Prospect Info: Wings Prospect Discussion, Part II

[OldnotDeadWings]

Well Kiiskinen was referred to in the initial post. It's somewhat debatable whether he should count as a late round pick for us considering that we traded for him

Buchelnikov is looking incredible.

Augustine looks great and wins like crazy.

Finnie, Lombardi and Mazur all look good too.

I think you could argue that Augustine looks better than Cossa. I think you could argue that the forwards above look better than MBN, Danielson, and Kasper (to a lesser extent considering his recent success in the NHL).

Now some of those guys are second rounders so it's debatable whether they should be included. I also personally still have Danielson, MBN and Kasper above any of their late round compatriots. I prefer Augustine to Cossa but I understand why most can project on tools and conclude that Cossa has the better future.

So ultimately I think my real stance is that our first round picks have broken themselves into two tiers and many of our later round picks have climbed into the lesser tier. There's the Raymond, Seider, Edvinsson and ASP tier. Those guys all took off post draft, immediately adopted a trajectory that suggested they would be top of the lineup players. The former three are currently living up to that expectation, but even before they made, at least to me, their current performance wouldn't have been at all surprising. These are the guys where they developed so well that you're constantly trying to talk yourself out of insane, unfair lofty expectations. "Sure ASP just won his second WJC best defenseman award, and is leading the SHL defensive scoring and controls play every time he steps out there, etc but he's sort of small, won't have such an easy time beating NHL goalies from a distance and can't skate like Makar so I shouldn't get my hopes up too high. He's not guaranteed to be a top 3 offensive defenseman in the world." Their success feels inevitable, like it's almost already happened and we're just waiting on history to catch up.

Then there's the Cossa, Danielson, Kasper and MBN tier. They're all fine. They all project to be NHL players and have top of the lineup potential. But they also all feel like they could fizzle out into just okay players. I'm constantly trying to talk myself into believing in them. "Sure Danielson didn't score, and he turned over the puck a lot and he got out muscled a lot and I wish he'd shoot more, etc but he has a lot of obvious tools and it's hard to put up points in the AHL, he's focusing on being responsible and he'll develop physically so I shouldn't be too harsh judging his performances. He has a chance to be a top 6 player." I can talk myself into the possibility that they develop into top of the lineup players, but I know that to some extent I believe that because I want to. Their success feels like a dream of the future- technically possible but ephemeral, ethereal, and evitable.

I think that Buch, Finnie, Lombardi, Augustine and Kiiskinen are very much in that second tier. If you want to rate Buch above MBN or whatever, I don't think that's a bad take.

That's a good and fair assessment IMO of where things are with the rebuild assets. I'd add Mazur to that last group, Plante and a couple others not far off. It also remains to be seen how AlJo, Berggren and Elmer develop going forward. They're all iin the NHL, at the moment, but for practical purposes still prospects in the sense their outcomes are yet to be determined. Fan frustration this season is understandable but the bigger picture is positive.

 

[ShanahanMan]

Which late rounders are looking better than our first rounders?

I think Augustine is looking better than Cossa, and I’d argue Buch, Kiis and even possibly Lombardi are looking better than Danielson and MBN.

 

[SirloinUB]

Ironic turn in narrative considering "nothing from the late round picks" has been a very common critique against yzerman.

 

[schuelma24]

Once again thankful for the ignore button. I can tell from the replies who is posting and what. Gotta say, praising Yzerman's late round drafting is a plot twist I didn't see coming.

 

[izlez]

Ironic turn in narrative considering "nothing from the late round picks" has been a very common critique against yzerman.

Well, the beautiful thing is that you can start calling early 2nd round picks "late round" when it helps to build the narrative you want

 

[Crunchy]

I think Augustine is looking better than Cossa, and I’d argue Buch, Kiis and even possibly Lombardi are looking better than Danielson and MBN.

Lombardi is what 2 years younger older then Danielson? Lombardi scored what like 15-20 pts in his D+3 NHL year, while Danielson is out producing that in his D+2 and is bigger, faster, and better at defense? Nah

That's just weighting based on draft position, if Danielson was picked in later rounds, this forum would be euphoric about him.

