dudacek

Looking at the latter half of the top 10 in some recent drafts to see where taking “the next best centre” rather than “BPA” got you or may have got you. 2008: 6 Filatov, 7 Wilson, 8 Boedker, 9 Bailey, 10 Hodgson -> 14 Zach Boychuk 16 Joe Colborne Winger Josh Bailey was the best of the bunch at 9, reaching for a centre from outside the top 10 would have got you a bust 2009: 6 Ekman-Larsson, 7 Kadri, 8 Glennie, 9 Cowen, 10 Paajarvi -> 16 Peter Holland Kadri was the right pick at 7, Glennie a horrible reach at 8, reaching outside the top 10 would have been another bust 2010: 6 Connolly, 7 Skinner, 8 Burmistrov, 9 Granlund, 10 McIlrath -> 14 Schwartz Burmistrov was a horrible pick. Granlund and Schwartz would have been fine, but ironically ended up as wingers. 2011: 6 Zibanejad 7 Schiefele 8 Couturier 9 Hamilton 10 Brodin -> 15 JT Miller Great year for picking or even reaching for a centre. Miller is clearly better than the 4 guys who went before him. 2012: 6 Lindholm, 7 Dumba 8 Pouliot 9 Trouba 10 Koekkoek -> 12 Girgorenko 13 Faksa Terrible year for centres, one top 6 centre in the entire draft, Hertl at 17. 2013: 6 Monahan 7 Nurse 8 Ristolainen, 9 Horvat, 10 Nicushkin -> 12 Domi 14 Wennberg Both centres picked were reasonable value, reaching for either of the next 2 wasn’t going to solve your C problem 2014: 6 Virtanen, 7 Fleury, 8 Nylander, 9 Ehlers, 10 Ritchie -> 16 Larkin This was the year to reach. Larkin likely should have been a top 5 pick 2015: 6 Zacha 7 Provorov 8 Werenski 9 Meier 10 Rantanen -> 16 Barzal Given the strength of this draft, Strome at 3 and Zacha were clear reaches, but Barzal should have been top 10 2016: 6 Tkachuk, 7 Keller, 8 Nylander, 9 Sergachev, 10 Jost -> 11 Brown, 12 McLeod Jost Brown McLeod with McAvoy and Chychrun still on the board make this a poster child of centre reaching. 2017: 6 Glass, 7 Anderson, 8 Mittelstadt, 9 Rasmussen, 10 Tippett -> 11 Villardi, 12 Necas 13 Suzuki Just a bizarre draft for centres - 8 of the 1st 11 picks were centres, but just 2 of those 8 (Hischier and Pettersson) are now proven NHLers. Meanwhile, 5 more centres went between 12 and 21 and all of them are good NHLers. *** Over that entire decade-long stretch, 3 1Cs taken between picks 6 and 10 and all 3 were taken in the same year. Meanwhile, just one outright bust, Scott Glennie. Looks like Barzal and Larkin were the only centre “reaches” who teams would have been right to reach for. It will be interesting to see if anyone emerges from the mess of 2017. The top 3 centres from 2018 look like reaches (Kotkaniemi, Hayton, Delandrea). Zegras looks very promising from 2019.

If your concern is projecting roster spots down the road, 2 years from now, you’ve got 5 players potentially tracking for 4 centre spots, 10 players tracking for 8 winger spots, 5 tracking for 3 LD spots and 2 for 3 RD spots. Based on need, RD is the clear preference. If you are concerned about slotting players into their proper roles on the roster, LD is the only position we are good enough, or deep enough, at to even consider passing on BPA. In my opinion, we have 4 centres (Tage, Mitts, Cozens, Krebs) 4 wingers (Tuch, Olofsson, Quinn, Peterka) and 5 defencemen (Dahlin, Power, Samuelsson, Johnson, Jokiharju) who have shown signs of being top 6 forwards/top 4 defencemen. Maybe Rosen should be included given his draft pedigree, but I haven’t seen it yet. Power, Dahlin and maybe Cozens are the only ones who have given us reason to believe they might be first-liners and none of them are that yet. We have talent coming at every position except right D. We need elite talent at every position except left D. Take the best player available. Years until UFA: Thompson 3 Ruotsalainen 3 Mittelstadt 4 Cozens 6 Krebs 7 Olofsson 2 Okposo 2 Girgensons 2 Bjork 3 Asplund 3 Murray 4 Tuch 5 Skinner 6 Quinn 6 Peterka 7 Rosen 8 Poltapov 8 Kisakov 8 Bryson 3 Dahlin 4 Samuelsson 6 Johnson 7 Power 8 Fitzgerald 3 Jokiharju 4

In the 1st 2 rounds, we don’t pass on a more highly ranked player because of position. For example, if our top tier is Wright, Savoie, Kemmel, Nemec and Cooley, and Kemmel is there where we pick at 8, we don’t go for Geekie over Kemmel. All things being equal you take the centre and avoid the LHD, but the need is overstated. The Sabres have 4 1st-round centres from the past 6 drafts - more than pretty much any NHL team. Given the fact we will likely have 4 top 40 picks, I would be surprised if we don’t emerge with 1 or 2 centres this year but you have to take what the draft gives you.

