Confirmed with Link: Oiler sign Dominik Kahun 1-year/ 975k

[Oilhawks]

Agreed. Markstrom will steal games for them so they should be about the same but I don’t have much faith in the Flames being a better team. Their defence is worse and the changes up front are minimal.

They aren't going anywhere until they get a real 1C and move on from Johnny. Like you said, Markstrom will mask the issues of that team at best.

 

[Zaddy]

I think you really underestimate the sophistication of NHL scouts versus media/fan sources like Hockey Prospect. Mark Edwards has a solid history as a club midget coach and has borrowed his rating 'system' from the Winnipeg Jets (3-9 scale, 3 is poor and 9 is elite). His categories and priorities are also not necessarily unique either as he ranks in order of importance: Compete, Skill, Skating, Physical. Edwards to his credit includes NHL scout opinions on players to augment his own assessments. They are solid in Ontario and Quebec with people able to live view. I enjoy reading RedLine Report with Kyle Woodlief whose worked on an NHL scouting staff.

NHL teams and their paid scouting staff consider their scouting information as proprietary knowledge gleaned through thousands of direct viewings of players, intel from coaches, players and family members. Their priority is to selfishly inform their million dollar decision making to make their teams better - it is not to give interviews or pithy soundbites to outsiders (fans, media etc.) Fanzine draft guides are fun, provide some good fodder beyond the snapshot most fans can access, and generally have a highly variable quality of eyes accessing projects with limited direct viewing opportunities as one might expect with highly limited resources (financial, human, scale, access).

As far as data samples, Central Scouting staff see thousands of live viewing games each year which divvies out to hundreds per staffer and multiply that over multiple years and the sheer volume of live sightings is substantively beyond all fan draft services. Similarly NHL scouts have a massive volume of live viewings each and every year. An interesting to look at this function: On road with NHL Central Scouting

You don't seem to respect Craig Button whose seen more prospects than you or I will over several lifetimes. He's now a conduit through his TSN employment to bridge the gap between the hard miles that professional scouts put in and our limited access to projecting teenagers. His father set up NHL Central Scouting and early efforts to create a consistent approach to categorize prospects that span the globe. He's in the edutainment business now but the guy's put in the work at all levels of professional scouting and management.

Button's own thoughts on hockey sense? And again, back to the data, this is an attribute that become clearer with the high volume of games viewed by qualified eyes and brains who get paid to make million decisions.

“The prospects that you are really trying to assess are the players that can see what is unfolding really quickly. Then being able to translate it quickly from their head to their hands and make the play—you can call that hockey sense.”

“Without good hockey sense or awareness, your other skills don’t matter, and that’s why so many players that can skate and have elements of skill do not succeed. It’s not because they don’t have the skill, it’s because they don’t have the intelligence.”

I appreciate the detail going into this post but lets just say if NHL teams are so sophisticated as you believe they are, why are their results so appallingly bad compared to amateur scouts and sometimes even fans? Boston in 2015 is a great example. How can an entire scouting staff get it so wrong and pass on three elite players for a middle-six winger and essentially two busts? Even HFBoards were rather unanimous at the time that Boston had made some terrible draft selections, so no hindsight was even needed in that case. Or the period where Vancouver Canucks got outdrafted by a potato?

I'm quite familiar with how the scouting industry works, both in terms of scouting services like HP et al and in terms of NHL teams as I have friends (and former colleagues) in both. As for Button, I'm quite doubtful he puts in much work these days, and if he does it's not reflected in his rankings because it's rather clear that they're massively influenced by international tournaments and not much else.

I also think you conflate effort with effectiveness. You can put in a lot of work but if you don't know what you're looking at it doesn't really matter. Another problem is that in my estimate the vast majority of scouting positions are filled by friends and relatives. Hockey is very much an old boys club. It seems to me that practically anyone can land a scouting gig as long as they have the connections. Being competent doesn't seem to be a prerequisite to be hired.

