Official Draft discussion thread

[JiriHrdina]

All comments, including ones complimenting the Wild for their great picks go here.

[Young Guns]

For those who dont know to join the chat Its the main CP chat. The link is at the top right of the page

[OILFAN #81]

I just checked in for the first time and I wanted to say great job by the Preds getting Myers at 15. He should be a top 8 pick in the NHL draft. Guy is a beast.

[simmer2]

My 5th rounder was already taken. I need to take someone else.

[Young Guns]

All those teams with to many players on there farm teams after this draft, come see me.

[simmer2]

Grant, someone, I don't have access to a computer and Matt (Enforcer) made a pick that has already been taken for me. Could someone please make a pick, doesn't matter who.

[Sylvanfan]

I am so happy that I don't have any picks after the first round of next years draft right now....Good god, we should do 1 minute picks in the first round and 3 minutes in the 5th....

[Mango]

LOL, Chad. Yeah, it started getting a bit painful there.

[Enforcer]

You know you're having a good draft when.....

You get the player you've wanted on your team since you found out about him (Anton Gustafsson).

The #1 rated Euro goaltender falls to you in the 2nd round.

And guys are trying to pick players you've selected long ago. Devils tried to pick Carle, LA tried to pick Anton Blomqvist.

Bloodlines:
Anton Gustafsson, son of Bengt-Ake Gustafsson
David Carle, Matt's brother
Lucas Sandstrom, Tomas is his uncle
Nik Pokulok, younger brother of Sasha Pokulok

The reason I took so many Swedes was I found a Swedish article with the top 50 Swedish players eligible to be drafted. I hope the writer knows his hockey. What if one of those guys I took late is the next Zetterberg?

One of the only things I was unhappy about was not being able to take Jimmy Hayes. It was a tossup between Carle and Hayes and I went with Carle.

I'll do a real wrap up of my selections in the future. Thanks to Grant for running the show and putting up with the idiocy, especially some of the silly stuff I did. Forgetting to post picks in the thread, trying to pick for the Coyotes by accident once, and for putting up with all the times I messaged saying "that guy is ineligible".

[Antithesis]

Yeah, I tried to pick Carle because you didn't post it in the thread! Where's my thank you for putting up with that, huh?

[Goffie]

The Pens are happy with the way their draft turned out. We were surprised to see Doughty around at #3 but we knew there was not much to choose from between him and Bogo so we were prepare to take either guy.

At #5 we were set to take AP, but we really felt that we wanted a top notch forward prospect, and in our opinion after Stamkos and Filatov Boedker was a step above the rest. We love his top notch speed and after watching the memorial cup we knew we wanted him in a Pens uniform. It was hard to pass on AP but with Doughty already in our stable we felt we could take the risk.

In the 2nd round we were pleased to see that our 2nd rank goalie was still available so late so we jumped on the chance to bring in Tom Mcollom. We feel we have a bit of time to let Mcollom develop but down the road he should be a solid NHL goalie.

With our next pick we took a player we had targeted from the start Nicholas Deschamps. We really like the upside on this young player as he came out of nowhere to win the QMJHL rookie of the year and top defensive forward awards. We were pleasantly surprised to see him around and were quick to jump on him.

Our last 2nd we decided to take a bit of a reach on a player we are quite found of. Justin Jokinen tore up his USHS league and is heading the US college route. We see Justin as a big winger who could be an NHL sniper down the road.

With our last two picks we decided to take a chance across the pond. We took swede jr league standout. Daniel Despotovic has a huge offensive ceiling, but lacks defensive play. We figure if he can work on his play on the defensive side of the puck he can be a top 6 winger in the NHL. In the 5th round we went to Belarus to select Igor Revenko. Revenko had a stellar u18 WC and was the leading point getter until Cody Hodgson put up 2 points in the last game to take teh scoring title. Revenko wants to play in the NHL and in our books that ranks him ahead of a lot of other euros.

[JiriHrdina]

The Wild were really hoping to land one of the big 3 dmen - but didn't see it happening so we were thrilled when Pieterangelo fell in our lap.

With our next pick #22 overall we were very happy to find Jordan Eberle available - one of the best finishers in the draft.

We had intentions of picking a goalie at 22, but with the top 4 ranked on our list all stil available we held off to #29 - when we picked the first goalie of the draft - Chad Pickard.

In the 2nd round, we opted for another kid we think has a lot of upside, perhaps as a second liner - Cory Trivino.

Our next pick the 2nd may seem like a reach for some but we think Erik Karlsson could easily go in the first round of the NHL. Lots of upside, and offensive abilities from the blueline.

Just 3 picks later we continued to improve the organization depth in net - selecting Harri Sateri...giving us two of the best goalies available in the draft.

Our final pick of the 2nd was Luke Adam - a big kid with power forward type upside. A poor man's Bobby Ryan.

Not going to bore you with the rest of the picks because after the 2nd its started to become more about just picking names of my list - don't know much about the kids - though Derek Stepan was a guy I had specifically targetted and was pleased to see him still there in the third.

Overall in the first two rounds we were very happy with the balance of our picks: 2G, 2D, 2F - with a focus on upside over low risk.

Fun draft! Thanks to all that participated and particulary those that helped others make selections.

It's always a grind but this was our quickest draft ever, clocking in at just over 3.5 hours. Not bad.