I'm curious; who do you guys think our best prospect outside of Granlund is and why?
I follow all our prospects as much as I can but I don't have the time to become all that familiar with them. I would like some well informed opinions on what we have.
Tough question. I would put Larsson at #2 right now. It's partially an indictment against the others though. Larsson's ceiling is rising while others are lowering. I still don't think Larsson is more than 2nd-line center, but to me he's the most likely to reach top-6 status. Coyle would be nipping at his heels on my list.
i really like brodin now but he needs to get bigger. larsson and coyle are both growing on me. since we can see coyle still succeeds at the jr level in canada is a good sign. and i loved phillips instantly since we drafted him
i've been pimping Brodin since we picked him, and i was always on the Phillips bandwagon and have only liked him more, he seems to have a good shot and is smart it will be good to see him develop.
i know not all of these guys will pan out but for now its good to see our guys performing and not regressing. i look forward to drafts now, i look forward to seeing the guys after we pick them and i really like that we are trying to go for character guys.
also i think Lucia is severely underrated, he has a hell of a wrist shot strong accurate the goal he scored at the X was such a strong shot. i think with proper development he should be a good top 6 winger for the Wild.
i just watched on youtube when erik karlsson was drafted, i believe Brent Flahr might have had something to do with it. they described him as a great passer who skates amazingly well and is smart with the puck...
now he is a very offensive player and its showing he is putting up some insane numbers this year but his attributes in decision making, skating, vision, and sense are close to how Brodin was described.
i really hope Brodin surprises everyone and just starts putting up points while providing rock solid defensive coverage.
I've been a little surprised by the amount of interest in Brodin. I'm not saying I'm not, I just remember when he was drafted and the lack of enthusiasm people had about it. Now he seems up there on many people's list, including many well informed ones.
I've been a little surprised by the amount of interest in Brodin. I'm not saying I'm not, I just remember when he was drafted and the lack of enthusiasm people had about it. Now he seems up there on many people's list, including many well informed ones.
i've been interested in him day one, and since seeing him play at prospects camp and in gold medal game its only gone up he has so many tools that he really could blossom into a very good dman for us.
people harped on him early on because he didn't put up massive points, but he's 19 i have a feeling he'll be a good dman for us for a long time
i just watched on youtube when erik karlsson was drafted, i believe Brent Flahr might have had something to do with it. they described him as a great passer who skates amazingly well and is smart with the puck...
I thought of pointing that out during the World Juniors but forgot. I think someone should look into it more to make sure. Who else did he have a role in drafting for the Senators?
I thought of pointing that out during the World Juniors but forgot. I think someone should look into it more to make sure. Who else did he have a role in drafting for the Senators?
Cowen, silfeberg (sp) i think he was there 08 and 09
I thought of pointing that out during the World Juniors but forgot. I think someone should look into it more to make sure. Who else did he have a role in drafting for the Senators?
Looks like he was named Ottawa's Director of Hockey Operations in July 2007, and left for the Wild after the 2009 draft so forthwild's 2008-2009 draft is right. Here's his full list of picks with Ottawa:
2008
Erik Karlsson 1
Patrick Wiercioch 2
Zack Smith 3
Andre Petersson 4
Derek Grant 4
Mark Borowiecki 5
Emil Sandin 7
2009
Jared Cown 1
Jakob Silfverberg 2
Robin Lehner 2
Chris Wideman 4
Mike Hoffman 5
Jeff Costello 5
Corey Cowick 6
Brad Peltz 7
Michael Sdao 7
Of those, obviously Karlsson is an All-Star (second overall pick behind Datsyuk). Zack Smith has 22 points in 52 games so far this year. Cowen's thought to be a future star. Lehner is a top-5 goalie prospect. Wiercioch is almost PPG in the AHL as a defenseman. Silfverberg is almost PPG in the SEL as a 21 year old, and viewed highly by Sens fans. Petersson and Borowiecki are listed late on the Sens' "top prospects" on HF. The former is putting up PPG in the AHL at wing and the latter is averaging almost 2 PIM per game on defense.
Flahr's time in Ottawa looks pretty good indeed, with a lot of SEL picks. Makes me think the guy's hypothesizing the other one of the draft team's "two guys" we've discussed was Zbad.
Wonder how long it will be until Flahr gets a GM position if these drafts for both Ottawa and Minnesota pan out in the longer run. Certainly they look positive at this stage.
I would hope Flahr would remain a director of hockey ops. He seems to have a knack for that position, and I think that advancing to a "higher" role as a GM wouldn't be the optimal place for his talents. That said, maybe he'd be even better in a GM role. I imagine some team will try make a play for him at some point, but it's hard to say whether he'd even be interested.
I would hope Flahr would remain a director of hockey ops. He seems to have a knack for that position, and I think that advancing to a "higher" role as a GM wouldn't be the optimal place for his talents.
