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2016 NHL Entry Draft, Alex DeBrincat, Alex Nylander, Auston Matthews, Charles McAvoy, Dante Fabbro, Dennis Cholowski, Jacob Chychrun, Jesse Puljujarvi, Jimmy Vesey, Kieffer Bellows, Luke Kunin, Markus Niemelainen, Matthew Tkachuk, Max Jones, Michael McLeod, Mikhail Sergachev, Olli Juolevi, Pierre-Luc Dubois, Podcasts, Pop Culture, Tim Gettinger, Tyson Jost, Wade Allison , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , 1 Comment

Final 1st-round mock draft and Bruins draft preview (audio)

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Well, NHL Entry Draft time is upon us…I can hardly believe that I will be flying to Buffalo, N.Y. in the morning and that by this time Friday night, Bruins fans will know who the next big hopeful will be.

Not to put too fine a point on it, but rather than write an excessively long post here, I’ll take the advice of a recent blog critic who didn’t like the length of my Bruins draft strategy piece and break it down for you in about 15 minutes. He’s out of luck on the bolded names, though- sorry pal. As Kenny Loggins once crooned- I’ll meet you halfway. I’m sharing my thoughts on where the Bruins are heading into the draft, and where I think they’re going, and not just in round 1. Keep in mind this is just one person’s opinion, and lots of things can happen between now and pick No. 14 in the First Niagara Center.

Here’s the audio:

I am not going to weigh in on internet rumors surrounding Jimmy Vesey. Look, until he either signs with the Buffalo Sabres or he doesn’t and becomes an unrestricted free agent on August 15, I’m going to do my level best to stay above the fray. Because of my relationship with him and members of his family going back to his prep school days, that’s precisely *why* I’m not going to get into the middle of what is flying around. I give full credit to the Sabres for stepping up and getting his rights- that puts them in the driver’s seat, at least for the next some-odd 60 days, and Tim Murray will either convince him to forego the chance to pick his destination, or Vesey will stay the course. My thinking- and it’s just my own intuition here- is that he’s come a full four years since Nashville drafted him in Pittsburgh. What is less than two months more at this point? But if Murray and Sabres owner Terry Pegula (and don’t forget Jack Eichel) make a convincing enough pitch, there’s not much stopping him from ending the soap opera.

But, if you’re looking for me to repeat things flying around various message boards- that’s not happening.

Now, onto the mock draft:

1- Toronto- Auston Matthews, C; The Leafs get their man- Arizona native’s the wire-to-wire No. 1 overall selection and with good reason.

2- Winnipeg- Patrik Laine, LW; The first big winners of the NHL’s new lotto jackpot system cash in with this pure shooter who turns goal scoring into an art form.

3- Columbus- Jesse Puljujarvi, RW; GM Jarmo Kekalainen pounces on this Finnish horse who isn’t quite the threat his countryman is, but isn’t that far off, either.

4. Edmonton- Matt Tkachuk, LW; On a team whose GM once saw firsthand what Milan Lucic could do, the Oilers grab a high-end power forward with serious bloodlines.

5- Vancouver- Pierre-Luc Dubois, LW; The Canucks need help everywhere, so Jim Benning can’t go wrong here with as complete a two-way threat as there is in this class.

6- Calgary- Logan Brown, C; Described by my pal Reed Duthie (who calls Hamilton Bulldogs games) as an “aircraft carrier with feet”, this massive center is also highly skilled, meaning- he’s off the board in the blink of an eye.

7- Arizona- Olli Juolevi, D; Is this Finnish version of the old Val Kilmer movie ‘Real Genius’ the first defender off the board in Buffalo? Very possible.

8.- Buffalo- Jakob Chychrun, D; After making a splash with the Vesey trade, the Sabres fire more shots across the bow, picking up this big name at 8, but his hockey IQ has raised some doubts.

9- Montreal- Alex Nylander, RW; The Canadiens seek skill and scoring, so why not grab the player who might have absolutely been the most talented player in the OHL draft class, even if he doesn’t always bring it.

