HFHabs 2019 Prospect Rankings

[DangerDave]

Poehling is miles ahead of Suzuki as a skater and puck carrier. Suzuki is at best an average skater who prefers to follow the play and have someone drop it back to him upon entry. Poehling also pressures puck carriers and close seams much faster than Suzuki can in he neutral zone due to his combination of size, skating and hockey IQ. Poehling is a neutral zone beast whereas Suzuki is only a plus player in the offensive zone.

Suzuki is an adequate defensive player as he has the IQ to anticipate plays but he just doesn't have any of the physical advantages that Poehling has.

Agreed with your final thoughts as we have an abundance of riches at every position

Sorry I have to disagree. I can't put a guy who played big minutes on a stacked team and only finished 79th in points above the OHL playoff MVP. They play a very different style and you need both on your team but I think you discount Suzuki's skating and strength quite heavily.

 

[Estimated_Prophet]

I wouldn't dismiss them this early but when you are the first pick out of said league it's going to get some blow back. If it works they will look very smart, if it doesn't then at least it was a later pick.

I like the Norlinder pick due to us having hired a new scout for Sweden, so I'm hoping for better luck this time around and that the new guy was a big reason why they went for him. Just hoping it wasn't another one of Rockstrom's "uncovered" gems or late bloomers.

Yeah, Rockstrom has been an unmitigated disaster.

 

[Estimated_Prophet]

Sorry I have to disagree. I can't put a guy who played big minutes on a stacked team and only finished 79th in points above the OHL playoff MVP. They play a very different style and you need both on your team but I think you discount Suzuki's skating and strength quite heavily.

Poehling wanted and accepted a role on a team that was predicated on being a two way shutdown player. If he was in the CHL he would have tore it up and maybe even have outscored Suzuki.

Suzuki has more skill but Poehling's size, strength and speed advantage would have been gross in the CHL. I am not saying that Poehling will necessarily outscore Suzuki in the NHL but the comparison that you are using is tremendously flawed. The fact that Poehling played on a high scoring team actually hurt his production as they spread playing time amongst the lines. If Poehling was on a worse team but was expected to be their offensive leader then he would have changed his approach and would have scored alot more. Let's also not lose sight of the fact that Ratcliffe is miles ahead of any of the zero prospects that Poehling had to play with.

We have two direct but small points of comparison between Poehling and Suzuki (2019 WJC and the recent prospect scrimmages), in both cases Poehling was far superior to Suzuki.

 

[montreal]

I don't put out my rankings until November or so as it gives me a chance to see every prospect play in an actual game which clearly takes time. That said my top 3 would likely be Caufield, Suzuki, Brook, perhaps in that order. To me they have the highest upside so while others bring a more well rounded game, it's hard for me to vote that over more flashier players although I have been burned many times over the years by the likes of the Perezhogin's, Kostitsyn brothers, Kristo, Collberg, etc...

Poehling, Primeau, Romanov, Ylonen would be my next group but not sure in what order. Primeau should be in the top group after what he's done in the NCAA but with Price here he is over looked imo as it's hard to figure out how he fits long term unless Price wants out at some point. Struble, Harris, Fleury, Norlinder are next up in some order with Ikonen, Hillis, Evans, Pitlick, Fonstad, McShane, Stapley, Olofsson. I haven't seen enough of Fairbrother to say if he's in that group or the next with Teasdale, Leskinen, LeGuerrier, McNiven, Vejdemo, Dichow, Khisamutdinov.

 

[montreal]

Poehling wanted and accepted a role on a team that was predicated on being a two way shutdown player. If he was in the CHL he would have tore it up and maybe even have outscored Suzuki.

I can't buy that, put Poehling on Owen Sound and I don't see him putting up 96 pts at 17. Suzuki has a much better shot, better playmaker, more creative. I'm sure he would do well in the OHL but I just don't see him being close to 100 pts each year.

 

[Estimated_Prophet]

I can't buy that, put Poehling on Owen Sound and I don't see him putting up 96 pts at 17. Suzuki has a much better shot, better playmaker, more creative. I'm sure he would do well in the OHL but I just don't see him being close to 100 pts each year.

Really is apples and oranges but you saw the way Poehling dominates smaller, slower players in the rookie scrimmages. He has been more offensively productive than Suzuki when put up against similar competition.

