray was known as a 200 ft defensively responsible player before the draft. His goal totals weren't that high until last season.

Stevie has picked only 4 forwards that scored 30 goals prior to the draft, and they are Mastrosimone, Buch, Danielson, and Becher. I'm on record as liking the last 3... but it's too few, just one every draft the last 3 drafts.

Kind of feels like you're making the opposite point you think you are. They're drafting players that project as not having "huge flaws" precisely because those offensively gifted but one-dimensional forwards can be found in UFA.

If you get a player in free agency, you know their flaws, and you know you can't fix them (Sprong being the best example). Prospects can develop, and it's easier to teach defense than goal scoring to a prospect.

Not to mention anything past the 1st round is a crapshoot, I'd rather take my chances on a scoring winger than a prospect whose ceiling is 4th line grinder or 3rd pair D. Those are a dime a dozen in free agency, the Wings are loaded with them now.


Seattle takes the exact opposite approach as the Wings relying heavily on analytics instead of "hard to play against" Draper eye test. Their prospects are all scoring at much higher pace in lower leagues, we'll find out in a few years if the approach works. Some of them are now in the AHL, and doing well so far.

 

[Dotter]

Finnie isn't a goal scorer, and Lombardi bloomed his D+1 season in the OHL. Even Ray was known as a 200 ft defensively responsible player before the draft. His goal totals weren't that high until last season.

Stevie has picked only 4 forwards that scored 30 goals prior to the draft, and they are Mastrosimone, Buch, Danielson, and Becher. I'm on record as liking the last 3... but it's too few, just one every draft the last 3 drafts.

Finnie is on pace for 43 goals and has shown good offensive skills during training camp. He was also leader on his team in goal scoring. Saying he is not a scorer seems disingenuous. Granted, he's not Ovechkin or Stamkos if that is your standard....

Everyone knew Raymond had impactful offensive upside. Him hitting over 30 goals is not a surprise to anyone, I would not be surprised if he is a consistent 40 goals scorer by his prime.

If you like Becher as a goal scorer, then you should love MBN as he has a better shot and more dangerous shot.

 

[Gniwder]

Finnie is on pace for 43 goals and has shown good offensive skills during training camp. He was also leader on his team in goal scoring. Saying he is not a scorer seems disingenuous. Granted, he's not Ovechkin or Stamkos if that is your standard....

Everyone knew Raymond had impactful offensive upside. Him hitting over 30 goals is not a surprise to anyone, I would not be surprised if he is a consistent 40 goals scorer by his prime.

If you like Becher as a goal scorer, then you should love MBN as he has a better shot and more dangerous shot.

Look at Finnie's draft profile. He wasn't projected to be a high scorer.... if he turns out to be one, that'll be fantastic. I definitely thinks he has potential, but he's playing in the WHL in his D+2 season so you expect him to score.

Ray was projected as a playmaker, more than a goal scorer though several pre-draft reports noted his quick release. At the same time those same sources questioned his production.

I'm on the fence with MBN because there were at least a couple other prospects I liked better, especially from an offensive potential. The kid is strong, has a hard shot, and runs over other players. There is a lot to like for sure. Even with all of these "hard to play against" draft picks, he's the only forward that'll knock opponents down at will.

I liked the last draft, half of the previous draft, and hated the 2022 draft aside from Buch. If Lombardi pans out, it would certainly make it more palatable. 19, 20, and 21 don't look like they'll yield anything significant outside the first round, just bottom pair D and bottom 6 forward and that's if AlJo, Wallinder, and Mazur pan out.

 

[Dotter]

Look at Finnie's draft profile. He wasn't projected to be a high scorer.... if he turns out to be one, that'll be fantastic. I definitely thinks he has potential, but he's playing in the WHL in his D+2 season so you expect him to score.

Ray was projected as a playmaker, more than a goal scorer though several pre-draft reports noted his quick release. At the same time those same sources questioned his production.

I'm on the fence with MBN because there were at least a couple other prospects I liked better, especially from an offensive potential. The kid is strong, has a hard shot, and runs over other players. There is a lot to like for sure. Even with all of these "hard to play against" draft picks, he's the only forward that'll knock opponents down at will.

