Caps top 20

[Gumby]

I just took a look at the Caps prospect rankings and without being too much of a homer I think I can fairly confidentally say that their entire top 20 has a fairly decent shot at makin it to the NHL.....thats pretty damn good. If just half of these guys pan out they could have one helluva team in a couple years. Then looking at all the old mock drafts posted before the draft and they have 4 sometimes 5 of what people here thought would be 1st rounders which I take as most people think they had a great draft too. Things are lookin damn good for the future.......had my doubts about McPhee pulling it off but it looks like he mighta done it (though winning the lottery certainly helped). Now they need to get this damn CBA BS worked out so i can order center ice and watch these kids develop!

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[Mizral]

A lot of the Caps prospects are safe picks, and I would agree that a lot of them have a good shot at the NHL - I'd say that about 3/4ths of that list makes it.

 

[GorillazXL]

There is no doubt Washington has a tonne of top end prospects who could possibly make the NHL in the next couple of years, I bit of this mind you is due to their lack of talent at the NHL level. Never the less I'll make a bold prediction and say Washington will be a top end NHL team within 5-7 years. The forwards of Fehr, Ovechkin, Semin, Fleishmann, Aulin, and Laich will be deadly for years to come. On defence its pretty solid with Green, Hedman and Schultz.

GXL

 

[EroCaps]

There is no doubt Washington has a tonne of top end prospects who could possibly make the NHL in the next couple of years, I bit of this mind you is due to their lack of talent at the NHL level. Never the less I'll make a bold prediction and say Washington will be a top end NHL team within 5-7 years. The forwards of Fehr, Ovechkin, Semin, Fleishmann, Aulin, and Laich will be deadly for years to come. On defence its pretty solid with Green, Hedman and Schultz.

GXL

and Eminger, Morrisonn, Lepisto, and Yonkman.

We could use another top-end offensive player.

 

[Ajacied]

Speaking of the Caps prospects here.. I noticed Ovechkin got rated a 9, the same grade Spezza, Frolov and more got before they graduated. Ovechkin should be a 9.5 IMO.. Then again, grades are not all that accurate here anyway.

 

[sharkyz15]

Speaking of the Caps prospects here.. I noticed Ovechkin got rated a 9, the same grade Spezza, Frolov and more got before they graduated. Ovechkin should be a 9.5 IMO.. Then again, grades are not all that accurate here anyway.

Frolov was a 9?

I know hes going to become a good player but he should be rated no higher then 7.5-8

 

[MHJS]

Spezza was 9.5

 

[Jacob]

and Eminger, Morrisonn, Lepisto, and Yonkman.

We could use another top-end offensive player.

Do you still consider Yonkman a prospect?

 

[H3ro]

Speaking of the Caps prospects here.. I noticed Ovechkin got rated a 9, the same grade Spezza, Frolov and more got before they graduated. Ovechkin should be a 9.5 IMO.. Then again, grades are not all that accurate here anyway.

I was shocked when I saw Ovechkin got rated only 9... He should be 9.5 at least...

 

[Teemu]

The hawks also have over 20 who have a good chance at the NHL (Babchuk, Barker, Bolland, Berti, Ellison, M Keith, Sindel, Seabrook, Vorobiev, Wisniewski, Barinka, Kukkonen, Radulov, Yakubov, Crawford, Brodeur, Viuhkola, Bickell, Garlock, Kuiper)

Does anyone besides the caps and hacwks have that?

 

[Vagrant]

Well, just to stir the pot here i'm going to say that Pittsburgh also had an organization full of "can't miss" or "safe" type prospects a few years ago and not many of them really panned out. Milan Kraft, Kris Beech, Michael Sivek, Colby Armstrong, Shane Endicott, Ben Eaves, Toby Peterson, Matt Murley, Michel Rosival, Ramzi Abid, Josef Melichar, Brooks Orpik, Ross Lupaschuk, Michel Ouellet, Noah Welch, Rob Scuderi, and Konstantin Koltsov. Of these 17 prospects, only two or three had made any significant contribution to the Penguins. In other words, don't count your chickens before they've hatched.

Beech, Lupaschuk, and Sivek looked like sure fire NHL prospects at the time of the Jagr deal, but here we are three years later and Kris Beech is a borderline NHL player, Lupaschuk has played 3 NHL games, and Sivek has played 38 NHL games for 6 points.

 

[DJ Spinoza]

The Penguins are still relatively stacked with prospects, I'd say Washington, Chicago, and Pittsburgh have the most depth in the league, but there are no guarantees.

I certainly like where I'm sitting fan wise, with a prospective defense of Fleury, Whitney, Welch, Orpik, Nemec, Bissionette, Fernholm, Scuderi.

