Kakko vs Laine

[Boxscore]

Kakko without an inch of doubt.

He is a complete bull in the corners and around the paint, even more so than Matthews. In fact, he reminds me of Marian Hossa or Peter Forsberg in that regard. His protection game is already elite at 18 and he'll round out to be a 6-4, 220 pound horse who's hungrier than Barkov in close. Plain and simple, Kakko has a winner's DNA.

Laine has a world-class shot and nothing else high-end to his game. He's not a great skater. He's a decent passer. He's not overly physical. He doesn't protect the puck well at all. He lacks intensity. He's moody. But his shot is off-the-charts great... one of the best releases I've seen since the 70's.

If I wanted to make fancy highlight videos, I'd go Laine. But I want to win hockey games, so I'll go Kakko... without thinking twice.

 

[Albatros]

Laine, 110 goals in 3 seasons. As of now there's no guarantee that Kakko will reach even 110 points.

 

[Boxscore]

Laine, 110 goals in 3 seasons. As of now there's no guarantee that Kakko will reach even 110 points.

That argument would hold up if we're comparing Laine to a generic, random prospect. Kakko is a can't miss stud with plenty of tools and size. He also torched the same league Laine played in... outproducing him quite a bit at the same age. He also outproduced Barkov and Rantanen in the same league, same age.

Kakko is a monster.

 

[Machinehead]

If Kakko comes anywhere near his projection, he should be better at everything except shooting. And he's good at that too.

 

[Pavel Buchnevich]

Laine had 74 assists before turning 21. How many players in the last 10 drafts have done that? This idea that he sucks at everything other than shooting is plain wrong.

If Laine is a 50 goal guy per season, I think he wins this poll. Closer to last season, and it's probably Kakko. If its neither and he's more of a 35-45 goal per season guy, likely Laine, but that would likely be close.

 

[93LEAFS]

Laine had 74 assists before turning 21. How many players in the last 10 drafts have done that? This idea that he sucks at everything other than shooting is plain wrong.

If Laine is a 50 goal guy per season, I think he wins this poll. Closer to last season, and it's probably Kakko. If its neither and he's more of a 35-45 goal per season guy, likely Laine, but that would likely be close.

Instead of using 21, how about we use the end of their D+3 season since Laine birthday just happens to fall where he gets 3 full seasons before he's 21. Quickly researching here. Should also probably start counting from 13 drafts back, because no one in recent drafts has had 3 full seasons which Laine just completed. So, starting for 2006 here is everyone who topped 74 assists by the end of their D+3 seasons. There's also quite a few guys like Malkin and Barzal who put up crazy assists in their D+3 but only had their D+3 season qualify. Most forwards who played all 3 of there first D+3 seasons are ahead of him. The only ones behind are Barkov, Kessel, Jordan Staal, Josh Bailey, Evander Kane, Tyler Seguin (Likely would have passed if 2012/13 wasn't a half lock-out), Skinner (closer but similar to Seguin), Burmistrov, Couturier, Yakupov, and Galchenyuk. Hischier is likely to pass 74 this year (13 assists away), Petersson has a decent shot.

McDavid: 169
P. Kane: 154
Backstrom (only 2 seasons): 121
Tavares: 118
Stamkos: 113
Eichel: 104
M. Tkachuk: 103
Mackinnon: 94
Matthews: 94
Doughty: 93
RNH: 91
Marner (only 2 seasons): 89
Draisaitl: 87
Gagner: 87
Duchene: 85
Hall: 80
Monahan: 79
Keller (only 2 seasons): 77
Landeskog: 77

 

[KevinRedkey]

Laine was a better prospect than Kakko, but his development took an unforeseen nosedive, so the answer is probably Kakko at this point.

 

[Pavel Buchnevich]

Instead of using 21, how about we use the end of their D+3 season since Laine birthday just happens to fall where he gets 3 full seasons before he's 21. Quickly researching here. Should also probably start counting from 13 drafts back, because no one in recent drafts has had 3 full seasons which Laine just completed. So, starting for 2006 here is everyone who topped 74 assists by the end of their D+3 seasons. There's also quite a few guys like Malkin and Barzal who put up crazy assists in their D+3 but only had their D+3 season qualify. Most forwards who played all 3 of there first D+3 seasons are ahead of him. The only ones behind are Barkov, Kessel, Jordan Staal, Josh Bailey, Evander Kane, Tyler Seguin (Likely would have passed if 2012/13 wasn't a half lock-out), Skinner (closer but similar to Seguin), Burmistrov, Couturier, Yakupov, and Galchenyuk. Hischier is likely to pass 74 this year (13 assists away), Petersson has a decent shot.