Also, the line that caught my attention was that anyone who exits protocol won’t be returning for at least 3 months because they won’t be tested again in that period.

So this means the Sabres who went into protocol Sunday might be eligible to return as early as Friday and the ones from before Christmas could even be eligible tonight?

Not sure exactly what you’re looking for, but if you want talented, physically immature 1st rounders who smashed concerns about their size, how about MitchMarner, Clayton Keller, Nikolai Ehlers, Teuvo Teravainen, Tyler Ennis, Claude Giroux, Zach Parise, and Danny Briere,

Interesting. Can’t say I watched any of them particularly closely, but I did notice a few in the games I’ve watched. Slafkovsky’s skill was notable against Sweden, but he’s not a pace-pusher. Wright looked like a good hockey player, but not a game changer. Mesar didn’t stand out. Really liked what I saw from Nemec.

I actually thought he might have had an assist on the 2nd goal. He rotated back alertly on D and broke up the rush smartly, leading to the rush that scored. He also didn’t look as tiny as I expected and was not getting overpowered. And, as I said in my original post, he looked engaged and responsible and fast. However, he didn’t actually do anything - lead rushes, force turnovers, create chances, get chances… You’d expect a kid who had been playing against men all year to show more against boys. The most frustrating thing was his lack of ice time. I think he had maybe 8 shifts in the last 2 periods? He is the 3rd-highest drafted forward on that roster (Eklund, Holtz) but he is also one of its youngest players. He may have a coach who looks to his vets first. Hopefully he gets more chances as the tourney progresses. I thought Team Sweden put out a real selfish, entitled vibe against Slovakia. They are going to need to adjust something if they want to progress in this tourney.

What did you think of his play?

Should I be surprised that those lines make perfect sense? All three have been put in a position where they can succeed. Actually really makes this one an interesting watch. Also, the Amerks are in trouble.

Rosen looks fast and invested but accomplished very little in the game I saw. Got some time on the 2nd unit PP but overall not a ton of ice time. Seemed to be an afterthought in his coach’s mind, more of a Hinostroza role. Did not showcase anything that screamed “1st rounder”

Just realizing how inexperienced the staff is beyond Donnie. Christie has never coached above the EcHL. The other three have never been head coaches at any level.

No one does.

Power wins a lot of battles without appearing to use much energy at all. Seals, protects, and moves the puck smoothly.

But when they other guys did it they never played lousy.

Are you taking about the drops in the end zone, or forgetting they happened? I’m sorry man, but the Pats passing game did “fine” today, but there are a handful of games this year when Josh played “lousy”? What am I missing?

See if Josh had a game where he put up something like, say, 14 for 32, 145 yards, 2 picks and no TDs, then I’d understand if somebody said he played a lousy game.

Living in the Vancouver market makes it impossible for me to like the Canucks. I think it might be similar to how many of you feel about the Rangers, who are a shrug to me.

To me, lousy means - at best - below average. Horrible means right at the bottom or close to it. The Bills have been around for what, 60 years? Where do Allen’s numbers rank on the all-time list of Bills QB seasons? How about the numbers of the offence, or the defence? They’ve lost 6 games and 5 of them were by a TD or less. I can’t believe fans of the Bills, of all teams, have forgotten what lousy means.

It was interesting watching the WJC exhibition game today. You guys have slowly won me over on the need to play your natural side. But Canada and Russia didn't have a RHD playing today between them. Maybe it's not as universal as you think.

Don't have much to add, matches my take. Novikov plays hard and has a physical presence.

Friedman tells Peters and Rivet that he's heard the sale rumour but that he would be surprised if anything gets done prior to the stadium deal being done. He thinks selling the Sabres would give fuel to stadium deal opponents.

After the Whistle podcast Peters says he's hearing the Sabre have a 1st on the table for a defenceman. Friedman responded he hasn't heard that, but he wouldn't be surprised. Peters then asked if it was true Chychrun is available. Friedman says he is and his age and contract status fit exactly what the Sabres are trying to do.

I'm not against Peterka going if that's what he wants. But I'm not sure how the WJC would help his development. He has already played at the WJC twice and dominated his 2nd trip. And he is flirting with being a top 10 scorer in the AHL on a team that would suffer without him. I'd rather him continue playing against better competition in Rochester instead of toying with other kids and losing in the process.

Think I recall reading on here that Steve Smith was a "Krueger" hire and Granato was a "Botterill" hire. And that is often the case when it comes to rounding out a coaching staff. Not that the coach and the GM work separately, just that there are various degrees of compromise in where the buck stops.