Penguins Prospects Thread

Gaucho
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Penguins Prospects Thread

Postby Gaucho » Fri Mar 31, 2023 7:15 pm

As if we need any more lessons in not drafting players who play bottom six when they're in junior. Even if he tops out at Zach Aston-Reese or whatever his highest ceiling is, I'm always going to make a frowny face at just unbelievably unimaginative picks. There's no excuse.
It makes no sense.

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Penguins Prospects Thread

Postby MalkinIsMyHomeboy » Fri Mar 31, 2023 7:32 pm

stop Nickl and diming me

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Postby mikey » Tue Apr 04, 2023 5:02 pm

I had Parker Ford as a 3rd round guy or so that year, same with Jami Krannila...and this isn't even retrospect pulls, it's out there. I said this at the time, the situation hasn't improved.
Ooh, WBS got this guy today. That's nice. I hope we give him an ELC...

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Postby mikey » Fri Jun 02, 2023 12:07 pm

We have relinquished the rights to Airola (or whatever) and Ryan McCleary...a bit surprised by the latter.

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Postby meecrofilm » Fri Jun 02, 2023 8:57 pm

Hopefully McCleary doesn't turn into a Muzzin-lite situation where a pro gets lost in organizational turnover.

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Postby mikey » Fri Jun 30, 2023 11:01 am

Emil Pieniniemi preview...

Image

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Postby Dickie Dunn » Fri Jun 30, 2023 12:30 pm

He'll fit right in.

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Postby mikey » Fri Jun 30, 2023 1:15 pm

2023 draft class...I'm re-posting the Yager report here from the Yager thread, if you already read it, skip it...I just want to be able to easily find it when I lose this notepad+ doc that I'm using to jot this all down...

Brayden Yager (C) - Acceleration is a little weak, but surprising top speed. He's not very athletic looking. So you don't have fast twitch muscle activation, he doesn't really withstand contact very well, he's not super well balanced. But he has a good skating base. That actually worries me more because it's hard to materially improve athleticism like this at this point. I think he'll probably get quicker if he wants to, but I don't know what he's going to do in traffic from this perspective. There's something about his skating that looks a little odd to me, but it's not a bad thing. It looks like he doesn't have very strong legs, but it looks like he really drives through his hips. He doesn't require a lot of foot churn to get up to his top speed at his third or fourth stride. His top speed gets really up there, maybe even a 7.5 or 8 out of 9 at the top. But the first step is like a 5.5 or so, maybe a touch higher.

Didn't amaze with his hockey sense, particularly in sort situations. His angles and details just aren't there. He isn't dumb by any means. But he's not a true playmaker. He can't really manipulate lanes. I don't even really like how he intends to get open...you look at his NZ routes, and I don't care for his processor there either. He has hands, but it's not really enough now with his lackluster first-step explosiveness. When he's coming downhill, his hands are good enough to beat players though. Compete got better later, thought he worked pretty hard in the playoffs.

Shooting mechanics are really good. Again, hip driven. He can drop through his hip line and create some lethal velocity from wrist shots and catch and release shooting. His shot in stride is pretty impressive for this caliber of player, which is promising because I think he's going to have to attack off the rush at the next level. But his stick whip is impressive, it's almost Kessel reminiscent. Except Yager takes a lot more shots from distance and from the outside and he doesn't "recover" into post-shot positioning very attentively. Conversely, I don't like his passing process under pressure - both technically and mentally. I don't think he has that level of feel, I don't think there's a lot of area pass upside, I don't think there's a lot of "second layer" finding upside either. If that last point holds true, it takes a big bite out of his "B" game and will enforce him being more of a downhill player as a pro. So, then you worry about his pace/tempo control as a result of that...and then you start to connect those dots and you inevitably come up with "winger".

I don't get his stat line. I just can't see much evidence that he's consistently a good playmaker. Maybe he got a bunch of secondary power play assists or something. I think his NHL stat line is going to be like 21+16=37 or some such.

He backchecks but he's not hard to play against in the defensive zone. Looks a little timid about contact in general. There's not a lot of initiating of contact, not even faux initial contact points to use to spin off of. Maybe he's not confident in his frame, at 5'11" 170, I guess that makes sense. But you look at other guys - like 5'9" Gavin Brindley - and they relish the chance to use their low center of gravity and their ability to dig in underneath and through the hands of their opponents to get inside. I don't see that fight in Yager. So, there's a little gap for some players between work ethic and toughness to play against. I don't think he's tough to play against at all. But I think he's willing to work. I imagine that a lot of blog scouts are all over the place on this...he's probably a dual threat 200 foot player that should have gone top 10 according to the lot of them, but I don't see that - I see what they see, I get it, but I don't think that's how it breaks...