Like I mentioned before, stats without context are very misleading.

I love that both of these guys are Hab prospects I just think that both are being improperly evaluated by the majority of the posters. If I had to bet I would bet on Suzuki having more career points than Poehling but I would bet on Poehling being the better player. Point totals do not equal value they are just one of a number of factors help to determine value.....albeit a large one.

I have always liked to picture the following scenario when trying to compare two players relative value to each other:

In the case of two forwards I envision a 12 man forward group made of each of the two players going head to head. I strongly believe that 12 Poehlings would shut down and outscore 12 Suzukis....therefore Poehling has more value. It is unconventional but it is what helps to drive my opinion in such discussions.

There is an interesting caveat that I must mention. Despite the fact that I picked Poehling to win the above scenario it is not so obvious to me who might win if the following hypothetical lineups went head to head: 8 Suzuki/4 Poehling vs. 8 Poehling/4 Suzuki......

 

[Canadienna]

I always think 'NHL readiness' is a garbage variable when ranking prospects. Show some stones.

It is a garbage variable.

I don't necessarily agree, I think it depends on how you look at it.

Caufield, Suzuki, Brook and Romanov may have higher upsides than Poehling (debatable as well), but Poehling has actually succeeded to this point, and is now near NHL ready, with even better upside than when he was drafted.

If you had a choice between the 20 year old C who is still projecting to be a top 6 center, and the same player at 18 years old who is also projecting to be a top6 C you take the guy later along in his development, as there is less time for things to go wrong, and they've already proven it for longer than the other.

That's not to say it should be the only variable, but it should play a role in evaluating prospects imo.

 

[Estimated_Prophet]

I don't necessarily agree, I think it depends on how you look at it.

Caufield, Suzuki, Brook and Romanov may have higher upsides than Poehling (debatable as well), but Poehling has actually succeeded to this point, and is now near NHL ready, with even better upside than when he was drafted.

If you had a choice between the 20 year old C who is still projecting to be a top 6 center, and the same player at 18 years old who is also projecting to be a top6 C you take the guy later along in his development, as there is less time for things to go wrong, and they've already proven it for longer than the other.

That's not to say it should be the only variable, but it should play a role in evaluating prospects imo.

I see "NHL Readiness" as a tie breaker between prospects of similar skill sets......other than that it is often abused

 

[dackelljuneaubulis02]

Have you forgotten how crucial of a role he played in our offense in 2013-14, he scored like 25% of our goals or something ridiculous like that. Subban, Price and him carried the team to the playoffs that year.

oh sure he put up goals but man was he ever middling in that playoffs. Sure DD and Vanek didn't help but that playoff run was due to Price, PK and our great forward depth. They were scoring by committee.

 

[montreal]

Really is apples and oranges but you saw the way Poehling dominates smaller, slower players in the rookie scrimmages. He has been more offensively productive than Suzuki when put up against similar competition.

Like I mentioned before, stats without context are very misleading.

I love that both of these guys are Hab prospects I just think that both are being improperly evaluated by the majority of the posters. If I had to bet I would bet on Suzuki having more career points than Poehling but I would bet on Poehling being the better player. Point totals do not equal value they are just one of a number of factors help to determine value.....albeit a large one.

I don't put any stock at all into a development camp. What I see with Poehling is a very good hockey player but one that I just haven't seen much in the way of offensive upside. In the NCAA, in the 1st half of the season, the top teams usually schedule games vs weak teams and then in the 2nd half they play mostly conference games only. In the 1st half of the season, when SCSU was facing some of the weakest teams out of the 60 overall schools (Alaska, Northern Michigan, etc..) Poehling scored goals in just 2 games.

For a 1st round pick, facing very weak goaltending, that was highly troubling. He wasn't playing with his brothers, he was on the best team and the 2nd highest scoring. So it was good that he was at a ppg but the lack of goals just bothers me. He did face one of the best goalies in Primeau but wasn't able to score and was a rare minus player that night. Here's his breakdown of goals,

Miami Ohio - 3 goals in 4 games
UNO - 2 goals in 4 games
CC - 2 goals in 5 games
Northern Michigan - 1 goal in 2 games

Miami Ohio was terrible this year, at 11-23-4, both goalies had around a 3 gaa. Only UNO gave up more goals in the NCHC as Miami gave up 122 goals on the year, UNO with 132 but in 2 less games. CC was struggling badly in the 1st half and that's when Poehling had 2 goals in one of the 2 games. In the 2nd half when he was playing with his brothers he didn't score in the 2 home games vs CC or in the playoffs.