I liked the last draft, half of the previous draft, and hated the 2022 draft aside from Buch. If Lombardi pans out, it would certainly make it more palatable. 19, 20, and 21 don't look like they'll yield anything significant outside the first round, just bottom pair D and bottom 6 forward and that's if AlJo, Wallinder, and Mazur pan out.

Outside the 1st round of the 2019 draft, there's only one player available that looks worth considering.... even he is not that spectacular. The 19 draft is proving to be an unremarkable draft. I cannot honestly judge 2020 and beyond yet, but we have clues and as of now 2020 also looks unremarkable past the 1st round. Jury is still out.

Hard to blame Yzerman when the talent pool was so thin.

 

[Geezer WC]

Not declaring it a bust. But Danielson is currently doing poorly in GR and Kasper has 1 secondary assist in 7 games. Not exactly how you'd like their seasons to be going

Kasper has looked fine on the third line. I'm glad it's time for him and Ed to be up and learning/thrown into the fire. No negatives to that.

 

[Oddbob]

Idk what this totally means but idk why they woulnd't want a 100 point player with back to back years with selke votes.

Idk if I'd consider him soft but luckily, it's subjective more than measured. I will say he had 100 plus hits and has time on the PK, especially younger. IMO, soft players don't get selke votes, play PK, have almost 1 block shot per game as a forward the last two years or get 100 plus hits in a season.

I'll be honest, there's' a lot of Swed's in the front office, if they feel he's not worth a move great, but I'm having a hard time believing it.

He plays for a Canadian team, those Selke votes mean very little. Auston Matthews was 3rd just last year for the Selke and I think he is less defensive by quite a bit than Larkin, and Larkin never gets Selke votes.
Also there has been quite a bit of talk about motivation issues with him. Do we really want an unmotivated 11+ mil player on our roster who used to be a 100 pt guy?

 

[Oddbob]

Idk, pucks kept going off Holmstrom back in the day all the time.

When Copp does it on the regular we will talk. Until then he hasn't beat a goalie while shooting a puck this year, so his 3 goals are not awesome or awe inspiring. He will get the same 9-15 goals he has every year in Detroit. You know this, because he doesn't look any better by the eye test than his first 2 years.

 

[Oddbob]

Finnie is on pace for 43 goals and has shown good offensive skills during training camp. He was also leader on his team in goal scoring. Saying he is not a scorer seems disingenuous. Granted, he's not Ovechkin or Stamkos if that is your standard....

Everyone knew Raymond had impactful offensive upside. Him hitting over 30 goals is not a surprise to anyone, I would not be surprised if he is a consistent 40 goals scorer by his prime.

If you like Becher as a goal scorer, then you should love MBN as he has a better shot and more dangerous shot.

To be fair, many overage players do quite well their final season or two as older players scoring wise in junior. Hope Finnie turns into something, but he didn't really stand out in preseason to me. Buch could be something as he is doing very well in the KHL right now, but major problem is at 21 years old he is still listed at 170 pounds, and I don't think many players are doing much at that weight in the NHL. Of course he can gain weight, but at 21 you would think he would be heavier by now.

That said, I agree with those who say Steve is drafting too many character guys/2 way guys. Character guys are great, but we need someone drafted to actually be awesome offensively. Raymond is tracking there, but I don't get that same vibe from Kasper or Danielson.

To me more concerning is not really that many outside 1st round picks are doing really well since being drafted. There are 2-3 doing well (Finnie, Buch, Lombardi) but most of them are not even being talked about as maybe something decent at the NHL level. Even James who was a 2nd round pick is sounding like at best a 4th line energy player.

 

[Pavels Dog]

Prospects can develop, and it's easier to teach defense than goal scoring to a prospect.

If that was really true it wouldn't be so easy to pick up gifted offensive players in FA and so difficult to find legitimately good defensive players.

Not to mention anything past the 1st round is a crapshoot, I'd rather take my chances on a scoring winger than a prospect whose ceiling is 4th line grinder or 3rd pair D. Those are a dime a dozen in free agency, the Wings are loaded with them now.

Lombardi, Buchelnikov, Mazur, Kiiskinen, Becher, Rychlovsky, Söderblom, Dower Nilsson * 2,.. the list goes on with scoring wingers we've drafted or gambled on.

