Prospect Info: With the #169 pick, the Wild select Reid Duke

[Engebretson]

Russo's blog:

Why not sign Duke?

Flahr said, “Some of our signings, what we have coming into the program, if you look at right wing in Iowa or going forward, you’ve got [Alex] Tuch and [Christoph] Bertschy and [Zack] Mitchell and whether [Kurtis] Gabriel’s up or down, maybe him. We’ve got [Adam] Gilmour, who’s going to play center or right wing. [Marc] Hagel. Even [Sam] Anas, whether he’s center or right wing, we haven’t decided.

“We just didn’t know if there was really an opportunity for him.â€

Duke ranked sixth in the WHL playoffs with 24 points in 21 games. He tied for 23rd in the league during the regular season with 33 goals.

At Wild development camps, he looked to have good hands and could really shoot the puck, which is why the Wild drafted him in the first place. But it doesn’t sound like the Wild was happy with his development in certain other areas of the game.

 

[BagHead]

Odd indeed. I have serious doubts about the Wilds amateur scouting group. They clearing can't identify skilled forwards outside top ten picks. I hope he goes on to have a great career. The stats look good. I would have liked to give him a shot.

Huh? Haula (though, you could argue that he isn't the current regime's player), Graovac, Kaprizov, and Zucker all look to be skilled forwards taken outside the top ten. I'm purposely naming non-first rounders here, because if I added those in, they do even better, with their only miss being Phillips.

In fact, the only forward this group has ever selected inside the top ten is Granlund, so that's a pretty small sample size to base your argument off of. Because of these facts, I don't really know why you feel the way you do. This scouting group isn't perfect, but they haven't bungled pick after pick either.

Anyway, I'm a little disappointed they didn't keep Duke, but with so many RW's in Iowa, it's a good turn by them to give Duke a chance elsewhere. I'm sure somebody will draft him late.

 

[Randy BoBandy]

Huh? Haula (though, you could argue that he isn't the current regime's player), Graovac, Kaprizov, and Zucker all look to be skilled forwards taken outside the top ten. I'm purposely naming non-first rounders here, because if I added those in, they do even better, with their only miss being Phillips.

In fact, the only forward this group has ever selected inside the top ten is Granlund, so that's a pretty small sample size to base your argument off of. Because of these facts, I don't really know why you feel the way you do. This scouting group isn't perfect, but they haven't bungled pick after pick either.

Anyway, I'm a little disappointed they didn't keep Duke, but with so many RW's in Iowa, it's a good turn by them to give Duke a chance elsewhere. I'm sure somebody will draft him late.

Okay so where are the skilled forwards that we drafted outside the top 10? Honestly who? Zucker is your best example? He is a third liner at this point in his career and I really don't think hes a second liner on a contender. He is looking like he will have a career trajectory similar to Setoguchi.

Kaprizov is a decent prospect but to call him anything other than a longshot is stupid. He will be in Russia for another 2 years then maybe, just maybe he can make an impact. Not getting my hopes up.

Graovac will be lucky to carve out a career as a 4th liner, but with his lack of grit don't see him lasting.

Tuch and JEE are okay prospects. Nothing to write home about. Still a lot of time, but to call them hits already would be a mistake.

So since 2009 they have Haula, Granlund, and Zucker as skilled forwards. Granlund was a top 10 pick. So Zucker and Haula are the only ones they identified in later rounds. They have had a lack of 2nd round picks lately so that doesn't help. We will have to see how the new group does in Iowa, but I'm not getting my hopes up.

 

[Dr Jan Itor]

Kaprizov may not be a sure thing, but he's a "skilled forward".

 

[Wabit]

Maybe the guy just doesn't want to play for the Wild, or hates the colors Red and Green, or he's scared of Nordy.

 

[BagHead]

Okay so where are the skilled forwards that we drafted outside the top 10? Honestly who? Zucker is your best example? He is a third liner at this point in his career and I really don't think hes a second liner on a contender. He is looking like he will have a career trajectory similar to Setoguchi.

Kaprizov is a decent prospect but to call him anything other than a longshot is stupid. He will be in Russia for another 2 years then maybe, just maybe he can make an impact. Not getting my hopes up.

Graovac will be lucky to carve out a career as a 4th liner, but with his lack of grit don't see him lasting.

Tuch and JEE are okay prospects. Nothing to write home about. Still a lot of time, but to call them hits already would be a mistake.

