Bantam Draft. Why??!!

[BigHitter67]

Can someone offer a good explanation of why this league (teams) thinks they can accurately and reliably project prospects at the age of 14/15 when the Jan to March births are enjoying their last days of the relative -age advantage .
The ‘ misses ‘ are endless with the most glaring in recent memory being the 56 Dmen taken ahead of Cale Makar (october born) . IF you can miss a generational Dman sooo badly at the age of 14 then why the hell bother ...lol

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[Kent Nilsson]

What alternative do you suggest for attributing player rights ?

 

[BigHitter67]

Uhm.. a U16 draft like the O and Q ?

 

[BigHitter67]

I mean .. you wait one more year and Makar likely jumps from 8th rounder to a 3rd? ? Better chance of league retaining these late bloomers ( late born player) who tend to turn sights on NCAA

 

[Kent Nilsson]

I didnt know the CHL bantam drafts were different ages. Interesting.

 

[Royal Canuck]

I mean, the NHL Draft has it's glaring errors too. Plenty of guys go undrafted or in the later rounds and pan out to be star players in the league.

Players develop at different stages, it's just what happens. I'd say by 13-15 you can tell if a player really has potential to take their game to the next level. And for those that don't (Jamie Benn for an example) they come up through Junior B ranks and play their way into a better situation for themselves. A guy that won the Art Ross Trophy in the NHL spent his entire 16-year-old season in Junior B. \

Should the draft age be across the board for the CHL? Maybe. But you can't say that the players are too young, scouts get it wrong at all levels and players develop at varying rates.

 

[BigHitter67]

I mean, the NHL Draft has it's glaring errors too. Plenty of guys go undrafted or in the later rounds and pan out to be star players in the league.

Players develop at different stages, it's just what happens. I'd say by 13-15 you can tell if a player really has potential to take their game to the next level. And for those that don't (Jamie Benn for an example) they come up through Junior B ranks and play their way into a better situation for themselves. A guy that won the Art Ross Trophy in the NHL spent his entire 16-year-old season in Junior B. \

Should the draft age be across the board for the CHL? Maybe. But you can't say that the players are too young, scouts get it wrong at all levels and players develop at varying rates.

Yeah , I suppose. Just wondering what the rational is

 

[e14]

The rational is trying to get kids to commit to CHL before NCAA gets them. CHL has little to offer compared to NCAA if you wait until 17 to commit them. Every year you wait you will lose kids/families who think just wait one more year and get scholarship.

 

[PCSPounder]

The rational is trying to get kids to commit to CHL before NCAA gets them. CHL has little to offer compared to NCAA if you wait until 17 to commit them. Every year you wait you will lose kids/families who think just wait one more year and get scholarship.

Has the WHL sustained losses in this process? The word is that the American pipeline to the WHL has thinned.

I’m not grasping a full understanding here, but I wonder if this draft quirk is backfiring on the WHL. Or... is it being rendered moot when the college system is potentially telling kids (based on GK limitations the CHL imposed and general attitudes among Canadian fans, etc.) that American kids will face issues on Canadian Major Junior teams?

 

[landy92mack29]

Can someone offer a good explanation of why this league (teams) thinks they can accurately and reliably project prospects at the age of 14/15 when the Jan to March births are enjoying their last days of the relative -age advantage .
The ‘ misses ‘ are endless with the most glaring in recent memory being the 56 Dmen taken ahead of Cale Makar (october born) . IF you can miss a generational Dman sooo badly at the age of 14 then why the hell bother ...lol

It's impressive how ignorant someone can be towards something but be so confident. Makar went so late because he was going the college route and told teams so. Even knowing that a team still picked him which shows how much they thought of him. If a team knows a kid is likely going the college route why use a high pick on them?

As for why bantam western Canada is much larger which results in way different levels of midget hockey compared to bantam so it's easier to compare all players vs each other. Also gives teams a extra year to sign them and less time for them to think college. Plus it's good for their development to get a whl camp in before they start midget, know what areas to improve upon to play up a level.

As far as misses most of the high picks work out but obviously not all will just like the nhl doesn't. If you wanted to use a player scouts badly missed on it's Jake Bean not Cale Makar.

 

[canucklax]

I believe the draft predates the NCAA-CHL recruiting battle of 14 and 15 year olds. Before there even was a draft for the WHL, teams were allowed to just list bantam age players once their season began in September. This meant scouting them in peewee so the team could try to get who they wanted once the window opened. So to delay the pressure on players, and make it less of a cluster-f of rushing to list players (back in the days of faxing in to the WHL office) they turned it into a bantam draft and it just never has been changed to match the eastern leagues.

Wikipedia has a quick summary of it WHL Bantam Draft - Wikipedia

 

[WaW]

Doesn't the WHL already lose more players to the US college route than the O and Q, primarily because of the vast geography of the league? I don't see how moving the draft back to 15/16 year olds, thus giving the kids on the fence even less time to contemplate their future and making them rush their decisions helps anyone.

 

[TJHKY]

More kids like to play in BCHL or AJHL so they can go NCAA route.
WHL lose more players to NCAA than OHL and QMJHL due to bantam draft, I guess.