Quote:
Originally Posted by Caged Great
You just never know what other teams may do. We might see someone jump up from the mid teens in the rankings into the top 10, sort of like how Scheifele was rated in the 12-18 range before the draft and getting picked at 7 by the Jets.
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Some of that can be half predicted. If you ever see a big, skilled centre rated in the teens they will probably go higher. That year I was hoping Scheiffele or Zibanejad would go outside the top 10, both were rated just outside of it. But what happened? All the centres went early that year, all of them went top 10.
Years like that are why I have my philosophy that big centres will often go higher.
How does that apply to this year? If a team feels Connor projects as a centre I think he could go top 10. Zacha probably won't fall out of the top 10 and may go top 8 even. Centre is more important of a position than the wing and some teams will prioritize it and end up ranking centres who are close to winger above them on their list. Zacha is a bit weird in that some scouts feel like he might be a winger but there's probably a team or two in the top 10 that see him as a centre.
So my prediction is that Zacha is a surefire top 10 pick and that Connor may go top 10 and is unlikely to fall out of the top 12. Joel Eriksson-Ek may go top 20 as a big, skilled centre.