 

[TCNorthstars]

Lombardi is what 2 years younger then Danielson? Lombardi scored what like 15-20 pts in his D+3 NHL year, while Danielson is out producing that in his D+2 and is bigger, faster, and better at defense? Nah

That's just weighting based on draft position, if Danielson was picked in later rounds, this forum would be euphoric about him.

Lombardi is a year older.

 

[lilidk]

Plante have a goal + pass so far , both on pp. Goal looks like Raymond - Cat- Larkin tik tak to combination

 

[Crunchy]

Lombardi is a year older.

Ahh yeah meant 2 years older, but I do see it's a 15 month difference. Lombardi an overager in the 2022 draft and Danielson in the 2023 draft, so technically 2 drafts apart. Edited my post to reflect.

 

[Hazy Little Thing]

I’ve never heard of second rounders be considered “late rounders” ever in the context of the NHL draft.

 

[HisNoodliness]

I’ve never heard of second rounders be considered “late rounders” ever in the context of the NHL draft.

Yeah, when I explained the logic of the OP, I mentioned that because it's a little silly. I do think that because the talent drop off in the draft is so quick that drafting in the second round is much more similar to drafting in the fourth than the first. So there's some legitimacy to the notion.

I also know that the OP was probably trying to be critical of our first round picks and complain. My take is the opposite. I think it's great that we've finally had some of our 2nd round + picks start to turn into something. We desperately needed that. The warts on our second tier of firsts were obvious before we were done announcing the pick. Buch playing well doesn't make Danielson's debatable offensive ceiling lower. It just means that we have one more good prospect in the system.

 

[Murmansk16A]

Great coast to coast goal by Finnie last night. He really looks like a guy who will be a top 6 forward in the NHL to me.

 

[OldnotDeadWings]

"Late-round" drafting is 6th and 7th rounds. Critics convinced the Wings have sucked since SY took over at "late-round" drafting are either jumping to conclusions or don't know what they're talking about. Only five players out of the approximate 200-plus skaters drafted in late rounds from 2019-22 have scored more goals than Soderblom, only seven have played more games, none look like future stars and in some cases like they'll add much to their current NHL totals. This isn't the Dats/Z drafting era anymore of future stars slipping through scouting nets and hasn't been for a while. Only about 10 per cent of "late-round" skaters play 200 NHL games and the percentage that make a difference for the teams that drafted them much smaller than that. SY has drafted 13 skaters in the late rounds, about half of them haven't turned pro yet or come to NA. If Soderblom and Finnie (or even unsigned Chase Bradley who has played two games with Colorado) make it to 200 games or if just one of them ends up in the top six for a stretch, Wings will have been one of the best teams at "late-round" drafting. Either way we still don't know enough yet to be sure, but Elmer and Finnie give the Wings more hope than most teams.

There are areas of the Draft the Wings haven't done well at, Second round and mid-round (3-5) drafting wasn't good in 2019/20 considering the number of picks the team had and how quickly it became apparent some of them were not good prospects. First-round drafting has been great from the start, since 2021 the Wings have been better in subsequent rounds.

 

[JediOrderPizza]

 

[norrisnick]

Great coast to coast goal by Finnie last night. He really looks like a guy who will be a top 6 forward in the NHL to me.

May have to pull that number out of the rafters...

 

[HisNoodliness]

"Late-round" drafting is 6th and 7th rounds. Critics convinced the Wings have sucked since SY took over at "late-round" drafting are either jumping to conclusions or don't know what they're talking about. Only five players out of the approximate 200-plus skaters drafted in late rounds from 2019-22 have scored more goals than Soderblom, only seven have played more games, none look like future stars and in some cases like they'll add much to their current NHL totals. This isn't the Dats/Z drafting era anymore of future stars slipping through scouting nets and hasn't been for a while. Only about 10 per cent of "late-round" skaters play 200 NHL games and the percentage that make a difference for the teams that drafted them much smaller than that. SY has drafted 13 skaters in the late rounds, about half of them haven't turned pro yet or come to NA. If Soderblom and Finnie (or even unsigned Chase Bradley who has played two games with Colorado) make it to 200 games or if just one of them ends up in the top six for a stretch, Wings will have been one of the best teams at "late-round" drafting. Either way we still don't know enough yet to be sure, but Elmer and Finnie give the Wings more hope than most teams.