I tend to think this way as well.. But I think we'd be hard pressed to convince Flahr otherwise.
I tend to think this way as well.. But I think we'd be hard pressed to convince Flahr otherwise.
Maybe, maybe not. People always assume that subordinates want their boss's job. They think that assistant coaches always want to be head coach, that assistant GMs want to be GMs, that Vice-Presidents want to be Presidents. That's not always true, even at the upper levels of management. Without knowing Flahr personally, I don't think any of us can say whether he wants a "higher" position. All the bits and pieces we can see make him seem happy in his current role, so maybe we'll be able to retain him in it long term.
Karlsson
SEL (age 17): 7gp 1g 0a
SEL (age 18): 45gp 5g 5a
NHL (age 19): 60gp 5g 21a
NHL (age 20): 75gp 13g 32a
NHL (age 21): 51gp 7g 40a
Brodin
SEL (age 16): 3gp 0g 0a
SEL (age 17): 42gp 0g 4a
SEL (age 18): 35gp 0g 5a
Hasn't really fast tracked as much as Karlsson did, but SEL is an EXTREMELY low scoring league and it's tough to draw comparisons. Although if he gets a couple goals and assists, that's really not far off. And his shot is admittedly not the best.
Russo's gushing about his skating combined with the scouts' touting his hockey sense and passing abilities...very good things.
Along with Granlund, Wild fans should be pumped to see him.
he may not make a great gm tho, his eye is to find the talent specially in the later rounds but as a GM you have a much greater responsibility and he won't have as much time to scout.
in any case i do hope he stays with Fletcher a long ass time and we keep getting awesome players out of it
Maybe, maybe not. People always assume that subordinates want their boss's job. They think that assistant coaches always want to be head coach, that assistant GMs want to be GMs, that Vice-Presidents want to be Presidents. That's not always true, even at the upper levels of management. Without knowing Flahr personally, I don't think any of us can say whether he wants a "higher" position. All the bits and pieces we can see make him seem happy in his current role, so maybe we'll be able to retain him in it long term.
like Wilds Willson, been an assistant for a long time seems to be happy in that role.
also Brodin is pretty much on pace with Karlsson for NHL, post draft year in Sweden followed by NHL (we think) now brodin could still show some offense but his entire team seems to lack scoring again and he is a very safe player one of the top +/-, me thinks when he puts on about 20lbs he needs to be around 190` and his shots becomes better we'll see some scoring from him. after all we all saw what a well placed wrister did to MN against phili
enough with the scoring talk! He's worth the pick without the scoring if his vision and skating are close to their advertised level.
I don't think anyone's particularly concerned about the lack of goals. What we should expect from him are assists. Unless he's getting the fabled "third assist," he should show up on the score sheet if he's using that vision to advance the play.
That said, Brodin's actually outperforming Karlsson in regards to assists. It's just the 5g that Karlsson had as an 18 year old where he progressed better than Brodin. Of course, Brodin could easily "not progress" on the score sheet and become a pure shut down guy. However, looking at guys like Karlsson (and Larsson) show that putting up 5 points in 35 games doesn't mean he'll never put up points in the NHL.
Regardless of whether he puts points up or not, he should be at the very least a quality top 4 guy.
i for one am not worried about his point production, he play a role he's asked to play and gets no pp time. Kids gonna be a player and will be fun to watch.
Yeah...he needs to have some scoring ability to be worth a top 10 pick. Unless he literally allows fewer than 10 goals over a season while being on the ice for 25 minutes a game.
I'm not worried. If his skill set is what what we think it is, he should be AT LEAST a 20-25 assist guy in the NHL. And I could see him being a 30-40 assist guy at his peak. If his skill set is what we think it is.
The goals...that's another thing. Obviously you need to have a shot to score goals. Guys like Zanon and Schultz get 1 or 2 goals a year. But to generate offense, especially on the PP, you need a good shot. Don't know how good or bad it is, but you won't score goals from the point without a good shot.
yeah, i didn't mean "no offense" but I don't think people should get the idea that he'll be some sort of offensive dynamo. I sort of expect him to get slightly better than Kim Johnsson numbers right off the bat and progress from there.
Lots of Aeros getting minuses this week. But McIntyre with 1g 2a. No idea where Almond is right now. Cuma and Fredheim continue their epic point race. Is Scandy hurt? Didn't play last week.
Euros had a "meh" week points wise.
Zucker had a nice weekend. Haula too. And Harvard won a pair of games! Must have been another Ivy League school.
Phillips pointless in two games and Coyle 0g 2a.
Whoever Josh Caron is, he hasn't gotten a point since being traded this season in 22 games, at the age of 21, in the WHL. I'm going to assume he's not going to make it very far.
