Quote:
Originally Posted by Beninho
Leon Draisaitl
David Pastrnak
Nikolaj Ehlers
Aaron Ekblad
William Nylander
Sam Reinhart
Robby Fabbri
Viktor Arvidsson
Dylan Larkin
Nick Ritchie
Bennett is below all these players imo. Until he proves otherwise he was a poor pick in hindsight. Stop the excuses and #freejanko
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This is the situation where you can call him a dissapointing pick but not a poor pick that can be blamed on the Flames IMO.
He was a consensus top 5 pick before the draft and the Flames took him at 4. Draisaitl, Ekblad, and Reinhart were drafted before him so they were never in consideration.
The arguement could be made for Ehlers and Nylander since they were also ranked in the top 10 and had the Flames drafted on of them it would have been still in the reasonable range but for the most part I feel like the Flames would have been heavily criticized if they took one of those two over Bennett.
Pastrnak, Arvidsson, & Larkin are better right now but were never going to be considered with a top 4 pick. You can't really fault the Flames for not drafting those guys since it is their development post draft that was strong.
Fabbri and Ritchie aren't any better than Bennett IMO so not sure why they are even on the list.
Really the best way to judge a draft pick (especially in the first round - it's muddier later on) is to look at the 5 picks right after where your player was selected - since those are likely the players who would have been in consideration where you picked.
For Bennett that would have been - Dal Colle, Virtanen, Fleury, Nylander, Ehlers. Bennett is better than the first 3 IMO but Nylander and Ehlers would both look real good on the top line with Johnny and Mony right now. Especially since it looks like we have center depth to overcome losing Bennett with Mony, Backlund, and Janko.