Quote:
Originally Posted by Fighting Banana Slug
Malcolm Gladwell made that point in a recent book. Basically a kid born earlier in the year makes a big difference developmentally, early. So when a kid is basically a year older as a 6 year old playing against 5 year olds, he looks amazing. That may then provide him with more opportunities, better coaching, etc. which will further improve his skills. It is just a theory, but an interesting one. His "proof" IIRC, was the Canadian world junior hockey team, which had a disproportionate number of January-March kids on the team.
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Yes, all true.
But the draft offers a new dynamic in that the cut-off is September. So the 'young guys' are the guys born in the summer (like Bennett) and the 'older guys' are the kids born Oct-Dec (which is the opposite of the above study).
I doubt there is any evidence, and I would imagine that scouts consider it, but I think it is a definite factor when trying to compare two kids in junior and one of them is 11 months (or 5%) older