As for the sound bytes and whatnot, there are plenty of times where you could theoretically get insightful comments from NHL scouts and executives, but the analysis tend to be very shallow. Rarely do you hear an insightful comment from whichever executive is interviewed after they've made their pick. Some guys like Mike Futa with the Kings and Mark Kelley with the Hawks can give good comments however. But you often see in the behind-the-scenes videos released post-draft when they're having their scouting meetings or are in their war room that the discussion between scouts are not very sophisticated at all.

This is an excerpt from a comment by the Avs director of amateur scouting Alan Hepple during this past draft: "A right winger, hard, hacks and whacks, skating just has to come"

Followed up by this comment from the same guy: "I think we got Ambrosio higher, I think he's got more skill, he's...Ambrosio is going to school, good kid"

Another comment on another guy: "Big elite skater, this kid's a hard worker"

Like wow, such impressive commentary. Some truly deep cuts. Really making a solid case.

 

[Drivesaitl]

I appreciate the detail going into this post but lets just say if NHL teams are so sophisticated as you believe they are, why are their results so appallingly bad compared to amateur scouts and sometimes even fans? Boston in 2015 is a great example. How can an entire scouting staff get it so wrong and pass on three elite players for a middle-six winger and essentially two busts? Even HFBoards were rather unanimous at the time that Boston had made some terrible draft selections, so no hindsight was even needed in that case. Or the period where Vancouver Canucks got outdrafted by a potato?

I'm quite familiar with how the scouting industry works, both in terms of scouting services like HP et al and in terms of NHL teams as I have friends (and former colleagues) in both. As for Button, I'm quite doubtful he puts in much work these days, and if he does it's not reflected in his rankings because it's rather clear that they're massively influenced by international tournaments and not much else.

I also think you conflate effort with effectiveness. You can put in a lot of work but if you don't know what you're looking at it doesn't really matter. Another problem is that in my estimate the vast majority of scouting positions are filled by friends and relatives. Hockey is very much an old boys club. It seems to me that practically anyone can land a scouting gig as long as they have the connections. Being competent doesn't seem to be a prerequisite to be hired.

As for the sound bytes and whatnot, there are plenty of times where you could theoretically get insightful comments from NHL scouts and executives, but the analysis tend to be very shallow. Rarely do you hear an insightful comment from whichever executive is interviewed after they've made their pick. Some guys like Mike Futa with the Kings and Mark Kelley with the Hawks can give good comments however. But you often see in the behind-the-scenes videos released post-draft when they're having their scouting meetings or are in their war room that the discussion between scouts are not very sophisticated at all.

This is an excerpt from a comment by the Avs director of amateur scouting Alan Hepple during this past draft: "A right winger, hard, hacks and whacks, skating just has to come"

Followed up by this comment from the same guy: "I think we got Ambrosio higher, I think he's got more skill, he's...Ambrosio is going to school, good kid"

Another comment on another guy: "Big elite skater, this kid's a hard worker"

Like wow, such impressive commentary. Some truly deep cuts. Really making a solid case.

Great rebuttal. We're on same page here. Plus the purpose of language is the conveyance of meaningful information, and like i said before for anybody that has assessment as a vocation, which scouts do, their actual language used is atrociously simplistic. But almost some of it by a sort of design. In what other career can you be so purposely vague, say such obvious things, and have pretty much life long employment because there really isn't any standard, and there isn't for some reason a lot of dog eat dog competition. Seems like you see scouts and they been milking this gig for decades.

In anycase for fans, shareholders, teams, people should expect more, and generally do, then the verbal nothings a lot of scouts utter. I mean this is not critiquing the scouts rank assessments or anything like that. Its criticizing a show your work ability to describe what you see, using actual useful words that can be understood and mean something beyond generality.