There are areas of the Draft the Wings haven't done well at, Second round and mid-round (3-5) drafting wasn't good in 2019/20 considering the number of picks the team had and how quickly it became apparent some of them were not good prospects. First-round drafting has been great from the start, since 2021 the Wings have been better in subsequent rounds.

I don't think anyone criticizing Yzerman for late round drafting uses the same definition as you. They're grouping everything after the second into one group. And frankly, I like their definition better than yours. I think that dividing the rounds based upon draft strategy and quality of prospects makes the most sense.

The top 3-5 picks in any draft are qualitatively different than the guys that come after. You're likely drafting very complete players with an obvious path to the NHL and top of the lineup potential. You can be confident in your projection.

From 5-15 you're once again getting a player that's likely to be a quality NHLer. Their path to the NHL is likely a little longer and they probably have a fatal flaw that could hold them back, but assuming that it doesn't break horribly, you can reasonably expect an NHL player and shouldn't be surprised to get a top of the lineup player.

The rest of the first and the early second, you're targeting guys that are pretty unlikely to make it because they have a rather serious flaw or have pretty limited upside with a safer projection. Most of these guys still end up playing 100 games, but we're falling from 75% to 30% over this range. The GM is also reasonably likely to have personally watched guys up to this point. Certainly they've seen all of the early first guys a lot. After this, you're relying mostly on the viewings of a couple scouts for any given prospect.

The mid-second onward is a crapshoot. You're hoping that your 2nd-7th collectively produce one NHL player. The collective odds of the 2nd-7th gives you very nearly the same odds of getting an NHL player as the first, about 75%. By pick 45 or 50 you're already extremely unlikely to get a guy that makes it to 100 games. We're looking at a very incomplete player with multiple fatal flaws. You're hoping to capitalize on a big developmental burst and a couple of interesting tools to turn them into an NHL player. 3 7th rounders are about as likely to become an NHL player as one mid second rounder.

The point is that I think the process and challenges of picking a guy at 50 are a lot more similar to the process and difficulties of picking a guy at 200 than 10. In the past I was critical of how we did with our picks after the first. Now, I'm pretty happy with it. I still think we should change our priorities to look for more boom and less grit, but things are looking up in that regard.

 

[OldnotDeadWings]

I don't think anyone criticizing Yzerman for late round drafting uses the same definition as you. They're grouping everything after the second into one group. And frankly, I like their definition better than yours. I think that dividing the rounds based upon draft strategy and quality of prospects makes the most sense.

The top 3-5 picks in any draft are qualitatively different than the guys that come after. You're likely drafting very complete players with an obvious path to the NHL and top of the lineup potential. You can be confident in your projection.

From 5-15 you're once again getting a player that's likely to be a quality NHLer. Their path to the NHL is likely a little longer and they probably have a fatal flaw that could hold them back, but assuming that it doesn't break horribly, you can reasonably expect an NHL player and shouldn't be surprised to get a top of the lineup player.

The rest of the first and the early second, you're targeting guys that are pretty unlikely to make it because they have a rather serious flaw or have pretty limited upside with a safer projection. Most of these guys still end up playing 100 games, but we're falling from 75% to 30% over this range. The GM is also reasonably likely to have personally watched guys up to this point. Certainly they've seen all of the early first guys a lot. After this, you're relying mostly on the viewings of a couple scouts for any given prospect.

The mid-second onward is a crapshoot. You're hoping that your 2nd-7th collectively produce one NHL player. The collective odds of the 2nd-7th gives you very nearly the same odds of getting an NHL player as the first, about 75%. By pick 45 or 50 you're already extremely unlikely to get a guy that makes it to 100 games. We're looking at a very incomplete player with multiple fatal flaws. You're hoping to capitalize on a big developmental burst and a couple of interesting tools to turn them into an NHL player. 3 7th rounders are about as likely to become an NHL player as one mid second rounder.

The point is that I think the process and challenges of picking a guy at 50 are a lot more similar to the process and difficulties of picking a guy at 200 than 10. In the past I was critical of how we did with our picks after the first. Now, I'm pretty happy with it. I still think we should change our priorities to look for more boom and less grit, but things are looking up in that regard.

