How much of scouting/development is skill vs luck?

[Pavels Dog]

I am not arguing, but engaging you guys in debate. What then is the definition of a GM? More often then not, he is a hockey man..so the marketing, salary cap, player contracts, etc, which he has input into, you associate with the business side of hockey Ops. And are not as closely attended to by him..he is not about to spend hours putting the legalese into the document.

Does that not leave his primary roles as: drafting (and all components associated with it), Pro player moves (and all components of that), hiring of coaches and all hockey ops.

if a GM does not give drafting a disproportionate time, I do not believe he will succeed. Doug Mclean did get fired and never worked again. Lou Lamarello, who I believe does an above average job of drafting/player development just keeps on going. I have always believed Lou is way more comfortable at the rink, than the office. And his success, Toronto aside, was/is in small markets, where he has no financial advantage.

I believe that a GM who stands at that podium in June, not having done his due diligence. Not having seen players with his own eyes, investigated them himself, is heading for trouble.

Similarly for a GM who trades, less all the above. See the guys in Ottawa debating the Mike Hoffman trade..The consensus is: Dorion got fleeced, because he may have believed his pro scouts and their evaluation of Boedker. Makes you wonder if he had done the work himself.

Makes me question what you think the job is for the scouts and scouting director?

I think you simplify what the GM does. Obviously you want him to love the sport and watch players himself, but like in any workplace I think it's not good in the long run with a boss that tries to micromanage. Kinda like how the GM should leave things like line combinations and icetime up to the coach even if he watches the games and has some disagreements.

 

[Mlotek]

I said we covered more ground in Russia and Sweden than anyone else. That was our competitive advantage. Not that we took Swedes because Hakan is Swedish. If that was your takeaway, I don't know what to tell you.

Yes there is that wonderful tale that Hakan accidentally was the only scout to see Datsyuk play.

Wings got lucky twice with Datsyuk and Zetterberg.

But is there any imperical evidence apart from that myth that Detroit Red Wings have created and been perpetuating for over a decade now?

 

[Dingle]

Makes me question what you think the job is for the scouts and scouting director?

I think you simplify what the GM does. Obviously you want him to love the sport and watch players himself, but like in any workplace I think it's not good in the long run with a boss that tries to micromanage. Kinda like how the GM should leave things like line combinations and icetime up to the coach even if he watches the games and has some disagreements.

Scouts are to take a list of:
60 junior teams in Canada at 5 eighteen year olds = 300. And make it 30
60 US based junior teams and universities = 300. And make it 30
60 European teams = 300. Make it 30

Chief scout..Makes the 90, ~ 45

Director of player personnel (if employed) makes the list 20.. along with AGMs (if employed).

The GM and AGM (If employed) take over from there. They make the list of 20 become the 5-8, you draft. and hopefully, 2-3 players that materialize. Yes through out all of this, there is interaction with everyone.

I get he is busy, but the task of that last 20 is so key. In it, may be a guy 5-10 spots above you. One you may want to trade up for. You better be sure. Don't get me wrong, I am not suggesting the GM needs to live in Waterloo Wisconsin, or Waterloo Ontario and watch junior hockey all day. But he better do a fair amount.

ditto for the guys at the pro level.

If that list of 5-8 is made up by anyone below GM/AGM, you may have problems on your hand. Keep in mind, your knowledge of that final 20..that can come in handy as you trade later on and may involve the 15 you did not pick or could not pick.

as for his role and line combos...think about it, he does. By virtue of who is on the team and how he built it...remember he acquires talent based upon a picture of how the team looks. SO yes, he envisions line combos. I believe way more of these conversations are had between GM and coach than you may assume...

 

[Frk It]

Yes there is that wonderful tale that Hakan accidentally was the only scout to see Datsyuk play.

Wings got lucky twice with Datsyuk and Zetterberg.

But is there any imperical evidence apart from that myth that Detroit Red Wings have created and been perpetuating for over a decade now?

Hakan said in his interviews that in order to see Datsyuk play it was logistically a travel nightmare. He had to commit 2 whole days to travel any time he wanted to go out and see him play. I think there was kind of an assumption by NHL teams that only the kids picked for international tournaments by Russia/Sweden were the kids you wanted to focus on, and it was too costly/time consuming to look beyond that. But the Wings seemed more willing to go that extra mile in those areas than the rest of the league from what I have read and heard.

Datsyuk was definitely a lot of luck, but you have to know he's out there to even be able to get lucky.

 

[Cyborg Yzerberg]

You want good character to fill out your team, but make no mistake, skill and ability are the most important things for a good team. People criticized Ovechkin’s character for his entire career, but that team won multiple Presidents Trophies and a Stanley Cup because of the skill of their core players despite a decade of ridicule. Playoffs are very random, who had the St. Louis Blues winning the cup last year? Every Stanley Cup winner did so with supremely talented hockey players first and foremost. It’d be nice to have a franchise player who is a good guy and plays with a lot of heart, we all would love another Yzerman, obviously, but as we have seen this decade, filling a team out with character guys over talented ones is a recipe for failure. The 2017 draft was an unmitigated failure.

