Why is Yakupov a bust?

[ricky0034]

You try to riddicule his post, but yeah, I think if Yak was drafyted by different team than Oilers'12, his chances of making it would be WAY better...

AND comparing McDavid to Yak, or using CMD to justify "its not Oilers fault, they were just unlucky with pics" rhetorics... Pathetic.

and McDavid was never even coached by Eakins who people mostly blame anyways

there's a GIGANTIC difference between being coached by Eakins and being coached by Todd McLellan

 

[rboomercat90]

To be honest, I was surprised when the Oil didn't trade the pick initially. I felt they could have landed an established D along with someones first pick. Or some sort of appropriate trade, anyways.

It appears that this was a case when ownership interfered with hockey operations.

It's become common knowledge in Edmonton that neither Tambellini nor the scouting staff wanted to draft Yakupov. Tambellini had been hinting in the media that the pick would be used on Murray. 9 of 11 scouts wanted Murray, 1 wanted Galchenyuk and 1 wanted Yakupov. The scouting staff was told an hour before the draft that the team was selecting Yakupov instead of Murray. This came as a surprise to them, not only because of who they were taking, but because this had not been how they had done things in the previous two drafts when they had the first pick. Those two selections had been more of a collaborative effort.

There's been plenty of speculation in the media since then that the decision was made above Tambellini and it was most likely made by Katz. If this scenario is true then it's likely Tambellini wasn't allowed to trade that pick.

 

[Hockeyisl1fe]

Watching him vs Avs; he has good speed and pretty good hands, but the problem is that he seems to always skate to where the puck is, not where it's going to be. That causes him to be behind the play in nearly every situation. Tries to do WAY too much on his own also, often resulting to just desperate deking around defenders and causing the play to die. In short: he can't read the game or plays happening.

 

[Never]

Lol "bust". The guy still plays in the NHL." Yakupov has not met expectations"

Alexandre Daigle played in the NHL for 13 years.

 

[Fantomas]

Yakupov's lack of hockey sense was apparent even before he entered the NHL. At least it was to me.

I don't believe Edmonton ruined him. There were warning signs much earlier.

He was terrible in his last World Junior showing. He put up some numbers, but watching him was very frustrating. Always skating with a head of steam, but accomplishing so little.

Yakupov also regressed in junior between the ages of 17 and 18. In his last season in Sarnia he was not as dominant as everyone expected.

 

[RoyIsALegend]

Why? Because he just might be the dumbest hockey player on the planet. No player does less with so much. Well done, Neil.

 

[Shruggs Peterson]

He's not allowed to slide the length of the ice after scoring goals in January anymore....really messed him up.

 

[xxxx]

Imagine Edmonton with Ryan Murray now...they were so close.

 

[Kunta Kinte]

I think he would be a good KHL player. He just cannot play against best systems and best players.

 

[Dorian2]

Watching him vs Avs; he has good speed and pretty good hands, but the problem is that he seems to always skate to where the puck is, not where it's going to be. That causes him to be behind the play in nearly every situation. Tries to do WAY too much on his own also, often resulting to just desperate deking around defenders and causing the play to die. In short: he can't read the game or plays happening.

Excellent summary of his game.

 

[sr edler]

1
The real question for me is why he has so terrible luck with teams and coaches?

Taylor Hall is a player who put up good numbers in Edmonton. Eberle another. And yeah, McDavid.

Perhaps it's on the player? Sometimes these things happen. You can't always blame others for your failures. The guy is very one-tracky and stubborn.

I re-watched all of Yakupov's goals from his rookie season, when he was not coached by Dallas Eakins but Ralph Krueger and was on a 29 goal pace over a full season, they're on YT. They're pretty much all easy tap-ins from very close distance. No variation at all, and most importantly he weren't creating those goals himself. You don't build a successful NHL career on easy tap-ins only.

 

[Frank Drebin]

Imagine Edmonton with Ryan Murray now...they were so close.

"Ryan Murray.....could you imagine"

Not saying Murray is junk, but hardly a franchise changer.