It's not my favorite thing to ever say here, but this feels like Jared McCann. Except, maybe he has another level in the playoffs.

3 to 9 scale for hockey sense, compete, skill, skating, physicality/misc. I might go: 5, 6.5, 7, 7, 4.5 | That grading is consistent with someone I wouldn't consider a true top six forward. It's also not someone I would draft in the 1st round. But I do get it. The top end looks like a top liner. I just don't know if that's how it breaks legitimately. I'm gonna stick with McCann - style and likely potential. It's rare that those two meet for me...

##

Emil Pieniniemi (LD/RD) - Puck pusher. Not very skilled. Good small area footwork for 6'2", he's agile and fluid, good starts and stops - especially for his size. There's not a lot of pop or power to it on closer inspection, but he boosts it with his work ethic and foot churn. He's aggressive in the defensive zone, but to the point that he'll chase guys out to the blueline and other dumb ****. Tough near his net. He works hard, d-men don't always get high end work rate grades (as opposed to urgency, which is a little different for me), but this guy works hard because he has to. Very busy, but not very efficient...his whole game is just messy. Puck skills are not good. Rush absorption is not good. Hell, even his pokecheck in the defensive zone where there isn't nearly as much speed matching to do and he already confidently has inside positioning is a borderline disaster. He rocks back onto his heels and then reaches with a guess and then spins a little on his heel or the center of his blade and just kinda...pinwheels (?) with the attacker instead of regrouping, re-protecting his triangle, and then making microadjustments to recover...ya know, like an NHL prospect would. He does play hard in front of his net, but he's not a real hitter it doesn't seem. I watched a handful of zone entries (offensively) and he doesn't even bother to look for teammates, he crosses the attack line and throws a 60 foot wrist shot into the goalie's chest. "All in a day's work, ma'am," he must think as he goes proudly to the bench, not knowing that he just short-circuited a 4 on 2 rush. Watching him pisses me right off.

This is exactly the type of player that should never be drafted because they're always around for $900k in free agency on July 20th. So, even if he somehow works out, it's still bad value...it's a high risk/low reward use of your second pick, this clues me into the idea that Dubas probably had very little say in any of this. The first pick isn't dissimilar to Tristan Broz, where he's skilled but you can't read that it's not what you really, really want...and this pick is just a waste of time...so this has "our existing scouting staff" written all over it so far. I'm not kidding around in the least when I say that I would trade this player for a 2024 7th right this second and sleep like a baby...

Grades (3 to 9, IQ, compete, skill, skate, phys/misc): 3, 8, 4, 6, 7.5

Mikhail Ilyin (C) - Good work rate. He's involved - forecheck, backcheck, takes good angles defensively, but he doesn't seem to finish anything. He doesn't hit. I saw one instance in one of his last junior games where he gets the angle and the timing exactly right, but he couldn't seal the wall. I gotta find out if it's his weight transfer letting him down because of his feet/lower half or if he's just not a killer. Clunky skater with a sloppy skating stride. He might take the shortest shifts in Russian junior history. I actually like his hockey sense and it creates a runway for him to be an effective passer despite his limited technical skill.

Here's an example of what I mean: most worker bees will get to that junction, I call it the "kill triangle" sometimes, where there's a coagulation of humanity guarding the attack line and the defensemen own the dots, and you're just going to try to chip and chase it through that mess. You have your own guy over the top straddling the line, you have three opponents there probably, and a lot of guys just try to Braveheart their way into that...I've seen Ilyin turn back against that pressure and try to find the weakside D coming late. That's good for a top end player, it's really impressive for a lower end player. One that doesn't have much technical skill and one that doesn't skate very well, but he's confident in his brain and his mental processor to give that a shot anyhow instead of hitting the dead end. Now, why is that important if it's not going to translate to even the KHL (probably)? It's important because players fail down. Fourth line junior players don't play in the NHL. They don't become fourth line NHLers. Never. This is a top-ish line forward in the MHL and he needs an "out". If he understands how offense is created, he'll know how to stop it. Those are the players that hang on. Players that adapt their game. No such thing as offense IQ vs defense IQ - I say it all the time. Mathematicians don't work with even numbers and not odds, right? You can't be good at addition and not be good at subtraction. So, if this guy understands and can process deceptive maneuvers, then he can do it in the converse. Skating can improve and defensive technique you can work on, right? But the innate ability to sniff it out is brought about by your innate ability to bring it in the first place. So, this gives me a little bit of hope that he could be a 4th liner one day. And I know that's not much, neither is he. So...as opposed to being a no chancer, maybe he can grind his way. You can see the conceptual understanding of spatial awareness, of puck protection principles...he just isn't good with the puck, so he can't do much with it.