It’s nice to draft a mix of character and skill to round out your 23 man roster, but especially with higher picks, you need to swing for the fences.

 

[Dingle]

You want good character to fill out your team, but make no mistake, skill and ability are the most important things for a good team. People criticized Ovechkin’s character for his entire career, but that team won multiple Presidents Trophies and a Stanley Cup because of the skill of their core players despite a decade of ridicule. Playoffs are very random, who had the St. Louis Blues winning the cup last year? Every Stanley Cup winner did so with supremely talented hockey players first and foremost. It’d be nice to have a franchise player who is a good guy and plays with a lot of heart, we all would love another Yzerman, obviously, but as we have seen this decade, filling a team out with character guys over talented ones is a recipe for failure. The 2017 draft was an unmitigated failure.

It’s nice to draft a mix of character and skill to round out your 23 man roster, but especially with higher picks, you need to swing for the fences.

just a minor note.

One player drafted in the top 3, from 2010 on wards has been in, or won a cup. Seguin in Boston, his second year (I think). Since then, no player..not even in it.

And players in the top 10 or so, have been on cup winners, but not as "stars".

top 10 picks since 2010, have not really lifted their teams all that much. Many continue to flounder.

 

[Mlotek]

Hakan said in his interviews that in order to see Datsyuk play it was logistically a travel nightmare. He had to commit 2 whole days to travel any time he wanted to go out and see him play. I think there was kind of an assumption by NHL teams that only the kids picked for international tournaments by Russia/Sweden were the kids you wanted to focus on, and it was too costly/time consuming to look beyond that. But the Wings seemed more willing to go that extra mile in those areas than the rest of the league from what I have read and heard.

Datsyuk was definitely a lot of luck, but you have to know he's out there to even be able to get lucky.

Perhaps, but to consistently get 20-30 guys taken every year requires more than guys on national teams.

• 2003 | 30 plrs
• 2002 | 34 plrs
• 2001 | 37 plrs
• 2000 | 42 plrs
• 1999 | 30 plrs
• 1998 | 22 plrs
• 1997 | 19 plrs
• 1996 | 20 plrs
• 1995 | 23 plrs
• 1994 | 32 plrs
• 1993 | 33 plrs
• 1992 | 38 plrs

There is validity to difficulty making it to Datsyuk games. His team was in Eastern conference so very few times they would play in Moscow.

Especially when on the lower league. He did play against 'Western' teams from Moscow area during that season.

 

[Rzombo4 prez]

You want good character to fill out your team, but make no mistake, skill and ability are the most important things for a good team. People criticized Ovechkin’s character for his entire career, but that team won multiple Presidents Trophies and a Stanley Cup because of the skill of their core players despite a decade of ridicule. Playoffs are very random, who had the St. Louis Blues winning the cup last year? Every Stanley Cup winner did so with supremely talented hockey players first and foremost. It’d be nice to have a franchise player who is a good guy and plays with a lot of heart, we all would love another Yzerman, obviously, but as we have seen this decade, filling a team out with character guys over talented ones is a recipe for failure. The 2017 draft was an unmitigated failure.

It’s nice to draft a mix of character and skill to round out your 23 man roster, but especially with higher picks, you need to swing for the fences.

Skill and character are not mutually exclusive. You are completely ignoring the amount of work that Ovechkin put in to get where he is, even after being drafted. Such is the binary world of HFBoards I guess.

 

[DatsyukToZetterberg]

I won't dig it up now, but a few years ago there was an article that showed NHL teams would draft slightly better than they do if they picked forwards solely on points. All of this projecting skills and assessing a players drive etc makes them slightly worse than a guy who has the stats page from chl.com.

I don't know the exact luck to skill ratio, but I'm willing to say that it is heavily skewed towards luck.

This isn't exactly the same article though it is based on the same idea. What if you just took a player's points, age, and height and based your draft selections off whatever results the model produced? This is the introduction to the model and while it is primarily focused on the Canucks you could use the method for any team. The method was used to find these results for the 2010-2013 drafts and the 2014-2017 drafts. I think the results show that even a model that is based on just those 4 factors can be quite effective and maximize the selections a team may have. I think scouting plays a large role in early selections, but for optimal results it should be combined with some sort of model based on NHLe or some sort of adjusted points.

For that reason I think almost a large portion of the late round picks and even the picks outside of the top 10 are heavily influenced by luck. I think where the luck starts to disappear is in the development of prospects and what resources the team provides, a process in which we as fans wouldn't necessarily be aware of. I'm not sure what a team could do to improve their development process, but I think looking at baseball company like Driveline would be a start.

 

[Cyborg Yzerberg]

Skill and character are not mutually exclusive. You are completely ignoring the amount of work that Ovechkin put in to get where he is, even after being drafted. Such is the binary world of HFBoards I guess.

Im not. I believe the narrative around Ovie and the Caps issues was always blown out of proportion. But these narratives have persisted all the way through their cup run. They’re obviously not mutually exclusive, but between the the two, skill should trump character.