2017 NHL Draft

[Trailer Fire]

I would love to pick up Foote. I don't want to draft that high though...

[schooner]

Originally Posted by djsFlames

That is frightening. Kids born in '99 are becoming adults...

Also saw a thing about how this is the first year that highschool freshmen are learning about 9/11 as an event that happened before their existence...

Time is an unrelenting #####.

I was a high school freshmen when that happened. Good god, thats the story I am going to tell my children.

[sureLoss]

Red Line report calling big, fast, skilled power forwards the strength of the 2017 draft and potentially weak for defencemen.

http://www.usatoday.com/story/sports...ards/92829180/

We’re a few weeks into the season and a couple of things seem pretty clear about what we’re going to see in next June's draft in Chicago: Big, fast, skilled power forwards. Lots and lots of them.

In fact, Red Line's 12 of 13 rated prospects, and 16 of our top 18, are forwards. The top five spots overall are occupied by forwards, and the smallest of them is Maxime Comtois, listed at 6-foot-2, 195 pounds.

Red Line’s top two prospects, Nolan Patrick and Gabriel Vilardi, just returned from summertime injuries and are already doing major damage. The top five grouping is shaping up to be pretty special. Kristian Vesalainen was an absolute beast through August’s World Junior evaluation tournament and early season play in Sweden’s top pro league, and Michael Rasmussen tallied eight goals in the season’s first seven games.

One other bold prediction: More than one goaltender will be selected in the first round. Yeah, that’s right, we said it. We know it’s not in vogue to take goalies early, it’s a strong year for netminders, led by the superb Ian Scott out west and Michael DiPietro in Ontario.

What we will not see early and often at next year’s draft are defenseman -- particularly those from North America. The only true highly skilled blueliner this year is Sweden’s Timothy Liljegren, and even he has been a mild disappointment in the early going.

Beyond him, Finland’s Juuso Välimäki and Miro Heiskanen may represent the second tier of skilled rearguards. The only two North American defensemen we see in the mix as potential first rounders at this point are Cal Foote and Nicholas Hague, both of whom are more in the mold of huge, physical shutdown defenders.

[FCAV]

To bump this thread, we over at FC have released our first rankings of the new season (not to be confused with our preliminary ranking last June).

We've switched things up a bit this year. Instead of doing a monthly ranking, we've doing four in-season rankings. We've also changed up our format. Instead, we'll be firing off top-100 rankings, because why not?

With that, enjoy our top-100 prospects for the 2017 draft:

http://futureconsiderations.ca/top-rankings/

[The Fonz]

Something I've wanted to mention for a while, but kept forgetting. The consensus surrounding this 2017 draft has been "not a strong draft class". There have been comparisons to 2012. It's been mentioned that it's not going to be as strong as 2016.

Lets look at the ISS 2016 NHL Draft Ranking from this time, last year:
http://www.isshockey.com/iss-hockey-...-for-november/

Nov 4th, 2015:

1. Matthews (#1)
2. Chychrun
3. Jones
4. Tkatchuk (#6)
5. Puljujarvi (#4)
6. MacLeod
7. Nylander
8. Brown
9. Laine (#2)
10. Gauthier
11. Dubois (#3)
12. Sergachev
13. Fabbro
14. Juolevi (#5)
15. Clague
16. Benson
17. Jost
18. Bellows
19. Steel
20. Bean
21. Keller (#7)
22. Knierim
23. Makinen
24. Krys
25. Howden
26. Kunin
27. Asplund
28. Abramov
29. Mattson
30. Hajek

- Laine didn't crack the top 5 until January. Think about what he's doing in this league, and then think about that.
- Dubois didn't crack the top 10 until March.
- Keller never got higher than the 12th rank. Obviously it remains to be seen how he pans out... but I know a lot of us, myself included, wanted Keller at our 6th pick if none of Tkatchuk, Dubois, or Puljujarvi were available.

Point I'm making is that, with the exception of Nolan Patrick, the rest of this 2017 draft class is relatively unknown. Any scouting service labeling a draft as poor when the players haven't even played their draft -1 season, is just plain stupid.

[Enoch Root]

^ was going to make a similar point, but you did a substantially better job of it - thanks

[devo22]

William Knierim ranked at #22 ... he then went undrafted.

really puts things into perspective with these draft rankings and projections. A lot can happen in a year.

[The Fonz]

Originally Posted by devo22

William Knierim ranked at #22 ... he then went undrafted.

really puts things into perspective with these draft rankings and projections. A lot can happen in a year.

Thanks for looking that up. Had to check how to spell his name 3 times, and was wondering where he ended up going... Laziness got me again though.

[Bunk]

God damn it, I guess I have to start learning about fataing teenage hockey players again.

👎

[Racki]

I've heard it said that Nolan Patrick projects to be a #2 centre. Does the same apply to Gabe Valardi? I'm just wondering if one/both of these guys is a sure fire centreman or if they might end up on the wing.

My curiosity comes from the fact that I still think that it's quite possible that Bennett ultimately ends up being a scoring winger, not a centreman. Would be nice to have a young centre to play with Bennett and Tkachuk for the next decade.

[Bunk]

Don't worry about the #1 pick. Even if we end dead last we will not win the draft, fools. We will pick somewhere 4-6, obviously.

[Iniggywetrust]

Really hate that I care about this thread this early into the season.

[Racki]

Originally Posted by Iniggywetrust

Really hate that I care about this thread this early into the season.

Pretty depressing eh? I have been getting pretty deep into this draft class the last week or ten days.

[Vulcan]

Originally Posted by Racki

I've heard it said that Nolan Patrick projects to be a #2 centre. Does the same apply to Gabe Valardi? I'm just wondering if one/both of these guys is a sure fire centreman or if they might end up on the wing.

My curiosity comes from the fact that I still think that it's quite possible that Bennett ultimately ends up being a scoring winger, not a centreman. Would be nice to have a young centre to play with Bennett and Tkachuk for the next decade.

Patrick has only played 6 games this season. He's out with an upper body injury which puts his future status a little up in the air.

Valardi is playing LW this season although scouts still think he's probably a centre.

[MarkGio]

Nolan could be a RW too because he's a righty. If he can go hard to the net, back check, and get into the hard areas, he will be a fine winger.

With Jankowski doing so well, I don't think we need to worry about moving wingers to centre

[ComixZone]

If we end up with one of Patrick, Liljergen or Tippett it'll be a good draft.

[CliffFletcher]

Sad that this thread is going to be at the top of the front page for the rest of year, and it's only November.

[Erick Estrada]

Originally Posted by ComixZone

If we end up with one of Patrick, Liljergen or Tippett it'll be a good draft.

Yeah. They may not be generational talents or even elite talents, they should be good top 6 forwards and this team needs more talent at the forward position.

[dissentowner]

I have to admit that Owen Tippett would be exactly what the Flames could use going forward. Unreal skill and speed, might have the best release in the OHL, and not a small guy, all on RW. Has 16G in 19 GP right now.

[GranteedEV]

In the hypothetical situation where we won 1st OA, would people trade Nolan Patrick for Tyler Toffoli or Mark Stone?