 

[SaltNPeca]

I think you guys give Eakins too much credit, and much like the players who stink it's easy to blame a "bad team" or "bad coach". Yeah, if you're a late rounder or undrafted I can buy that. But a 1OA... sorry. You are arguably the best of your draft year and your team makes every accommodation to prove themselves right. When a 1OA tanks this bad it's on them. Also, he's played on 2 NHL teams and had 3 or 4 NHL coaches.

Everything above and he also has a tight inner circle around him, including his family, telling him it's everyone else's fault except his.

Ryan Murray busted too. The top of that draft was terrible. If Galch had just been healthy he would have been the easy number 1.

I agree. Also do not forget his agent: Igor Larionov.
People are so quick to blame the Oilers "old boys club", but this Russian "old boys club" certainly made mistakes with Nail. Igor was intimately involved (including flying to Edmonton to have ice time discussions). In the end the proof is in the pudding. Nail stinks and Igor is his agent and mentor.

 

[TheNumber4]

I think the best answer and if you could only pick one hockey trait, has to be: Bad hockey IQ. It leads to overhanding of the puck, not being able to get open for shots, not getting the puck to the right areas when he has it, horrible puck management decisions, being in the wrong spot when he doesn't have the puck... essentially everything wrong with Yak is related to how he thinks the game.

It's why he cant use his good-to-great stickhandling, skating, shot, and I'll even say forecheck (when he was rolling with Roy that one brief period he was a beast on the forecheck and in junior). All of which were accurately scouted when he went first overall.

Also, can we stop saying coaching yet? Look there's lots of players that had the exact same coaches as Yak in Edmonton and turned out well. Then Yak also gets Hitchcock this year and I guess Yeo (don't know how much time they've spent together). At some point, you have to stop blaming the people around him and just blame the player.

That being said, whoever takes a shot at him next (i'm sure he'll get another chance) would do well to put him with a quick, speedy center with good hockey IQ and some skill. He worked with someone like an overaged Derek Roy, he might work out with someone like Tyler Johnson.

 

[Oilslick941611]

I mean just look at him skate out there, guy looks clueless. I was always disapointed with that pick. I didn't get the love for him. We needed Defense not another forward, he wasn't the BPA either and with the politics of the Oilers organization at the time of course he busted and busted hard.

He doesn't think the game at a high level, can't skate and everything he does is awkward on the ice. No surprises here. An embarrasment of a pick especially considering the scouts didn't want to pick him but the owner overruled them.

 

[Satire]

His mental game is off. I loved when he played in Edmonton. Heard stories about how he would buy homeless people meals and be the last guy off at practice. Great guy and hard worker.

When he started struggling he got in his own head. That is his problem overall. He is not a bad player and he has moments of brilliance. When things aren't going well for him instead of keeping it simple he tries to do too much. He's been stuck in that endless cycle for a long time. Kid needs a mentor and needs some confidence steroids. He has all the tools, but he lets the mental game get to him.

He ever figures that out and I think he'll find his way back into being a productive top 6 player on most trams.

 

[MikeK]

Others will try and get technical with their answers but the bottom line is YAK was a 1OA pick and is without question a bust. Not sure why there are still people trying to spin it another way. Those same people will probably still be here when he's 27 and playing in the KHL. The player is one of the biggest busts in NHL history.

 

[tempest2i]

Imagine Edmonton with Ryan Murray now...they were so close.

He'd be battling with Nurse for the left side of the bottom pair.

Or he'd be playing is off side, on the bottom pair with Nurse.

*shrug*

 

[Fremitus Borealis]

Hitchcock and Yeo are about the exact opposite kind of coach Yakupov needed to play under to have any hopes of resurrecting his NHL career.

 

[ElysiumAB]

Give him a break, he's being chased by bees.

 

[Sky04]

I think the best answer and if you could only pick one hockey trait, has to be: Bad hockey IQ. It leads to overhanding of the puck, not being able to get open for shots, not getting the puck to the right areas when he has it, horrible puck management decisions, being in the wrong spot when he doesn't have the puck... essentially everything wrong with Yak is related to how he thinks the game.

It's why he cant use his good-to-great stickhandling, skating, shot, and I'll even say forecheck (when he was rolling with Roy that one brief period he was a beast on the forecheck and in junior). All of which were accurately scouted when he went first overall.