 

[FanOfSadTeam]

No, neither of them is. They both come from the German ethnic minority in the Czech Republic which itself had been a part of Austria and the Holy Roman Empire of German Nations for centuries. So they are ethnical Germans who had been living in the relatively newly constituated Czech Republic and whose families emigrated back to the modern Germany very recently, the German term is 'Spätaussiedler'. Many of them did.

I knew Drai's dad is Czech by birth, but it confused me why their surname was German. Now it makes sense.

But Drai does spend a lot of time in Prague during the off-season as that's where he trains. I wonder if it's because of his own background or maybe because his trainer is from there.

 

[voxel]

Scouting is proof that wisdom of the crowd works. Individual answers are often wrong but collectively we converge on the correct answer. Of course there are reaches and outliers that hit the jackpot. I feel an averaged list like McKenzie’s could do no worst than most NHL lists.

 

[shoop]

Babcocks struggles were due to him. Barrie has been fine everywhere except a 23 game sample with Babcock.

Fair enough. Just have to make sure we temper expectations. PP QB and second or third pairing RD. There will be some defensive lapses, but more than made up for on offence.

 

[Behind Enemy Lines]

I appreciate the detail going into this post but lets just say if NHL teams are so sophisticated as you believe they are, why are their results so appallingly bad compared to amateur scouts and sometimes even fans? Boston in 2015 is a great example. How can an entire scouting staff get it so wrong and pass on three elite players for a middle-six winger and essentially two busts? Even HFBoards were rather unanimous at the time that Boston had made some terrible draft selections, so no hindsight was even needed in that case. Or the period where Vancouver Canucks got outdrafted by a potato?

I'm quite familiar with how the scouting industry works, both in terms of scouting services like HP et al and in terms of NHL teams as I have friends (and former colleagues) in both. As for Button, I'm quite doubtful he puts in much work these days, and if he does it's not reflected in his rankings because it's rather clear that they're massively influenced by international tournaments and not much else.

I also think you conflate effort with effectiveness. You can put in a lot of work but if you don't know what you're looking at it doesn't really matter. Another problem is that in my estimate the vast majority of scouting positions are filled by friends and relatives. Hockey is very much an old boys club. It seems to me that practically anyone can land a scouting gig as long as they have the connections. Being competent doesn't seem to be a prerequisite to be hired.

As for the sound bytes and whatnot, there are plenty of times where you could theoretically get insightful comments from NHL scouts and executives, but the analysis tend to be very shallow. Rarely do you hear an insightful comment from whichever executive is interviewed after they've made their pick. Some guys like Mike Futa with the Kings and Mark Kelley with the Hawks can give good comments however. But you often see in the behind-the-scenes videos released post-draft when they're having their scouting meetings or are in their war room that the discussion between scouts are not very sophisticated at all.

This is an excerpt from a comment by the Avs director of amateur scouting Alan Hepple during this past draft: "A right winger, hard, hacks and whacks, skating just has to come"

Followed up by this comment from the same guy: "I think we got Ambrosio higher, I think he's got more skill, he's...Ambrosio is going to school, good kid"

Another comment on another guy: "Big elite skater, this kid's a hard worker"

Like wow, such impressive commentary. Some truly deep cuts. Really making a solid case.

Funny to cherry pick the Bruins organization. One can also point to their hitting big on a first pairing d-man at 14 in McAvoy or Pastrnak at 25. They took a scorched earth franchise under Chiarelli and built out a Cup contending team with improved drafting a piece of the puzzle. The Barzal draft they have seven players which have NHL games (a total of about 550 games). Pastrnak draft year Boston has four NHL players out of the five picks they had with 850 games played. Great drafting teams find talent beyond round one.

I don't conflate effort with effectiveness. NHL scouts generally work on an annual contract so don't produce you're at high risk of unemployment. It's different when your livelihood is on the line versus playing scout with internet clips and, if lucky, maybe seeing a live viewing or two of a prospect in one's immediate area.

