Why is everyone so excited for Zibanajad?
by Mikem1992 on Feb 14, 2012 12:03 PM EST
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If i take a look at his stats an its nothing too impressive to some of the guys that were drafted later. I know that SEL league is harder than the QMJHL but it seems like this guy should not have been drafted this high. Any more information that makes this guy such an intriguing prospect please let me know. Untill know my advice is try to sell this guy for a high end younger player or put him in a package deal.
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Comparables
Comparin SEL stats to North American junior leagues is really difficult, but i think you could go around that and compare other players statistics from the SEL to Zibanejads current stats.
At this point Mika is an 18 year old, who has played in 15 games and has scored 3 goals and assisted 4, so the stat line basically is 15gp 3g+4a=7p.
Nicklas Bäckström played in the SEL in the ‘05-’06 season as an 18 year old, his stats were 46gp 10g+16a=26p.
That same year Anze Kopitar played in the SEL as an 18 year old, 47gp 8g+12a=20p.
Magnus Pääjärvi was 18 in ‘09-’10, 49gp 12g+17a=29p.
While these stats do not offer a comprehensive analysis of the point totals of young players in the SEL (thet would really need a lot more of effort), it might give you some idea how 18 year olds usualy do in sweden. Point per game total at this point for Zibanejad is 0,47 ppg compared to 0,56; 0,42 and 0,59 to the others, but ofcourse there’s still games to be played and it might go either way. Also bare in mind that Zibanejad seems to be considered as somewhat of a two-way player.
There's a conversion formula somewhere for how different leagues stack up with the NHL
But I don’t know where it is :(
Maybe one of the editors knows what I’m talking about?
NHL-E, or NHL equivalency
But they’re pretty flawed, in my mind, especially for 18-year-olds in the AHL.
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by Peter Raaymakers on Feb 14, 2012 3:11 PM EST up reply actions
… erm, I mean 18-year-olds in the SEL.
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by Peter Raaymakers on Feb 14, 2012 3:12 PM EST up reply actions
It's a different league.
Players, especially young players, get buried and hardly get any minutes. It’s just what the do in the SEL. Watch him play, he’s a dynamic player who plays both ends of the ice well. I’m excited for him and would hate him getting traded by the sens.
He is 18 years old and we drafted him about 8 months ago . How about you let him develop before you start suggesting we trade him. You want to sell high and trade him for a “high end younger player.” NEWSFLASH, Mika IS the high-end younger player. From what I’ve heard, aside from being physically able to play in the NHL today, he has an “NHL level” shot and one-timer. He has excellent physical tools and just needs the time to develop. Remember he is ONLY 18, lol for god sakes give him some time to develop before you start making ridiculous comments about trading him.
Ridiculous comments?
It was a question and an opinion, so there’s no need to be so dismissive in your rebuttal.
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by Peter Raaymakers on Feb 14, 2012 3:12 PM EST up reply actions
"Untill know my advice is try to sell this guy for a high end younger player or put him in a package deal."
C’mon Petey Pefe. We just drafted the guy! How can you not laugh at that?
I think the sell high advice is incredibly wise. He is coming off a world juniors where he was over shadowed by a 17 year old and a fifth round pick from his draft and still has had praise heaped on him for scoring the gold medal winner. He shot up draft boards for playing a dominate physical style the final 2 months of last season. At the beginning of the year he wasn’t even in the discussion as a first rounder. Fast risers scare me when they can’t step into the NHL immediately, because it shows a certain amount of regression from their previous pace of development. I am also illogically affected by what I saw from David Rundblad this season. Yeah, they are two different players with completely different styles of play, but seeing the unbelievably large holes in his game after being named the top defenceman in the SEL still creeps into my mind. I think putting Zibanejad in a package to get a current first line player is intelligent asset management, especially with the log jam at centre.
Thank god you guys aren't Ottawa's GM
How can you honestly think that trading our 6th overall pick 8 months after he’s drafted is great “asset management.” I will go on record right now in saying that the LA Kings are going to regret trading Schenn, Simmonds and a 2nd for Mike Richards. I know it’s a stretch but this is essentially what you’re advocating (Schenn representing Zibanejad in this comparison :p). Actually to be honest I would bet they already regret it.
We'll see
I happen to think that Zibanejad is worth keeping around. But ‘wise asset management’ sometimes does mean moving players you have only recently acquired if you think you can get a better player back. Sometimes, as you insist, it means developing prospects and not leaping at the opportunity to move them just for the sake of making a move.
From my perspective, if Murray had the opportunity to trade Zibanejad (perhaps as part of a package) for someone like Landeskog, I would hope he takes it.
