GDT: World Junior Championships

[Curt]

1 hour ago, matter2003 said:

Cozens dominating and is the key player and co-captain on Team Canada leading the tourney in points...great to see a Sabre in this spot and looks like we might really have something great with this kid...

Are there any examples of players with this level of dominance at the WJC's flaming out in the NHL?

Lol, Casey Mittelstadt?

[sabresparaavida]

1 hour ago, Curt said:

Lol, Casey Mittelstadt?

Casey IIRC had 11 points in the WJC the one year, Cozens had already had more with time left in the championships.

[dudacek]

3 hours ago, matter2003 said:

Cozens dominating and is the key player and co-captain on Team Canada leading the tourney in points...great to see a Sabre in this spot and looks like we might really have something great with this kid...

 

Are there any examples of players with this level of dominance at the WJC's flaming out in the NHL?

As they point out Casey is the best close-to-home example, but there are plenty.

Cody Hodgson was a tourney MVP, Alex Nylander had 9 points as an under-ager and 12 in his draft year.

[Ducky]

Nic Petan tied with McDavid and Reinhart for 11 points in the 2015 WJC.

[dudacek]

Here’s a PRE-game presser with Cozens.

Most interesting thing in there for me was that Sam Reinhart has kept in touch with Dylan since he was drafted. He took him under his wing at camp last year and has been in text communication about the whole Hockey Canada experience.

Doesnt fit the impression some seem to have about Sam and good to hear.

https://video.hockeycanada.ca/en/c/njt-availability-with-dylan-cozens-d7747670.106242

[Taro T]

16 hours ago, Weave said:

Dylan Cozens has been a horse.  My goodness does he control play with is size, strength, and work. 

No doubt we've found our power forward.  The only question will be is he our next 2C, or our next 1RW.

Maintaining the flexibility to play Cozens at whichever of those 2 roles he grows into was a big part of my not liking the choice of Quinn who is only a winger.  Really wanted another high ceiling C in the pipeline rather than a W.

Quinn is growing on me.  But the thought of Eichel flying down the ice with Cozens next to him is enticing.  And having Hall out there as well, we could watch our very own Legion of Doom line.

Of course, if Mittelstadt pans out, that could still happen and he could have any 2 of Skinner, Reinhart, Olofsson, Quinn, or Thompson flanking leaving whomever the 3rd C is (Ruutsalainen, Asplund, other?) with a legit pair flanking him as well.

[Taro T]

And, it was good to see that when the Canadians were holding off the extra man attack of the Finns that Quinn was out there with Cozens.  His ability to play at both ends will, should he develop as we hope, make him an asset on either the 2nd or 3rd line & possibly even next to Eichel.

[Curt]

50 minutes ago, sabresparaavida said:

Casey IIRC had 11 points in the WJC the one year, Cozens had already had more with time left in the championships.

Sure, but Mitts led the tourney that season and won mvp.  He was considered to be completely dominant.  Cozens isn’t leading the tournament in scoring and it looks like scoring is way up this season.

Honestly though, if you go look at the top 3-4 scorers from years past, large majority of them became at least solid good nhl players.

[Taro T]

Wonder how much scoring increased in past seasons that the NHL got a late start or no start?

 

[LGR4GM]

Scoring at the wjc is a good sign but it's just another data point. It's not some magical "wjc scoring leader means they will be an nhl star".

[Thorner]

8 hours ago, tom webster said:

I’m not sure that’s true. He’s only two years out from his draft class, pretty common for him to be playing in this tourney.

So you think in a normal year it would be more likely for him to be in this tournament rather than in Buffalo? My comment wasn't in the abstract, my contention is that he would have been in Buffalo.

4 hours ago, Taro T said:

Maintaining the flexibility to play Cozens at whichever of those 2 roles he grows into was a big part of my not liking the choice of Quinn who is only a winger.  Really wanted another high ceiling C in the pipeline rather than a W.

Quinn is growing on me.  But the thought of Eichel flying down the ice with Cozens next to him is enticing.  And having Hall out there as well, we could watch our very own Legion of Doom line.

Of course, if Mittelstadt pans out, that could still happen and he could have any 2 of Skinner, Reinhart, Olofsson, Quinn, or Thompson flanking leaving whomever the 3rd C is (Ruutsalainen, Asplund, other?) with a legit pair flanking him as well.

Totally agree with the bold. 

Edited January 1, 2021 by Thorny

[Thorner]

4 hours ago, Curt said:

Sure, but Mitts led the tourney that season and won mvp.  He was considered to be completely dominant.  Cozens isn’t leading the tournament in scoring and it looks like scoring is way up this season.

