Devils Day Two Draft Recap
I was lucky enough to speak with John Paddock a few times back when he was working in the Philadelphia Flyers front office in the 2008-2010 range. I recall a conversation we had about what separates the teams which draft well from the teams which do not draft well. The theory was that good drafting teams draft as a team — with the scouting staff meeting often with the GM and AGM to develop a draft strategy and compare each others’ notes on all the prospects. The poorer drafting teams tend to draft with less cohesion — giving all of the scouts too much autonomy to pick “their guy” without the collective input of the rest of the scouting team. Another way poorer drafting teams fail is by harping too hard on a particular draft philosophy, like the Ottawa Senators did this year reaching on almost every pick on a physically huge player and passing on far greater talent with every single pick. This is precisely the opposite of the problem a team like Toronto has, where they do not even consider physicality or intangibles as relevant when drafting their players, instead involving too heavy of a statistical approach.
Without the ability to speculate on how it happened, I felt in the 2020 draft the Devils dropped the ball with their final three picks. Edwards, Baumgartner and Shlaine were three straight “throw a dart” type picks in my opinion, though I generally have disdain for that type of cynicism in my own analyses. Yet, one year later there has been nothing to prove me wrong. Edwards was not close to the best defender as a 19 year old on his USHL team, while Baumgartner regressed in the Swiss league and Shlaine was utterly overmatched in the NCAA. I hoped for better in the second Devils draft with Tom Fitzgerald at the helm in 2021.
The good news is that the Devils first round was outstanding, as the Devils picked up the best offensive defenseman they’ve had since Scott Niedermeyer in Luke Hughes, and potentially a player who combines several elements of Claude Lemieux and Randy McKay at RW in Chase Stillman. As for Day Two? Well, these are strictly my observations…
3rd Round (#68 overall) C/LW Samu Salminen, Jokerit FIN Jr.
First, the good: Salminen is a deadly shooter, who is willing to go to the net and the dirty areas to score. His shot is an absolute weapon, we can argue that it was top 10 in the 2021 draft class. He is one of the top handful of face-off whizzes in the draft as well, maybe in the discussion for the best. These reasons alone make him a worthwhile pick in the 3rd round. When we factor in that Salminen is also a high-compete player with a highly intelligent game, the pick looks even better.
Though his IQ leads to a terrific ability to anticipate the puck and find soft spots on the ice to load up his terrific shot, it does not extend to his passing or vision. This leads us to the bad: there are certain elements which will inhibit his ability to stay at C, and threaten his ability to be a middle-six NHLer despite his excellent scoring talent. A top-9 center in the NHL must be able to be a playmaker, and Salminen is not this player. He’s fine as a straight-line passer, but does not anticipate seams, much less create them, so I’d say he’s a pure shooter and not a dual threat. His other qualm is that he is not a particularly good skater — and this is the key element he simply must improve to become anything more than a heady grinder with some scoring pop at the NHL level.
There are reasons to believe that Salminen has the character and compete level to improve his areas of weakness. I’d say his upside is a goal-scoring 2nd line LW or 3rd line C at the NHL level, which is fine for the 68th overall pick in a so-so draft year. Therefore, I would certainly give this pick a good grade. However, I can’t help but think the Devils passed on a couple of even higher-upside, lower-risk forwards taken soon after such as Simon Robertsson or Ayrton Martino. And this is to say nothing of some of the terrific D passed up by the Devils picked later in the 3rd round, such as Svozil, Olsson, Kuzmin and Kirsanov. So, although I like Salminen and think he’s generally a good pick, I give the pick a B instead of an A.
4th Round (#100 overall) G Jakub Malek, VHK Vsetin Czech Jr.
I am not a goalie expert, and I get the desire of the Devils to draft a goalie every year, in case one works out — after all, it is the most difficult position to scout and project. I will also agree that Malek looks good at first look — offering nice size at 6’4 and very athletic for that size, despite an extremely thin frame.
However, if the Devils are going to annually throw a dart at a goalie, can’t they wait until a later round? Two picks later, Vegas selected the best Czech forward in the draft with C Jakub Brabenec. Two picks after that, Chicago tabbed a 6’4-215 physical D who can absolutely fly in Ethan Del Mastro. Later in the same round, two high-upside offensive wingers were taken in Jackson Blake and Connor Roulette. The kicker was Red Savage going to Detroit later in the 4th round — the prototypical third-line C the Devils desperately need in the system, and a teammate and friend of Luke Hughes.
