Very nice work putting in the time and effort. Are you planning to continue this into the future?
Some suggestions for next year and beyond if you do:
1: The trading idea sounds cool "I get to see the guy I really liked!" but it pushes you further away from your goal of comparing to the team's drafting. You'll get more out of your work if you force a difficult decision and choose between players you may not like as much.
2: No goaltenders taken. Teams must take goalies to fill out depth where you have the luxury of not caring. It cannot be expected to do research and evaluation on goalies so maybe a fair solution is just to put, for example," 3rd round #74: best goaltender available ". Your method gives you 2-4 free picks that a normal NHL team will not be able to make.
3: Set yourself strict deadlines on list releases and keep documentation on the different changes you make. I can imagine it being extremely difficult to avoid using post-draft information when coming up with your list. Self criticize your changes to determine if you were influenced by the actual draft positions or any accidental readings of later released information.
4: You set no conclusions so I'm unaware how you made them, if at all. Don't forget to fill in AHL roster spots and make conclusions off of that. Drafting career AHLers that work well with developing players is Important. They are more valuable than players who drop out or never come over to the organization. You may need to alter your drafting strategy if you continuously run into shortages at the minor league level.
I appreciate your interest, but you are one of those the take this too seriously in my opinion. The first few years I simply casually posted on HFB who I would have drafted with the Habs picks, now with the software I more avid at following the draft, I produce a list and simply let players fall as they may. This is just fun to me to look back on even if the comparison isn't perfect in every way.
1. I said I didn't want to get into this and I already explained my reasons in the OP and responses.
2. That's a fair point. I don't scout players all that much, particularly goaltenders, I mean it is very hard to project goaltenders by seeing them play. I find my edge by looking at numbers, but numbers for goaltenders don't mean all that much as well. Also, factoring their slower development curve, there is higher variance in selecting goaltenders so drafting them is more luck base. Put all of this together and it is a bit like rolling the dice to me if I were to draft goaltenders. I don't see why I should be taking that risk considering I have a pretty high batting average drafting F/D.
Having said that, I honestly believe that unless you are desperately in need of goaltenders in your organization, avoiding drafting goaltenders altogether might be a viable strategy. Hear me out, unless you are a high-end goaltender you hold nearly no value, 1B and premium backup were easily available as free asset for little money and term in free agency, Bernier, Hutton, Mrazek, Halak, Lehner, some of them will be 1G for their team, none of them cost as much as Ian Cole which is a 4th D at best, Jay Beagle a 3rd liner at best cost more than most of them. Value wise drafting goaltenders seem to give you a poor return. Therefore, since their trade market tend to be lower you might be better off selecting forwards and defensemen which have higher market value and subsequently trade them for goaltenders if need be. An additional benefit to this strategy is that since you will tend to have fewer goaltenders in your system it should be easier for you to attract the top young goaltending UFAs in need of an entry-level deal which there is a higher proportion of available compared to other positions most year due to the previously explained higher variance in development. On top of this, MTL had Price all those years, they have their premium 1G, and like I just said, backup hold no value, no need to get one by draft, we got ours on waivers, the prospect challenging him, Lindgren, we signed him as a free agent, same for our 4th goaltender, McNiven, despite drafting Fucale in the 2nd rounds a few years ago. To me, goalies are almost a waste of picks. We don't even know when Price will need a replacement, bad timing can cause problems, even if we draft a star we may be forced to trade him away despite the comparative lower market value because we have no room, NYR had to trade away Ranta because of Lunqvist and his contract even though they are soon going to be in need of a replacement for him. To me, we are better off doing something like New Jersey, they traded away a high-value pick for a young premium 1G, Schneider, near Brodeur retirement and they are good in net for another decade, to me that's a lot wiser than selecting a goaltender 5 years prior at the similar draft position of the traded pick (add to this that the goaltenders they drafted to prepare for Brodeur retirement where not worth it for them in the end, forcing them to make the trade).
Drafting a proportional amount of F/D/G is not necessarily the best strategy even if it seems like the intuitive thing to do. I am pretty sure my logic holds up, I doubt GMs and scouts can think that through though. You can take a flyer with a late rounder at times though, that's fine with me.
The goaltenders that were the 2nd BPA on my list for during those years for those picks are: Ed Minney with the 7th in 2014, Veini Vehlainen with the 7th rounder in 2015, Stuart Skinner with the late 4th rounder and Primeau with the 7th rounder in 2017. You can find all of those in the links I provide. I liked Carter Hart on his draft year, could have been higher up my list if I felt like a goaltender was a need.
3. It is not my full-time job. I was doing it more casually the first years, this season my list was ready pre-draft, hopefully, I can continue doing the same in the upcoming years.
4. My AHL is looking solid, players I drafted signing entry-level or continuing playing pro hockey factoring the picks position is a clear step higher than average by the looks of it.