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Lanny_McDonald · 07-04-2017, 07:31 AM

@Calgary4life

All those things you said about Valimaki were also said about Anderson the year he was drafted. Remember how excited we were when he scored 64 points in 67 games and was 4th in team scoring. Seriously, go check it out for yourself.

http://www.hockeydb.com/ihdb/stats/p...php?pid=165972

All of these kids have talent, but all of them have holes in their games. They all have things they have to work on to become professionals. Continuing down the Andersson example, his conditioning and dedication to the game were in question, and it took a couple years to turn that around. Only after that was addressed did we start to see a player that has actual NHL potential. Valimaki will fall in the same boat. There are things he will have to work on before the team thinks he's ready to challenge for a position, and that should always be remembered.

To put things into perspective, Valimaki was drafted three picks after Sven Baertschi was picked in his draft, and that was a better draft. I caution people to not get too excited about players just selected, especially outside of the top 10. Patience to see what you have is required. Immediately slotting a just drafted kid into your top prospect slot is a clear display of flavor of the month behavior. That, or your development system is completely bereft of talent, which we know is not the case for the Flames, especially at defense. I think it is just stating the obvious that Valimaki, as gifted as he is, should have to perform to see what we've got. I would suspect the team believes he's a good prospect, but is behind several players at just his position, like Andersson, Kylington, and Fox. That doesn't include our other top prospects at other positions, like Jankowski, Gillies, Parsons, etc. I encourage you to select who you like, but I just want to remind people that the year after being drafted is usually the one that you see what you have and what kind of prospect you have. I think Valimaki's going to be good, but I gotta see him perform in context, and with some direction from the team, to get that full sense of who and what he is going to be.

07-04-2017, 07:31 AM	#96
Lanny_McDonald Franchise Player Join Date: Mar 2013 Exp:	@Calgary4life All those things you said about Valimaki were also said about Anderson the year he was drafted. Remember how excited we were when he scored 64 points in 67 games and was 4th in team scoring. Seriously, go check it out for yourself. http://www.hockeydb.com/ihdb/stats/p...php?pid=165972 All of these kids have talent, but all of them have holes in their games. They all have things they have to work on to become professionals. Continuing down the Andersson example, his conditioning and dedication to the game were in question, and it took a couple years to turn that around. Only after that was addressed did we start to see a player that has actual NHL potential. Valimaki will fall in the same boat. There are things he will have to work on before the team thinks he's ready to challenge for a position, and that should always be remembered. To put things into perspective, Valimaki was drafted three picks after Sven Baertschi was picked in his draft, and that was a better draft. I caution people to not get too excited about players just selected, especially outside of the top 10. Patience to see what you have is required. Immediately slotting a just drafted kid into your top prospect slot is a clear display of flavor of the month behavior. That, or your development system is completely bereft of talent, which we know is not the case for the Flames, especially at defense. I think it is just stating the obvious that Valimaki, as gifted as he is, should have to perform to see what we've got. I would suspect the team believes he's a good prospect, but is behind several players at just his position, like Andersson, Kylington, and Fox. That doesn't include our other top prospects at other positions, like Jankowski, Gillies, Parsons, etc. I encourage you to select who you like, but I just want to remind people that the year after being drafted is usually the one that you see what you have and what kind of prospect you have. I think Valimaki's going to be good, but I gotta see him perform in context, and with some direction from the team, to get that full sense of who and what he is going to be.