Prospect Info: Senators Prospects Watch 2017/2018

[toxic poster]

Well, White was picked 21st. Hard to get a superstar in that part of the draft. If he becomes the 'grunt' worker on a 2nd line, that is a big win for us. If he becomes a solid 3rd liner, that's still a decent pick.

this would be an okay argument if boeser, konecny, aho, roslovic weren't all picked after him.

 

[Burrowsaurus]

this would be an okay argument if boeser, konecny, aho, roslovic weren't all picked after him.

well yeah this was touted as the best first round ever. and there was serious offensive talent on the board,.

 

[toxic poster]

If we keep Pageau at 2C and do not upgrade there. I could see White having a reasonable chance at being 3C more so if Smith is dealt

i figure they're probably going to integrate him into the league as a RW playing with Duchene/Hoffman. they had a fair bit of success once white got his legs going at the nhl level.

 

[toxic poster]

well yeah this was touted as the best first round ever. and there was serious offensive talent on the board,.

and they took another safe pick with a late first round, pretty wack imo

 

[Micklebot]

and they took another safe pick with a late first round, pretty wack imo

To be fair, White was fairly highly regarded going into the draft;
McKenzie: 16th
McKeens: 19th
ISS: 15th
FC: 19th
Pronman: 22nd

We didn't exactly reach for him, so much as some other guys fell (really, just Konecny) and we didn't snatch them up.

Aho and Roslovic would have been considered big reaches had we drafted them at the time. Boeser was typically ranked behind White too. I get that many of those complaining now targeted more skilled guys at the time, so it's not so much revisionist thinking, but this is hardly a case of the team trying to outsmart everyone else.

 

[QuietOnTheFront]

Honestly, if you look at pre-draft rankings, we took a player right where he was supposed to go. We would have been outraged at the time if we took Aho or Roslovic. Hindsight is 20/20. It is easy to make these assessments after the fact. If other GMs knew that Aho would be what he is now he would have went higher, probably top half of the first round. No one projected him to succeed this early into his career, and there was doubt whether or not he would translate to the NHL.

Managing the draft needs to be calculated. You need a mix of safe picks and risks. We had two firsts, we took a risky pick (at the time) in Chabot, and added insurance with White. If we went all in on high/risk high reward picks, we would leave ourselves vulnerable to hit the wrong side of the sword too often, which can cripple a franchise.

I am not sure why people are easily writing off White after a year where our entire farm system underachieved, quite possibly due to terrible coaching. White has shown flashes of offensive upside, and could end up being a solid 2nd line C/RW down the line. Obviously next year is an important one in that he really needs to make steps towards this.

 

[Sens of Anarchy]

Honestly, if you look at pre-draft rankings, we took a player right where he was supposed to go. We would have been outraged at the time if we took Aho or Roslovic. Hindsight is 20/20. It is easy to make these assessments after the fact. If other GMs knew that Aho would be what he is now he would have went higher, probably top half of the first round. No one projected him to succeed this early into his career, and there was doubt whether or not he would translate to the NHL.

Managing the draft needs to be calculated. You need a mix of safe picks and risks. We had two firsts, we took a risky pick (at the time) in Chabot, and added insurance with White. If we went all in on high/risk high reward picks, we would leave ourselves vulnerable to hit the wrong side of the sword too often, which can cripple a franchise.

I am not sure why people are easily writing off White after a year where our entire farm system underachieved, quite possibly due to terrible coaching. White has shown flashes of offensive upside, and could end up being a solid 2nd line C/RW down the line. Obviously next year is an important one in that he really needs to make steps towards this.

No Dangles No Good .. No Woman No Cry... No Dangles No Good ..

 

[Karl Prime]

It's easy to say "thy should have taken Boeser or Aho" but there are other teams that missed on those two as well. If we could have accurately predicted how good they would be then they both wouldn't have been available where Ottawa picked White.

 

[Boom Boom Apathy]

Honestly, if you look at pre-draft rankings, we took a player right where he was supposed to go. We would have been outraged at the time if we took Aho or Roslovic. Hindsight is 20/20. It is easy to make these assessments after the fact. If other GMs knew that Aho would be what he is now he would have went higher, probably top half of the first round. No one projected him to succeed this early into his career, and there was doubt whether or not he would translate to the NHL.