The more I watch, the less I think of technical skill. Look, you can be a defensive player and all, but there's a requisite amount of skill that you need. Pal, you gotta be able to catch a pass in stride. You can't stop your feet to catch passes, to make passes, to take shots...I'm not saying you gotta walk guys left and right, but come on. Look, I don't want to say, "Well, he only gets points against bad teams" because you can say that about anyone...but the Russian leagues are really unbalanced. So, you have to look. Like, at a glance, he has 7 assists (of his 22) in two games against two teams that each won 9 of 54 games this year.

At the same time, his KHL numbers aren't fair either. He played less than a minute in five of them. He played over 10 minutes in 6 or 7 of them. Not that I expect production there. But he had both of his assists and was a +2 in the bigger minute games. But whatever, I don't know why I'm looking at stats, I just watched him...he's not talented.

Grades: 7.5, 7, 3.5, 4, 5.5

##

I need a break from watching these goons...I just can't see myself sitting here for another few hours in a row on a guy who is under 6', a half point per game in the OHL, who averaged 9:50 a game in their second round playoff series vs. Peterborough..............................9 motherf*ckin minutes 50 seconds across the biggest six junior games of his career...serenity now! I'll be back...

##

Cooper Foster (LW/C) - Two-way forward. Easily overtaken physically. Loses battles on the boards with aplomb. Not an explosive skater by any means, not very athletic, not strong. He pulls up short on all of his hit attempts it feels like, there's just no follow through. 99 times out of 100, you can't paint stripes on a kitty and call him a tiger, so if you're going to be a defensive guy in the league, you probably need some truculence in your game - he doesn't have it. He is good defensively. He's smart. At wing or center, he comes all the way back. There are some flashes of competent puckhandling in light/moderate traffic. I wonder about his skill chaining though. I don't like how he retrieves pucks. If you're gonna be a guy that just destroys, you have to be able to get the pucks and get them to the guys that can create, right? Look at where defensive defensemen went...guys that were 6'5" oxmen that killed everyone got eliminated, yes in part because of the no touching rules, but also it was "discovered" that puck possession is big. So, banking it off the glass and out wasn't enough. Same concept here, if you're going to be a guy that disrupts plays, you need to be reliable in getting it back. That's something Scooter here will need to work on. The more I watched, the more I saw that he does have some skill. I think he can shoot, but he rarely gets it off. I checked out his goal sample, I was pleasantly surprised that he scored very few junior goals. A lot of his tallies were near the net, rebounds, far-post drive tap-ins...so, I like that because it's scalable. He's easy to move from in front of the net though. He's certainly more skilled than the Russian and the 3rd rounder, but I don't know if it's enough for me to feel good about it because he's so unathletic.

Grades: 7.5, 5.5, 5.5, 4, 4

Emil Jarventie (LW) - First thing I notice here is that he's competitive, good foot churn. Unlike his brother Roby, who plays in molasses. He has a short stride and small legs...it sort of gives the illusion that he's really fast, but I think he's just a good skater, not great. He gets off his center line well, allowing him to push through turns pretty quickly and efficiently. Interestingly, he'll choke down on his stick (top hand) to catch passes even on the rush. He's 5'9", 160 and it shows. He's on the floor a lot, but he doesn't draw many penalties - at a rough glance, I only see four drawn in his pro games. So he's on the floor and an arm isn't going up. He loses a lot of battles. Not the smoothest puck handler, he doesn't chop it into pieces, but I don't think there's much dynamic there. The playmaking and passing are good, he can make some one touch plays that tell me his mental processor is really high. Shooting is weak. He only scores junior goals really as far as I can tell. He's kind of like Valtteri Puustinen but instead of having a shot, he can pass. I don't think he's as good as Puus Puus when we took him, but we took him at 20 and this kid is 18...but like Puus Puus, I don't think he plays. Our Finnish scout certainly has a type...

