Quote:
Originally Posted by dissentowner
Actually Brown least fits what the Flames are needing. First off, he is not physical at all and he never will be. More importantly he is a centre and is going to play as one so exactly where is he going to play on our squad? We are set at centre going forward for sure in the top two spots, moving either Bennett or Monahan to the wing would be stupidity. The third line C spot is locked down by Backlund with others like Jankowski challenging. Now you take into factor how many 6'6 skill players you ever see in the NHL go on to have a great career, you don't. Brown is the absolute last guy mentioned in the upper half of the draft we should be considering.
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Well in one sense I agree with you as I've argued Brown may not have risen as high on the Flames list as other teams because we're not desperate for big, skilled centres as much as other teams are.
However I think your argument about how few big skilled 6'6 forwards excel goes both ways. If Brown achieves his #1-2 centre potential then he becomes hugely valuable because he's a big skilled 6'6 centre which would be a massively rare commodity in the league.
It's like if in Chara's draft year you argued that there has never been a good 6'9 defenseman. Who cares about the past? You have to be looking to the future and the game is changing and evolving and kids are bigger and bigger. Trust your scouts and if he turns out you have a fantastic commodity, a true rarity in the league. One team did and they landed a franchise d-man despite the fact no 6'9 players had ever excelled before. They later traded him away because their GM was Mike Milbury but that's beside the point.
If the Flames have Brown in their top 6 then they think he has extremely high potential and if he comes close to meeting that potential he'll be extremely valuable. I don't think any of us should rule out that possibility as there have been lots of whispers that some teams/scouts have moved him into their top 6.
But I'm like you, I think the Flames may not have him as high as #6. But let's not use his size against him in a weak argument. He is being talked about as a potential top 10 pick because of that size, skill, skating combination. Any team that has him top 6 thinks he can be a 6'6 #1 centre and that's hugely valuable. I'm not sold he's a good bet to be a #1, I think he could top out as a #2 and that would drop him for me considering we have Bennett, Monahan and Jankowski as potential top two centres already. I'm gathering your thought process is similar. How much more upside does he have than Jankowski?
In the end I think the question the Flames may have asked themselves is, "Is Brown so far ahead of the other options at #6 that we'd take him despite having Bennett, Monahan, Jankowski and Backlund already?" To me the answer is very likely to be no. I see lots of other appealing options at various positions. Brown isn't a clearcut top 6 player to me unless your team is hurting real bad for big skilled top two line centres.