You put more stock in an Avalanche promotional video for its fans than I do. It certainly glosses over the year's work put in, games watched, team list put together and argued out to ready the team for culmination of all of that preparation to drive their draft selections. Fans ... which the video is marketed too ... want to go behind the curtain and this marketing effort is a light take likely satisfying for many fans to get that elusive pick. Too simplistic to draw conclusions otherwise and dismissive of the body of work done to prepare a team for its most vital function of stocking young talent. Colorado under Sakic seems to be doing okay on all fronts.

I don't disagree that NHL scouting and other organizational jobs have been a closed shop. It needs to open up as we've seen somewhat in other sports most specifically baseball which caters very well for strong analytical approach. We've seen one 'new guy, new approach' taken with Chayka in Arizona and the outcome of a heralded stats 'guru' has left a train wreck behind. Mike Futa who you cite is very articulate and has a strong body of experience. Yet an emerging Kings team opted to sever ties. Tough business. I'm actually not a huge Craig Button 'fan' - I enjoy his perspective, roll my eyes at a lot but give respect to a guy that's done the hard miles being paid at all levels of NHL business. Just don't get dismissing him outright.

Projecting NHL players from teenagers across a global scope within an almost endless set of leagues, quality of competition and other variables makes this likely the most difficult draft in professional sports. The data plays that out with a substantive drop off literally within the first round and where in subsequent rounds present a crapshoot to find and draft talent. I'd like to believe that random website posters can beat the system, its people and the wealth of resources available to make these million dollar decisions but I don't. It is a fun pastime which can strangely become fixed belief in knowing better than experts. Not unique to sports drafts but we also see a proliferation of internet experts for covid treatment and you name it.

EDIT: Sorry, meant to add that I appreciate your passion as a poster and the time and effort you put into the draft.

 

[OilCanada92]

 

[FanOfSadTeam]

Wrong thread.

 

[TheNudge]

Hey guy’s

i wanted to get some feedback on kahun value. Everything i keep reading about his game screwm top 6.

which side do you prefer


Team A get: Kahun
Team B get: Jamieson Rees + 3rd entry 2021

 

[MuzzaFuzza]

I'm not sold that they are any better either. I maintain that goaltending has been a convenient scapegoat for the Flames for years.

Talbot was as good as Markstrom last year IMO (or at least very close). Tanev is overrated and made of glass.

IMO their offseason wasn't much better than the Canucks'

It was worse IMO. Canucks traded a 3rd rounder for a #2 dman and let the Flamers overpay their aging free agents. They lost Toffoli but Calgary lost Brodie.

I don't really know how people can say Calgary had a great off-season, but it seems to happen every year. Seems like a lot of insiders don't really take contracts into consideration when assessing acquisitions. Like how we were once a "winner" because we added Lucic.

 

[Oilhawks]

It was worse IMO. Canucks traded a 3rd rounder for a #2 dman and let the Flamers overpay their aging free agents. They lost Toffoli but Calgary lost Brodie.

I don't really know how people can say Calgary had a great off-season, but it seems to happen every year. Seems like a lot of insiders don't really take contracts into consideration when assessing acquisitions. Like how we were once a "winner" because we added Lucic.

Was listening to NHL Sirius radio and they were starting to do offseason report cards. Not sure who said it as I caught it halfway but one of them was saying (I’m paraphrasing) “I didn’t think Calgary had a good offseason when others thought they did years prior but this one they did”. Not sure how anyone can say it’s close to good with a downgrade in D and 0 meaningful change to their forward lineup.

I agree that you could say Calgary’s was worse than Vancouver’s. Especially if Markstrom isn’t as good as he was this past season. There’s pretty much no chance that he’s that good for more than half of his contract. That being said, the Schmidt fluke is the only thing keeping Vancouver’s offseason from being a total debacle.

 

[Spawn]

Babcocks struggles were due to him. Barrie has been fine everywhere except a 23 game sample with Babcock.