Seattle takes the exact opposite approach as the Wings relying heavily on analytics instead of "hard to play against" Draper eye test. Their prospects are all scoring at much higher pace in lower leagues, we'll find out in a few years if the approach works. Some of them are now in the AHL, and doing well so far.

Source on this? I thought they drafted Beniers in large part because of words people hate around here; compete, two-way play, work ethic, high floor etc.
I guess I'm not seeing the big deal about their drafting so far but it's extremely early.

19, 20, and 21 don't look like they'll yield anything significant outside the first round, just bottom pair D and bottom 6 forward and that's if AlJo, Wallinder, and Mazur pan out.

There's no bonus points awarded for late round steals. If Edvinsson and Cossa pan out anything outside the 1st is pure bonus. 2021 looks really good in that respect given that both Buium and Mazur have clear NHL potential (even some sleeper potential in Savage).

There are 16 teams with more NHLers playing on their team that were drafted 2019 and after.

I swear 5 years ago this board only cared about impact players from the draft. Now that we've drafted Seider and Raymond all that seems to matter is that we didn't draft Brett Leason in the 2nd round to pad the NHL games played stat.

 

[Snuggs]

If Yzerman pays up for RHD Rasmus Anderson or F Elias Pettersson I'll be happy.

If he sells at the TDL I'll be happy.

If he stays put for a 2nd year in a row... I'll be super unhappy again! Red Wings have the prospects to bump up for a few months if they're out of a playoff race and in the same breath, if they are in the race they can package up some guys/picks to get a player of quality and replace the lost depth with a good young prospect. Either way the guys the team would call up aren't going to be asked to play major roles for the final few months outside of bottom six or bottom pairing defense minutes.

 

[19 for president]

I don't think the Wings rebuild has gone off the tracks yet because 3/4 of those players aren't on the roster yet. Where I do think Yzerman could fail is not pushing the rebuild fast enough to coincide with Larkin still being an effective center. If one of Danielson/Kasper fail to be as good as Larkin it is going to be very hard to win.

I don't necessarily agree with how much he has slow rolled certain guys IE Ed last year and not having Kasper on the initial roster, but I don't think it has hurt those players development long term.

Where I think we haven't been great is in pro scouting and UFA signing. I can handle Copp or Compher but not both. Same thing with Holl or Petry. He has created a lot of clutter on the roster that was not needed.

With all that said I still see where he is going with the rebuild. It is slow. We didn't get a franchise center that is easy to build around because we never got that top 3 pick. We are building from the back end out. We have two goalie prospects that I think have that franchise/ elite potential in Augustine and Cossa. We have two pillars on defense in Seider and Ed, and a potential elite offensive dman waiting in the Wings in ASP. Not to mention a plethora of other young dman that have continued to look solid in Aljo, AntJo, Wallinder, Buium, etc. The issue is that all of what I described typically takes longer to come into the NHL and make a huge impact than elite centers or forwards do. Seider was the exception, but most goalies and dman take a bit to develop.

Then we have the forwards. I agree that I think we could have taken some more boom or bust swings but there is no guarantee that we would have been successful there. So looking at what we have we are building a two way team that will be a massive pain to play against. MBN has the shot and build to be a true PF (rarely seen in this NHL), Kasper is a two way center that is elite on the forecheck. Danielson is what I call a true 2 way center. Ray I think will end up a PPG guy very shortly. So I think we have 4 top 6s locked up and then you have a good chunk of potential guys in Mazur, Lombardi, Buch, Belcher, Finnie, etc. Now this whole strategy does hinge on Kasper/Danielson becoming top 6 centers or at least one being a top 6 while Larkin remains top 6. This could be Yzerman's big fail if he isn't able to get this addressed. This is where I think slow rolling young guys could have a major impact.