So since 2009 they have Haula, Granlund, and Zucker as skilled forwards. Granlund was a top 10 pick. So Zucker and Haula are the only ones they identified in later rounds. They have had a lack of 2nd round picks lately so that doesn't help. We will have to see how the new group does in Iowa, but I'm not getting my hopes up.

I'm not prepared to call any of them hits or misses, yet. I'm simply saying that our scouts have identified promising skill players, and they've been doing it regularly for some time now. That doesn't excuse them for taking lesser skilled players, like Gabriel, when they clearly had better options, but they definitely find their share of skilled players. In this case, we may be talking about different definitions of skill. I would call Bertschy a skilled player, though an NHLer he is not. Still, a decent find since he's now in our farm system. It would help if we identified what you meant by a skilled player. Since we're talking about since '09, perhaps we call it under 25 years old and a regular NHL scorer (even though most of the players taken by this current staff haven't hit 24 yet)?

If that is the case, that usually means the player was a top 10 pick. Often times there's a sharp drop-off before the top 10 even ends, so it'd be safer to say top 5, even. Some drafts are deeper than others, so I should note that I'm talking about percentages of success over time. Small sample sizes usually have outliers.

Teams that get Kucherov's or Palat's regularly, like the Lightning, are the exception to the rule. I understand if you want their scouting staff, but they have their scouting staff already, so we can't have them. And actually, the truth is that even they don't get scorers outside the top 10 regularly. They got lucky with picks after the top 10 turning into scoring players over the course of 5 drafts. (Killorn, Palat, Kucherov) Other than that, their drafting has been the result of top 3 picks, and a bunch of busts. That's actually largely what our team's drafting looks like, except that we didn't get to draft top 3. The truth is, that's what most team's drafting history looks like.

We could fire ours and hire new ones, but are the new ones actually better? I would seriously doubt it. I'm happy our current scouting staff is getting us NHL players with the mid-late round picks. That even just some of them are borderline scorers in the NHL is icing on the cake.

 

[Randy BoBandy]

Why not sign Duke?

Flahr said, “Some of our signings, what we have coming into the program, if you look at right wing in Iowa or going forward, you’ve got [Alex] Tuch and [Christoph] Bertschy and [Zack] Mitchell and whether [Kurtis] Gabriel’s up or down, maybe him. We’ve got [Adam] Gilmour, who’s going to play center or right wing. [Marc] Hagel. Even [Sam] Anas, whether he’s center or right wing, we haven’t decided.

“We just didn’t know if there was really an opportunity for him.â€

-Russo

I guess looking at that I see the logic in it. A lot of depth at his position in Houston next year, nothing very impressive though.

 

[DANOZ28]

wild mgmt may have sugarcoated it , i would think there must have been character / attitude issues for us not to sign him.

 

[grN1g]

Downing - Graovoc - Schroeder
Duke - Bertschy - Mitchell
Jenys - Lang - Tuch
Lucia - Gilmour - Anas
Gabriel

there is room.

 

[hipchecks]

Would like to have taken a chance on him, but the organization must've saw something I didn't. Not too worked up about it.

 

[saywut]

Don't really see why its a big deal, still a longshot player. Wouldn't surprise me to see Duke go undrafted. Lang's more likely to be an NHLer so if it was truly a 1 contract competition the right choice was made. The Hagel contract a year ago was puzzling and is really the only one that stands out as someone who deserves a contract less than Duke, but his does expire in 1 year whereas Duke would've got a 3-year ELC.

 

[Johnny Danger]

i know he was not signed, but he's rocking the WHL as an overager right now. Any interest from the NHL?

 

[ThatGuy22]

i know he was not signed, but he's rocking the WHL as an overager right now. Any interest from the NHL?

He'll probably atleast land an AHL deal after his season, maybe he gets thrown an ELC offer if he can keep it up.

 

[Saga of the Elk]

Bump

https://www.nhl.com/goldenknights/n...reid-duke-to-entry-level-contract/c-287435242

Good for him, he gets to be an historical footnote at the very least

 

[MuckOG]

I guess he will be Vegas's version of Steve Aronson.

 

[AKL]

Does this mean Vegas won't take Brodin or Dumba? Is this like future considerations?

 

[gphr513]

Does this mean Vegas won't take Brodin or Dumba? Is this like future considerations?

If only

 

[AJ Thelen]