His offensive struggles were likely Babcock. But Barrie has had some truly horrendous years defensively in his career.

 

[MuzzaFuzza]

Was listening to NHL Sirius radio and they were starting to do offseason report cards. Not sure who said it as I caught it halfway but one of them was saying (I’m paraphrasing) “I didn’t think Calgary had a good offseason when others thought they did years prior but this one they did”. Not sure how anyone can say it’s close to good with a downgrade in D and 0 meaningful change to their forward lineup.

I agree that you could say Calgary’s was worse than Vancouver’s. Especially if Markstrom isn’t as good as he was this past season. There’s pretty much no chance that he’s that good for more than half of his contract. That being said, the Schmidt fluke is the only thing keeping Vancouver’s offseason from being a total debacle.

Yeah its a real piss off that Benning fell backwards into making a great trade. Before the trade i'd say Vancouver's was worse, but picking up Schmidt for pennies saved it. They downgraded everywhere else though.

I agree with your assessment of the Flames too. Did nothing to their forward group, got worse on defence and upgraded in the position that wasn't their main problem to begin with but maybe Markstrom will be lights out for them.

 

[Tobias Kahun]

His offensive struggles were likely Babcock. But Barrie has had some truly horrendous years defensively in his career.

No one is saying he is good defensively. But if he’s put in the proper positions he will be a real good player for us.

 

[Spawn]

No one is saying he is good defensively. But if he’s put in the proper positions he will be a real good player for us.

Agree

 

[Soundwave]

Barrie under Keefe (Babcock was fired at game 23):

32 points in 47 games: 56 point pace

+4 rating in 47 games

 

[Aerchon]

I appreciate the detail going into this post but lets just say if NHL teams are so sophisticated as you believe they are, why are their results so appallingly bad compared to amateur scouts and sometimes even fans? Boston in 2015 is a great example. How can an entire scouting staff get it so wrong and pass on three elite players for a middle-six winger and essentially two busts? Even HFBoards were rather unanimous at the time that Boston had made some terrible draft selections, so no hindsight was even needed in that case. Or the period where Vancouver Canucks got outdrafted by a potato?

I'm quite familiar with how the scouting industry works, both in terms of scouting services like HP et al and in terms of NHL teams as I have friends (and former colleagues) in both. As for Button, I'm quite doubtful he puts in much work these days, and if he does it's not reflected in his rankings because it's rather clear that they're massively influenced by international tournaments and not much else.

I also think you conflate effort with effectiveness. You can put in a lot of work but if you don't know what you're looking at it doesn't really matter. Another problem is that in my estimate the vast majority of scouting positions are filled by friends and relatives. Hockey is very much an old boys club. It seems to me that practically anyone can land a scouting gig as long as they have the connections. Being competent doesn't seem to be a prerequisite to be hired.

As for the sound bytes and whatnot, there are plenty of times where you could theoretically get insightful comments from NHL scouts and executives, but the analysis tend to be very shallow. Rarely do you hear an insightful comment from whichever executive is interviewed after they've made their pick. Some guys like Mike Futa with the Kings and Mark Kelley with the Hawks can give good comments however. But you often see in the behind-the-scenes videos released post-draft when they're having their scouting meetings or are in their war room that the discussion between scouts are not very sophisticated at all.

This is an excerpt from a comment by the Avs director of amateur scouting Alan Hepple during this past draft: "A right winger, hard, hacks and whacks, skating just has to come"

Followed up by this comment from the same guy: "I think we got Ambrosio higher, I think he's got more skill, he's...Ambrosio is going to school, good kid"

Another comment on another guy: "Big elite skater, this kid's a hard worker"

Like wow, such impressive commentary. Some truly deep cuts. Really making a solid case.

Great rebuttal. We're on same page here. Plus the purpose of language is the conveyance of meaningful information, and like i said before for anybody that has assessment as a vocation, which scouts do, their actual language used is atrociously simplistic. But almost some of it by a sort of design. In what other career can you be so purposely vague, say such obvious things, and have pretty much life long employment because there really isn't any standard, and there isn't for some reason a lot of dog eat dog competition. Seems like you see scouts and they been milking this gig for decades.

