The Athletic Who are the top NHL prospects under 23 years old? Scott Wheeler ranks top 50

[Doug Prishpreed]

It's always interesting when these lists come out and the preference of the list is illustrated in the preferences of the reader. Some Sabre fans want to see others acknowledge Quinn as being what some Sabre fans hope and dream that he is.

As for shifts based on the draft, do you mean that a player's ranking as an undrafted prospect shuffles based on where his draft position was? I've seen that it could be list builders validating it against the backdrop of the league's professionals valuing a player. *shrug*

I'm not sure I understand your question, but last week I looked through all of the "updated prospect rankings" on the main board (basically exactly what Wheeler is doing), and many of them have the 2022 prospects in aroughly similar order to where they were drafted, relatively. Then you look at their post history and see a 2022 1st round ranking from a month ago, and see a totally different order.

Really, you had Korchinski ranked 17th for the 2022 draft a month ago, and now he's top 12 out of all prospects in the entire league drafted the past five years?? I kind of assume they're just regurgitating, which I'm glad Wheeler isn't doing. As much as I disagree with a lot of his takes.

 

[Sabre Dance]

Krebs has fallen a lot from his 2021 rankings, Quinn rose a few spots.

 

[Chainshot]

I'm not sure I understand your question, but last week I looked through all of the "updated prospect rankings" on the main board (basically exactly what Wheeler is doing), and many of them have the 2022 prospects in aroughly similar order to where they were drafted, relatively. Then you look at their post history and see a 2022 1st round ranking from a month ago, and see a totally different order.

Really, you had Korchinski ranked 17th for the 2022 draft a month ago, and now he's top 12 out of all prospects in the entire league drafted the past five years?? I kind of assume they're just regurgitating, which I'm glad Wheeler isn't doing. As much as I disagree with a lot of his takes.

Your example hits on it exactly: fans (and some writers) shift their lists to align with draft position. The validation of having experts, in this case NHL scouts and GMs, rank players lends itself to that sort of shuffle. There are probably not many casual fans out there who are building a prospect ranking starting from their own draft list, then following on with their own subsequent development assessments to refine grading for players. Some do, but most are just going with where someone was drafted, then some vague impression of how that player is player (many just by scoring totals) based in part on player visibility, and if they are out of sight (like in the AHL) they drop them.

 

[Nikolajs Sillers]

Fingers crossed Quinn does well so some of those analytics can go...

 

[sabremike]

You would have to have an anti reality force field around you to rank Quinn that low with the season he had in his D2 season in the AHL. The only thing that was able to stop him was mono.

 

[SabresNorth]

It's nice to see different opinions and I respect that wheeler watches all these guys.. But I can't take his work seriously here. It feels like clickbait at best which is too bad. It should be a fun exercise and make for interesting discussion instead it just discredits him in my opinion.

 

[enthusiast]

I've got no issue with outlier rankings, but if they aren't internally consistent wrt evaluation standards they're certainly due for criticism

 

[Dex]

If I'm Quinn and I saw that list - especially the Rossi vs Quinn ranking - I'm super motivated to prove the a-hole wrong. A lot of the skepticism about Quinn being picked where he was by the Sabres was countered by the argument that Quinn was a late starter and therefore a late bloomer. I guess his winning the Red Garret Award for ROY in the AHL over Rossi was not enough to convince Scott Wheeler that this was the case

Not that Quinn needs any incentive to keep growing his game, but to be so disrespected calls for a big F-you to Wheeler.

Thank you Scott Wheeler. Looking forward to seeing Quinn play this year.

 

[Ace]

It’s funny that we were the ones to take Quinn over Rossi because we largely wanted Rossi when the pick came up and the organization thought Quinn was the better prospect. If you look at the black book from their draft year,the scouts notes are glowing for Quinn with several “been better than Rossi every game I’ve seen” comments. There was a definite switch in parts of the scouting community before we took Quinn (and obvious where our scouts stood). It created a kind of divide between the players and I enjoy that we were on Wheeler’s side of the divide to start…but stuff has happened since then. Kind of a lot of stuff. And this isn’t a case of “well…fans just overrate their players” and I know that because everyone hated Nylander his whole time and so many hate Rosen. It’s too simplistic to say it’s a homer thing…the homers are the ones who would be the most angry still if the team went against them and got it wrong. Wheeler is the one whose position is hard to understand on this one. The only argument people who were against the Quinn pick because they thought Rossi was the better player was that Quinn’s shot and not being 5’9 projected him out better. Wheeler not only defies that…which is fine because it was arguable…he denies the reality of what’s happened post draft...which isn’t.