Now the question is what does this mean? I don't know. I watched a lot of him and while I like him a lot, I can't overlook how disappointing those numbers are for a 1st round pick. That said we have seen guys in the NCAA put up big numbers like Danny Kristo only to flop or guys like Tkachuk that don't and then do well in the NHL.

But for me it just left a bad taste in my mouth when you see when he was able to do at 18, and then at 19 it was just plain ugly. That to me has to at least be concerning, now how it relates to his NHL play I can't say but it's why I couldn't rank him as our top prospect again as I did last year (before the system got much stronger).

I have not had any doubts that he will be an NHLer and very likely a very solid one, but it's just very hard for me to consider him as having high upside when he disappointed so badly in the NCAA. I once got accused of watching prospects play, that my opinion was skewed because of watching too much or something to that effect. At the time I thought that was a first, getting called out for actually watching prospects play and not just well it's my opinion based off his stats or what I read somewhere that has been a typical response during my many years at HF. But maybe in this case it will have merit, maybe his lack of goals in the NCAA this year was just more to due with the team being so strong and his new coach just rolling 4 lines since they were so deep, clearly the deepest team in the NCAA. And with him clearly being a pass first guy that maybe that's why he didn't score much at all in the 1st half. At the end of the day I am happy that he and Suzuki and others are all Habs, now we just have to hope in time it will lead to a cup or many!

 

[26Mats]

Being mvp of the world juniors and getting a hat trick in your first game is something very few players accomplish.

These could be flash in the pan achievements. But Poehling could also be something special.

All these rankings are fun but pretty meaningless, and we'll get to see the proof in the pudding starting in a few short weeks now...

 

[Legend123]

I like him at #1 as Caufield and Suzuki both have major flaws that will make them much less multi dimensional than Poehling.

For me he is much better than Caufield and Suzuki in the defensive zone and neutral zone as well as being more effective in some aspects of the game in the offensive zone. People put way too much weight on point production and not nearly enough emphasis on a player's total contribution to winning.

Yup just look at Ryan O'Reilly. He certainly is no Kane, Marner or whichever dynamic explosive player there exists. Yet he won the playoff MVP and fully deserved it. Ill take a ROR over a marner come playoff time almost every single time.

 

[26Mats]

Yup just look at Ryan O'Reilly. He certainly is no Kane, Marner or whichever dynamic explosive player there exists. Yet he won the playoff MVP and fully deserved it. Ill take a ROR over a marner come playoff time almost every single time.

Ror is better now. But we'll have to see what Marner becomes at ROR's age to compare them. Not sure if you were taking age into consideration in your post or comparing their playing styles no matter how good Marner becomes. Remember, kane was also playoff MVP once.

 

[montreal]

Yup just look at Ryan O'Reilly. He certainly is no Kane, Marner or whichever dynamic explosive player there exists. Yet he won the playoff MVP and fully deserved it. Ill take a ROR over a marner come playoff time almost every single time.

O'Reilly before this year never had more then 64 pts, Marner had 68 assists in his age 21 season with 94 pts. I understand how people would rather have a ROR in the playoffs but Marner being so young and near a 100 pt player would be very hard to pass up for ROR imo.

 

[Legend123]

O'Reilly before this year never had more then 64 pts, Marner had 68 assists in his age 21 season with 94 pts. I understand how people would rather have a ROR in the playoffs but Marner being so young and near a 100 pt player would be very hard to pass up for ROR imo.

I wasnt making the ROR vs Marner comparison . I was just taking them as examples. There are others (age isnt the point here). For instance, entering the 2020 playoffs I would gladly take a ROR/Kopitar/Bergeron type of player over the more dynamic player. And sure Kane was a total beast. But he would be just one of the few exceptions to this order of preference. I absolutely adore playoff Kane. Hes a total beast.

Irregardless of age, who would you take for the playoffs as a team that has neither of those type of players, the Bergeron or the Marner type of player?? You cant go wrong either way, but i would gladly take Bergeron and im sure many coaches think the same.

that of course doesnt mean Marner isnt a beast. We all know he is.