10- Colorado- Mikhail Sergachev, D; The Avalanche land a big talent that has scouts divided on his overall defensive awareness, but may be at the top end of the skill factor in the OHL.

11- New Jersey- Tyson Jost, LW-C; Ray Shero blinks- he can’t believe Jost is on the board here, and after landing Pavel Zacha a year ago, grabs another potential elite forward bound for North Dakota in the spirit of one Zach Parise 13 years ago.

12- Ottawa- Michael McLeod C; The Senators are betting that McLeod’s blend of size, skating and smarts propels him to stardom up the middle, even with questions about his NHL upside.

13- Carolina- Clayton Keller, C; Small but dynamic center has major league potential as an uber-dangerous playmaker.

14- Boston- Dante Fabbro, D; Knowing what the Bruins tend to value in their players and what they need at this stage, this defender is right up their alley at 14.

15- Minnesota- Luke Kunin, C; St. Louis native did a great job as a freshman on a poor team- the sky’s the limit and the Wild can’t resist.

16- Detroit- Charlie McAvoy, D; A player who could just as easily go to Boston two picks earlier, if he’s still on the board here the Wings pounce.

17- Nashville- Jake Bean, D; The Predators know Bean has a high-end skill set and grab him with outstanding value at 17 where others had him projected inside the top-10.

18- Philadelphia- Kieffer Bellows, LW; Passed up by his hometown Wild, Bellows doesn’t have much time to dwell  on it & makes sense as a fit in Philly with his deadly release and penchant for filling the net.

19- NY Islanders- Riley Tufte, RW; Big, massive, skates well, tremendous long-term promise and the Isles struck gold with Brock Nelson in Minnesota before, so why not take a big payoff project here?

20- Arizona via NYR- Julien Gauthier, RW Major concerns about hockey sense and a tepid second half after tearing it up early in the season mean that the Val d’Or standout slides, but he’s solid value here.

21- Carolina via LAK- Max Jones, LW; Speedy power forward has some nasty play that has gone over the line, but if the Hurricanes can harness that raw aggression- he could be one of those role guys you win with.

22- Winnipeg via CHI- Logan Stanley, D; When you pick Laine at 2, you can afford to take on more of a project player with your bonus 1st-rounder, and with Stanley’s size, skating and snarl- he looks like a solid bet to play even if he tops out as a mid-tier shutdown D.

23- Florida-German Rubtsov, C; The Russian forward in class is someone worth jumping on in the early 20’s and Dale Tallon does just that.

24- Anaheim-Tage Thompson, RW; Huge but raw with an upside that some in the NHL scouting community feels is too legit to quit, the UConn Husky becomes a part of the West Coast quack attack.

25- Dallas- Dennis Cholowski, D; It sure looks like the late-surging BCHL two-way defender is bound to land in the 1st round, and he looks like a good fit for the resurgent Stars under Jim Nill.

26- Washington- Pascal Laberge, C; Speedy and skilled, the Capitals need to find secondary scoring behind Ovechkin and Backstrom- this Victoriaville Tigre brings that in spades.

27- Tampa Bay- Brett Howden, C; Some say he looks a lot like his older brother, but this Howden seems to have more killer instinct and finish around the net. Stevie Y. will take it.

28- St. Louis- Lucas Johansen, D; With Kevin Shattenkirk likely to leave via trade, the Blues will look to infuse more offensive talent and potential with this latest product of the Kelowna D machine.

29- Boston via SJS- Markus Niemelainen, D; The B’s could go with a forward with their second pick like a surprise 1st-rounder in Wade Allison here, but if they add another 6-5 D who can really skate, this Finn will complement the right-shooting Brandon Carlo nicely at some point.

30- Anaheim via Toronto via PIT- Boris Katchouk, LW; Anaheim grabbed the big RW earlier, now they get the gritty, in-your-face and underrated Soo Greyhounds scorer at the end of the round after giving up Frederik Andersen to the Leafs. (Thanks to the readers who pointed out my mistake)

Alex DeBrincat drops out of the 1st round, but he won’t last long in the 2nd.

