[RedHawk12]

Overall, I am very happy with how the draft turned out for Conroy and the Flames.

Like many others here, I wasn't initially thrilled with the Honzek pick given some of the other players available. But having slept on it, I'm starting to like it more and more. Honzek is a big guy that moves well and has offensive potential. The term "safe pick" has taken on a negative connotation, but I really don't think it should. I project Honzek to be a 40-50 pt player in his prime maybe with a 60-70 pt career year, but is someone that will end up playing 700-800 games fairly easily. Think of Mikael Backlund in terms of overall games played and ice time. That would be a win for a first round pick. I know it would be more exciting to get someone with higher upside, but based on where we were drafting, that upside will also come with high risk to bust. The more I think about it, the more I believe the priority on drafting in the first round is getting a sure-fire NHLer. When you take big swings in round 1 and they end up a bust, it leaves the team with gaps/voids in age, which the team will inevitably try to make up for by signing free agents. We have seen over and over again this is a recipe for disaster. Draft players you know will play. Pelletier, Zary, Coronato and now Honzek is a good start and ensures that there is no huge age gaps on our roster.

The other thing is listening to Conroy compare Honzek to Rantanen is exciting. If he is able to tap into some of that offensive potential, it would be a huge win.

Now, I do believe there is a time and place to take big swings on boom/bust players and that is in mid/later rounds. This is where I think the Flames did well this year. I'm very excited about Morin and Suniev in particular.

The other thing that I like about what I believe is the Flames draft philosophy is drafting forwards in the 1st round and defensemen in the 2nd round. Unless you are getting a sure-fire top pair D in the 1st, it's better to go with a forward. There are always TONS of defensemen in the 2nd round with top-4 potential and that's the right way to go imo. I love our recent history of Pelletier/Zary/Coronato/Honzek in the 1st and Andersson/Kylington/Kuznetsov/Morin in the 2nd. More of that in the future please.

The other thing that really stands out, especially with this draft but I've noticed in the past 2 drafts as well, is a return to an emphasis on size. I think there's definitely some PTSD among the fanbase with drafting big players, but the more I think about it, the more it seems like a sound approach. The important thing here is to not draft big players for the sake of them being big, but also combining that with hockey IQ, skating and vision. I think this is the key distinction and the Flames are aware of it. When I look at the "big" players we drafted the last few years, I don't see them as the Hunter Smiths and Keegan Kanzigs from before. I think they can legitimately play because they have many other great attributes.

Lastly, with respect to drafting size vs skill, I think we definitely had a bit of a shift in philosophy after hitting a home run with Gaudreau. After that draft, we started taking some swings on tiny skilled guys specifically in later rounds...Phillips, Zavgorodniy, Emilio Pettersen, Beck, Francis just off the top of my mind. The thing is NONE of these players are close to Johnny and they are really top 6 or bust guys, and almost all of them are trending towards bust. Which again leads to gaps in age range filled in by bad UFA signings etc. On top of that, even with Gaudreau, a 1 in a 1000 kind of lucky pick, we saw that his size is a big detriment come playoff time.

Moving forward, I don't mind drafting big guys in later rounds as long as they have those other attributes like hockey IQ and good shot. For example, Bell and Ciona are two recent big guy picks that have a better chance of making the NHL compared to the smaller ones I listed earlier.

Again, happy with the draft and looking forward to following their progress.