Honestly though, if you go look at the top 3-4 scorers from years past, large majority of them became at least solid good nhl players.

Cozens is also a season older. He specifically would normally not have been in the tournament. Would have been like Casey being in the tournament last season. 

Age is a massive, MASSIVE factor in these things. It's why a player like Perfetti, by an accounts a dominant junior scorer, is more less a PP specialist in this tourney.

Edited January 1, 2021 by Thorny

[GASabresIUFAN]

By the way Casey dominated in his draft year.  This is Cozens D2.

[dudacek]

Cozens is 19 years 11 months and has put up 11 points so far in 4 games.

At 18 years 11 months he had 9 points in 7 games

During Casey’s only WJC he was 19 years 1 month and had 11 points in 7 games.

[Thorner]

13 minutes ago, dudacek said:

Cozens is 19 years 11 months and has put up 11 points so far in 4 games.

At 18 years 11 months he had 9 points in 7 games

During Casey’s only WJC he was 19 years 1 month and had 11 points in 7 games.

Right, there isn't enough data separation here to say anything. 

- - - 

As for this year, Cozens had 6 points in a game where I could literally score on their goalies. And I'm not kidding. He looks excellent but yes, Casey did too. 

The thing with Cozens is he actually has bankable junior seasons leading up to this. 

Edited January 2, 2021 by Thorny

[dudacek]

32 minutes ago, Thorny said:

Right, there isn't enough data separation here to say anything. 

- - - 

As for this year, Cozens had 6 points in a game where I could literally score on their goalies. And I'm not kidding. He looks excellent but yes, Casey did too. 

The thing with Cozens is he actually has bankable junior seasons leading up to this. 

Bankable is an interesting choice of words.

Casey’s freshman college stats were not special and did not reflect the amount of hype he got as a prospect in his D1 year. That said, they were good and compare with a number of freshmen college players who have gone on to have top six NHL careers, as well as current guys like Turcotte and Zegras. This is especially true considering the fact he was not on a very good team and was their primary offensive generator.

So I would say Casey also had bankable amateur seasons.

Its a bit of a pet peeve because there is a bit of a narrative out there that Casey sucked in college that grew out of the debate over who was a better prospect, he or Petterson. People correctly were pointing out the Petterson was putting up numbers in the Swedish Elite League that were unheard of for anyone at that level, while Casey was putting up numbers that were merely good for a college freshman.

I know you know this, but everyone reading might not.

[Curt]

2 hours ago, GASabresIUFAN said:

By the way Casey dominated in his draft year.  This is Cozens D2.

No. It was Casey’s D1 season.

[SabresBillsFan]

Casey and Dylan are two totally different players. Dylan is a solid two way player with size and can really skate, plus he’s a leader. Casey has good offensive skill but lacks most of the other things that stand out for Dylan.

[Taro T]

7 minutes ago, Curt said:

No. It was Casey’s D1 season.

Yep.  And Cozens #'s at the WJC in his D1 were a bit behind Mittelstadt's IIRC.

[Thorner]

2 hours ago, dudacek said:

Bankable is an interesting choice of words.

Casey’s freshman college stats were not special and did not reflect the amount of hype he got as a prospect in his D1 year. That said, they were good and compare with a number of freshmen college players who have gone on to have top six NHL careers, as well as current guys like Turcotte and Zegras. This is especially true considering the fact he was not on a very good team and was their primary offensive generator.

So I would say Casey also had bankable amateur seasons.

Its a bit of a pet peeve because there is a bit of a narrative out there that Casey sucked in college that grew out of the debate over who was a better prospect, he or Petterson. People correctly were pointing out the Petterson was putting up numbers in the Swedish Elite League that were unheard of for anyone at that level, while Casey was putting up numbers that were merely good for a college freshman.

I know you know this, but everyone reading might not.

You picked out one "ok" season when Cozens had several of the stand-out variety. 

and there's the "narrative" word again lol..( I know it was more of a generally-directed comment)

Cozens had better amateur seasons, and more of them. Cozens had strong, improving amateur pre-draft production, followed by an exceptional D+1 year. Mittelstadt had mystery box high-school production, okay D1 stats and a fantastic WJC.

If we want to know how much stock people put in this tournament, just read this thread. If anyone doubts that's where the lion's share of his hype came from. 

