What country produces the most hidden gems?
- Thread starter CatsforReinhart
- Start date
Most European leagues (except Sweden, Finland and a couple of other countries to an extent) are severely underscouted. The Russian league and its junior league is severely underscouted.
The chance of finding a hidden gem is obviously higher in countries with a larger amount of hockey players (Russia, Sweden, Finland, Czech Republic, Germany, Switzerland in that order).
But I'd say at this day and age you're probably not going to find a player like Zetterberg in round 7.
People and ordinary hockey enthusiasts are talking about prospects when they're 14 years old or even younger, a massive amount of info is available online, etc.
It's more a question of rooting out a major North American bias and optimizing the selection process *in the later rounds*, where a lot of the players being drafted are a bunch of random guys from 3rd or 4th tier North American junior leagues or colleges. It leaves out a lot of talented European/Russian prospects from underscouted leagues. Most of them still wouldn't make the NHL, but their chances of becoming good pro players are definitely higher.
As for the efficiency of hockey programmes, I'd say Sweden and Finland have the highest number of 'gems' per capita. They also probably scout Norwegian and Danish talent, which helps their domestic leagues.
In terms of lack of exposure, Switzerland has a good domestic league with few NHL scouts. The number of draftees from MHL (the KHL junior league) is small relative to the talent playing there.
The chance of finding a hidden gem is obviously higher in countries with a larger amount of hockey players (Russia, Sweden, Finland, Czech Republic, Germany, Switzerland in that order).
But I'd say at this day and age you're probably not going to find a player like Zetterberg in round 7.
People and ordinary hockey enthusiasts are talking about prospects when they're 14 years old or even younger, a massive amount of info is available online, etc.It's more a question of rooting out a major North American bias and optimizing the selection process *in the later rounds*, where a lot of the players being drafted are a bunch of random guys from 3rd or 4th tier North American junior leagues or colleges. It leaves out a lot of talented European/Russian prospects from underscouted leagues. Most of them still wouldn't make the NHL, but their chances of becoming good pro players are definitely higher.
As for the efficiency of hockey programmes, I'd say Sweden and Finland have the highest number of 'gems' per capita. They also probably scout Norwegian and Danish talent, which helps their domestic leagues.
In terms of lack of exposure, Switzerland has a good domestic league with few NHL scouts. The number of draftees from MHL (the KHL junior league) is small relative to the talent playing there.
Djp
Registered User
The Russian/communist factor skews the data. I don't think mobility was much of a find than a team taking a chance that maybe they could see him play at some point.
I think in terms of hidden gems it will be more likely in Europe because teams may not have as much scouting there. In North America you have extensive tv coverage so if anyone is playing well everyone will eventually see them
Another think is hard is because at 17 a player hasn't finished growing.
With oloffson I haven't heard if it was a clerical error in him being listed at 5-7 or he grew in the year before the draft.
Getting a player ( not goalie) after the 3rd round is much more pure lucjk than necessarily drafting skill.
I think in terms of hidden gems it will be more likely in Europe because teams may not have as much scouting there. In North America you have extensive tv coverage so if anyone is playing well everyone will eventually see them
Another think is hard is because at 17 a player hasn't finished growing.
With oloffson I haven't heard if it was a clerical error in him being listed at 5-7 or he grew in the year before the draft.
Getting a player ( not goalie) after the 3rd round is much more pure lucjk than necessarily drafting skill.
Djp
Registered User
But I'd say at this day and age you're probably not going to find a player like Zetterberg in round 7.
I agree with much of what you said. Teams probably have better luck tolling the dice in rounds 5-7 on European players than NA players.
The only way I see another zetterburg happening is if the player comes from a non hockey country ( France, Italy) who has the raw talent but not the experience. He would be more of a project.
When Zetts got drafted only a few teams seemed to do much Europe scouting beyond the world juniors and looking at the top talent who could get drafted in the early rounds.
For some reason I'm thinking-/could be wrong---wasn't there some rules in place for drafting players from Europe like you could only draft 18 yr olds in early rounds.. After then they had to be 20 or older?
CatsforReinhart
Registered User
dotcommunism
Moderator
- Aug 16, 2007
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The Sabres have drafted one player, Philip Gogulla, out of Germany in the past 20 years. Only two Germans drafted period in that time span, with Felix Schütz being drafted out of the QMJHL. It's not like the Sabres have gone around picking a ton of Germans in recent memory.
If you're talking about all time (and really the NHL draft in 2014 is very very very different from the NHL draft in 2000, let alone 1985), then Uwe Krupp wasn't a bad pick out of Germany, playing over 700 NHL games as an 11th rounder in 1983
French or Italian juniors don't get drafted at all. Their junior national teams play in the 2nd or 3rd tier or worse for the most part and NHL scouts usually don't consider the level of competition to be good enough to draft someone based on that. The same principle applies to their domestic leagues.
The ones who make it to the NHL/AHL generally are already established pro players in Europe or Russia.
That's the thing with some of the smaller hockey countries (Botswana is a "non-hockey country", both Italy and France have pro hockey leagues) - they have pretty well established leagues, so the young players usually don't play abroad when they're young. It's the same way in Poland, UK and a bunch of other countries. It limits their growth and they also don't gain any exposure. To a certain extent the same can be said about Germany - if more German talent enjoyed the expertise and coaching of countries with better hockey traditions, the number of German NHL players would be a lot bigger.
