Prospect Info: Aleksi Heponiemi (2017, #40 overall), Kärpät (Liiga)

[Jean Luc Discard]

1 assist in 8 games.

I've read somewhere that he has only 1 shot on goal.

Is anybody has seen him play?

I don't get how so many people around here were so high on him.

At 147 pounds, there's no way he can be effective in the NHL...and not even in the AHL it seems.

I'll refer to what I said some time ago...

There is plenty of smaller players in the NHL indeed but Hepo needs to either bulk up or get a lot faster if he wants to make a successful jump into the AHL/NHL. He's just going to get squashed if he's not prepared to make drastic adjustments. For an instance in comparison to Vatrano, who's a bit taller than Hepo, has 50lbs on Hepo so that almost makes them totally two different players. Even if Hepo would focus on building muscle then that would probably amount to something like 5lbs per year and thus he has a long road ahead of himself. It's good that he's finding success in the Finnish league where a player has time and space to be creative but he's still at least a 2-3 year project in regards to Panther hockey.

 

[Prominence Problem]

I'll refer to what I said some time ago...

Don't know how much of the weight Frankie had was muscle, at least back in the day. I thought I read somewhere he got shipped out of Boston because he was eating too much of his parents Italian cooking from their local restaurant.

 

[sinDer]

Don't know how much of the weight Frankie had was muscle, at least back in the day. I thought I read somewhere he got shipped out of Boston because he was eating too much of his parents Italian cooking from their local restaurant.

Haha! Can't blame him!

 

[pantherbot]

Another comparable is our new boy wonder Malgin. He's actually shorter than Hepo, but has 30 pounds on him...and I think most would still consider Malgin a smaller guy.

As I've said earlier...I see the potential, but Hepo has the most risk and I would have been in favour of trading him. Now...I'm not sure what his trade value is, but I'd still explore it and see if any GM is willing to give up solid assets for Hepo.

 

[sinDer]

Another comparable is our new boy wonder Malgin. He's actually shorter than Hepo, but has 30 pounds on him...and I think most would still consider Malgin a smaller guy.

As I've said earlier...I see the potential, but Hepo has the most risk and I would have been in favour of trading him. Now...I'm not sure what his trade value is, but I'd still explore it and see if any GM is willing to give up solid assets for Hepo.

There's no point in trading him. His value has probably never been so low.

 

[vendetta]

Relax on malgin. I wasn’t as high on him as some. Had him below tippet and borg all along but his iq will allow him to alter his game and adjust. This is the very definition of needing time. He’s physically immature still. First time in North America playing pro hockey. It’s a big jump and a lot of adjustment.