Heck, there were more than a few fans on our Canes board that were pissed we took Aho over guys like Bittner, Sprong and a few others in the 2nd round. Canes got lucky. They typically had a small (by NHL standards) scouting department, but the year before hired Joni Pitkanen to be a European scout. The fact that Pitkanen had ties with Karpat is why the Canes knew about Aho.

 

[aragorn]

i figure they're probably going to integrate him into the league as a RW playing with Duchene/Hoffman. they had a fair bit of success once white got his legs going at the nhl level.

I tend to disagree. I assume that Ottawa could stack the top line with Hoffman, Duchene & Stone to start the season to try & get as many quick wins as possible. It's likely that Pageau starts the yr as the 2nd line centre which may open up a spot for White as the 3rd line centre with Smith on one side to help with faceoffs & Pyatt most likely on the other. I also assume that Brown will likely start the season in Belleville (we'll see) along with Chlapik. Not sure if they re-sign Paajarvi or buy-out Gaborik or Burrows.

Hoffman - Duchene - Stone
Dzingel - Pageau - Ryan
Smith - White - Pyatt
McCormick - Paul - Burrows

 

[Hale The Villain]

It's easy to say "thy should have taken Boeser or Aho" but there are other teams that missed on those two as well. If we could have accurately predicted how good they would be then they both wouldn't have been available where Ottawa picked White.

Couldn't have predicted how well either has translated to the NHL level but their production in their respective leagues in their draft year suggested both had the potential to be impact players.

Boeser's USHL production was amazing for a 17YR old, and Aho had about 0.5 PPG in the SM-Liiga too.

 

[toxic poster]

I tend to disagree. I assume that Ottawa could stack the top line with Hoffman, Duchene & Stone to start the season to try & get as many quick wins as possible. It's likely that Pageau starts the yr as the 2nd line centre which may open up a spot for White as the 3rd line centre with Smith on one side to help with faceoffs & Pyatt most likely on the other. I also assume that Brown will likely start the season in Belleville (we'll see) along with Chlapik. Not sure if they re-sign Paajarvi or buy-out Gaborik or Burrows.

Hoffman - Duchene - Stone
Dzingel - Pageau - Ryan
Smith - White - Pyatt
McCormick - Paul - Burrows

that's the worst bottom6 in the league holy f***

 

[Ouroboros]

that's the worst bottom6 in the league holy ****

Probably the worst 2nd line too.

 

[Micklebot]

Probably the worst 2nd line too.

And we haven't even included our former 40 goal guy in Gaborik!

But seriously, Brown, Batherson, Formenton, and Chlapik need to save this team by becoming impact players

 

[Sens of Anarchy]

that's the worst bottom6 in the league holy ****

Probably the worst 2nd line too.

You guys are getting me psyched .. What about our iron clad d corps? they must be good right?

 

[TkachukNorris79]

I tend to disagree. I assume that Ottawa could stack the top line with Hoffman, Duchene & Stone to start the season to try & get as many quick wins as possible. It's likely that Pageau starts the yr as the 2nd line centre which may open up a spot for White as the 3rd line centre with Smith on one side to help with faceoffs & Pyatt most likely on the other. I also assume that Brown will likely start the season in Belleville (we'll see) along with Chlapik. Not sure if they re-sign Paajarvi or buy-out Gaborik or Burrows.

Hoffman - Duchene - Stone
Dzingel - Pageau - Ryan
Smith - White - Pyatt
McCormick - Paul - Burrows

This is pretty bad. I think Stone and Duchene should be on separate lines with our current forward depth. They're our two best forwards but Stone himself can allow Pageau and Ryan to excel and make it a half decent 2nd line until the kids are ready to step up (Brown, mainly).

Beginning of the year (barring trades) should look like:

Dzingel-Duchene-Hoffman
Ryan-Pageau-Stone
Chlapik-Smith-White
McCormick-Paul-Pyatt

We pray that Smith has a bit of a bounceback year. Also that 3rd line can have anyone ate centre. But eventually give one of the kids a chance and see if one runs with it. Bottom 6 isn't pretty though.

By the end of the year, could be much different depending how we are. If we're out if the playoffs and the have all shown pretty well, I see no reason for us not to ship out Hoffman, Pageau, Smith and Ceci. Probably a goalie as well.

Back end will probably look similar all year, with some guys hopping in and getting a chance, but ultimately Wolanin and Jaros beating out Claesson and Harpur. Huge hole on LD, really need to find that Methot replacement for EK. I honestly think through FA with Cole/DeHaan is our best bet if we can entice one (we should have kept Cole IMO).

