Where are they now? News on past Habs prospects and players

[Habs Fan in Edmonton]

15 minutes ago, tomh009 said:

And every team misses what look like brilliant picks in retrospect. Kuznetsov, for example? He was picked 26th, probably 20+ teams wish they had picked him.

 

Absolutely, there are many many examples, Marchand at 71, Shea Weber at 49, Bergeron at 45, Pastrnak at 26. Just a few that come to mind, 

[hab29RETIRED]

3 hours ago, Commandant said:

I don't think its that simple though.  How many of those picks are mistakes of drafting, and how many look great if they simply develop better. 

 

There isn't any real way of separating the two. 

Player development or lack there of has played a huge factor in the our draft failures. But, I think organizational philosophy does as well. There have been so many many players we have drafted over the years that a big part of the assessment both by management and our scouting department that didn't even mention a players offensive potential, it's been a lot about character. I for one am sick of hearing how a prospect, whether it's Chipchura, Higgins, McDonough, or Komisarik, or Timordi is that the highest form of praise about the player is that the player can be the future captain of the Montreal Canadiens because of his character. 
 

when I'm looking at who we are drafting,  that is the farthest thing on my mind. I want a Lafleur, Robinson, Shutt, Naslund, Type of player - none of whom were captains. Busy all are highly skilled and productive players. That's what we should be focusing on. 
 

the next step for sure is developing a player. It starts with guiding the player before they join the organization, and has to continue with coaching both in the AHL and NHL. The coaches we have hired have been horrible. It's been well documented and reported how Therrien treated Terry Ryan in the AHL, and 20 years later you can see in the habs tv show of Subban asking Therrien to explain what he wants from him, and all he gets is more chewing out then coach. Thats not how you develop a player.

[alfredoh2009]

1 hour ago, tomh009 said:

And every team misses what look like brilliant picks in retrospect. Kuznetsov, for example? He was picked 26th, probably 20+ teams wish they had picked him.

Exactly 

[Commandant]

22 minutes ago, hab29RETIRED said:

Player development or lack there of has played a huge factor in the our draft failures. But, I think organizational philosophy does as well. There have been so many many players we have drafted over the years that a big part of the assessment both by management and our scouting department that didn't even mention a players offensive potential, it's been a lot about character. I for one am sick of hearing how a prospect, whether it's Chipchura, Higgins, McDonough, or Komisarik, or Timordi is that the highest form of praise about the player is that the player can be the future captain of the Montreal Canadiens because of his character. 
 

when I'm looking at who we are drafting,  that is the farthest thing on my mind. I want a Lafleur, Robinson, Shutt, Naslund, Type of player - none of whom were captains. Busy all are highly skilled and productive players. That's what we should be focusing on. 
 

the next step for sure is developing a player. It starts with guiding the player before they join the organization, and has to continue with coaching both in the AHL and NHL. The coaches we have hired have been horrible. It's been well documented and reported how Therrien treated Terry Ryan in the AHL, and 20 years later you can see in the habs tv show of Subban asking Therrien to explain what he wants from him, and all he gets is more chewing out then coach. Thats not how you develop a player.

 

Here are some, top 2 round picks since 2005 to the 2020 draft, after that the jury is out.

 

Ones that didn't work.... Scherbak, Galchenyuk, Beaulieu, Collberg, Kristo, Latendresse, Maxwell, Brook, Ikonen, Ylonen, Kotkaniemi, Mysak, 

 

Ones that worked..... Pacioretty, Subban, Sergachev (but was traded), Caufield, 

 

These are not defensive players.... these are high end offensive prospects, more didn't develop than did. 

[GHT120]

15 hours ago, Commandant said:

I don't think its that simple though.  How many of those picks are mistakes of drafting, and how many look great if they simply develop better. 

 

There isn't any real way of separating the two. 

I don't discount the importance of development ... but teams can't develop what isn't there ... did any of those 2015 "top prospects" really have the potential to be anything more than 3rd line/5D/backup goalies, at best?  Better development might have meant NHL careers, but I-M-O not careers of significance ... other teams drafting in the same "area" found more talented players; perhaps, as has been suggested, highlighting an issue in "draft philosophy" ... Tinordi and McCarron are the most egregious to my view.