Up front, Malkin, Salmonsson, Anshakov, Koltsov, Malone, Kraft, Surovy, Moulson, Eaves, Talbot, Bartschi, Ouellet, Dixon all show pretty good offensive talent. Then you have good depth with guys like Murley, Carcillo, Stone, Armstrong, Filewich. Nick Johnson from this year's draft looks like a pretty good player.

In goal, top end talent with Fleury, and decent depth with Caron, Chiodo, Goepfert, Duba, and Brown.

But again, no one knows who will make it and who will not. I certainly don't think that all these Penguin prospects will become NHLers, but it's a pretty impressive assembly of talent and depth at forward, defense, and goaltending that has spurred from good drafting from 1999 on.

Fleury, Whitney, Welch, Orpik, Nemec, Bissionette, Fernholm, Scuderi, Malkin, Salmonsson, Anshakov, Koltsov, Malone, Kraft, Surovy, Moulson, Eaves, Talbot, Bartschi, Ouellet, Dixon, Murley, Carcillo, Stone, Armstrong, Filewich, Johnson, Schneider, Christensen, Caron, Chiodo, Goepfert, Duba, and Brown. That's 34 players, not including the infamous Jagr trio.

Lupaschuk I've pretty much given up on. It's a shame, I sort of feel bad for him, because he is one of the hardest workers, but never seems to put it together. Sivek has returned to the Czech Republic apparently, for the time being. I guess we'll see what happens with the labor stuff, and whether or not he comes back over for camp or not. Beech will almost assuredly be given a good chance to play in the NHL this year, the same way Kraft was last year. People had given up on Kraft, and I'm pretty much at that point with Beech, but we'll see what Olcyzk does with him.

One thing I will say is that, on any team, not all of your best guys will develop. I hope that the Pens will be able to develop a core group of players out of that; guys like Fleury, Whitney, Welch, Orpik, Malone, Koltsov, Malkin, Salmonsson, and then go from there. The cards will have to be played right, but I think the Pens have a good chance of developing this core, and then we'll see what happens from there.

On all teams, free agent signings will have to be made, holes will have to be filled, and probably some of these prospects-maybe even guys consider to be really good-may need to be traded for another need. It's not which group of players is best now, it's which General Manager can utilize his group of assets best to form a good NHL team.

 

[EroCaps]

Do you still consider Yonkman a prospect?

I do still consider Yonkman a "prospect". The same way Pens fans considered Ryan Malone a "prospect".

 

[DJ Spinoza]

If you're referring to me, I threw guys like Koltsov, Kraft, and Malone in there just because it fit with the whole young core theme of my post.

 

[EroCaps]

If you're referring to me, I threw guys like Koltsov, Kraft, and Malone in there just because it fit with the whole young core theme of my post.

I wasn't referring to you or anyone in particular.

 

[Vagrant]

I just want to clarify that I wasn't attacking Pittsburgh or their prospects, it's just a pretty good example of the fact that not all your highly regarded prospects are going to pan out. It's that way with every team in the league. To come out and say that there is a good chance that your Top 20 prospects will be NHL players is pretty ridiculous, in my opinion. I'm not even sure that the Top 20 prospects in the entire league right now will be NHL regulars when it is all said and done. Players stock rise and they fall just as quickly if not quicker.


If I was a fan of the Capitals, i'd aim for 5 of those Top 20 prospects to become important pieces of the lineup in the future. That's excluding Ovechkin, who isn't exactly what i'd consider a prospect due to the fact that he'll probably play his entire career at the NHL level. If the Capitals can get a 25-30% success ratio out of those prospects, i'll bet you they would take it. It's not an attack against the Capitals prospects either, but you don't very often come across a group of prospects that 50% go on to have marked NHL success.

 

[Letang fan 58]

I just want to clarify that I wasn't attacking Pittsburgh or their prospects, it's just a pretty good example of the fact that not all your highly regarded prospects are going to pan out. It's that way with every team in the league. To come out and say that there is a good chance that your Top 20 prospects will be NHL players is pretty ridiculous, in my opinion. I'm not even sure that the Top 20 prospects in the entire league right now will be NHL regulars when it is all said and done. Players stock rise and they fall just as quickly if not quicker.


If I was a fan of the Capitals, i'd aim for 5 of those Top 20 prospects to become important pieces of the lineup in the future. That's excluding Ovechkin, who isn't exactly what i'd consider a prospect due to the fact that he'll probably play his entire career at the NHL level. If the Capitals can get a 25-30% success ratio out of those prospects, i'll bet you they would take it. It's not an attack against the Capitals prospects either, but you don't very often come across a group of prospects that 50% go on to have marked NHL success.