 

[Legend123]

Ror is better now. But we'll have to see what Marner becomes at ROR's age to compare them. Not sure if you were taking age into consideration in your post or comparing their playing styles no matter how good Marner becomes. Remember, kane was also playoff MVP once.

I wasnt comparing them (see my post above).

 

[DangerDave]

I wasnt making the ROR vs Marner comparison . I was just taking them as examples. There are others (age isnt the point here). For instance, entering the 2020 playoffs I would gladly take a ROR/Kopitar/Bergeron type of player over the more dynamic player. And sure Kane was a total beast. But he would be just one of the few exceptions to this order of preference. I absolutely adore playoff Kane. Hes a total beast.

Irregardless of age, who would you take for the playoffs as a team that has neither of those type of players, the Bergeron or the Marner type of player?? You cant go wrong either way, but i would gladly take Bergeron and im sure many coaches think the same.

that of course doesnt mean Marner isnt a beast. We all know he is.

You ideally have both types of players though. All those strong 2 way players you mentioned are benefitting from having a dynamic offensive player on their line (except Kopitar and it shows).

 

[Legend123]

You ideally have both types of players though. All those strong 2 way players you mentioned are benefitting from having a dynamic offensive player on their line (except Kopitar and it shows).

I agree except for that last part.

 

[BenchBrawl]

Encouraging list for sure.

I'd always rank the prospects in terms of ceiling, not probability of reaching it. You win Stanley Cups with impact players, and being an impact player requires a high ceiling. I have little enthousiasm for someone whose ceiling is a second pairing or a third line. You can trade for or sign such players. That is unless I was very confident in our players development team that they could mold young players into a winning culture of the pro organization. Don't thin kwe have either of these things right now. Maybe one day.

 

[montreal]

I wasnt making the ROR vs Marner comparison . I was just taking them as examples. There are others (age isnt the point here). For instance, entering the 2020 playoffs I would gladly take a ROR/Kopitar/Bergeron type of player over the more dynamic player. And sure Kane was a total beast. But he would be just one of the few exceptions to this order of preference. I absolutely adore playoff Kane. Hes a total beast.

Irregardless of age, who would you take for the playoffs as a team that has neither of those type of players, the Bergeron or the Marner type of player?? You cant go wrong either way, but i would gladly take Bergeron and im sure many coaches think the same.

that of course doesnt mean Marner isnt a beast. We all know he is.

i see, the problem is unless your team has great depth, you will likely need that Marner type to get you to the playoffs but then you need someone like ROR step up big in the playoffs.

Since the Habs haven't been in the playoffs much this past 5 years I haven't watched a single non Hab playoff game since the last lockout so I don't really know who does what in the playoffs in seasons we don't even make it.

 

[Legend123]

i see, the problem is unless your team has great depth, you will likely need that Marner type to get you to the playoffs but then you need someone like ROR step up big in the playoffs.

Since the Habs haven't been in the playoffs much this past 5 years I haven't watched a single non Hab playoff game since the last lockout so I don't really know who does what in the playoffs in seasons we don't even make it.

Yeah exactly. You need a marner to make the playoffs then u need a ROR ro beast it up during the playoffs. Alas, its ever so hard to have both type of players. Thats why the Hawks were so dominant. They had Toews + kane along with the rest of their star loaded team

 

[Estimated_Prophet]

I don't put any stock at all into a development camp. What I see with Poehling is a very good hockey player but one that I just haven't seen much in the way of offensive upside. In the NCAA, in the 1st half of the season, the top teams usually schedule games vs weak teams and then in the 2nd half they play mostly conference games only. In the 1st half of the season, when SCSU was facing some of the weakest teams out of the 60 overall schools (Alaska, Northern Michigan, etc..) Poehling scored goals in just 2 games.

For a 1st round pick, facing very weak goaltending, that was highly troubling. He wasn't playing with his brothers, he was on the best team and the 2nd highest scoring. So it was good that he was at a ppg but the lack of goals just bothers me. He did face one of the best goalies in Primeau but wasn't able to score and was a rare minus player that night. Here's his breakdown of goals,

Miami Ohio - 3 goals in 4 games
UNO - 2 goals in 4 games
CC - 2 goals in 5 games
Northern Michigan - 1 goal in 2 games

Miami Ohio was terrible this year, at 11-23-4, both goalies had around a 3 gaa. Only UNO gave up more goals in the NCHC as Miami gave up 122 goals on the year, UNO with 132 but in 2 less games. CC was struggling badly in the 1st half and that's when Poehling had 2 goals in one of the 2 games. In the 2nd half when he was playing with his brothers he didn't score in the 2 home games vs CC or in the playoffs.