[Commandant]

 

5 minutes ago, GHT120 said:

I don't discount the importance of development ... but teams can't develop what isn't there ... did any of those 2015 "top prospects" really have the potential to be anything more than 3rd line/5D/backup goalies, at best?  Better development might have meant NHL careers, but I-M-O not careers of significance ... other teams drafting in the same "area" found more talented players; perhaps, as has been suggested, highlighting an issue in "draft philosophy" ... Tinordi and McCarron are the most egregious to my view.

 

Consensus of media both before drafts and after drafts were that the Habs did pretty well in getting these players and on this list, every single one flopped.  Going 0 for 10 is not normal. 

 

As for the draft philosophy, I've already posted a list of first and second round picks that were picked to be high end offensive talent, some made it but most didn't. 

 

There wasn't one philosophy and it wasn't picking against talent. 

 

Some will bust, that happens to all teams, but its the complete 0-for while being well regarded for what they were doing in Europe/Junior/NCAA and then getting no where when they hit the AHL that was the issue. 

[dlbalr]

3 hours ago, GHT120 said:

I don't discount the importance of development ... but teams can't develop what isn't there ... did any of those 2015 "top prospects" really have the potential to be anything more than 3rd line/5D/backup goalies, at best?  Better development might have meant NHL careers, but I-M-O not careers of significance ... other teams drafting in the same "area" found more talented players; perhaps, as has been suggested, highlighting an issue in "draft philosophy" ... Tinordi and McCarron are the most egregious to my view.

 

At best, some had higher ceilings than that.  Scherbak was supposed to be a top-six winger, Fucale was supposed to be a future starter (why else would you draft a goalie in the high second round), and I thought Juulsen had second-pair potential.  As for de la Rose and Tinordi, they were supposed to be higher-end role players.

 

I don't necessarily put all 10 from that list in bust territory.  Andrighetto had a decent run for a late third-round pick, Hudon had some NHL success, albeit brief which is still not bad for a fifth-rounder when most don't make it that far.  Condon had a few NHL years which is fine for an undrafted free agent.  I can't criticize not getting something from Reway as a fourth rounder as most don't make it either.  But yeah, the misses at the top of that group hurt.

[The Chicoutimi Cucumber]

Development has been a huge issue for years and years.

 

Gainey drafted a nice crop of highly-regarded prospects. The results were much better than under Bergevin, but still, most of those players still petered out into mediocrity. I always found it telling that in 2009 Gainey took over the coaching reins halfway through the season, then fired the entire AHL staff at year’s end - presumably because he’d had a close-up look at what they had wrought. 

 

And lest you think I’m excusing Gainey, remember that his organization had Price living as a 19-year-old all alone in the Old Port. I’ve always said, it was a very near thing with Price. We almost ruined him.

 

As for MB: Galy’s problems are now well-known, but throwing him into the league at age 19 or whatever could only have compounded them, showing a dire lack of judgement about the young man’s character. They did the same to KK. I think it is reasonable to infer that both Crown Jewels of the Bergevin drafting years were badly mishandled. Heck, Bergevin even did the same to Mete and he too petered out into nothing. While the current regime has, to my consternation, taken a similar approach, a huge difference is that the coaching staff seems fully oriented toward player development, and seems to be good at it. Therrien, by contrast, was a bully and a buffoon oriented to his own ego, who should not have been allowed within 20 feet of an elite prospect; Julien seems to have floundered on an old-school approach and, to be fair, was all about “winning now.” Meanwhile the AHL was a complete mess for five years under Bergie’s bum-buddy Lefebvre.

 

Bergevin was mostly great at the trade table, and mostly terrible at player and organizational development.  

[Peter Puck]

19 hours ago, GHT120 said:

 

When assessing draft picks in retrospect it is less where they were drafted and more who did the team pass on to draft the player.

