Value of: Calgary Trading Up at the Draft

[Scintillating10]

It sure is, unless your team is bottom 5 in goals for....

Guess where The Habs are......

Parekh will help that out

 

[StreetHawk]

No specific examples come to mind.... but just about any team trading up implies another trading down, and when teams have a handful of guys they see as having similar potential, that's when they move down to get extra picks.

EDIT: You might see limited upside for the team trading down, but they see upside at no risk. if you project some interesting prospects will be available later on in the draft, but right now you'd be picking a guy far ahead of where he should go.... why not trade down, get those extra picks, and pick the same guy you had your sights on anyways?

And while we tend, as fans, to focus on the high-end players, GMs have an organization to run - they need to have new kids being pumped in, given a chance, push vets if they can, and move onwards sooner or later. Adding 2nd rounders gives them options to add depth where they want it, and hopefully strike gold sooner or later with a star picked later than expected.

Each GM also has a timeline for when they need to return their team to the PO, as we are talking about trading up to a much higher draft slot here.
SJ had limited prospects in 2022, thus took the trade down from 11 to 27, added 2 seconds in the first half of the second from AZ. From their stance, at the beginning of a rebuild, if they didn't love who was there at 11, adding more lottery tickets was wise.
If you are a team needing to make the PO, adding extra picks doesn't do anything. You are preferring to get some help now for that 8th or whatever OA pick. Unless you can turn those extra picks into something from another club. Ie. Montreal with Newhook for a pair of seconds.

Otherwise, most of the teams picking high, are way more likely to keep their pick and take what they hope to be a higher end player rather than take their chances on multiple picks later.

I like to use a 200 game cutoff for what I would deem as someone who made it in the NHL. Needs 3 years to complete and most are not getting to 200 NHL games on their ELC. Would need a second contract. Goalies, say 25 starts.

2013 NHL draft, 2nd rounders at 200 games. Erne, De La Rose, Compher, Hagg, Jarry, Lehkonen, Carrier, Bertuzzi, Sanford have hit that mark. 9 players. These are guys turning 29 in 2024. There are a few who are within 50 games, but like Nic Petan, has played 41 games in the last 4 seasons and needs 30 to hit 200. Bowey, is in the KHL this year and last year was in the A, is at 158. Unlikely to see him get to 200.

2014 draft, it's at 8 players for now at 200 games.
2015 draft, very strong. 13 at 200 and probably 4 or 5 more who are close enough to realistically get to 200.

Typically under a coin flip shot of finding someone in round 2 who is a NHLer for 200 games or more.

 

[ManByng]

We need centers so there is NO chance we trade our pick unless Lindstrome and Catton are gone.

Then it will be a tough choice not to pick the best defenseman available even if we have a truck load of them.

We already went stupid picking Kotkaniemi over Tkachuk so picking a projected 2C-3C over a projected top 2 or franchise defenseman is asinine asset management.

We shall see...

If the top centers are gone when the Habs pick and if by some chance Parekh or Buium are available, I would guess that they would take one of them? The Habs have to ask themselves if they have a d-man in the system with the kind of talent and upside as Buium and Parekh have? It's never bad to have great defensive depth coming up in the system and could give the Habs trade options in the future.

 

[StreetHawk]

If the top centers are gone when the Habs pick and if by some chance Parekh or Buium are available, I would guess that they would take one of them? The Habs have to ask themselves if they have a d-man in the system with the kind of talent and upside as Buium and Parekh have? It's never bad to have great defensive depth coming up in the system and could give the Habs trade options in the future.

Best assets to have to trade away are C and D (value wise in return) over wingers. So, nothing wrong with stock piling D if that is the BPA.
Habs shouldn't be reaching for a position unless it's a tie breaker between 2 players who are very close.

But, right now, no reason for MTL to trade back for more assets.

 

[Scintillating10]

If top 4 forwards are gone by 7 Habs might trade down. But want more than a 2nd to drop to 11. Otherwise we just pick our guy at 7.

 

[StreetHawk]

If top 4 forwards are gone by 7 Habs might trade down. But want more than a 2nd to drop to 11. Otherwise we just pick our guy at 7.

Do the Habs need more 2nd/3rds?

2025 - have extra 1st, 2nd, 3rd and a conditional 3rd based on Allen's games played for NJ.
2024 - have extra 1st and 3rd. Have Avs 2nd but not their own (Dvorak)

2023 - dealt 2 seconds for Newhook
2022 - had an extra first and 2 seconds and 2 thirds (Beck/Hutson & Rohrer/Engstrom)
2021 - Had 2 seconds (Kidney/Kapanen)
2020 - Had 2 seconds (Tuch/Mysak)
2019 - Had 2 thirds (Norlinder/Fairbrother)
2018 - Had 3 seconds and 2 thirds (Ylonen/Romanov/Olofsson & Hillis/Harris)
2017 - Had 2 seconds and 2 thirds (Brook/Ikonen & Walford/Fleury)

From 2017-2023 drafts they had used 6 additional 2nd rounders. And traded away at least one or two as well (Newhook/Dvorak)

Hughes took over in early 2022. Has he revamped the scouting and development departments? That's a lot of change to make happen in 2 years. The track record of the prior regime for 2nds/3rds doesn't exactly jump out. Romanov is the best of the bunch and a legit 2nd pairing Dman. Most everyone else is either didn't make it or a work in progress and don't know what they are/will be yet.

 

[Kielbasa]

If top 4 forwards are gone by 7 Habs might trade down. But want more than a 2nd to drop to 11. Otherwise we just pick our guy at 7.

Considering Calgary would be looking to move up for forwards, this would them incompatible with the Habs at least in this regard.