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Okay- that’s it. I’m off to Buffalo.

Reminder- if you want breaking NHL draft news, picks, analysis and hot takes (or is it “taeks?”) give me a follow on Twitter: @kluedeke29 I might be able to get some Periscope action going as well, so look for that.

Will be on TSN 690 with my Red Line Report boss, Kyle Woodlief, with host Tony Marinaro this Friday, June 24, from 11-noon (Eastern) live from First Niagara Center to talk draft, draft and nothing but draft.

Will do some deeper dives on the draft at the blog in the coming days, but this is pretty much it until the big event, and even then- will just hit the wave tops, but keep checking in- I might have some Easter Eggs and surprises for you.

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Red Line Report 2016 draft guide is out

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June is finally here and in addition to the Pittsburgh Penguins being up 3 games to 1 in the Stanley Cup Final series against the San Jose Sharks, it means that the NHL Entry Draft is about 2 weeks away.

TSP founder’s note- Truth in lending- going to plug a product here, and for those who might not be aware, I am a member of the staff that produced it, so this is not an objective product review. As long as you’re okay with that, read on…

The 2016 draft previews and guides are out. Red Line Report’s 22nd annual draft issue arrived in mail boxes yesterday (or today if you’re further away from Lake Placid) and you can also order it on pdf at a $50 fee.

Why so expensive?

Well, for one- Red Line Report is an independent hockey scouting service founded by professionals and designed for professionals. There are no bells and whistles- no photos, statistics or any of the eye candy that you want in a classic magazine format publication. What you are paying for is hard information and scouting reports, insider notes and analysis on players that RLR scouts (all of whom have proven hockey backgrounds either as players or analysts) have all seen *live* in multiple viewings.

Back in the mid-1990s, several smart hockey men (one of whom is a D1 NCAA hockey head coach) realized that there was no existing professional journal for hockey insiders, and thus Red Line was born- with an idea of providing hard news and notes on players and prospects that might be of interest to various team executives, staffers and coaches. The original RLR did not exist in the format that it does today, but by 1997, it was becoming increasingly more of a deeper dive into NHL draft prospects than what the public typically saw from the annual Hockey News draft preview issues published every spring since 1984.

When Nashville Predators scout Kyle Woodlief left his position in 1998, he had previously done work for Red Line before his NHL scouting job and saw an opportunity to bring his vision to life. Woodlief purchased the publication and immediately set about shaping RLR into the NHL’s unofficial 31st team- running his staff like an NHL team does and building an annual amateur player ranking very similarly to the way the 30 pro hockey clubs do.

As such, RLR never, ever uses our inside knowledge to put players on our list where we think they *might* get drafted- we rank the players from top to bottom based on how we see it, and that’s why a player like Boston University defenseman Charlie McAvoy, who very well could be a top-10 selection in Buffalo and should fall no lower than 15-18 in a few weeks, is currently ranked just outside our first round. This is nothing against McAvoy, who has the makings of a good player, we’re just not convinced he’s better than the 30-odd players we have ranked ahead of him. Sometimes we’re spot on, and other times- not so much. But you can say that about 100% of the NHL teams out there and every individual who has claimed to be a draft analyst- no one has a perfect track record…that’s just not how the world works.

In the near two decades that Woodlief has owned RLR, he’s helped more than 10 of his staffers land scouting jobs with NHL teams. All 30 NHL clubs currently subscribe to Red Line’s professional season-long service along with myriad junior, NCAA and other pro clubs. When it comes to independent scouting, RLR is the recognized standard. That is not to say the other draft publications aren’t, but I’ll let them make their own cases to the marketplace. I know the people involved, and there is mutual respect there.

So, what are you getting for your $50?

For starters- the Red Line business model is simple: less is more.

Our draft guide is just 32 pages because we know that there is such a thing as paralysis by analysis. If you want more product, then there are other options out there worth exploring, but we won’t expand our guide to compete, because we believe in our approach- largely unaltered since 1999.