 

[TheOctopusKid]

Not that he is beyond critique, I'll get to those in a moment. Handful of the positive though:

• Went from arguably the worst overall prospect talent pool in the league in 2019, and one of the worst farm system to cultivate and develop those prospects to one of the highest rated prospect pools in the league. The Holland-era Wings did not prioritize prospect development or draft picks, and not only did Yzerman have to replenish the pipeline with talent, he needed to rebuild the entire organization. The dearth of quality in our system was apparent, especially in the Goalie and Defenseman areas and how poor we had historically been there. He has replenished that with Seider, Edvinsson, Wallinder, ASP, Johansson, Tuomisto, Biuim, etc. as a key priority, and added in arguably the best 1:2 Goalie prospect tandem in the league in Cossa and Augustine.
• He went from a team whose 2nd leader scorer was Athanasiou, the corpse of Justin Abdelkader, a backless Danny Dekeyser, a totally disengaged Nielson, and a rapidly declining Howard all under multiyear deals with little to no flexibility to a team whose core future (Seider, Raymond, Larkin) are all locked into long-term, team friendly deals and whose team has 18M in cap next year, and 40M the year. Complain all you want about the "outrageous deals" given to washed up vets, none of their contracts are prohibitive on what we need to do for our window. Who cares what we pay someone in the short term as long as it doesn't constrict our long term flex. Which it hasn't. Yzerman has cleaned up the books to a great degree and locked in long term on the key assets we are going to need to compete.
• In the absence of getting a Top 5, generational forward from lotto luck, when we bottomed out in 2019-2021 (Hughes, Lafreniere, and to a lesser extent, Power), he walked with Seider, Raymond, and Edvinsson. All you could make a case is as valuable as anyone in those respective lotteries. Yzerman's hit rate on his 1st Rd has been outrageous. We are very fortunate that we've gotten as much quality as we have. And if we see Cossa, Danielson, ASP, and MBN hit the same general trajectories as Raymond, Seider, and to a lesser extent Edvinsson and Kasper (jury's still out), we are going to be in an amazing position
• Detroit was unable to pull anything remotely decent in free agent class after free agent class for years. Not that was our focus, as the team seemed content trying to trade for pieces or adding declining superstars looking for lesser roles (Alfredsson, Richards, Cole, Green, etc.). The names we did get we're often secondary free agents looking for a final pay out In a lot of these years, we had neither the cap space nor the appeal to attract any free agent of any note. The ones we did, we're overpays and proved to be disastrous (Weiss, Nielson). Not to say that the free agents that are available now are infinitely better, but we are in the conversation again and are landing FAs, that I don't believe we would've pulled in 2017 (Perron, Chiarot, Copp, Compher). I think there is a very clear trajectory of the FA's we signed in 2010's to the first two years of FAs Yzerman acquired (Erne, Suter, Random Joe with a pulse), to the guys we are in conversations with now (Kane, Tarasenko, etc.) who had choices.

Some negatives:

• Pro-scouting and specifically on injury and character: Yzerman seems to keep being pulled into odd, behind the scene "character" issue guys which is proving to be costly. Specifically Vrana, Walman, and to a lesser extent Sprong. I can't speak to Walman as that situation has still yet to reveal itself fully but Vrana's issues we're well known in WAS, and that imploded quite drastically and the FO was quick to move on. Same with Walman, and Sprong's off the ice issue and what seemed to be a very long time before he was resigned by another club and far lower market value for a player of his scoring. Yzerman and his pro-scouting department seems to have taking some gambles or didn't do their full due diligence and have had to pay the price for it.
• 2nd Rd Draft picks has been not great: Look, 2nd Rd picks are typically 'meh' shots anyway, but honestly from the sheer quantity of them, we should have move to show from them. If for no other reason as trade fodder. Our 1st Rd picks have been outstanding but our 2nd Rd picks have been equally unimpressive. Does that change if a Wallinder, Augustine, and Buium all hit as roster players? Probably, but we've drafted 13 prospects in the 2nd, and I'm not sure any of them are higher than a potential depth player at this point and that's still a pretty lower percent. If we're not going to either make a serious swing at upside potential or lock in middle lineup depth or role players, we might as well package them up for more 1st Rders. We're at contract limits within the organization, less and more quality should be a priority now
• Probably too conservative on transitioning prospects: Allowing time for our prospects to grow and develop and using veterans to cover the spot until they are ready makes sense, but in many cases these prospects need more opportunity to see the NHL and he has probably been too conservative bringing them up. Hard to say, as we don't know how 'good' they have tracked against their internal development plan. We just don't know if they are where the organization wanted them to be but it seems like honestly we needed to have a bit more faith in our prospects and given them more leash to figure it out. Maybe that changes over the next three seasons (Kasper, Johansson then Danielsson, Wallinder, then ASP and MBN) as we load int he final sets but it would be nice to see them get more time in the NHL and not immediately sent done when a vet gets healthy.