While I agree that trading Zibanejad isn't necessarily an ideal plan, I think we need to be careful in overvaluing a prospect based on draft position
Once a player is drafted, where they were picked means absolutely nothing. As Senators fans, we have ample evidence of this: Daigle. Alfredsson. Lee. Filatov.
When a player is in the organization’s system, the only thing that should matter is their value to the team. If the team feels that Zibanejad can be traded for a player they value more, then it IS intelligent asset management, regardless of where those players were drafted. For instance, if in 1995, the Oilers decided to trade Jason Bonsignore (4th overall) for Daniel Alfredsson (133rd overall), it would be terrible asset management based on draft value, but outstanding asset management based on their eventual careers.
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Sometimes I wonder about that.
So much of a person’s career depends on where they end, who they play with, and the system they’re in. There’s no guarantee Alfie would be as successful anywhere else – he came into his own here because of Daigle and Yashin’s theatrics, but had he been somewhere else, would he have? I don’t know. Elliot was a decent backup here, but he’s doing great in STL with a new system and coach that works for him and was an all star.
Just some thoughts. We could have drafted Crosby, and you know the media here would have torn him apart in the first season because of his whining to the refs and diving. God forbid if we had drafted Ovie!
I'm actually with you 100%
I think, based on my outside observations, that this is where most teams make their mistakes when drafting: they try to simply fit talent in their organization rather than fit their organization to their talent.
Kyle Turris is a great, recent example of this. Did he magically learn to play hockey because Paul MacLean is better on a whiteboard than Dave Tippett? There’s no way. Someone in Phoenix (namely, Gretzky) fucked up big time in thinking Turris was a fit there.
Everyone’s got talent at the NHL level—even Chris Neil has some nice moves in enough open space—so much of their success comes from two different factors:
1) Is the organization the right culture to develop the player?
2) Is the player willing to do what’s asked of them to develop?
You mess those up, and it’s the quickest path to a bust, in my opinion.
As for Alfie, I think he might have been a good player with another team, but he would never have become ALFIE anywhere but Ottawa.
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I think that’s where Detroit does phenomenally well, and something we’ll have soon too. Their AHL guys come up, and know the Detroit system. So they can play in Detroit with very little training. They pick guys who can fit their system, and when they sign someone who doesn’t, the contract is short enough that they can get out.
His draft position does however lend credence to how highly the organization (as well as others around the league based on pre-draft rankings and such) values his potential as an NHLer. So ya draft position 8 months after a kid is drafted is relevant. It isn’t so relevant say 4 or 5 years following. But again to advocate selling high right now is a bit up surd considering again he is only 18.
Oh, there's no doubt that it lends credence to his value within the organization
That’s why you’d only use him in a trade to acquire a prospect you valued more. But I disagree that draft position is relevant to value post-draft—that’s why Rundblad was only with the team for a little more than a year despite what they gave up to get him.
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I highly disagree that draft position doesn’t matter years after the fact. Teams will value players higher years later because of their draft position. Turris was a middling prospect who was a top 3 pick, yet never found any traction with the Coyotes. He was drafted 5 years ago and had proven little at the NHL level, yet we gave up a former first round pick and a 2nd round pick to acquire him. There is no way the cost would have been so high if he was a middling 2nd or 3rd round pick. Clearly there is a relation between draft position and post-draft value for players.
I think 7+ years after you get drafted, or really when you’re to the point of being able to sign as a UFA is when draft position matters much less. Even still teams will give shots to middling former first rounders than they ever would with average late round picks.
by modsuperstar on Feb 18, 2012 5:08 PM EST up reply actions
There are four things I would like to address from your post.
1. Trading a draft pick three years after they’re drafted is close to pointless. Either they have already developed into an NHL player or a player with NHL potential or they haven’t by the time they are 21. That means that if you’re going to trade a prospect you need to do it before their development has stagnated.
2. Getting a proven 30 goal goal scorer with size and physicality for potentially good NHLers is usually a good move. Not always, but 9 times out of 10.
3. Brayden Schenn is a much better player and prospect than Zibanejad. Not only based on his draft position, which you’ve agreed is important, but also in pedigree, speed, and finish. I’m assuming your smiley face recognized this, but it’s important to point out.
4. From the extensive time I’ve spent watching Shane Prince I have an extremely strong feeling that he is going to be a good 2nd line centre in the NHL.
For those primarily those four reason I reassert the reason that Zibanejad should be traded for Rick Nash if possible, and Bobby Ryan if not.
I think the 21 year old cutoff seems pretty low. Look at many of the guys on the Sens who went to collegiate route, many of them were still playing in College at age 21 and have subsequently become NHL regulars. Not every player can be fit into the same mould as far as player development.
by modsuperstar on Feb 18, 2012 5:11 PM EST up reply actions
Two words: GOLDEN GOAL.