I cannot say whether Jakub Malek will pan out, none of us can. I am not criticizing him as a player, not even one single bit. But I feel this pick was downright awful considering what the Devils need and who was still available. I give the pick a D-.
5th Round (#129 overall) LD Topias Vilen, Pelicans FIN Jr.
Anyone who has read my draft writing over the past two decades knows I love the defensive, stay-at-home defenseman perhaps more than anyone else who calls themselves a draft writer. Vilen is exactly this. He plays a simple, chip the puck out of trouble and take care of your position game with some physicality, and he does it well. Vilen adds to this a very hard slap-shot, though his lack of offensive instincts of any kind certainly temper his ability to blast the puck.
His problems are quite simply, he does not think the game at anything more than a reactionary level, and he has heavy feet — I’d say his skating is below average.
Though I generally like this kind of player, I am forced to ask: don’t the Devils have enough defensive minded left defensemen in the system? Vilen enters the Devils prospect pool as #7 on the Devils LD depth chart; well behind Hughes, Mukhamadullin, Okhotyuk, Bahl, Vukojevic and Misyul and just ahead of Zaitsev and Edwards. The next pick at #130 was a high-upside LW in Sean Tschigerl, while a far more polished and higher upside RD (which the Devils are desperate for) in Jack Bar was taken later in the same round by Dallas. In the middle of the round, Winnipeg — who had another outstanding draft — took RW Dmitry Rashevsky, a devastating shooter and puck handler.
Again, this is no knock on Vilen. I feel, if he improves his skating, he has a reasonable chance to be the stay-at-home half on an NHL third pairing. Just not in New Jersey — there’s just no way he eclipses all the far more talented names ahead of him on that list.
6th Round (#164 overall) RD Viktor Hurtig, Vasteras Sweden Jr.
Finally — finally! — the Devils took a RD. Though he is an over-ager and a project, Hurtig combines a few valuable traits which give him upside. He is between 6’5 and 6’6 providing enormous wingspan, while he’s also a better-than-average skater who shoots the puck well and sees the ice pretty well, especially for a big man. His defense needs work, but it’s better than average, although we must take that with caution since he was a 6’6 19 year old playing in a junior league against entirely smaller and younger players.
Since we’re now in the 6th round, it’s almost self-defeating to decry who else was left on the draft board. My pick here would have been RW Matvey Petrov, but I’m not crying a river. I felt Hurtig was a far superior pick to the two players who were drafted before him, because his combination of size, skating and skill certainly give him much more upside than the average 6th round pick.
7th Round (#203 overall) C/LW Zakhar Bardakov, Vityaz Podolsk KHL
This was — by far — my favorite Devils pick of Day Two. Another over-ager, Bardakov is a physical, in-your-face two-way center with high probability of making an NHL bottom 6. He just missed my Top 96 list, and I would have been happy had the Devils taken him as early as the 4th round.
Bardakov is one of the more physical forwards in the entire draft, and at 6’2-200 he is extremely strong for his size. He is mean, mean, mean — I’d call him one of the top five or six hitting forwards in the draft, and he often crosses the line. He is downright intimidating for opposing defensemen to line up against. Bardakov crashed creases and plays with extreme prejudice.
I feel Bardakov must improve his skating to be a true impact bottom-sixer, and again — though this kid has some scoring ability, we’re not discussing a top-six scorer by any stretch of the imagination. But if he can improve his speed and explosiveness enough to stay at center, I feel he or Pytlik can be internal options for long-term fits as the Devils 3C. In the 7th round, I absolutely love a pick like this, and Zakhar Bardakov was certainly the Devils best value in Day Two of the 2021 draft.
How Steven Ives Day Two Would Have Looked:
Finally, I’d like to add this — so we can compare the results of the Devils draft team and my own opinions a decade down the line. I’m personally rooting for the Devils here, since I want a cup more than I want to be right.
#68: LW Simon Robertsson
#100: C Red Savage
#129: RD Jack Bar
#164: RW Matvey Petrov
#203: RD Jake Martin