Grades: 7.5, 7, 4.5, 6, 3.5

Kalle Kangas (LD) - This is actually interesting because you look at it and go, "he's a 6'4", 200+ pound defenseman, who has 2 goals and 9 assists in 58 games at the Finnish junior level...what are we talking about here?" but that's why you never judge a book by its cover. I watched him, and boys...he's actually even worse than you think.

Standard issue giant pointless defenseman that has no puck skills at all. Most of his zone entries (however rare) involve him crossing six inches over the blueline and then flipping the puck gently into the corner or on net. Not a good skater. Not a huge open ice hitter, partly because he's a loose gap defender...but he is tough near the net. And uhhh...whatever. He's not good.

Grades: 5, 6, 3, 4, 8
Last edited by mikey on Sun Jul 02, 2023 6:10 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Gaucho
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Penguins Prospects Thread

Postby Gaucho » Fri Jun 30, 2023 1:28 pm

We drafted Bobby Dollas and Sergei Plotnikov?

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Postby Gaucho » Fri Jun 30, 2023 1:31 pm

wait, I don't think Dollas is who I'm thining of ...

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Postby mikey » Fri Jun 30, 2023 1:43 pm

I forget how Dollas played...Plotnikov is pretty on point, this kid is smarter...Plot is tougher...

I confuse Dollas with Fredrik Olausson in my head, but I'm pretty sure they weren't at all similar...but when I go through the mental rolodex and pull up the "Bobby Dollas file" it's highlights of what I think is Olausson...

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Postby King Colby » Fri Jun 30, 2023 2:23 pm

Olausson was offensive I thought dollas was defensive and slightly physical

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Postby faftorial » Fri Jun 30, 2023 2:34 pm

Olausson was offensive I thought dollas was defensive and slightly physical
:thumb:

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Postby mikey » Fri Jun 30, 2023 2:51 pm

Yeah, Olausson was definitely an offensive guy. I'd buy that Dollas was the nondescript player you've described haha

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Postby The U » Fri Jun 30, 2023 3:38 pm

Well that was a depressing read. Haha

Much appreciated though.

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Postby meow » Fri Jun 30, 2023 5:21 pm

Our pets heads are falling off

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Postby King Colby » Fri Jun 30, 2023 6:12 pm

Dubas is an analytics guy it's ok

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Postby Gaucho » Sat Jul 01, 2023 6:16 am

I just don't understand the Pens draft strategy (which clearly isn't working). Every player they draft is said to need time to develop and work on certain things. Well, duh. They're all said to be solid, well-rounded players (more or less), but NONE of them, it seems, is ever said to be exceptional or at least very good at one thing or another. I didn't want them to pick Oliver Moore, but at least he's standing out at something.

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Postby meow » Sat Jul 01, 2023 7:09 am

Emil Pieniniemi preview...

Image
I’ve watched this three times and each time I get more angry. What a piece of **** play this was from start to finnish

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Postby willeyeam » Sat Jul 01, 2023 8:40 am

I've seen Letang do that at least twenty times so let's not write him off yet

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Postby meow » Sat Jul 01, 2023 8:53 am

No you haven’t

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Postby willeyeam » Sat Jul 01, 2023 8:59 am

No you haven’t
Pretty sure half of them were in OT last year

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Postby mikey » Sat Jul 01, 2023 11:34 am

Result and process need to be considered...also, this isn't me cutting a clip because I'm doing a hack Daily Show bit about a politician I don't like...these are how his games go...

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Postby mikey » Sat Jul 01, 2023 11:35 am

I just don't understand the Pens draft strategy (which clearly isn't working). Every player they draft is said to need time to develop and work on certain things. Well, duh. They're all said to be solid, well-rounded players (more or less), but NONE of them, it seems, is ever said to be exceptional or at least very good at one thing or another. I didn't want them to pick Oliver Moore, but at least he's standing out at something.
I may be off with my timing, but do we actually produce more NHL talent out of college free agents than our drafts...? DOC, ZAR, Sheary...at what point does someone step and go "what the **** guys?"

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Postby MR25 » Sat Jul 01, 2023 12:31 pm

Hopefully Dubas gets the opportunity

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