Now the question is what does this mean? I don't know. I watched a lot of him and while I like him a lot, I can't overlook how disappointing those numbers are for a 1st round pick. That said we have seen guys in the NCAA put up big numbers like Danny Kristo only to flop or guys like Tkachuk that don't and then do well in the NHL.

But for me it just left a bad taste in my mouth when you see when he was able to do at 18, and then at 19 it was just plain ugly. That to me has to at least be concerning, now how it relates to his NHL play I can't say but it's why I couldn't rank him as our top prospect again as I did last year (before the system got much stronger).

I have not had any doubts that he will be an NHLer and very likely a very solid one, but it's just very hard for me to consider him as having high upside when he disappointed so badly in the NCAA. I once got accused of watching prospects play, that my opinion was skewed because of watching too much or something to that effect. At the time I thought that was a first, getting called out for actually watching prospects play and not just well it's my opinion based off his stats or what I read somewhere that has been a typical response during my many years at HF. But maybe in this case it will have merit, maybe his lack of goals in the NCAA this year was just more to due with the team being so strong and his new coach just rolling 4 lines since they were so deep, clearly the deepest team in the NCAA. And with him clearly being a pass first guy that maybe that's why he didn't score much at all in the 1st half. At the end of the day I am happy that he and Suzuki and others are all Habs, now we just have to hope in time it will lead to a cup or many!

I just don't put much stock into his stats with SC as he was not playing an offensive role and had to cover for and carry lesser linemates while playing the role of shut down center. We are in agreement that he is not going to be a huge point producer I just think that he will be a player who should make a bigger overall difference than Suzuki as he is far superior on two thirds of the rink.

I also believe that you may be surprised at how his goal/assist ratio should change in the pros. He scored 8 goals in 8 games when paired with superior linemates at the WJC and in his NHL debut. He is on record talking about how he buys into the role that he is given which was a shut down center at SC and a net presence at the WJC.

I absolutely think he is capable of scoring 30 goals in the NHL as he has all of the tools to be every bit as good as Gallagher in front of the net. If he gets PP time in this role he certainly has the potential to be a great weapon. I could absolutely see him having some 30-20-50 type of seasons while being a shutdown center. Much like Brady Tkachuk and Max Pacioretty, it is often not a linear statistical translation from the NCAA to the NHL. I am not putting a ton of stock into his NHL debut but he didn't surprise me either. That is exactly the type of game I expect him to play, obviously the points were fortunate as he won't score anywhere approaching that rate but the same chances are going to be there for him.

 

[TT1]

my top 10:

#1 - Cole Caufield
#2 - Ryan Poehling
#3 - Nick Suzuki
#4 - Alexander Romanov
#5 - Cayden Primeau
#6 - Josh Brook
#7 - Jesse Ylonen
#8 - Jordan Harris
#9 - Cale Fleury
#10 - Jayden Struble

 

[Estimated_Prophet]

Let's not forget That Kotkaniemi is younger than 29 of the 37 players on this list and one of the 8 that are younger is Jordan Harris who was born 1 day after Kotkaniemi. It is silly to rule out a 19 year old kid from this list because he no longer qualifies as a rookie. These list should include all junior aged players.

1. Kotkaniemi
2. Caufield
3. Poehling
4. Suzuki
5. Brook
6. Romanov
7. Primeau
8. Ylonen
9. Harris
10. Struble
11. Norlinder
12. Fleury

That is plain ridiculous people!

 

[Treb]

Let's not forget That Kotkaniemi is younger than 29 of the 37 players on this list and one of the 8 that are younger is Jordan Harris who was born 1 day after Kotkaniemi. It is silly to rule out a 19 year old kid from this list because he no longer qualifies as a rookie. These list should include all junior aged players.

1. Kotkaniemi
2. Caufield
3. Poehling
4. Suzuki
5. Brook
6. Romanov
7. Primeau
8. Ylonen
9. Harris
10. Struble
11. Norlinder
12. Fleury

That is plain ridiculous people!

Let's also include Mete because Henriksson is there!