Inside, you get our draft list of players from 1 (Auston Matthews) to 312 (Julien Tessier). Yes, we know there are only 211 draft spots (2014 1st-rounder Conner Bleakley’s re-entry means that Phoenix gets a 2nd-round comp pick for him after acquiring his rights but not signing him by June 1), but we see a lot of players, so there is no harm in building a more robust base list, which helps teams with a perspective as they finalize their own lists.

Of those 312 listed players in RLR, we do in-depth scouting reports on the top-116. These scouting reports are typically around 120 words a pop, so you’re not going to get a lot of repetitive language to describe how crisply a player’s edging contributes to his game. We know your time is precious, so we get to the point and cover the gamut of what a player does and what we think he can be at the pro level one day. Every profile comes with an NHL projection of what kind of contribution we think he’ll make (if he makes it) and an NHL player comparison.

Also in the guide-

— 2 mock drafts in which Kyle and yours truly attempt to determine what the 2016 first round will look like. These mocks are very different from our own list because in it, we *are* using our inside info in certain spots to predict what teams will draft whom where. For example- McAvoy is a top-20 pick in both.

— A comprehensive team needs analysis to assist you with what we think each NHL club is lacking and how some of those needs might factor into their draft strategy.

— A European free agent roundup. Some players on our list have already been signed to NHL deals and we list them out. Other European vets are available, so it gives you the reader a head start should your favorite NHL team snap one up between now and the September start of training camp.

— The 2017 NHL draft top-67. This is how we see things some 400 days before next year’s draft and a lot can change. In our 2015 draft guide, here’s what our top-5 looked like:

1- Auston Matthews

2- Jakob Chychrun

3- Jesse Puljujarvi

4- Logan Brown

5- Jake Bean

One year later, all five of those guys are in the running for top-10 selections, with Matthews a cinch to be No. 1 overall and Puljujarvi very likely going 3rd. Truth in lending- we whiffed on Patrik Laine, who was 48 in June 2015- that had much more to do with a lack of work ethic and maturity last year, but he proved us all wrong and is a firm No. 2 on our 2016 draft guide list. Oh, and B’s fans- we had Dante Fabbro at 7th overall a year ago (and he’s pretty close to that ranking in June 2016), so don’t let anyone tell you he wasn’t highly regarded coming into the season- that’s bunk.

— Finally, our draft guide has its annual “special categories and awards” section, where we rank the most underrated, overrated, best and worst skaters, scorers…best character guys, toughest, and then those who we find lacking for one reason or another. When you hear people (agents?) complain about RLR, this is usually at the crux of the matter, but this is something that is as much a part of the draft guide as jelly is with peanut butter on a sandwich.

So…that’s the pitch.

$50 is a lot to spend on any publication and our product is not for everyone. But again- if you are a hard core hockey and draft enthusiast, and you want what the pros use (true story- sat next to Blues scout and HHOFer Al MacInnis on a flight to Pittsburgh and when I introduced myself as a RLR staffer, he pulled out our draft guide), then it’s a good investment. (Yes, tooting the own horn here, but it’s an honest statement- NHL guys read RLR)

You can order the guide (sans subscription) a la carte at the aforementioned price by going to http://www.redlinereport.com or by simply calling Kyle at 518-523-4289 and placing your order. If the year-long subscription interests you, there are several options you can choose from. And when you get Mr. Woodlief on the phone, tell him Kirk sent you. I won’t get anything more than a boot in the backside when the staff meets up in Buffalo for the draft, but at least he’ll know I’m working for a living.

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Up next on the blog- will do a Boston Bruins draft strategy analysis for you, whereby I will attempt to break down the team’s philosophy and what I believe they need and how that all dovetails into what they will do in Buffalo.

 

 

 

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Off to Grand Forks for the 2016 U18s

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Faithful readers, this is the part where the blog starts to segue from the 2015-16 NHL season and looks ahead to late June, when the 2016 NHL Entry Draft will be held in Buffalo.

