Enjoyable read as always. Thanks, steblick!
I won't dare to question your rankings in any way, since I think it should be clear to everybody by now that this is a year with an extremely wide open field which has a great deal of latitude past the top-15 or so, and it will certainly all be about personal perspective, of which yours is probably the most respected one on these boards. Instead I will chip in a few comments of my own, from my largely OHL-based observations:
steblick said:
22. Little- The guy just scores and scores. Can he do it at the next level? I hope he proves that this rating is too low.
Per some previous discussions in other threads, I do agree that there is a chance that Little falls this low. But I'll maintain that it's going to be a big mistake if he does.
42. Ryan- Tough, reliable, consistent. Will not excite you but get the job done.
43. Weber- Pretty close to Ryan in terms of style, with a touch more jazz in his play.
44. Peckham- Intense, ferocious and colorful player. He can be scary- for his own team too!
66. Williams- If the U18 team doesn’t have the confidence to play him even as a 6th guy…
In a draft with a lot of wild cards and little consensus, I think there are always going to be NHL teams who find a personal favourite based on intangibles like character and toughness. Or just plain size. Or some combination of such attributes. Even last year with all those Pelech and Pokulok, Finley and Mihalik picks, it was clear enough again that NHL teams will still place a high value on character/size/toughness. So I can imagine some defensemen such as those in this group having a fan-team out there that pulls one of them into the 1st round. It's impossible at this stage to predict which one(s) will get that break, but it seems likely that it will happen, IMO.
Williams is such an interesting question mark now... I kept hoping I'd finally get to see him in the WU-18 to see what all the top-10 hype was about, but then he played just 1 (brutal) shift against Finland, and nothing much more. Can't bode well as you say. But then, even as a flavour-of-the-month prospect, it seems like more than one somebody likes him. I agree with putting him waaay down on a personal ranking list, of course. But it sounds like he'll go much higher.
56. Emmerton- He lacks an identifiable NHL skill or strength. Call me a doubter. I hope I’m wrong.
I don't think you're wrong. He's sort of like this year's Daniel Ryder. A little bit bigger, maybe a bit better skater. But I agree that his #10 ranking by CSB is a bit overboard, especially when it comes down to projecting where NHL teams are going to take him. I don't read too much into his showing at the WU-18, I didn't find he really got used consistently in a role where he could establish chemistry, and that's an important element to his game, but when he gets it, he does subtly and smartly make the players around him better. He's a good candidate to drop into the 2nd round in the NHL, but I think he's also a good candidate for making the team which gets him there reasonably happy to get a smart player like him down there. On the other hand, as a Habs fan, I've also seen what Matt Higgins and Duncan Milroy have amounted to as pros, which is probably a risk for Emmerton too.
70. Shutron- Hopefully he’s improved his decision-making but I’m not sure what he brings to the table other than slick skating. Please prove me wrong, Ben.
I still like Shutron better than most of the other defensemen in this draft. I wouldn't call him a slick skater, really. In fact, I probably wouldn't praise very many of his physical skills, except the shot, I guess. What I would want to know about him is more about his character and his psychological profile, his leadership potential, etc. I still feel like he reminds of something of a Mike Green, not really a defenseman who is easily pigeon-holed or categorized, but has an intangible ability to play suprisingly well in either end at times. Which tends to clash with some of the other reviews I read where he gets labelled more definitively as an offense-only guy.
Not to mention that that goal came against Russia, one of the top teams.
