...I mean, I was listing prospects pretty exclusively. Hence the lack of Hanifin, Tanev, Kylington, Gilbert. Totally meant in the development system, my bad.
Powerhouse team? They are good, but they have the 4th best record in the league - not exactly blowing it out. And as for HB specifically, he leads the team in points and there are only 2 other guys within 20 points of him. You're trying to make it sound like he's getting secondary assists on an offensive juggernaut - HE is the bus driver on that team.
Also, this was your quote earlier in the thread - now that Blaster said something nice about HB, suddenly you're talking like he's a mediocre prospect, and nothing even close to Willander.
Kitchener is one of the top scoring teams in the league and most of his points are secondary, not sure why we are debating this?
I like HB and as I've said in other posts will continue to follow his progress but any reference to Makar is trolling in my mind.
Between Willander and HB, I don't think the comparison is even close.
If HB can improve his skating it will increase his chances of making the NHL, the good news for Flame fans is that he thinks the game very well.
The Canucks literally just went through this with Jack Rathbone; over a point per game in the AHL for his first two seasons (albeit the first one a short one).
This is why I always feel numbers or items you can quantify are undefeated.
Jack Rathbone broke out in his D+3 year with NHLe of 39. (D+1 was 14)
Hunter Brzustewicz is breaking out in his D+1 year with NHLe of 35.
That is the major differentiator here. Statistics have proven (albeit I agree not perfect for obvious reasons) that the younger a player is that they achieve this type of success, the more promising their career is likely to be.
If Hunter Brzustewicz didn't blow out his shoulder in his D-1 year as referenced by the Athletic article that I posted earlier, who knows where he would have gone in his Draft year. He lost of FULL season of critical development time for which I believe he is JUST starting to catch back up to his development curve.
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nhlE is a good standard to compare production across non NHL leagues. It is a TERRIBLE tool for predicting a player's production at the NHL level. The reason is due to the opportunities a player receives in the two leagues.
If your conclusion is that HB is more likely to be a successful NHL defenseman than Willander, you simply do not understand basic principles of talent evaluation. There are 0 NHL scouts who would agree with that. There is a wide range of outcomes for this type of player, from Adam Fox to Michael Del Zotto to Ty Smith to Will Butcher to Marc Andre Gragnani to AHL lifer. The bell curve is much fatter for the latter type of player and that is simply the reality. Be optimistic but reasonably so and don't throw out laughable, call-in-show quality takes.
This is a prospect with value. That value is not 12th overall pick value. Full stop.
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nhlE is a good standard to compare production across non NHL leagues. It is a TERRIBLE tool for predicting a player's production at the NHL level. The reason is due to the opportunities a player receives in the two leagues.
If your conclusion is that HB is more likely to be a successful NHL defenseman than Willander, you simply do not understand basic principles of talent evaluation. There are 0 NHL scouts who would agree with that. There is a wide range of outcomes for this type of player, from Adam Fox to Michael Del Zotto to Ty Smith to Will Butcher to Marc Andre Gragnani to AHL lifer. The bell curve is much fatter for the latter type of player and that is simply the reality. Be optimistic but reasonably so and don't throw out laughable, call-in-show quality takes.
This is a prospect with value. That value is not 12th overall pick value. Full stop.
Byron Bader's model spits out the following comparables:
Tom Willander - Tim Erixon, Jeff Petry
Hunter Brzustewicz - Pavel Mintyukov, Rasmus Sandin, Noah Dobson
I'd take Bader's model over any scout's eye test for talent evaluation. As you can tell, I'm heavily biased towards statistical models.
Unless - all of these subjective measures are an actual flaw holding the player back - skating (for example) - I really don't think they are more important than actual production at certain age in a certain league.
EDIT:
Which is why "scouting" took a massive leap forwards with the implementation of analytics.
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41% of Brzustewicz assists are primary.
44% of Hughes assists are primary.
A defenceman’s assists being secondary are not a mark against anyway. They might mean a great breakout pass to create a two on one, or a good point play on the powerplay, etc.
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Also - same channel has similar scouting profiles for Tom Willander. Since this is a Flames forum, you can find them and watch them yourself. I'll focus on the Flames prospect instead.
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nhlE is a good standard to compare production across non NHL leagues. It is a TERRIBLE tool for predicting a player's production at the NHL level. The reason is due to the opportunities a player receives in the two leagues.
If your conclusion is that HB is more likely to be a successful NHL defenseman than Willander, you simply do not understand basic principles of talent evaluation. There are 0 NHL scouts who would agree with that. There is a wide range of outcomes for this type of player, from Adam Fox to Michael Del Zotto to Ty Smith to Will Butcher to Marc Andre Gragnani to AHL lifer. The bell curve is much fatter for the latter type of player and that is simply the reality. Be optimistic but reasonably so and don't throw out laughable, call-in-show quality takes.
This is a prospect with value. That value is not 12th overall pick value. Full stop.
No one said any of those things.
NHLe is far from perfect. But one thing it does is quantify progression. And though the comparisons are far from perfect, we can compare against other player's numbers, as long as we understand the limitations.
Brzustewicz jumped from an NHLe of 22 in his draft year, to 39 in his D+1 year. That is incredible progression.
For Willander, we only have this year unfortunately, so measuring progression is not possible. But his number for this year is 12.
It's not perfect, it's not even great. And the only thing it's measuring is production. But that doesn't mean we can't use it and discuss it. And it's the only tool we have.
A defenceman’s assists being secondary are not a mark against anyway. They might mean a great breakout pass to create a two on one, or a good point play on the powerplay, etc.
Of course they aren't - it was a silly comment by Rikster.
Are some secondary assists freebies? Sure. But the flip side of that is sometimes the guy that does all the heavy lifting, a=or makes the key play, doesn't get an assist at all. That is why we use large sample sizes, to make those anomalies fall away. And that is why I compared him to Hughes, to show Rikster that his claim was stupid.
If a forward gets a lot of secondary assists and not many primary points, it's a telltale that his linemates may be making him look better than he is.
If a defenceman does the same, it's a telltale that he's good at getting the puck up to his forwards. He's expected to be one step further removed from scoring a goal.
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nhlE is a good standard to compare production across non NHL leagues. It is a TERRIBLE tool for predicting a player's production at the NHL level. The reason is due to the opportunities a player receives in the two leagues.
If your conclusion is that HB is more likely to be a successful NHL defenseman than Willander, you simply do not understand basic principles of talent evaluation. There are 0 NHL scouts who would agree with that. There is a wide range of outcomes for this type of player, from Adam Fox to Michael Del Zotto to Ty Smith to Will Butcher to Marc Andre Gragnani to AHL lifer. The bell curve is much fatter for the latter type of player and that is simply the reality. Be optimistic but reasonably so and don't throw out laughable, call-in-show quality takes.
This is a prospect with value. That value is not 12th overall pick value. Full stop.
Literally no one is making claims like you're suggesting.
As for your last sentence, you first laughed at people for basing comments off NHLe, then you turn around and make your case based on draft position. Ignoring the appeal to authority, the draft is a snapshot in time. Players progress and regress. The 2023 draft was the deepest in history, and some scouts think there were more than 50 players with top 6, top 4 potential. And again, that was at that moment.
We now have another half year of data. Some kids are going to progress this year more than others. And who has progressed more than anyone? Brzustewicz. So do we evaluate the progression? Or do we just say hey, we have the draft data, we know who's good and who isn't?