 

Jacob de la Rose - Next player selected was JT Compher (2xgames played, 8xgoals, 5xassists)
Nikita Scherbak - three picks later was Adrian Kempe (4xGP, 26xg, 84xa)
Zach Fucale - eight picks later the next goalie selected was Tristan Jarry (64xGP)

Noah Juulsen - in fairness, hard to predict injuries ... but two picks later was Anthony Beauvillier and nine picks later was Sebsastian Aho

Jarred Tinordi - in the next eight picks came Mark Pysyk, Kevin Hayes, Evgeny Kuznetsov, Charlie Coyle and Brock Nelson

Michael McCarron - next pick was Shea Theodore

Martin Reway - #116, nobody significantly better in close proximity

Sven Andrighetto - three picks later, Oliver Bjorkstrand (2xGP, 5xg, 3xa)

Charles Hudon - eight picks later, Connor Hellebuyck

Mike Condon - undrafted ... his year the Habs drafted Danny Kristo, Steve Quailer, Jason Missiaen, Maxim Trunev and Patrick Johnson

 

Except for Reway and maybe Andrighetto there were better choices available ... five failures drafted while passing on Condon.

 

I-M-O the six "picks" whose names are in red were mistakes; I exclude Fucale and Hudon because 8 picks is quite a separation.

The problem here is you are looking at 8 players and then complaining that the one we picked isn't the best of those 8.   Realistically, unless these picks are in the top 15 overall, a team should expect to get the best of 8 players about 1/7 or 1/8 of the time.

Then they need to develop that player.   

 

  There seems to be a lot of looking at players we drafted who didn't develop and using that as evidence they couldn't have developed.  As an example, we have no real

evidence why Tinordi failed to reach his ceiling.  Was he overrated or was his development faulty.  Not much evidence to decide either way.

 

[The Chicoutimi Cucumber]

3 minutes ago, Peter Puck said:

The problem here is you are looking at 8 players and then complaining that the one we picked isn't the best of those 8.   Realistically, unless these picks are in the top 15 overall, a team should expect to get the best of 8 players about 1/7 or 1/8 of the time.

Then they need to develop that player.   

 

  There seems to be a lot of looking at players we drafted who didn't develop and using that as evidence they couldn't have developed.  As an example, we have no real

evidence why Tinordi failed to reach his ceiling.  Was he overrated or was his development faulty.  Not much evidence to decide either way.

 

 

I think if, year after year, your picks are regarded as good selections, and year after year, they come to nothing, development has to be the primary explanation.

[Prime Minister Koivu]

11 minutes ago, Peter Puck said:

The problem here is you are looking at 8 players and then complaining that the one we picked isn't the best of those 8.   Realistically, unless these picks are in the top 15 overall, a team should expect to get the best of 8 players about 1/7 or 1/8 of the time.

Then they need to develop that player.   

 

  There seems to be a lot of looking at players we drafted who didn't develop and using that as evidence they couldn't have developed.  As an example, we have no real

evidence why Tinordi failed to reach his ceiling.  Was he overrated or was his development faulty.  Not much evidence to decide either way.

 

A record of 0-10 is good evidence 

[JoeLassister]

I've always wondered if the picks of  Tinordi and McCarron were really Timmins' picks.

 

It seemed, to me at least, that those 2 picks were a command of the management to get bigger at all cost. 

 

Tinordi was drafted after the Habs were bullied by the Flyers in Semi-Finals, being swept like 2-3 games out of 5. Flyers had big size talent players and it showed.

Same for McCarron, I think it was after getting ####ed up by the Sens, including the Lars Eller incident. 

Anyway, I guess we'll never really know, but this is a question that I'd love to ask Trevor Timmins. 

[Peter Puck]

1 hour ago, Prime Minister Koivu said:

A record of 0-10 is good evidence 

First of all going 0-10 when each chance is 1/8 is not good evidence.  It is pretty close to average.

 

Secondly, the data posted by GHT120 shows the Habs going 1 for 10 (Reeway was the best pick in his range).  Thus the record is as close to average as possible with 10 data points.

 

 

[alfredoh2009]

for what-ever is worth, my notes show that the best prospects in 2015 where Sergachev, Lehkonen, Scherbak, McCarron. Juulsen. They didn't make the playoff that year but made it to the 2nd round the year before and to the 3rd round the one before that.

the trades for Vanek and Petry negatively affected the draft.