UFA-Karlsson
Chabot-Ceci
Wolanin-Jaros
Boro
Harpur/Claesson

By 2019-2020, Hoffman, Ceci, Pageau, Smith will be replaced with Brown, Batherson, Formenton, 4OA and whoever we get for those guys.

At least the future is looking bright.

 

[Xspyrit]

I tend to disagree. I assume that Ottawa could stack the top line with Hoffman, Duchene & Stone to start the season to try & get as many quick wins as possible. It's likely that Pageau starts the yr as the 2nd line centre which may open up a spot for White as the 3rd line centre with Smith on one side to help with faceoffs & Pyatt most likely on the other. I also assume that Brown will likely start the season in Belleville (we'll see) along with Chlapik. Not sure if they re-sign Paajarvi or buy-out Gaborik or Burrows.

Hoffman - Duchene - Stone
Dzingel - Pageau - Ryan
Smith - White - Pyatt
McCormick - Paul - Burrows

There's absolutely no chance that the line-up looks like this, unless Boucher wants to lose his job and put an end to his NHL career right away.

It would also be stupid to stack the 3 best forwards on the first line. Stone makes his linemates better and help them produce so he should be the one moved away from Duchene and Hoffman who have proven chemistry together. I don't know if somebody (like Micklebot) could dig the numbers of Dzingel production when he played with those 2, I'm sure it was quite interesting.

Based on all that, the first line should certainly be HOFFMAN-DUCHENE-DZINGEL

Like I said earlier, Pageau and Stone have shown chemistry before and had very good production together 2 years ago. Smith was their LWinger and ended up with 25 goals. If you put Ryan there, who has much better hands and can make high skilled plays, you increase your chances of good production for a 2nd line. Based on hypothecially 82 healthy games together, I could see Stone with 65 pts, Ryan with 55 pts and Pageau with 45-50 pts (including special teams)

Based on all that, the second line should certainly be RYAN-PAGEAU-STONE

And we're not even sure of who will make the team. Brown? 4th OA pick? Batherson? Formenton? Paul? etc.

I think White and Chlapik will be there. Pyatt has one year left (and it's cheap) so he should be there to not have an entire green bottom-6. No idea what will happen with Burrows and Gaborik as they are perfect candidates to cut salary. Same with Smith, who could be traded for a pick and replace him by a younger and cheaper player.

If I had to guess (if none of Brown, 4th OA pick, Batherson, Formenton, etc makes the team)

Smith-White-Chlapik
Pyatt-Paul-Burrows
McCormick

But then again, too many questions to answer before predicting the line-up, particularly the bottom part of it.

EDIT : Just saw that, Melnykout has a very similar group to mine.

 

[Sens in Process]

To be fair, White was fairly highly regarded going into the draft;
McKenzie: 16th
McKeens: 19th
ISS: 15th
FC: 19th
Pronman: 22nd

We didn't exactly reach for him, so much as some other guys fell (really, just Konecny) and we didn't snatch them up.

Aho and Roslovic would have been considered big reaches had we drafted them at the time. Boeser was typically ranked behind White too. I get that many of those complaining now targeted more skilled guys at the time, so it's not so much revisionist thinking, but this is hardly a case of the team trying to outsmart everyone else.

At the time, the Sens thought they were getting real value with White. Some commentators were saying with his athleticism, motor, determination and skill, he could have went in the top 10 if it wasn't for his bout with mono. I didn't particular like the White pick. He wasn't really on my radar, but admittedly, it appears to be a solid pick.

Two things to consider:

Development is not linear. Some players peak early, some late and some not at all. Aho might plateau or regress in the next couple of years and white could end up being that really solid 55-60 center. Couterier didn't become an offensive force until this year, at 25, while Zibanejad was putting up 51 three years ago and may never reach that mark again(who knows?). Meszaros put up 39 point as a 19 year old and never matched that total again. There are a ton of examples.

The quality of a pick be shouldn't be completely evaluated on whether the player a few selections later was better. Drafts are just snapshots in time and there is so much room for error. Evaluating different players at different stages of maturity across different leagues, with different styles of play and different rink dimensions is a risky endeavor. I think a more reasonable approach is look at a range of 5 to 10 players around your teams selection, particularly in the 1st round , and evaluate from their.

Btw: I have been reading things about Boucher's skating in the NHL-Draft prospects page that reduced my fears about taking him at 4.

I like his upside more than Dobson's.