McDavid: 169
P. Kane: 154
Backstrom (only 2 seasons): 121
Tavares: 118
Stamkos: 113
Eichel: 104
M. Tkachuk: 103
Mackinnon: 94
Matthews: 94
Doughty: 93
RNH: 91
Marner (only 2 seasons): 89
Draisaitl: 87
Gagner: 87
Duchene: 85
Hall: 80
Monahan: 79
Keller (only 2 seasons): 77
Landeskog: 77

It's close to 20, but most of the players who've played enough games to factor into this discussion are all really good players. It's not a high number of players. I think if in isolation you took an average of 25 assists per season from those ages, that would be considered a likely first line player, as long as the rest of their game wasn't bad. Laine isn't going to be one of the league leaders in assists because he's a goal scorer, but this idea that he's a bad playmaker isn't backed up by the stats because even without the elite shot, those are some pretty good assist numbers when you consider that he's done that in his D+1, D+2 and D+3 seasons.

 

[93LEAFS]

It's close to 20, but most of the players who've played enough games to factor into this discussion are all really good players. It's not a high number of players. I think if in isolation you took an average of 25 assists per season from those ages, that would be considered a likely first line player, as long as the rest of their game wasn't bad. Laine isn't going to be one of the league leaders in assists because he's a goal scorer, but this idea that he's a bad playmaker isn't backed up by the stats because even without the elite shot, those are some pretty good assist numbers when you consider that he's done that in his D+1, D+2 and D+3 seasons.

The thing is his assist rate doesn't really seem to be improving, its actually regressed at 5V5 on a per 60 basis every year. Its obviously not fair to compare him to the McDavid, Marner and Eichel's, but his primary assist at 5v5 rate over the past 3 years is more inline with Sam Bennett, Timo Meier, and Pavel Zacha. He can make the occasional nifty pass, but it doesn't appear to lead to consistent production. Part of that is Laine has trouble winning puck battles and/or maintaining puck possession not allowing him to create passing windows.

 

[Dabeast]

Long term? I pick Kakko. Just for this season? I still pick Kakko

 

[Neutral Hockey Fan]

Patrik Laine - Top-tier legend in the making?

I just hope the Finnish Five + TWS don’t do to Kakko what they did to laine in the legendary laine thread. That thread certainly did not age well at all

 

[skiba77777]

rangers fans would probably be disappointed if kakko only had 50 points in his 3rd season

 

[VoluntaryDom]

Long term? I pick Kakko. Just for this season? I still pick Kakko

fax w

 

[Neutral Hockey Fan]

rangers fans would probably be disappointed if kakko only had 50 points in his 3rd season

50 points and a potential contract hold out. Laine is definitely over-valuing his 50 point “contribution” this season

 

[Trocity]

Honestly, I would take the risk with Kakko. The guy has looked awesome from the few games I've watched him play. Meanwhile, I watch a fair amount of Jets games and Laine just looks... lethargic out there. It seems like all he can do is shoot. He looks so slow and lazy, I dunno what it is but the guy has never really impressed me outside of shooting.

 

[Ciccarelli]

Kakko is allready better than Laine ATM. In future he will be so much better that it's not even funny. Laine will be a career 40-50 goal scorer, so will Kakko but Kakko will net an assist per game to go with that.

 

[Halla]

Laine had 27 ESP this past season and was -24.

if not for this past terrible season it would have been him easily but for now its Kakko. I think he is just gonna be a more complete player

 

[Boxscore]

Kakko is allready better than Laine ATM. In future he will be so much better that it's not even funny. Laine will be a career 40-50 goal scorer, so will Kakko but Kakko will net an assist per game to go with that.

So you think Kakko is going to be a (40 goal), (80 assist), (120 point) player?

 

[Ciccarelli]

So you think Kakko is going to be a (40 goal), (80 assist), (120 point) player?

I think the top players willscore around that, yes.

 

[Boxscore]

I think the top players willscore around that, yes.

I love Kakko but I never see him scoring 120. Crosby scored 120 once in his entire career. Ovechkin and Malkin never hit 120.

I think prime Kakko could be a 85-90 player though, which will put him constantly in the top-10 scoring when healthy. His career year could be around 98 points.