Some quick thoughts:
- As far as first line tough guys go, Hextall > Crowder. Crowder was able to lead a team in scoring once, but was nowhere near the leaders. Hextall led his team in scoring every time he played a full season in his prime, and was top-20 in points twice, and was no less tough.
- Oliver is definitely far better than Vanek at this point.
- Projecting Shuvalov is difficult, but I think it's fair to say he would not have been anywhere near Allison's level (a top-20 scorer four times) in the NHL.
- In a best-case scenario, Loktev is about as talented and about as skilled in other ways as Boudrias. Similarly, in a best case scenario, Alexandrov is about as talented as Cloutier (top-2 in WHA points three times, excellent NHL PPG)
- None of Regina's third line is as skilled in raw defense as anyone on Alberta's line. however, they're all plus players defensively, much better overall as two-way players and all are tough but clean.
- I think Bjorn is way out of his league being on an MLD 1st pairing. I mean, he's not even as good as Tregubov, is he? and Tregubov is a spare in this draft (not that he should be)
- There's some decent skill in the Alberta defense. The big differences I see are that they have no one in Munro's league defensively on their first pairing and no one in Burke's league defensively (or overall) on their third. While their best three offensemen (Pekka, Green, Olausson) can match our best three (Kaberle, Fraser, Reise) in terms of firepower, they are not close to as good defensively, and they don't have an answer to the Munro/Evans/Burke trifecta aside from Buswell.
- Goaltending is a huge mismatch. Cude is a two-time 2nd team all-star too, but under stranger circumstances. Resch was a legit 2nd team all-star twice, was superior to Billy Smith statistically while they played together, was considered a playoff hero until two bad games led to him losing the job to Smith (who ran with it), and after being traded continued to be regarded as one of the NHL's best goalies for years, and legitimately earned more all-star/norris votes playing for brutal teams, thanks solely to the eye test (providing evidence that his 2nd all-star teams were not just from being insulated by the powerful Isles) - also, he was desired enough that he was able to play until he was the NHL's oldest player by two years. He is, IMO, the draft's best goalie and Cude is perhaps above only Kirk McLean among starters.
- Nothing against Marc Crawford, but he's not a stellar MLD coach. Darryl Sutter is. In fact, Darryl Sutter is an ATD coach from this day forward. When you think of reasons why LA won the cup twice, his name comes up immediately. Crawford's name comes up only after Roy, Sakic, Forsberg, and likely a couple of other names - fair or not.
Your thoughts?