The lineup at the end of the season was something like:

Pacioretty-Danault-Radulov

Galcheynuk-Shaw-Lehkonen

Byron-Plekanec-Gallagher

Martinsen-Ott-Mitchell

 

Markov-Subban

Davidson-Petry

Beaulieu-Benn

[Commandant]

5 minutes ago, alfredoh2009 said:

for what-ever is worth, my notes show that the best prospects in 2015 where Sergachev, Lehkonen, Scherbak, McCarron. Juulsen. They didn't make the playoff that year but made it to the 2nd round the year before and to the 3rd round the one before that.

the trades for Vanek and Petry negatively affected the draft.

The lineup at the end of the season was something like:

Pacioretty-Danault-Radulov

Galcheynuk-Shaw-Lehkonen

Byron-Plekanec-Gallagher

Martinsen-Ott-Mitchell

 

Markov-Subban

Davidson-Petry

Beaulieu-Benn

 

Sergachev was drafted in 2016 so not sure why your notes would have him. 

 

 

[DON]

on same note

Evolution of Canadiens Development Model - The Hockey Writers - Montreal Canadiens - NHL News, Analysis & More

"Player development is as much an art form as it is a science and every management group has its own process and philosophy. Positive outcomes come down to two factors, the player’s buy-in and a consistent message from the NHL team’s development group."

 

[The Chicoutimi Cucumber]

1 hour ago, DON said:

on same note

Evolution of Canadiens Development Model - The Hockey Writers - Montreal Canadiens - NHL News, Analysis & More

"Player development is as much an art form as it is a science and every management group has its own process and philosophy. Positive outcomes come down to two factors, the player’s buy-in and a consistent message from the NHL team’s development group."

 

 

Very good article. The following pull quote is also on-point:

 

“In 2015, the same development approach was used for every player; play one year in Europe, junior hockey or NCAA, then make the jump into the professional ranks. It was a cookie-cutter approach that made no accommodations for a player’s individual needs or issues before putting them into the professional leagues. Are they smaller or larger, are they in need of more development in their skills like skating or shooting? Bergevin had some development coaches, but none were specialists and they weren’t supported with analytics. Now, specialty coaches and more are seen under Kent Hughes.

The current management group has invested heavily in player development plans…”

 

Bergevin made some shrewd trades and his 2020 offseason was a masterpiece, but basically he sucked balls.

[Prime Minister Koivu]

Okay I don’t know what hockey magazine this picture is from or what year it’s from but I’m guessing 2019. 
 

Top prospects rankings and future line combinations/positional depth chart. 
 

Remarkable stuff 

 

 

[Commandant]

it looks like the Sports forecaster

[alfredoh2009]

49 minutes ago, Prime Minister Koivu said:

Okay I don’t know what hockey magazine this picture is from or what year it’s from but I’m guessing 2019. 
 

Top prospects rankings and future line combinations/positional depth chart. 
 

Remarkable stuff 

 

 

and we lost Fleury.

[Habs Fan in Edmonton]

Interesting that Suzuki was only ranked as the 6th best prospect. He certainly developed. Even rated behind Josh Brook although I was convinced Brook would be an NHL'er, not sure what happened there. 

[tomh009]

Hindsight is always 20/20 but this looks like a really terrible assessment, even for the time.

[Commandant]

42 minutes ago, alfredoh2009 said:

and we lost Fleury.

 

A guy who has played 22 NHL games since leaving Montreal and was in the AHL for all of last season, except for 1 game. 

 

Oh and he's cleared waivers, so anyteam who wanted him (including Montreal) could have had him. 

 

WHAT A LOSS. 

[Prime Minister Koivu]

A long summer without news so far and I still think another move is coming. 
 

Until then I’m getting by reading random crap on twitter. Someone posted this picture and it makes me mad every time I see it. 
 

Worst period in Habs history and I hated both of these men. 
 

 

 

 

[GHT120]

19 minutes ago, Prime Minister Koivu said:

A long summer without news so far and I still think another move is coming. 
 

Until then I’m getting by reading random crap on twitter. Someone posted this picture and it makes me mad every time I see it. 
 

Worst period in Habs history and I hated both of these men. 

 

 

ONE of them had good reason to have such an ego ... and the other is from Alma.