I confess that I did not watch the draft live on TSN this year as we were at the PCA Graduation Banquet. However, I was glad that the Islanders took John Tavares first overall, especially for my brother Tim's sake as he told me he would have officially "given up" if the Isles had gone for anyone other than Tavares. Also, I think my Calgary Flames had a decent draft, though the best part of the draft for the Flames was picking up the rights to Jay Bouwmeester, though they did give up a good defenceman in Jordan Leopold. If the Flames can sign JayBo, their defence looks even more impressive with him, Dion Phaneuf, and Robyn Regehr.
As I went through a few team-by-team analysis of the draft, I noticed a couple things. First of all, the Leafs chose no (zero!) European players... way to go, Brian Burke! (Don Cherry and myself are proud of you!). To me, that's a statement after the Leafs have been drafting Europeans for years... and then trading any of the good talent away (though they've done that with lots of Canadian and American players too!)
Secondly, I noticed that none of the Canadian teams took more than two players under six feet tall... yet the Detroit Red Wings took four players listed under six feet in height, including their first two picks, Landon Ferraro who plays for the Red Deer Rebels and is the son of former NHLer Ray Ferraro, and Slovakia's Tomas Tatar who was impressive at the World Juniors this past year. If you look at the Red Wings current roster, they have five regular forwards under six feet and two defenceman. So you say, "oh, this is the new NHL so we just draft small players!" No, that seems to be the New York Islanders' former strategy... they have eight players on their current roster less than six feet tall... and look where they ended up (with the first overall draft choice!). It seems that success is having key talented/skilled players under six feet yet combining them with a number of "average" size players who provide balance in skill, grit and size to the roster.
Finally, this year was not identified as a strong draft for goaltenders. And so, guess who did not draft a goaltender this year - Detroit! Interestingly, of the Canadian-based teams, only the Maple Leafs did not draft a goalie this year.
Just a few interesting observations... and perhaps some encouragement and hope for Leafs fans!
1 comment:
Hey Steve,
Thanks for the draft update...and for encouraging us Leaf fans. This is the best season of the year for the Leafs - golf season - it typically starts in April each year, with a few days break for the draft.
We Leaf fans are about three months away from our second favourite season: "I think they've got a good team and might make the playoffs this year" season, and about five months away from "does anyone have a good goalie they don't need?" season, and seven months away from "well at least we'll get a good draft pick" season and about 9 months away from "It's a rebuilding year...hey didn't we trade away next year's first round pick for that journeyman goaltender who's down in the minors now" season. Then it's back to golf season.
Go Leafs Go!
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