NotProkofievian
Registered User
- Nov 29, 2011
- 24,476
- 24,599
I'm probably the only one who's gonna say this, but i disagree with this whole "you draft for the BPA regardless of size" narrative.
While i agree that speed and skill is the most important attribute to look for, you still need size.
In fact, i think we will slowly but surely see small skilled players slowly lose their advantage as very soon all teams will weed out the slow footed pylons on defense (where have you gone, Douglas Murray) and have dmen with size and who can skate in order to neutralize the smaller forwards.
In addition, I also believe this trend will also lead to teams to figure out "well, we better not rely on those small skilled forwards anymore so let's start to counteract those huge speedy d-men by drafting huge forwards who could skate and handle the puck".
Ultimately, it will be a league where big boys with skills and speed at both the forward and defense position that will be the norm.
I get it that it that guys like Gaudreau, Marner, Debrincat, Gallagher, Tyler Johnson still have their place and canl excel in this league, but these will be the exception, not the rule ( and in most cases, they are surrounded by bigger guys)
All this to say please no more guys like Dumont, Colberg, Bozon, Audette, Andreghetto, Maxwell, Bitten, etc... (i'm not even sold on Mete to be honest)
And i'm not advocating for big guys who can't skate either (hello McCaron)
The league is trending to skilled, big and fast (see the Jets ) and we need to draft accordingly, not experiment with a trend that we were too late on and that is about to die. (and yes i know Vegas is small, but lets see how long they'll last against a team that is not just big but that can also skate with them)
It's not like teams are selecting players because they're smaller, instead of some hypothetical big fast skating talented players. If a player is big, fast, and talented, they're selected very early in the draft. There's still an extreme bias towards size. It's just that big players tend to not be fast, or talented. There could be all kinds of reasons for this. For instance, it's not realistic to expect someone who's 6'3 to have Gaudreau's agility. Also, if you're 6'3 and a forward, you likely don't need to be that skilled or fast to be effective at the junior levels. There isn't as much of a selection pressure on bigger players to develop themselves in the same way. The NHL itself is just selecting for the smaller, faster players as a result of a rule change, and change in rule enforcement. Now, of course the rules could change back, and the Tinordis of the world can all of a sudden have jobs again, but in the meantime I think we should just select for talent.
The keen eyed observer will note that we haven't done that for some time. I don't think there's anyone on the planet prepared to argue that Michael McCarron, Connor Crisp, Nikolas Koberstein, Jacob de la Rose, and Michael Pezzetta were selected for their talent.