TL;DR - There's a lot to like about the rebuild. We are in a really good position with good, not great talent, but have a lot of it with a well timed and planned cap table. If our goal is to have 12 "good" players in our Top 6 and Top 4 and Goal, instead of 3 Stars and gradually declining talent in depth, we seem well poised for that. Are there things for us to improve? Definitely, but I don't think there rebuild is "wrong".

 

[Winger98]

RE: second round (and later) picks

I haven't looked into it but I've seen other posters talk about how a few of those drafts (2019 and 2020 in particular) are looking like weaker than normal drafts, which sucks because that was when we hit our low. I'm wondering how much the various covid restrictions around the world killed the development of guys, not just Wings prospects.

really lousy circumstances for a lot of these kids to have been trying to get off to good starts on their careers.

 

[Frk It]

Finnie isn't a goal scorer, and Lombardi bloomed his D+1 season in the OHL. Even Ray was known as a 200 ft defensively responsible player before the draft. His goal totals weren't that high until last season.

Ray was projected as a playmaker, more than a goal scorer though several pre-draft reports noted his quick release. At the same time those same sources questioned his production.

Raymond was a pure upside pick and a dual threat guy. Don't try to spin it as anything other than that.

 

[Frk It]

RE: second round (and later) picks

I haven't looked into it but I've seen other posters talk about how a few of those drafts (2019 and 2020 in particular) are looking like weaker than normal drafts, which sucks because that was when we hit our low. I'm wondering how much the various covid restrictions around the world killed the development of guys, not just Wings prospects.

really lousy circumstances for a lot of these kids to have been trying to get off to good starts on their careers.

It's definitely a factor. I think our strategy for rounds 2-7 is far too conservative relative to the amount of capital we have had though.

 

[FMichael]

Got it. We don't have center depth so over pay smh.

Umm you must be ‘new’ to NHL hockey and UFA…Just about EVERYONE gets paid more than what they’re worth come July 1st .

It’s not a great contract nor is it the worst…As others have mentioned (and if you’re a Red Wings fan) this team had a gaping hole at center after Larkin and with Copp being available, willing to sign, and from Michigan - well I’m sure you can figure out the rest.

 

[Gniwder]

If that was really true it wouldn't be so easy to pick up gifted offensive players in FA and so difficult to find legitimately good defensive players.

Ummm, which gifted offensive player have we picked up in FA aside from Kane after he had major hip surgery?

Lombardi, Buchelnikov, Mazur, Kiiskinen, Becher, Rychlovsky, Söderblom, Dower Nilsson * 2,.. the list goes on with scoring wingers we've drafted or gambled on.

You might actually want to look up their stats before the draft, not after the draft. Also, Rychlovsky is a free agent signing, Kiiskinen was acquired through a trade to pick up assets for a Walman trade.

Source on this? I thought they drafted Beniers in large part because of words people hate around here; compete, two-way play, work ethic, high floor etc.
I guess I'm not seeing the big deal about their drafting so far but it's extremely early.

Lots of articles if you follow the Kraken. They built a big analytics staff right away, which isn't all that surprising considering Seattle is basically Silicon Valley north. You know, little companies like Amazon and Microsoft and what not.

https://www.nytimes.com/athletic/2238159/2020/12/08/building-the-kraken-roster-involves-one-of-the-nhls-largest-analytics-staffs/

There's no bonus points awarded for late round steals. If Edvinsson and Cossa pan out anything outside the 1st is pure bonus. 2021 looks really good in that respect given that both Buium and Mazur have clear NHL potential (even some sleeper potential in Savage).


I swear 5 years ago this board only cared about impact players from the draft. Now that we've drafted Seider and Raymond all that seems to matter is that we didn't draft Brett Leason in the 2nd round to pad the NHL games played stat.

There are bonus points for late round steals, it's an additional roster players. The team only gets one 1st round pick every year (aside from trading away assets obviously). If this team wants to get out of Mediocreville, Draper needs to start hitting on picks outside of the first round.

This team doesn't have any elite superstar generational players like Matthews or McDavid, so the only way they can compete for the Cup is by having secondary scoring.