Edited January 2, 2021 by Thorny

[dudacek]

37 minutes ago, Thorny said:

You picked out one "ok" season when Cozens had several of the stand-out variety. 

and there's the "narrative" word again lol..( I know it was more of a generally-directed comment)

Cozens had better amateur seasons, and more of them. 

I chose narrative deliberately. It is false and misleading to suggest Casey sucked in college. I did not and do not suggest you are advancing that narrative, but it is out there.

To your point, I did not “pick out one OK season,” I was explaining the genesis of the narrative. The season was not “OK” he led his team in P/PG at nearly a point per game as an 18-year-old freshman. It was a good season by any objective measure.

The bold is absolutely true. There was nothing on Casey’s resume to suggest he would be ready for the NHL after just a combined 58 games in college and the USHL. Botterill is moron.

Edited January 2, 2021 by dudacek

[Thorner]

1 minute ago, dudacek said:

I chose narrative deliberately. It is false and misleading to suggest Casey sucked in college. I did not and do not suggest you are advancing that narrative, but it is out there.

To your point, I did not “pick out one OK season,” I was explaining the genesis of the narrative. The season was not “OK” he led his team in P/PG at nearly a point per game as an 18-year-old freshman. It was a good season by any objective measure.

The bold is absolutely true. There was nothing on Casey’s resume to suggest he would be ready for the NHL after just a combined 58 games in college and the USHL. Botterill is moron.

Except relative to expectations. 

I don't think it was particularly good for an 8th overall pick, either. There's plenty of talk out there about how people need to cool their expectations on Zegras, speaking of, because he didn't perform much differently to Mittelstadt. 

You pointed to the same comparison to elevate Casey, thought it was interesting I've seen several use it to downgrade expectations on Zegras. 

Regardless, it was only 1, whatever it was, and it certainly wasn't close to Cozens D1. NM the pre-draft seasons.

To understand why Casey was able to go as high as 8 with such wishy-washy bonafides heading into the draft, we merely need to take a look at the forwards drafted after Casey. 

 

[Taro T]

4 minutes ago, dudacek said:

I chose narrative deliberately. It is false and misleading to suggest Casey sucked in college. I did not and do not suggest you are advancing that narrative, but it is out there.

To your point, I did not “pick out one OK season,” I was explaining the genesis of the narrative. The season was not “OK” he led his team in P/PG at nearly a point per game as an 18-year-old freshman. It was a good season by any objective measure.

The bold is absolutely true. There was nothing on Casey’s resume to suggest he would be ready for the NHL after just a combined 58 games in college and the USHL. Botterill is moron.

Minnesota was nearly a tire fire the year he was there.  If he had any sort of competent wingers he could've had at least 15 more points.  It was almost like watching Eichel feed Kane the puck at the side of the net and have him fan on the open net.

[GASabresIUFAN]

Most of the hype on Casey came from writers like Wheeler and Pronman stating that he was the best player outside the NHL or some such nonsense despite jumping from High School to the NHL is basically a year.  

This is from Pronman in 2018. https://theathletic.com/491172/2018/08/30/nhl-farm-system-rankings-no-1-buffalo-sabres/

Quote

 

ELITE NHL PROSPECT

2. Casey Mittelstadt, C, Minnesota-Big Ten

Mittelstadt was the MVP of the World Juniors and had a decent initial showing with the Sabres as a teenager. He’s a player who stands out due to his elite offensive abilities. There are very few players outside the NHL who can create offense like he can and often he can bring fans out of their seats. He skates well, has arguably the best set of hands outside the league, and has great overall offensive instincts as a playmaker. Off the puck he’s not the best. Despite having fine size he isn’t going to be a high-end physical player and needs work defensively. However, he shields pucks fine and, given his size and elite skill package, he still has the potential to be a star in the league. I have small reservations about his production at various levels relative to his age that raises a tiny alarm in my brain, but I’ve watched him so much and see a consistently high-end guy that I’m not too concerned.

 

Just a reminder.

 

[Curt]

9 hours ago, Taro T said:

Minnesota was nearly a tire fire the year he was there.  If he had any sort of competent wingers he could've had at least 15 more points.  It was almost like watching Eichel feed Kane the puck at the side of the net and have him fan on the open net.

Minnesota was definitely not a tire fire that season.  They were ok.  They had a winning record and scored more than they gave up (barely).  What they were was a not exceptional talented team that played a defensive style.  On a more talented team Mitts probably would have produced more, but I kind of doubt he would have put up over 45 points.  That would be a truly elite freshman season.

Edited January 2, 2021 by Curt