Prospect Info: Denis Gurianov - 12th Overall Pick, 2015

[OttMorrow]

If you don't mind me asking, why do you have him at 31? For contrast, McKenzie's final ranking was 21 (http://www.tsn.ca/mckenzie-s-final-ranking-mcdavid-eichel-and-1.300634) and this guy had him at 44

This is a DEEP draft with plenty of talent available early. The word was that this guy was a bigger risk than most Russians to stay in Russia. That was the biggest reason for me dropping him in my rankings. I pointed him out some weeks/months ago and I do think he's talented. Admittedly, I did have him somewhere in the teens before hearing of his high risk to stay in Russia. I then dropped him because of the bevy of talent in the 1st without that flight risk.

There is a lot I do like about him. Especially after watching his shift-by-shift just now. He can skate and he has a high compete-level. I only saw 1 highlight goal of his prior to tonight. He is tough to scout.

I still have my hesitancy with him for the simple reason that I am not convinced that he's better than Barzal...and for sure he's more risky in 1) coming to the US and 2) adjusting to NA Style.

He's also one of the youngest players in the draft. June 97 Birthday.

I geniunely hope that I am the one eating crow over this pick and not Nill. Here's to hoping Nill knocks it out of the park with this one.

 

[RastaRockett]

The Kid Looks great. Having him and Nichushkin as 1st and 2nd line Right wingers sounds pretty damn good for the future.

What about Ritchie? Maybe Guryanov can play left since he's lefty... But I assume he's got a nasty one timer.

 

[LT]

The Kid Looks great. Having him and Nichushkin as 1st and 2nd line Right wingers sounds pretty damn good for the future.

I think one of my favorite things about this is his versatility to play both wings. In three years...

Benn - Seguin - Nichushkin
Gurianov - Spezza/Dickinson - Ritchie

That could be absolutely insane. Our defense should be fine via internal options by then, Benn and Seguin will still be elite, Nichushkin will be peaking, maybe Guri comes in in a Tarasenko-esque manner...

The talent is clearly there with this pick. I don't think you can be upset at all about a pick on draft day - you can be upset about not picking someone else, but there's no way anyone can call Gurianov a bad pick right now.

 

[OttMorrow]

I'm starting to warm up to this pick more and more. Time will tell.

For those who haven't seen the shift-by-shift:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mLVFj3q_bpE

 

[Dundalis]

This is a DEEP draft with plenty of talent available early. The word was that this guy was a bigger risk than most Russians to stay in Russia. That was the biggest reason for me dropping him in my rankings. I pointed him out some weeks/months ago and I do think he's talented. Admittedly, I did have him somewhere in the teens before hearing of his high risk to stay in Russia. I then dropped him because of the bevy of talent in the 1st without that flight risk.

There is a lot I do like about him. Especially after watching his shift-by-shift just now. He can skate and he has a high compete-level. I only saw 1 highlight goal of his prior to tonight. He is tough to scout.

I still have my hesitancy with him for the simple reason that I am not convinced that he's better than Barzal...and for sure he's more risky in 1) coming to the US and 2) adjusting to NA Style.

He's also one of the youngest players in the draft. June 97 Birthday.

I geniunely hope that I am the one eating crow over this pick and not Nill. Here's to hoping Nill knocks it out of the park with this one.

So in other words, zero to do with talent. Russian factor like everyone else. You take the Russian factor out of it, it's not so much of a reach anymore is it?

And Barzal fell for a reason.

 

[JCLiponfanboy*]

What about Ritchie? Maybe Guryanov can play left since he's lefty... But I assume he's got a nasty one timer.

Crap I forgot about him. I used to only follow junior and College hockey, so I'm still catching up on players in the AHL and NHL. Ritchie was a beast in Junior but I forgot about him once he became pro. What kind of impact is he projected to have?

 

[Alveio]

It's been a while since I got here, but the draft made me came back here.

And OH BOY, I LOVE this pick. He looks amazing, and I can't wait to see him play in the NHL. We could have a huge top 6 in the next 2 years.

 

[________]

It felt very similar to the Campbell pick when we passed up on Fowler to go way off the board...maybe it's not quite as bad as the Campbell one, but the same feeling..

How was Campbell going off the board? He was projected to taken before the Stars pick.

They had Campbell ranked as the 3rd best player in the draft. (there are quotes about this from the past, they thought he could become a franchise goalie)

At least they got the player they wanted in Campbell, even if so far it hasn't worked out like they thought it would.

 

[OttMorrow]

How was Campbell going off the board? He was projected to taken before the Stars pick.

They had Campbell ranked as the 3rd best player in the draft. (there are quotes about this from the past, they thought he could become a franchise goalie)

At least they got the player they wanted in Campbell, even if so far it hasn't worked out like they thought it would.

Campbell was "off the board" on every list except our own that year.

 

[OttMorrow]

And Barzal fell for a reason.

You'd like to think that there was a reason, but you don't KNOW.

Even if there was a reason, that may not mean he fell for the right reason.

There's plenty of players who fall for no reason having to do with them for a reason that teams later kick themselves in the butt for.

Did Cam Fowler fall past us for a reason? Yeah. The reason was that our guy got his list wrong.

 

[Caser]

Guryanov is a real athlete, probably would have been good even at judo, if he didn't chose hockey (Guryanov is in the blue jersey in that video):

 

[OttMorrow]

Guryanov has definitely done some Judo or wrestling. Beautiful throw!