 

[Micklebot]

At the time, the Sens thought they were getting real value with White. Some commentators were saying with his athleticism, motor, determination and skill, he could have went in the top 10 if it wasn't for his bout with mono. I didn't particular like the White pick. He wasn't really on my radar, but admittedly, it appears to be a solid pick.

Two things to consider:

Development is not linear. Some players peak early, some late and some not at all. Aho might plateau or regress in the next couple of years and white could end up being that really solid 55-60 center. Couterier didn't become an offensive force until this year, at 25, while Zibanejad was putting up 51 three years ago and may never reach that mark again(who knows?). Meszaros put up 39 point as a 19 year old and never matched that total again. There are a ton of examples.

The quality of a pick be shouldn't be completely evaluated on whether the player a few selections later was better. Drafts are just snapshots in time and there is so much room for error. Evaluating different players at different stages of maturity across different leagues, with different styles of play and different rink dimensions is a risky endeavor. I think a more reasonable approach is look at a range of 5 to 10 players around your teams selection, particularly in the 1st round , and evaluate from their.

Btw: I have been reading things about Boucher's skating in the NHL-Draft prospects page that reduced my fears about taking him at 4.

I like his upside more than Dobson's.

Bouchard, I'm assuming? Yeah, my concern was earlier reports on his skating as well, but he apparently really improved in that regard. I honestly haven't watched enough of London, or Bouchard specifically to really dispute what others say about him, but from what I have seen and read, he looks like a solid pick.

It's funny; people complain about safe picks, well, that's what Sheifele was seen as in his draft year. His upside was questioned, coaches loved him and his work ethic along with he well developed 2-way game, he needed to work on his strength and skating. He had high hockey IQ, and was a great stickhandler. In the end, it's that work ethic that ended up turning him into the player he is today

 

[Sensinitis]

Bouchard, I'm assuming? Yeah, my concern was earlier reports on his skating as well, but he apparently really improved in that regard. I honestly haven't watched enough of London, or Bouchard specifically to really dispute what others say about him, but from what I have seen and read, he looks like a solid pick.

It's funny; people complain about safe picks, well, that's what Sheifele was seen as in his draft year. His upside was questioned, coaches loved him and his work ethic along with he well developed 2-way game, he needed to work on his strength and skating. He had high hockey IQ, and was a great stickhandler. In the end, it's that work ethic that ended up turning him into the player he is today

Scheifele might have been a “safe pick” if he were picked in the 10-12 spots (wasn’t that where he was projected to go?)

But he was picked a bit earlier, kinda off the board but not really. I don’t think he is the textbook definition of a safe pick considering where he was taken and where he was projected to go, his skillset was definitely a “safe” one though for sure. High IQ and good to great at pretty much everything.

 

[Sens in Process]

Bouchard, I'm assuming? Yeah, my concern was earlier reports on his skating as well, but he apparently really improved in that regard. I honestly haven't watched enough of London, or Bouchard specifically to really dispute what others say about him, but from what I have seen and read, he looks like a solid pick.

It's funny; people complain about safe picks, well, that's what Sheifele was seen as in his draft year. His upside was questioned, coaches loved him and his work ethic along with he well developed 2-way game, he needed to work on his strength and skating. He had high hockey IQ, and was a great stickhandler. In the end, it's that work ethic that ended up turning him into the player he is today

ooops, yes, Bouchard.

 

[armani]

Way too many posters are down on White, I already see him as a better player than Curtis Lazar and nobody projected Aho or Boeser (or others) to be the kind of players they are (kind of like most didn't think EK65 was a top-30 prospect except for Ottawa and Anaheim).

Without hindsight, for where he was picked at the time, White was the right choice. I see 2-way potential as a top-9 player, and it won't surprise me to see him be an effective top-6 player given his skillset. Dude hasn't played a full season of NHL hockey yet.

 

[FolignoQuantumLeap]

Yeah, I like White. I see top 6 material there. He might not be Boeser but I have little doubt he'll be a productive NHL forward the way he plays in high traffic areas.

 

[TkachukNorris79]

EDIT : Just saw that, Melnykout has a very similar group to mine.

Great minds think alike

 

[ReginKarlssonLehner]

Yeah, I like White. I see top 6 material there. He might not be Boeser but I have little doubt he'll be a productive NHL forward the way he plays in high traffic areas.

You see top 6 material in White? If he becomes a top 6 player for us that would be huge win. Even as a complementary player.