Prospect Info: Bowen Byram - D [2019: 4th Overall] Part II: Now serving a side of overconfidence!

[Foppa2118]

Seriously... people need to watch Cirellli. He’s elite defensively and very solid at ES. With decent PP time... he’s a 60 point player now. Maybe 65-70.

Cirelli isn't a 60 point player yet because his career high is 39 points, and he finished with 44 points, while on pace for 53 last season in his contract year.

He's a very good player, but he probably wouldn't get much more PP time than what he got in Tampa, because MacKinnon, Mikko, Landy, Kadri, Saad, Burakovsky, Makar, and one or both of Girard/Toews will all be ahead of him. Perhaps Donskoi too.

65-70 points is an awfully big jump from a 53 point pace, playing as what likely would be the 3C role in Colorado.

Cirelli was 3rd among forwards in even strength minutes on Tampa last year. There's no way he's getting that role in Colorado. He could easily end up 5th or 6th on the Avs in even strength minutes, and get similar PP time as Tampa.

 

[Spirits]

Tbf it'd be for a 2C as he'd knock Kadri down to 3C. But I'm also not advocating it'd be smart to trade Byram yet.

Fair enough. This may go down as one of the worst trades in our history if we did it which is why I am glad Sakic runs this team and not fans.

 

[PAZ]

This is certainly a better list then the last one

I really don't see an argument for any of the arguable ones though tbh.


Gio has declined quite a bit the last year. OEL isn't very good anymore. Niskanen is retired .

Eh that's fair, there are probably some names I did miss like Spurgeon that was brought up.

I personally can see an argument on most players on that list and this was a career year for Girard, he hasn't proven that he can continue this level of play.

Things change quick, last year Barrie was our #1D playing 25 minutes a night for us in the playoffs to playing 18 minutes a night in Toronto. I do think Girard benefits greatly from playing in Bednar's system, and that's why other people would would rank Girard lower, he wouldn't be as good of fit on their team. Don't get me wrong, Girard is perfect for our system and he's a top 30 defenseman for us - but throw him in other teams systems and he may be less effective.

Guys like Morrissey, Trouba, Schmidt, Petry, etc. will be effective in almost any system.

 

[dahrougem2]

He’s not offersheeted because they are rare (will be more so in a flat cap world) and Tampa takes care of their own. They always do, so players fall in line.

Does this begin to change given Tyler Johnson situation? Or are we guessing that one is a one-off

 

[Pierce Hawthorne]

Eh that's fair, there are probably some names I did miss like Spurgeon that was brought up.

I personally can see an argument on most players on that list and this was a career year for Girard, he hasn't proven that he can continue this level of play.

Things change quick, last year Barrie was our #1D playing 25 minutes a night for us in the playoffs to playing 18 minutes a night in Toronto. I do think Girard benefits greatly from playing in Bednar's system, and that's why other people would would rank Girard lower, he wouldn't be as good of fit on their team. Don't get me wrong, Girard is perfect for our system and for the Avs he's a top 30 defenseman - but throw him in other teams systems and he would be less effective.

Girard is also only 22 years old though. It's easy to forget how young he is, because he's been in the league for so long already. But the kid very likely is still not quite finished developing yet.


Like back on the Makar/Girard comparison here... When Sam Girard was 19 year old, he was playing almost 20 minutes a night in the NHL for the Avs and a big part of our miracle playoff appearance less then 8 months after trading Duchene. 19 Year old Cale Makar was only just starting his freshman year in College.


Girard and Makar are only separated in age by ~5 months. People talk a lot here about how Cale has this huge potential that he could reach and how he's so young and going to get so much better... Both guys are 98 birthdays, it is pretty reasonable to suggest Girard has quite a bit more upside to his game still as well.


Tbh the fact Girard had 225 games of NHL experience before turning 22 is crazy.

 

[henchman21]

Does this begin to change given Tyler Johnson situation? Or are we guessing that one is a one-off

He still got his series of contracts so I don’t see it changing

 

[PAZ]

Girard is also only 22 years old though. It's easy to forget how young he is, because he's been in the league for so long already. But the kid very likely is still not quite finished developing yet.


Like back on the Makar/Girard comparison here... When Sam Girard was 19 year old, he was playing almost 20 minutes a night in the NHL for the Avs and a big part of our miracle playoff appearance less then 8 months after trading Duchene. 19 Year old Cale Makar was only just starting his freshman year in College.