 

[Satan]

I'm still pissed we didn't take Barzal.

 

[LT]

Campbell was "off the board" on every list except our own that year.

Swap Fowler and McIlrath in that draft and its not nearly as bad at the draft or now.

Granted, this has nothing to do with Gurianov. Probably shouldn't take this OT so quickly

 

[Satan]

Gormley bro

 

[BeaverSports]

If he's your guy, you just take him. It appears he was. Nill had a good record finding guys in Europe and in Russia in particular with Detroit. I wanted Konecny but I'll trust the pick.

 

[LT]

Gormley bro

Swap him and Burmistrov too, then.

Campbell wasn't even that off-the-board, either.

Wasn't Erik Karlsson considered a reach at 15 in 2008? Lindholm at 6 in 2012?

Far, far too early to judge a pick and say this is anything like Campbell. I'm more than sure they did their diligence and scouted Barzal well enough to know that he either simply wasn't that good, or wasn't as good of an option as Gurianov to them.

Also, is his name with a y or an i? Everything before the draft had a y, but not it all has an i.

 

[LT]

For those who missed it...

 

[LT]

 

[LoneStarHockey]

The more I see from this kid, the more I like him. I agree it was a very surprising pick and I understand those that are convinced we reached for him but at this point we just have to trust Nill and the scouts. Apparently they saw enough to have him very high on their board. It will be interesting watching him progress.

 

[usefulfiction]

I love that we're willing to swing for the fences like this. Love the pick!

 

[Mr Misty]

This is a DEEP draft with plenty of talent available early. The word was that this guy was a bigger risk than most Russians to stay in Russia. That was the biggest reason for me dropping him in my rankings. I pointed him out some weeks/months ago and I do think he's talented. Admittedly, I did have him somewhere in the teens before hearing of his high risk to stay in Russia. I then dropped him because of the bevy of talent in the 1st without that flight risk.

There is a lot I do like about him. Especially after watching his shift-by-shift just now. He can skate and he has a high compete-level. I only saw 1 highlight goal of his prior to tonight. He is tough to scout.

I still have my hesitancy with him for the simple reason that I am not convinced that he's better than Barzal...and for sure he's more risky in 1) coming to the US and 2) adjusting to NA Style.

He's also one of the youngest players in the draft. June 97 Birthday.

I geniunely hope that I am the one eating crow over this pick and not Nill. Here's to hoping Nill knocks it out of the park with this one.

Thanks for posting this. I have a ton of respect for people who put in the time and effort to know what they are talking about and it can be hard to separate the people who know from those who don't.

The more I read about him since the pick, the more it seems like he has some really impressive skills relative to his peers and the only negative is the "xenophobia" factor.

 

[Atas2000]

Just relax with your russian factor worries, guys. Gurianov stated in an interview he plans to fight for a spot in the KHL this season and wants to go to Dallas next year.

source:http://www.sports.ru/hockey/1030862040.html

 

[Ghost of Kyiv]

I just have a weird mixture of shock, confusion and a ton of intrigue about the pick, I feel the exact same way this year with Gurianov as I did last year with Honka.

I’m entirely willing to believe that the scouting community overlooked Gurianov due to things beyond his control. And you if you look at the 2 other reaches that Nill has taken in the first round, Honka and Dickinson, both have definitely lived up to their respective selections. I really don’t have much doubt that Nill will outperform other hockey minds over the long term since he has been a crucial part of organizations that have consistently been doing so for a very long time.

I guess the thing that most concerns me about Denis is that he really wasn’t able to make much of an impact in the KHL, if you look at the other 1st round forwards who came straight out of Russia in recent years, all of them have more impressive KHL resumes that Gurianov did in their respective draft years.

-Nichushkin had 15 points in 43 KHL games (playoffs included)
-Kuznetsov put up 9 points in 39 KHL games (playoffs included).
-Tarasenko made the KHL at 16 and put up 34 points in 80 KHL games prior to being drafted.

Gurianov had 1 points in 8 games, a big reason for that is Denis being a June birth, and that shouldn’t be overlooked but if Dallas views him as a player who should have been mentioned along with the Dylan Stromes of the world; than he should probably have played more games above the MHL.

 

[Ghost of Kyiv]

That’s certainly not to say I dislike him, his shift by shift was very impressive, and I do love speedy power forwards. Furthermore, I think Russians are usually under-appreciated and unfairly judged due to their nationality. He seems to be the type of player that I would love so it wouldn’t really surprise me if I quickly become infatuated with Gurianov.

Button said he has the best shot of any draft eligible player and his skating is pretty ridiculous as well. I was particularly pleased to see him play on the PK internationally, even if he may not do that as a pro, it’s always nice to see highly skilled forwards be trusted in defensive situations.

I love that he is seemingly willing to go to the dirty areas in front of the net to fight for a goal and that he excels at puck control down low in the offensive zone and can cycle with the best of them. In a league that is increasingly becoming more aware of the value of controlling the puck in the attacking zone; that is so incredibly valuable. Also, big speedy power forwards usually tend to excel at drawing more penalties then they take (Val excels at this as did Erik Cole). I bet you’ll see a lot of D men taking hooking penalties trying to slow this guy down and I think that is a really under rated skill that no one really ever pays attention to.

All in all, I’m just anxious to actually watch him play so I can get a better informed opinion on him. Still a little skeptical, but definitely excited.