 

[Duddy]

You guys sure as hell care a lot about a random list.

 

[Ace]

You guys sure as hell care a lot about a random list.

You sure as hell care a lot about commenting on comments about a random list.

 

[debaser66]

I am always suspicous and curious what goes on behind those mysterious pay walls

 

[SabresNorth]

Having Quinn so low in the top 50 prospects list would be like having Mathews at #12 in a list of best goal scorers of 2021/2022

 

[Sabre Dance]

Having Quinn so low in the top 50 prospects list would be like having Mathews at #12 in a list of best goal scorers of 2021/2022

He had Quinn 45 last year and Krebs 26. He made a comment a few months ago when ranking the Sabres the #1 prospect groups. He said Quinn is close to jumping Krebs.

He’s never been very high on Quinn in his rankings. Based on his rankings he feels this draft class offers better prospects.

 

[jmelm]

Aside from the fact that these are some of the worst prospect rankings I've ever seen in over 20 years of following prospect rankings, I F**KING HATE these stupid multi-draft year prospect compilation rankings IMMEDIATELY after the draft before any of those guys have played even a pre-season game.

Not only is it practically irrelevant as f**k, it's also absolutely moronic conceptually....

So we are supposed to take kids, just drafted and haven't played in any games or tournaments, and rank them against D+1, D+2, and D+3 seasons?

I mean, is Wheeler some kind of clairvoyant hockey Nostradamus who knows how these kids, just drafted, are going to perform in the upcoming season and tournaments and be able to compare that yet-unhappened performance against players who've done that already for 1, 2 or 3 years? I mean give me a break.

This whole thing is so bad and stupid, it's almost like the equivalent of smearing shit across every other piece of work he's written in the last year. It just cheapens it and calls into question his insight and judgement of prospect analysis.

Did I mention I hate it? Can you tell?

 

[joshjull]

The draft was just a few weeks ago. There was no new information since then.

Most people's rankings on this website show a big difference from pre-draft and post draft, when no new games have been played. I see it all the time.

What? I’m talking about the guys drafted this year. I’m talking about guys like Quinn/Rossi who have played plenty of games since getting drafted.

 

[MarkusKetterer]

I am always suspicous and curious what goes on behind those mysterious pay walls

All of the fun stuff is plebs aren’t partial to

 

[jmelm]

All of the fun stuff is plebs aren’t partial to

Don't worry....if you were a subscriber to the Athletic, you would cancel your subscription immediately after reading that steaming pile of horse shit article.

 

[Sabre Dance]

Aside from the fact that these are some of the worst prospect rankings I've ever seen in over 20 years of following prospect rankings, I F**KING HATE these stupid multi-draft year prospect compilation rankings IMMEDIATELY after the draft before any of those guys have played even a pre-season game.

Not only is it practically irrelevant as f**k, it's also absolutely moronic conceptually....

So we are supposed to take kids, just drafted and haven't played in any games or tournaments, and rank them against D+1, D+2, and D+3 seasons?

I mean, is Wheeler some kind of clairvoyant hockey Nostradamus who knows how these kids, just drafted, are going to perform in the upcoming season and tournaments and be able to compare that yet-unhappened performance against players who've done that already for 1, 2 or 3 years? I mean give me a break.

This whole thing is so bad and stupid, it's almost like the equivalent of smearing shit across every other piece of work he's written in the last year. It just cheapens it and calls into question his insight and judgement of prospect analysis.

Did I mention I hate it? Can you tell?

It’s the same thing we do on a smaller scale with Sabres prospects.

I’m not sure what the issue is? It’s the same thing as putting Savoie over Quinn in Sabres rankings.

 

[jmelm]

It’s the same thing we do on a smaller scale with Sabres prospects.

I’m not sure what the issue is? It’s the same thing as putting Savoie over Quinn in Sabres rankings.