In anycase for fans, shareholders, teams, people should expect more, and generally do, then the verbal nothings a lot of scouts utter. I mean this is not critiquing the scouts rank assessments or anything like that. Its criticizing a show your work ability to describe what you see, using actual useful words that can be understood and mean something beyond generality.

Scouting is proof that wisdom of the crowd works. Individual answers are often wrong but collectively we converge on the correct answer. Of course there are reaches and outliers that hit the jackpot. I feel an averaged list like McKenzie’s could do no worst than most NHL lists.

Agreed. Generally speaking drafting/scouting past the first round seems more luck based than skill based. Scouting seems a gig anyone can do and requires no special skill set or aptitude.

I will say there is an X factor tho.

Development.

Drafting and development go hand in hand. Competition within the prospects team and ice time/role. Competition within the organization. Additional input/coaching/specific training given to prospects. These things strike me as more controllable than actually drafting itself.

If you as an organization have great skating coaches/programs do you draft more skill with heavier boots because you think a prospect in your development can overcome that weakness.

I doubt that but would be interesting.

 

[McDNicks17]

His offensive struggles were likely Babcock. But Barrie has had some truly horrendous years defensively in his career.

Far fewer than good years though.

Outside of last season where he was a -2 at 5v5(in large part due to Babcock), he's only been a minus player at 5v5 once and that was the season where the Avs had one of worst seasons in the modern era.

 

[Tobias Kahun]

Barrie under Keefe (Babcock was fired at game 23):

32 points in 47 games: 56 point pace

+4 rating in 47 games

He was a +10 in 47 games at 5on5 under keefe.

 

[Paralyzer]

Fair enough. Just have to make sure we temper expectations. PP QB and second or third pairing RD. There will be some defensive lapses, but more than made up for on offence.

But Leaf fans called him garbage and a waste of space on their 'elite' defense corp

 

[McJadeddog]

I knew Drai's dad is Czech by birth, but it confused me why their surname was German. Now it makes sense.

But Drai does spend a lot of time in Prague during the off-season as that's where he trains. I wonder if it's because of his own background or maybe because his trainer is from there.

Or because Prague might be the prettiest city in all of Europe (at least from the major ones I have visited anyhow). Plus $8.5 million USD is going to go a lot farther in Prague than it will in Berlin or some other major German city.

 

[McJadeddog]

Hey guy’s

i wanted to get some feedback on kahun value. Everything i keep reading about his game screwm top 6.

which side do you prefer


Team A get: Kahun
Team B get: Jamieson Rees + 3rd entry 2021

He screams "middle-6" to me, even though his fancy-stats really do seem to say he's a 2nd line winger. I think he ends up rotating between 2nd/3rd line wing for us.

 

[OfCorsiDid]

No one is saying he is good defensively. But if he’s put in the proper positions he will be a real good player for us.

It’s gonna be interesting what Tippett might be able to do with him once he is able to assert some influence.

My guess is, you’ll see a more complete player out of Barrie next season at the cost of reduced 5v5 offence.

However, the massive amount of powerplay points he’ll accrue will make up the difference.

 

[Delicious Pancakes]

He screams "middle-6" to me, even though his fancy-stats really do seem to say he's a 2nd line winger. I think he ends up rotating between 2nd/3rd line wing for us.

Unless he finds instant chemistry on a line I wouldn't be surprised if he moved around between lines 1-3. The Oilers' only legit top 6 wingers right now are still just RNH and Yamo (and Yamo at this point is not a sure thing), which means Kahun, Ennis, Neal, Kassian and Pulju could all find themselves on the 1st or 2nd lines at times. While Tippett doesn't tend to get blender happy he clearly doesn't mind mixing things up either.