Quote:
Originally Posted by JTech780
Chayka has done an incredibly average job IMO. His drafting and developing record has been pretty bad.
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I have to disagree here. In my opinion, to do a "good" job as a GM at the draft, you need your first round picks to turn into players. To do a "great" job, you need to hit on the first rounders and also manage to extract some value from the later rounds. Chayka's first round picks have been:
Clayton Keller;
Jakob Chychrun;
Pierre-Olivier Joseph;
Barrett Hayton; and
Victor Soderstrom.
Of those, three are clear hits, in my view. There are no busts. Keller and Chuchrun aren't just NHL players, they're already very good, top-6 / top-4 options at a young age. Hayton was considered a reach, as the consensus pick at the time was Zadina. I think we can all now see that Hayton was clearly the right decision there, as the guy became a star in his draft+1 year and will be Calder-eligible next year after playing 20 games this season and has a shot at a nom. Joseph, as a 23rd overall pick, was a good risk-reward bet; he certainly has NHL skating but it remains to be seen if the rest of his game can get there. Regardless, he was used as part of the package to acquire Kessel, so value was had. Soderstrom fits in the "too soon to tell" category, but was selected roughly where he was ranked by most (though Pronman had him lower).
I think that's a pretty good record for first rounders. On later rounds, he's been just "OK". Tyler Steenbergen was an excellent get as a late round pick, looking like he should have gone top 30 in his D+1 year, although he's been slow to adjust to the AHL and it's still too soon to tell if he can produce at a pro level. Kevin Bahl turned out to be an excellent choice as a 2nd rounder, and helped them acquire Taylor Hall. There are a bunch of guys who have a shot to be NHLers, but nothing sure yet. I would rate his work outside of round 1 as roughly average.
So, combining good results from the first round, with average results after the first round, I think I would say he's done quite a good job at the draft.