Quote:
Originally Posted by SebC
I always feel like once a player gets waived you can end your evalutation of them as a draft pick. They're not stuck at replacement level forever, but the pick failed to produce anything that wasn't made available to the whole league for free.
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I believe that thinking is a bit flawed. A player being on waivers means they are available for free ONLY if you keep them on your roster all year. In the case of prospects who aren't fully developed this condition basically keeps any team from claiming them. So you can usually sneak prospects down through waivers that aren't NHL ready yet because no team is going to waste a precious 23 man roster spot to claim a kid that isn't NHL ready yet. There are the occasional exceptions (Corrado being claimed by TOR and then never played) but overall kids who are still developing but aren't NHL ready can pass through waivers.
So Poirier for example still has good NHL upside and may not be a wasted pick. He isn't NHL ready which means no team will claim him off waivers but he may prove to be a very valuable NHLer within a year or two if he develops this season.