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by Peter Raaymakers on Feb 14, 2012 3:10 PM EST reply actions
I think it deserves a few more words than that
He was a beast during “clutch time” in that game.
He also led the tournament in shots. Maybe not a very important category but one nonetheless. The fact that many of us have such a limited sample viewing size of him (SEL stats, World Junior and 9-game tryout in Ottawa) and are advocating trading him and questioning his value to the organization is again a bit ridiculous for an 18 year old.
And last year we had another two words for a prospect: Borje Salming
Yes, it is nice to have accolades to tout our prospects by to other teams’ fans, but they really don’t get us anything.
No one good has ever even won that thing!
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Maybe your right about he has some skills. But i have not seen anything convincing me he’s going to be something special. Especially to be taken sixth overall. And a high end younger player meaning someone who has a little NHL experience. The return on a player like Zibanajad would be quite a bit, and i dont see him fulfilling that potential. SELL HIGH BUY LOW
Well, okay, but are you a professional scout?
Because Murray and staff saw enough to take him sixth overall, and I’m guessing they saw a lot more of him than you have.
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I agree they saw more, but how much more?
ZIbanejad was on no one’s radar until very late in the year, like February. Even then he didn’t crack the top 10 of most people’s draft boards. I know that if these analysts were as smart as they think they are they’d still have jobs in the NHL, but most of them have previously had jobs in the NHL so they have some insight.
My main point is that Zibanejad is still a pretty big unknown for Ottawa too. The only other draft eligible player on Djurgarden last year was Claussen, so its not like Djurgarden had Ottawa’s Swedish scout at many of its games through another method. All I’m saying is the selection of Zibanejad has Nazem Kadri-type fast riser no one was really looking at feel to it I haven’t like since we’ve picked him.
Yeah, that's a good point
All we know is that Murray and staff liked Zibanejad enough to pick him 6th. That’s hardly a guarantee that he’s the next Alfie or anything close.
But for us, as fans, who don’t have the same access to the players or the film of them, to say a player “hasn’t shown [us] anything”… that’s like saying you don’t think a plane will fly because it doesn’t look aerodynamic without having access to the engineering process that built it.
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Your 'sell high buy low' idea is missing one thing:
The value for Mika Zibanejad really isn’t all that high outside of Ottawa right now. If he were made available, there would certainly be teams interested, but it’s not like they’d trade a significant piece for him; he’s proven too little for that.
In my opinion, Zibanejad’s realistic upside is higher than his market value right now. So instead of selling high, we’d be selling low on a very promising young prospect.
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by Peter Raaymakers on Feb 14, 2012 3:57 PM EST up reply actions
As Murray likes to say, "he's a good guy." Aside from Z'bad's skill set,
they also really like him as a person. Murray’s the only GM I am aware of talking about players’ personalities. I think that’s important.
by whatsinaname on Feb 14, 2012 11:23 PM EST up reply actions
Stability
If you want us to become a contending team, you need stability. For that, you identify your core and you build around it. We’re in that process. To figure out who will be part of the core, we need to play them. Zibby has played 9 games as an 18year old. How can we possibly know that he can be part of our core if we get rid of him already? How do we know the young player you speak of will come in and play well? Just because he’s been in the league for a year or two doesn’t mean we’re better off with him.
Zibby has plenty of upside, let’s see what he can do.
by I Still Miss Hossa!!! on Feb 14, 2012 4:04 PM EST reply actions
I have nothing to add to this conversation right now beyond this:
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by Ryan Classic on Feb 14, 2012 8:50 PM EST reply actions 4 recs
I'm also excited for Zibanejad!
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by Ryan Classic on Feb 15, 2012 2:26 AM EST up reply actions
You’re also a stickler for the details. Love the jersey. Who’d you hire to be the colourist on set?
by Spezzal Teams Playa on Feb 15, 2012 5:05 AM EST up reply actions
It’s not just that playing in the Q and playing in the SEL are different. Heck, playing in the QMJHL and in the OHL are different. But in the Q, your competition is aged from 16-19. Zibanejad was playing against men in the SEL from the age of 17. Big difference.
by spez_dispenser on Feb 15, 2012 12:02 AM EST reply actions
Different sort of a player
The thing about Z’jad is that he is a different sort of a player. The name of the game at the lower levels of hockey outside of the NHL is scoring goals. More goals = more money.
Usually players who are good scorers have to learn how to play defensively. Z’jad is one of the few Junior age players I’ve ever seen whose ass needs to be kicked to take some chances offensively, because he is so responsible defensively.
And Peter is right, outside of the Sens Z’jad has relatively little value right now.
IMO, it will be a tough thing for Z’jad to make 2nd line center next year out of TC and he will probably need a year in the AHL.
What we need is patience and he will be a very good player.
Getting rid of him now, we’d probably end up with another player with less potential.
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