 

[Pavels Dog]

Ummm, which gifted offensive player have we picked up in FA aside from Kane after he had major hip surgery?

Gostisbehere? Sprong? Tarasenko? Gustafsson? Perron? Debrincat via trade can also be included for sake of argument. Who do you think other teams would have an easier time acquiring from us; the offensively gifted Berggren or the defensively/physically gifted Rasmussen? One archetype is dime-a-dozen, the other is highly coveted for a reason.

You might actually want to look up their stats before the draft, not after the draft. Also, Rychlovsky is a free agent signing, Kiiskinen was acquired through a trade to pick up assets for a Walman trade.

I said drafted or gambled on, i.e. acquired via other means. Acquiring Kiiskinen for example seemed like a pretty targeted move to shift talent in the pool from D to F, something it sounds like you should be in favor of.

Lots of articles if you follow the Kraken. They built a big analytics staff right away, which isn't all that surprising considering Seattle is basically Silicon Valley north. You know, little companies like Amazon and Microsoft and what not.

https://www.nytimes.com/athletic/2238159/2020/12/08/building-the-kraken-roster-involves-one-of-the-nhls-largest-analytics-staffs/

While interesting, I have my doubts about the usefulness of analytics when it comes to the draft. Either way it's going to be 5+ years to know if they've cracked some secret sauce or not. The way they've talked about Beniers certainly doesn't sound like it was an analytics driven draft choice, nor was Wright some off-the-board analytics pick.

There are bonus points for late round steals, it's an additional roster players. The team only gets one 1st round pick every year (aside from trading away assets obviously). If this team wants to get out of Mediocreville, Draper needs to start hitting on picks outside of the first round.

Kind of missing the point. The total talent acquired is what matters, not which round it was drafted. You're acting as if we would get bonus points if Buum is a top pairing D and Edvinsson a 3rd pairing guy instead of the inverse happening. Or is your bar for a successful 2021 draft to get a top pairing D, a top 4D, a top 6F and a #1 goalie? I.e. the best draft of all time?

 

[Realgud]

Not that he is beyond critique, I'll get to those in a moment. Handful of the positive though:

• Went from arguably the worst overall prospect talent pool in the league in 2019, and one of the worst farm system to cultivate and develop those prospects to one of the highest rated prospect pools in the league. The Holland-era Wings did not prioritize prospect development or draft picks, and not only did Yzerman have to replenish the pipeline with talent, he needed to rebuild the entire organization. The dearth of quality in our system was apparent, especially in the Goalie and Defenseman areas and how poor we had historically been there. He has replenished that with Seider, Edvinsson, Wallinder, ASP, Johansson, Tuomisto, Biuim, etc. as a key priority, and added in arguably the best 1:2 Goalie prospect tandem in the league in Cossa and Augustine.
• He went from a team whose 2nd leader scorer was Athanasiou, the corpse of Justin Abdelkader, a backless Danny Dekeyser, a totally disengaged Nielson, and a rapidly declining Howard all under multiyear deals with little to no flexibility to a team whose core future (Seider, Raymond, Larkin) are all locked into long-term, team friendly deals and whose team has 18M in cap next year, and 40M the year. Complain all you want about the "outrageous deals" given to washed up vets, none of their contracts are prohibitive on what we need to do for our window. Who cares what we pay someone in the short term as long as it doesn't constrict our long term flex. Which it hasn't. Yzerman has cleaned up the books to a great degree and locked in long term on the key assets we are going to need to compete.
• In the absence of getting a Top 5, generational forward from lotto luck, when we bottomed out in 2019-2021 (Hughes, Lafreniere, and to a lesser extent, Power), he walked with Seider, Raymond, and Edvinsson. All you could make a case is as valuable as anyone in those respective lotteries. Yzerman's hit rate on his 1st Rd has been outrageous. We are very fortunate that we've gotten as much quality as we have. And if we see Cossa, Danielson, ASP, and MBN hit the same general trajectories as Raymond, Seider, and to a lesser extent Edvinsson and Kasper (jury's still out), we are going to be in an amazing position
• Detroit was unable to pull anything remotely decent in free agent class after free agent class for years. Not that was our focus, as the team seemed content trying to trade for pieces or adding declining superstars looking for lesser roles (Alfredsson, Richards, Cole, Green, etc.). The names we did get we're often secondary free agents looking for a final pay out In a lot of these years, we had neither the cap space nor the appeal to attract any free agent of any note. The ones we did, we're overpays and proved to be disastrous (Weiss, Nielson). Not to say that the free agents that are available now are infinitely better, but we are in the conversation again and are landing FAs, that I don't believe we would've pulled in 2017 (Perron, Chiarot, Copp, Compher). I think there is a very clear trajectory of the FA's we signed in 2010's to the first two years of FAs Yzerman acquired (Erne, Suter, Random Joe with a pulse), to the guys we are in conversations with now (Kane, Tarasenko, etc.) who had choices.

