The draft is over and so is a trade that sent our second-highest rated (according to the last poll) prospect away in the Rick Nash trade. We will only rank the top 20 prospects because we don't have much beyond that.
Please write who you want added to the poll, and give a reason for it. This makes the discussion here more lively.
THE RULES
WHO IS A PROSPECT: We can't all have different standards based on what we each want personally. We are on the HF board, so let's follow their rules. The standard for what's a prospect is here: http://www.hockeysfuture.com/whatmakesaprospect
* Please don't write that so-and-so should or should not be a prospect. It's not up to each individual here to decide, it's up to the HF rules.
HOW TO RANK PROSPECTS: Based on their value in a hypothetical trade or waiver draft. This takes into consideration a prospect's ceiling, how close he's to making it, his health, work ethic, the whole deal. Imagine there was a prospect waiver draft and you could keep only one prospect. That guy is our #1 prospect. Then imagine we had one more waiver protection. That guy is our #2 prospect.
CATEGORIES: We'll have top 20 prospects with 5 unranked honorable mentions. The top 10 will be "Top Prospects", the second 10 will be "Second-Tier" and the final 5 will be "Projects & Suspects". This is less than the normal number of prospects we have because the prospect quantity has gone done. We traded 2 picks and a prospect for Erixon, we dealt away Kundratek, McDonagh graduated, etc. The quality is still great, but the quantity is not as great as before, so 20+5 should be enough.
The first 6 options in the poll are the top 6 prospects from the summer who haven't graduated.
The previous rankings from the winter of 2012 (italized means the prospect is no longer ours because we lost rights to him or he's highly unlikely to ever return):
TOP PROSPECTS
1. LW Chris Kreider 2. D Tim Erixon
3. C J.T. Miller
4. LW Carl Hagelin
5. D Dylan McIlrath
6. RW Christian Thomas
7. RW Jesper Fasth
8. C Michael St. Croix 9. RW Mats Zuccarello
10. C Steven Fogarty
SECOND TIER
11. C Andrew Yogan
12. RW Shane McColgan
13. C Oscar Lindberg
14. D Blake Parlett 15. D Pavel Valentenko
16. LW Ryan Bourque
17. D Samuel Noreau 18. G Chad Johnson 19. RW Andreas Thuresson 20. C Casey Wellman
HONORABLE MENTIONS
(Ranked based on the number of votes they got in the last round.)
21. D Mikhail Pashnin
22. G Scott Stajcer
23. D Peter Ceresnak
24. G Cameron Talbot
25. C Danny Hobbs
26. RW Randy McNaught
Voted for Chris Kreider, which will probably be a consensus pick. Hagelin is close because he's more proven, though he likely won't get nearly as much love in the first round.
Add Michael St. Croix. That one is a no-brainer. Scored over 100 points this season.
__________________
"Here we can see the agression of american people. They love fighting and guns. when they wont win they try to kill us all." -HalfOfFame
It's not surprising that I never heard of the person who voted for Hagelin.
__________________
"Trust me I'm an expert, I watched 13 rangers games on NHL center Ice this year through streaming." -Starburst
"I don't even understand what the point of all this arguing is. Are you guys hoping that the other side is going to have an epiphany and go 'Oh, OH! You're right, we ARE going to lose this series!'" -Crease
__________________
"Of course giving Sather cap space is like giving teenagers whiskey and car keys." - SBOB "Watching Sather build a team is like watching a blind man with no fingers trying to put together an elaborate puzzle." - Shadowtron
Sestito still on the make a wish tour. - rholt168
Do playoff game count towards being a prospect? Hagelin had less than 65 regular season games, but had more combined with the playoffs. Is there any clarification here? Still voting for Kreider. Add MSC.