Don't disagree on much of your post. It's why I often refer to "post-first round" picks as being part of a collective group from which you're hoping to get at least one NHLer, perhaps two if you don't have a first-rounder or he busts. What round that guy or guys comes from doesn't matter. But there is a difference IMO in NHL potential between those picked from mid-second round through at least the third round, and those picked in the last two rounds. The percentage having an NHL career drops and then flattens out the last 2-3 rounds. Calling someone a "late-round" pickclearly implies it was a later round, so not much confusion it was the sixth or seventh round. Callng everyone a "late round pick" from the mid-2nd onward doesn't add much clarity to how the prospect was evaluated leading to the Draft. Its's mostly semantics but I think it reflects that late second-round pick AlJo for example was clearly considered a better prospect than fellow Swedish D Berglund drafted in the sixth round. It's appropriate that fans had higher expectatons for one than the other.

 

[ShanahanMan]

Lombardi is what 2 years younger older then Danielson? Lombardi scored what like 15-20 pts in his D+3 NHL year, while Danielson is out producing that in his D+2 and is bigger, faster, and better at defense? Nah

That's just weighting based on draft position, if Danielson was picked in later rounds, this forum would be euphoric about him.

Simply comparing our prospects that are currently in the pros (yeah I kind of cheated with Augustine but I also purposely left Finnie out who may end up being some special too).

I don't think anyone criticizing Yzerman for late round drafting uses the same definition as you. They're grouping everything after the second into one group. And frankly, I like their definition better than yours. I think that dividing the rounds based upon draft strategy and quality of prospects makes the most sense.

The top 3-5 picks in any draft are qualitatively different than the guys that come after. You're likely drafting very complete players with an obvious path to the NHL and top of the lineup potential. You can be confident in your projection.

From 5-15 you're once again getting a player that's likely to be a quality NHLer. Their path to the NHL is likely a little longer and they probably have a fatal flaw that could hold them back, but assuming that it doesn't break horribly, you can reasonably expect an NHL player and shouldn't be surprised to get a top of the lineup player.

The rest of the first and the early second, you're targeting guys that are pretty unlikely to make it because they have a rather serious flaw or have pretty limited upside with a safer projection. Most of these guys still end up playing 100 games, but we're falling from 75% to 30% over this range. The GM is also reasonably likely to have personally watched guys up to this point. Certainly they've seen all of the early first guys a lot. After this, you're relying mostly on the viewings of a couple scouts for any given prospect.

The mid-second onward is a crapshoot. You're hoping that your 2nd-7th collectively produce one NHL player. The collective odds of the 2nd-7th gives you very nearly the same odds of getting an NHL player as the first, about 75%. By pick 45 or 50 you're already extremely unlikely to get a guy that makes it to 100 games. We're looking at a very incomplete player with multiple fatal flaws. You're hoping to capitalize on a big developmental burst and a couple of interesting tools to turn them into an NHL player. 3 7th rounders are about as likely to become an NHL player as one mid second rounder.

The point is that I think the process and challenges of picking a guy at 50 are a lot more similar to the process and difficulties of picking a guy at 200 than 10. In the past I was critical of how we did with our picks after the first. Now, I'm pretty happy with it. I still think we should change our priorities to look for more boom and less grit, but things are looking up in that regard.

Correct, I refer to “late rounds” generally as anything past 1st.

 

[newfy]

Great coast to coast goal by Finnie last night. He really looks like a guy who will be a top 6 forward in the NHL to me.

I'm not sure he quite does anything well enough to say he's a top 6 forward type..... buttttt he does a lot of things extremely well that he should become an extremely versatile and helpful player for the wings. The type of guy that in a playoff run could make him a fan favourite type because he'll have a timely goal here and there but follow it up with a big shot block or something in a different game.

Maybe a mix of a Dougie Brown, Dan Cleary type

 

[Coach Reggie Dunlop]

2 goals for ASP today

 

[OgeeOgelthorpe]

Great coast to coast goal by Finnie last night. He really looks like a guy who will be a top 6 forward in the NHL to me.

His speed is impressive. Handling at speed looks very good.

I’m not sure what to make of him yet, but as Newfy said he’s trending towards that 2nd/3rd line utility guy. I think that’s a great outcome.