Some negatives:

• Pro-scouting and specifically on injury and character: Yzerman seems to keep being pulled into odd, behind the scene "character" issue guys which is proving to be costly. Specifically Vrana, Walman, and to a lesser extent Sprong. I can't speak to Walman as that situation has still yet to reveal itself fully but Vrana's issues we're well known in WAS, and that imploded quite drastically and the FO was quick to move on. Same with Walman, and Sprong's off the ice issue and what seemed to be a very long time before he was resigned by another club and far lower market value for a player of his scoring. Yzerman and his pro-scouting department seems to have taking some gambles or didn't do their full due diligence and have had to pay the price for it.
• 2nd Rd Draft picks has been not great: Look, 2nd Rd picks are typically 'meh' shots anyway, but honestly from the sheer quantity of them, we should have move to show from them. If for no other reason as trade fodder. Our 1st Rd picks have been outstanding but our 2nd Rd picks have been equally unimpressive. Does that change if a Wallinder, Augustine, and Buium all hit as roster players? Probably, but we've drafted 13 prospects in the 2nd, and I'm not sure any of them are higher than a potential depth player at this point and that's still a pretty lower percent. If we're not going to either make a serious swing at upside potential or lock in middle lineup depth or role players, we might as well package them up for more 1st Rders. We're at contract limits within the organization, less and more quality should be a priority now
• Probably too conservative on transitioning prospects: Allowing time for our prospects to grow and develop and using veterans to cover the spot until they are ready makes sense, but in many cases these prospects need more opportunity to see the NHL and he has probably been too conservative bringing them up. Hard to say, as we don't know how 'good' they have tracked against their internal development plan. We just don't know if they are where the organization wanted them to be but it seems like honestly we needed to have a bit more faith in our prospects and given them more leash to figure it out. Maybe that changes over the next three seasons (Kasper, Johansson then Danielsson, Wallinder, then ASP and MBN) as we load int he final sets but it would be nice to see them get more time in the NHL and not immediately sent done when a vet gets healthy.

TL;DR - There's a lot to like about the rebuild. We are in a really good position with good, not great talent, but have a lot of it with a well timed and planned cap table. If our goal is to have 12 "good" players in our Top 6 and Top 4 and Goal, instead of 3 Stars and gradually declining talent in depth, we seem well poised for that. Are there things for us to improve? Definitely, but I don't think there rebuild is "wrong".

Great post! But it's still a little too early to judge most of the 2nd round picks imo. Johansson just made it onto the roster and he was a 2019 2nd rounder.

 

[rangersblues]

Umm you must be ‘new’ to NHL hockey and UFA…Just about EVERYONE gets paid more than what they’re worth come July 1st .

It’s not a great contract nor is it the worst…As others have mentioned (and if you’re a Red Wings fan) this team had a gaping hole at center after Larkin and with Copp being available, willing to sign, and from Michigan - well I’m sure you can figure out the rest.

Umm just because everyone does it doesn't mean it's the right thing to do. I don't think you could give away Copp and certainly not Holl.

 

[FMichael]

Umm just because everyone does it doesn't mean it's the right thing to do. I don't think you could give away Copp and certainly not Holl.

Well I guess it's a good thing that we're not giving them away...In fact - both are well known fan favorites.

 

[Lampedampe]

I've already said my piece on the 2nd round picks.

If we're gonna look at the bright side, 2021 draft is tracking quite well imo. I can see the following:

Edvinsson; elite defender
Cossa; elite goalie
Buium; 4-5#D
Mazur; top-9 winger
Red Savage; prototypical 4th liner