Yes, but as you widen the scale further and further across 32 teams, with more players among the 7 or so hockey countries and even more leagues therein (junior vs. lower level pro vs. top level pro) there's just WAY WAY too many variables for this to be anything other than complete garbage.

And there's always WAY too much recency-draft bias here. There are probably 7 to 9 players from the 2023 draft who, if they were in this year's draft class, would go first overall (or at least #2 ahead of everyone else).

That list is a disgrace. Just look at where Quinn is ranked and who's ahead of him. Where is Peterka? It's one of the worst lists of this type I've ever seen.

In fact, even if you extract all of the 2022 drafted players and look at the older prospects, it's still a ranking whose quality is on par with the idea of taking the woman of your dreams to a candlelight dinner served inside the cramped confines of a music festival's portable toilet.

 

[tsujimoto74]

He had Quinn 45 last year and Krebs 26. He made a comment a few months ago when ranking the Sabres the #1 prospect groups. He said Quinn is close to jumping Krebs.

He’s never been very high on Quinn in his rankings. Based on his rankings he feels this draft class offers better prospects.

Good to know that no one needs to take his rankings seriously then, because he's clearly out of touch. Quinn left Krebs in the dust a while ago...along with at least 2 dozen other players this dummy ranked ahead of him. (Not even gonna waste my time clicking through on this one.)

 

[valet]

quinn at 36 despite having one of the best ahl seasons in the whole league?
savoie at 9??? never played a pro game? the only thing that makes sense here is power at #1

 

[debaser66]

All of the fun stuff is plebs aren’t partial to

I can clearly see that now

 

[Jim Bob]

Scott Wheeler's top 10 drafted NHL goalie prospects ranking, 2022 edition

In the second part of the 2022 edition of his drafted NHL prospect rankings, Scott Wheeler evaluates the NHL's top goalie prospects.

theathletic.com

Levi (5) & Portillo (9) make the top 10 and UPL is in the Honorable Mention bucket.

 

[Dingo44]

Scott Wheeler's top 10 drafted NHL goalie prospects ranking, 2022 edition

In the second part of the 2022 edition of his drafted NHL prospect rankings, Scott Wheeler evaluates the NHL's top goalie prospects.

theathletic.com

Levi (5) & Portillo (9) make the top 10 and UPL is in the Honorable Mention bucket.

5. Devon Levi, G, 20 (Buffalo Sabres — No. 212, 2020)

Levi had a season for the ages at Northeastern, posting a .952 save percentage across 32 games and winning both the Mike Richter Award as college hockey’s top goalie and the Tim Taylor Award as its top rookie. His journey from the CCHL to the world juniors and then the Olympics all during the pandemic is one of the best stories in hockey these last couple of years. He has exactly the skills smaller goalies need to be successful — impressive control on his outside edges (and the patience to hold them), quick feet on his shuffles so that he can stick with dekes and go post-to-post or low-to-high to get to tough pucks, perfect reads on shooters, excellent tracking through and under traffic, and a battler’s mentality in the net which keeps him in plays even when he looks like he’s down and out on his knees. There aren’t a ton of 6-foot goalies in today’s NHL, at least not starting ones, but Levi, like Wolf, has all of the tools to become one.

9. Erik Portillo, G, 21 (Buffalo Sabres — No. 67, 2019)

After waiting for his turn in the Wolverines goal as a freshman, Portillo ran with the net as a sophomore, playing every night to some of the best non-Levi results in college hockey, with a .926 save percentage across 42 games (second only to Hobey Baker winner Dryden McKay’s 43) to backstop Michigan to a Frozen Four appearance. Portillo is massive, with a 6-foot-6 and 225-pound frame. He uses that frame to play a poised, deep-in-his-net style, rarely overcommitting to shooters in an effort to play within his net and avoid scrambles when things start to break down. At his best, Portillo takes away all of a shooter’s space and looks unbeatable. He’ll let the odd soft goal squeak through and his rebound control can sometimes disappoint him but he’s got impressive control, coordination, skill and mobility for a goalie his size. I also like how loud he is in the net. You can really hear him back there (a lot like Cossa) and it’s clear he wants to command play with directions and his impressive ability to play the puck and start breakouts. He’s also, like Levi but with very different tools, an excellent goalie one-on-one with shooters on breakaways.