Only problem with saying that pittsburgh's players didnt pan out and is that they were not considered top end prospects and most of them are still on track to play in the nhl. If you havent noticed the pens havent exactly been rushing along the prospects that they have they are letting them develop into solid 2 way players.

 

[sharkyz15]

The hawks also have over 20 who have a good chance at the NHL (Babchuk, Barker, Bolland, Berti, Ellison, M Keith, Sindel, Seabrook, Vorobiev, Wisniewski, Barinka, Kukkonen, Radulov, Yakubov, Crawford, Brodeur, Viuhkola, Bickell, Garlock, Kuiper)

Does anyone besides the caps and hacwks have that?

Although the Sharks dont have 20 they probably have a good 13-15 but the thing the sharks have that those teams dont is prooven young talent playing in the NHL and contending for the Stanley Cup

 

[Vagrant]

Only problem with saying that pittsburgh's players didnt pan out and is that they were not considered top end prospects and most of them are still on track to play in the nhl. If you havent noticed the pens havent exactly been rushing along the prospects that they have they are letting them develop into solid 2 way players.

Well, with the exception of two or three on the Top 20 list for Washington, they aren't top end prospects for the most part either. Also, the defintion of "pan out" that I was going by is that they are solid contributers at the NHL level and not just up and down between the AHL and NHL level. While those players are pretty young still, most had them projected to be in their respective lineups three years ago.

We could sit here and discuss the semantics of how long is too long for a prospect, but by my estimation the window has all but closed on a lot of the Penguins prospects from a few years ago that were highly touted. That's just my opinion.

 

[DJ Spinoza]

I just want to clarify that I wasn't attacking Pittsburgh or their prospects, it's just a pretty good example of the fact that not all your highly regarded prospects are going to pan out. It's that way with every team in the league. To come out and say that there is a good chance that your Top 20 prospects will be NHL players is pretty ridiculous, in my opinion. I'm not even sure that the Top 20 prospects in the entire league right now will be NHL regulars when it is all said and done. Players stock rise and they fall just as quickly if not quicker.

Yes, I know, I was just bringing up the current Penguins system as another example.

As I said, not all of them are going to pan out. All three teams have good depth and good top end players. But they aren't going to take their group of 18-22 year olds and form an entire team from it, because we know that's not how it works.

I think the best strategy is to form a core of players, while your bad, and then improve and add the neccessary pieces as you see fit to get better. Case in point, Tampa Bay. They added players to their core while they were a bad team, and then were able to gradually pick up the right pieces.

And, obviously as Tampa shows us, you don't neccessarily have to draft this entire core, either. If you can draft a good bit of it, then good, but I believe you have to develop it.

We'll see what happens with these teams over the next few years... But there's no way that all prospects, or even most prospects, will develop as planned.

 

[Jacob]

I do still consider Yonkman a "prospect". The same way Pens fans considered Ryan Malone a "prospect".

Ryan Malone has at least played hockey in the last two years.

 

[H3ro]

The hawks also have over 20 who have a good chance at the NHL (Babchuk, Barker, Bolland, Berti, Ellison, M Keith, Sindel, Seabrook, Vorobiev, Wisniewski, Barinka, Kukkonen, Radulov, Yakubov, Crawford, Brodeur, Viuhkola, Bickell, Garlock, Kuiper)

Does anyone besides the caps and hacwks have that?

Montreal Canadiens.

Andrei Kastsitsyn, Alexander Perezhogin, Chris Higgins, Kyle Chipchura, Tomas Plekanec, Yann Danis, Ron Hainsey, Marcel Hossa, Cory Urquhart, Maxim Lapierre, Ryan O'Byrne, Konstantin Korneev, Michael Lambert, Corey Locke, Alexei Yemelin, Oskari Korpikari, Jaroslav Halak, James Wyman, Duncan Milroy, Jonathan Ferland.

They all have a good chance to earn a spot someday in the NHL.

 

[Gwyddbwyll]

The impressive thing about Washington is the depth though. Mike Green barely cracks their top ten at 10th! Chicago has Wisniewski and Montreal has Lapierre. Good prospects both but they aren't first rounders.

It doesnt stop there with Boyd Gordon at 14th, Jonas Johansson at 17th..

As well as the Caps graduated Semin, Sutherby and Eminger (Montreal only graduated two notables in Komisarek and Ryder and Chicago graduated one in Ruutu)

IMO the Caps, Canadiens and Hawks were very close. But Caps have jumped way ahead with this year's draft (and so they should have with all those picks from dismantling their team).

 

[montreal]

Stick to hockey or take it to pm. I had to delete several posts cause they had nothing to do with hockey.

 

[McDonald19]

Frolov was a 9?

I know hes going to become a good player but he should be rated no higher then 7.5-8

agreed 7.5-8 sounds right.