Girard and Makar are only separated in age by ~5 months. People talk a lot here about how Cale has this huge potential that he could reach and how he's so young and going to get so much better... Both guys are 98 birthdays, it is pretty reasonable to suggest Girard has quite a bit more upside to his game still as well.


Tbh the fact Girard had 225 games of NHL experience before turning 22 is crazy.

Oh I completely agree Girard isn't done developing and he's one of the more valuable defenseman in the league, but the question that you brought up was what defenseman is better right now. Older players like Weber will decline and others like Dahlin will develop.

It's fair that other fans will rate Girard lower than us, and I don't think that makes him underrated. For example, I do think that a Lindell - Heiskanen pairing is better than a Girard - Heiskanen pairing.

 

[Northern Avs Fan]

I think this upcoming season is probably the last year of growth we’ll see from Girard. Mostly because he’s already got so much game experience under his belt already. I don’t think defenceman improve much after 300 games played in the league.

 

[Foppa2118]

Girard is also only 22 years old though. It's easy to forget how young he is, because he's been in the league for so long already. But the kid very likely is still not quite finished developing yet.

Tbh the fact Girard had 225 games of NHL experience before turning 22 is crazy.

Unfortunately after next season when Girard is 23 years old with 300 NHL games he'll be a finished product though right?

 

[FreshFitted67]

Has there been any word about Byram's options next year if he doesn't make the Avs, and the WHL doesn't have a season, considering the WHL wouldn't let him play in Europe?

Someone just mentioned that the WHL has announced an opening night date of Jan 7th. So hopefully he will have that option, but with an inevitable second wave just about to get rolling, who knows?

 

[Balthazar]

Girard is either a #2 next to a stud #1 RHD with size (say, Pietrangelo) or a #3 on a good team.

He was our #1 last year though.

 

[Foppa2118]

Someone just mentioned that the WHL has announced an opening night date of Jan 7th. So hopefully he will have that option, but with an inevitable second wave just about to get rolling, who knows?

Well that's semi good news I guess. Will be interesting to see how it plays out though if the NHL season gets delayed and the WHL season doesn't, if Canada continues to handle the virus better than the US.

Also could delay Byram's start to the WHL season if he gets some NHL games, in but then gets sent back to Vancouver and has to quarantine for two weeks.

 

[Northern Avs Fan]

Girard is either a #2 next to a stud #1 RHD with size (say, Pietrangelo) or a #3 on a good team.

He was our #1 last year though.

A #3 on a good team? He’s on a good team, with a good defence.

 

[Foppa2118]

A #3 on a good team? He’s on a good team, with a good defence.

He could easily end up a #3 here though if Byram hits his potential. Toews could challenge him as well, it's too early to know how well he'll fit on the Avs.

 

[FreshFitted67]

Well that's semi good news I guess. Will be interesting to see how it plays out though if the NHL season gets delayed and the WHL season doesn't, if Canada continues to handle the virus better than the US.

Also could delay Byram's start to the WHL season if he gets some NHL games, in but then gets sent back to Vancouver and has to quarantine for two weeks.

Yeah it's gonna be it's gonna be interesting to see how it all shakes out. Canada has been handling it pretty good but the cases are surging all across the country rn. I think it's mostly due to the weather. This virus seems to like the cold so this winter is probably gonna get pretty hairy. Plus the WHL has teams in the States, so I don't know how they're planning on crossing the borders n such. I think there's a somewhat decent chance their season gets delayed or cancelled, and they don't have big TV deals, they rely on ticket sales so the whole CHL might be in trouble.

 

[Foppa2118]

Yeah it's gonna be it's gonna be interesting to see how it all shakes out. Canada has been handling it pretty good but the cases are surging all across the country rn. I think it's mostly due to the weather. This virus seems to like the cold so this winter is probably gonna get pretty hairy. Plus the WHL has teams in the States, so I don't know how they're planning on crossing the borders n such. I think there's a somewhat decent chance their season gets delayed or cancelled, and they don't have big TV deals, they rely on ticket sales so the whole CHL might be in trouble.

That's how it always works. When it gets cold during fall and winter, people tend to stay indoors and huddle up together in close spaces. That's why we consider this to be flu season, because this is when cases spike every year.

Troop deployment during WWI contributed to it as well, but the Spanish Flu peaked during the following winter, not the initial outbreak in the Spring.

That's also why we base the annual flu shots off of how the southern hemisphere is handling the virus during their winter/our summer.