Also, can we stop saying coaching yet? Look there's lots of players that had the exact same coaches as Yak in Edmonton and turned out well. Then Yak also gets Hitchcock this year and I guess Yeo (don't know how much time they've spent together). At some point, you have to stop blaming the people around him and just blame the player.

That being said, whoever takes a shot at him next (i'm sure he'll get another chance) would do well to put him with a quick, speedy center with good hockey IQ and some skill. He worked with someone like an overaged Derek Roy, he might work out with someone like Tyler Johnson.

Wouldn't mind trying him on the Lightning, could result in a cheap depth forward with high upside. If he can't score with Drouin or Kucherov feeding him, he's not going to score at all in this league.

 

[oXo Cube]

Hitchcock and Yeo are about the exact opposite kind of coach Yakupov needed to play under to have any hopes of resurrecting his NHL career.

Frankly, I think this is wrong and a poor excuse.

I don't care how talented you are, you can't play in the NHL if you can't play a defense first game inside of a team structure. If Hitch can't(couldn't) get Yak to do that then nobody can.

Even noted liability players like Eberle are good positionally and support breakouts. Yakupov can't even do that.

 

[Bye Felicia]

Oh so many reasons he's a bust.

1. He was a physical beast in junior, but once he got to the NHL he was too small and didn't play with enough tenacity to really be any sort of physical presence game in and game out.

2. His shot while very hard is horribly inaccurate. It doesn't matter how hard you can shoot the puck if you don't hit the net. A handful of times he'd just blow one by a goalie and everyone would be like "WOW what a shot he has" but most of the times he'd just shoot it wide or right into a goalies bread basket.

3. To go along with #2, even if his shot was accurate, he never knew how to get open to use it. I've never seen a player who so frequently is facing the wrong way on the ice. Oiler fans for years accused basically everyone on the team of "looking off" Yakupov and not passing him the puck. It's because he was never actually in a position to shoot the puck.

4. He's a quick player, but not a fast player. You'd never see Yakupov break away from a defender or blow by someone. Just doesn't have the kind of speed you'd expect from a small scoring winger.

5. Overrated stick handling ability. He has a tendency to over handle the puck. Not in the sense that he'd try one move to many, but in the sense that he seems to have difficulty skating with the puck on his stick without losing it. Nothing is ever smooth for Yak.

6. He passes the puck too hard. Seriously lol. Yak never seemed to realize that he might need to take some power off his passes. He'd whip it around and guys just wouldn't be ready for it or it would end up 3 feet off the ice.

7. Zero hockey sense. Like... none. In the o-zone or the d-zone, Yak has no clue what to do out there. He just doesn't process the game at a fast enough level. Ends up in no mans land all the time.

This is an excellent summary. If you watch Yak play even for just a few shifts, that is enough for you to witness all of these characteristics.

For all the (absolutely warranted) talk about Yak's mental game being lacking, it seems like some people do not recognize that there are serious shortcomings in his skill as well. He can't hit the net, he can't pass, and he can't keep the puck on his stick.

 

[SK13]

Nail Yakupov is one the least intelligent players I've ever seen.

I said it before the trade, and I'll say it again. He's a fast skater than doesn't attack on the rush, he's a good shooter that never gets into shooting lanes. Where's this offensive skill going to manifest into goals?

Give him a centre he has perfect chemistry with and he'll score 40 points. But if the wind hits him wrong on any specific day, he'll go months without scoring again. Pretty useless player.

 

[Atas2000]

Taylor Hall is a player who put up good numbers in Edmonton. Eberle another. And yeah, McDavid.

Perhaps it's on the player? Sometimes these things happen. You can't always blame others for your failures. The guy is very one-tracky and stubborn.

I re-watched all of Yakupov's goals from his rookie season, when he was not coached by Dallas Eakins but Ralph Krueger and was on a 29 goal pace over a full season, they're on YT. They're pretty much all easy tap-ins from very close distance. No variation at all, and most importantly he weren't creating those goals himself. You don't build a successful NHL career on easy tap-ins only.

Why are you cherry picking from my post? I named a whole number of reasons.

His terrible luck with coaches just adds to the whole catastrophe.

It is on some coaches with some players. Eberle is terrible, RNH is terrible, Nurse is terrible, Dubnik, Schulz are doing well in different environments. Quite a list of prospects that underperformed on the Oilers.