The Bruins, as of right now and until the April 30 draft lottery, are looking at picks 14 and 19, assuming they don’t hit jackpot and move into the top-3 with their selection (1% chance of landing No. 1 and then minimally better odds at 2 and 3). The 19th pick is San Jose’s and they’re in the playoffs…good gamble and payoff by Sharks GM Doug Wilson, who picked up the right goalie in Martin Jones (Marty we hardly knew ye!) for his 2016 1st and a middling prospect in Sean Kuraly. He’d make that trade 10 out of 10 times.

The IIHF World Under-18 Championship is in Grand Forks, North Dakota this year and man- what a great time to go!

The fabulous Finns- Patrik Laine and Jesse Puljujarvi– will be there.

The 2 Jakes- Jakob Chychrun and Jake Bean– will be there (man there are a lot of hockey players named Jakob/Jacob/Jakub or Jake these days).

The Penticton fan duo of Dante Fabbro and Tyson Jost will be there.

Three OHL studs from a trio of different nations: Alex Nylander (Sweden), Mikhail Sergachev (Russia) and Mike McLeod (Canada) will be there.

And then there’s the Americans: BU recruits Clayton Keller and Kieffer Bellows…plus dual citizen Logan Brown. That’s 12 1st-round prospects right there and all off the top of my head. There are quite a few more quality prospects from 2016 who will be competing for the gold this week and next.

We’re also getting a look at late ’98 and 2017 NHL 1st-round prospect Kailer Yamamoto on Team USA. The Spokane Chiefs forward is a small, but dynamic scorer who looked pretty impressive on film at the Ivan Hlinka last August. It will be nice to get some live reads on him.

USA is trying to win a third consecutive gold medal since 2014, when Canada broke the four-year streak. Canada is going  to be one tough nut this year, though- on paper, they are stacked!

Three members of Red Line Report’s staff, headed by Kyle Woodlief, will be at the tourney to take in the action and further refine our list as we build towards our annual June draft guide. You can read Kyle’s columns at USA Today and get free content over at http://www.redlinereport.com, too. We’d love to add you as a subscriber and even if you don’t opt for the monthly service, you can always go a la carte and purchase our draft guide.

I won’t be posting in-depth game reports or anything like the stuff some of you may remember from my 2011 Bruins Draft Watch blog (my work with Red Line precludes that) but I will drop some insights here and there, so I hope you’ll keep checking in.

As we get closer to the draft, I can open the spigot more as interest in the event increases and then TSP will be in Buffalo to break all the action down.

The Bruins might be out of the playoffs, and you might not even be a Boston fan with your team still firmly in the hunt for the Stanley Cup, but you’ll still get a lot of free content here from now through the end of June. So, bookmark it. Subscribe. Tell your friends. What have you…just don’t forget to keep the Scouting Post close!

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2016 NHL Entry Draft Podcast: View from the Top

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I want to thank everyone who gave feedback about the first podcast I posted on the blog, covering the top 10 Boston Bruins prospects. I enjoyed doing it, so I figured it was a good time to go back to the well and do some extended coverage on the 2016 NHL Entry Draft, which will be here before we know it.

This particular podcast is designed to be the first in a series, where I will share observations on the various players in the late ’97/prior to September 16, 1998-born guys eligible for the 2016 NHL draft.

These are *not* players I am identifying just as options for the Bruins- the draft series should appeal to all fans who have an interest in the draft class. The way the B’s are performing at least up to the beginning of February, they aren’t serious contenders for Auston Matthews or Patrik Laine, but you never know. Perhaps the fans of clubs who are in position to come away with those two will find this audio informative.

As for the 2016 draft as a whole- it’s not all that deep, at least compared to a year ago. It’s superb at the top- and I talk about that to start the podcast, but there’s probably a big drop-off once you get out of the first round, and that means that a lot of the pre-draft rankings will see a lot of variance and movement once you get into the 40’s.

Well, enough of an intro- here’s the podcast.

I plan to do an audio mailbag in the future- a podcast version of what I was doing over the summer when I solicited questions over at Twitter, so if you have some questions that spin out of this post, fire away and I will try to address them on the next podcast.