 

[FreshFitted67]

That's how it always works. When it gets cold during fall and winter, people tend to stay indoors and huddle up together in close spaces. That's why we consider this to be flu season, because this is when cases spike every year.

Troop deployment during WWI contributed to it as well, but the Spanish Flu peaked during the following winter, not the initial outbreak in the Spring.

That's also why we base the annual flu shots off of how the southern hemisphere is handling the virus during their winter/our summer.

Yeah well that might be a problem for all professional sports this coming winter might be write-off. If we're at a baseline of 40,000 cases per day, just wait until the real cold hits.

Winter Is Coming

 

[Foppa2118]

Yeah well that might be a problem for all professional sports this coming winter might be write-off. If we're at a baseline of 40,000 cases per day, just wait until the real cold hits.

Winter Is Coming

Yeah right now I think most projections are on the optimistic side of things. I thought they would be starting next season in January when we were back in March/April.

They could easily get bad enough to delay everything again though, because as you allude to we didn't do a good enough job wearing masks and distancing to suppress the spread and lower the cases per day during the summer.

We were at 38k cases per day in mid April. Then it went down a bit. Then in June when we opened back up it started going up again and peaked at 74k per day in mid July. Then in August it started going down but bounced all over the place from 50k per day to it's lowest of 26k per day.

So now we're about to kick off the flu season in the fall, and cases were at 57k just three days ago. It's only going to get worse as we get into the winter with no vaccine.

U.S. COVID-19 new cases by day | Statista

 

[FreshFitted67]

Yeah right now I think most projections are on the optimistic side of things. I thought they would be starting next season in January when we were back in March/April.

They could easily get bad enough to delay everything again though, because as you allude to we didn't do a good enough job wearing masks and distancing to suppress the spread and lower the cases per day during the summer.

We were at 38k cases per day in mid April. Then it went down a bit. Then in June when we opened back up it started going up again and peaked at 74k per day in mid July. Then in August it started going down but bounced all over the place from 50k per day to it's lowest of 26k per day.

So now we're about to kick off the flu season in the fall, and cases were at 57k just three days ago. It's only going to get worse as we get into the winter with no vaccine.

U.S. COVID-19 new cases by day | Statista

Yeah man I think days of 100,000 cases looks pretty inevitable. Good thing is that the death rate has dropped and seems to be staying low. But yeah it's gonna be a sh*tshow. Everybody's gonna have the Rona by February/March

 

[FreshFitted67]

If you look at Northern Hemisphere Countries new cases per day, almost every damn country is starting to spike, this thing is about to get ugly, no matter who is president lol,
But I'm sure the inevitable chaos in the streets (from both sides) during election time won't help either. I think the U.S. is walking into the perfect storm here in the next couple months.
I'm still crossing my fingers for hockey tho lol

 

[FreshFitted67]

This all still somehow relates to Byram

 

[Foppa2118]

Yeah man I think days of 100,000 cases looks pretty inevitable. Good thing is that the death rate has dropped and seems to be staying low. But yeah it's gonna be a sh*tshow. Everybody's gonna have the Rona by February/March

It's hard to tell though how much of that drop is due to doing way more testing than we were before. Especially among children and young adults, as well as those who are asymptomatic.

Where as before we were prioritizing testing for those showing symptoms and those who were the highest risk, because we were slow to produce the testing supplies needed.

If were lucky though, some of the therapeutics that are starting to become approved for mass use will be available soon, and will hopefully offset the more extreme increases in potential deaths during the winter.

 

[Foppa2118]

This all still somehow relates to Byram

It started off relating to Byram but it's less so now.

To bring it back around, I think there's a decent chance Byram ends up in a sort of no mans land where it's 50/50 whether they should keep him up in the NHL, and it's 50/50 whether the WHL will have the finances to pull off a shortened season if it gets delayed past the tentative January date.

A lot of this could be alleviated if they'd just let him play in Europe though. Which hopefully they'll reconsider if the WHL has to delay.

 

[JH21]

Girard is either a #2 next to a stud #1 RHD with size (say, Pietrangelo) or a #3 on a good team.

He was our #1 last year though.

Wait. Last I checked the Avs were the 4th best team in the league last year.

 

[FreshFitted67]

Aaaaanyways maybe the NHL will allow teams to carry extra players like during the bubble and that way we can have Byram with the avs all year (not wishing for injuries but I do hope he gets some NHL minutes this year)