Silver Nuggets: Bruins win the Stanley Cup; Case against drafting Landeskog

Way back when in our infancy, Daigle was for sure a “CAN’T MISS” prospect, and look how that turned out. On the other hand the Sens drafted Alfy in the 6th round and look how that turned out.

At best the draft is a calculated crap shoot, based on alot of generalities, that says that if a guy is a good player who scores when he’s 16 he should be a good player who scores when he’s in the NHL. There are sooooo many other factors outside of the stats though, not the least of which is the mental abilities of any given player which is really difficult to estimate / project.

We are talking about young kids here, where one year can turn a hockey player’s life around. They are drafted at a time when they are barely shaving. So to say that a player has this or that upside is really a stretch, because we have very little idea what any players limits are at that age.

When a player is 32 years old, then you can talk about upside. Personally I think all the conversation about upside at the age of 17 years old is people having too much time on their hands and overanalysing.

Scouts and GMs are paid to analyse so they do that, and some of them are pretty good at it. Others… not so much.

Landy is perhaps riskier than some of the other top picks because he scored less, but I love a physical player. In the end the most physical team with the best goalie won this year and these kinds of teams win more often than not.

I’d like to see us become a team that owns the puck and lets the other team touch it every once in a while. That’s why I want Landy. I think we’ll score enough with the talent we are developing once we become tough enough… With Sutton, Volchenkov and Fisher we were getting there… without them, we aren’t nearly tough enough yet.

Pretty sure a team that was accused of salting the ice to slow down its opponent didn’t care. Also maybe Dawson City should’ve left more time for travel arrangements when it challenged the Silver Seven.

In Montreal IIRC the riots were started by organized crime elements that used it as a cover to steal stuff. Or was this just a mob mentality?

the which is a pointless activity – although fun under many circumstances – but what I am doing, inspired by the photo of Chara lifting the Cup, is picturing the Sens’ 2007 Cup run with Chara and Hossa in the line-up instead of Redden and Heatley.

Yeah, yeah, I know, if wishes were horses and all that.

Boston were tougher and played with more heart. They had more Canadians on the team. I think that had something to do with it :D

I am all over the place with whom management should draft. I’ll go with best player on offence. I like what Landeskog could bring to the table in terms of intangibles. I feel that a prospect like him will develop into a main cog on any team in the NHL. Sometimes skill is not apparent in hockey’s numbers. But then again I would like a very skillfull centre because it would be awesome to have both Spezza and the New Prospect penetrating any defence.

The green men at least had some class after that loss.

Because I’m sure that the teams that drafted Jarome Iginla, Mike Richards, Corey Perry and Jonathan Toews really regret the decision. Ok, so only Toews was a top-5 pick, but still, how many players would take take ahead of any of those guys?

You can have all the skill in the world and go nowhere. Yet if your heart is in it, you can go as far as you want.

Teams will regret not taking Landeskog, mark my words.

I don’t know how likely it is that Landeskog will fall out of the top five, but Pronman’s projected peak GVT for the sixth draft pick overall is not much worse than, say fifth, nor is it that much better than 7th or even 8th (although I’m sure the difference adds up over time). Nor would that be the only criterion by which to make a choice, of course. All that is to say is that while (according to Pronman) Landeskog may not be a good top-five pick, he might be a reasonable pick-up at sixth; Pronman ranked him 13th overall.

Probably the most germane point in Pronman’s article is that, more than with younger draft-eligible players, Landeskog would be somewhat wasted on a rebuilding team; given that he is nearer his peak, he would be more valuable looking for a team that wants to win now, or soon.

On the other hand, while I understand why Pronman warns not to over-rate the importance of ‘intangibles’ (although it should be obvious that they have a tangible effect on a player’s game), it must be said that the Senators have had their fair share of talented top-five pick material players who, due to ‘intangible’ factors, did not live up to their billing or else were unwilling to make the kind of plays necessary to win in the play-offs, such as Alexandre Daigle, Alexei Yashin, and even, to a certain extent, Wade Redden or Dany Heatley. (In the case of Redden I do not mean to imply that he was doing drugs, the which cannot be demonstrated, but he occasionally displayed a certain fragility of character, and that temperamental fragility had an effect upon his play).

All that is to say that Landeskog might be outclassed as a offensive player by some of the other prospects, or even in terms of defensive puck possession; but should he be cast in the mould of a Jonathan Toews, that might make him much more valuable to a would-be Cup-winning team than if he were a more gifted goal scorer like Heatley is (or was, as he appears to be declining of late).

That said, it is not clear that Landeskog is without a doubt the player the Senators should pick at the 2011 draft, and arguably if they were able to trade up into the top five, they should go after a Couturier or a Huberdeau (Huburdeau?) or a Nugent-Hopkins, if they can.