A bit of both. He we very good two years ago, but since his development has basically flatlined. I think he’s a worth a look with our second first rounder because there is some talent there, but you have to be concerned about which way his development has gone.
Pronman posted a mock this morning, with us taking McTavish at 6. He says early buzz has McTavish tied to Detroit, but team sources say not to discount Johnson and Wallstedt. I am skeptical of any leaks from Detroit, but taking McTavish or Johnson at 6 makes me think they believe either can play C. If they think Johnson can play C, that’s my guy.
After digesting the most recent draft stuff I could find, these are my final rankings: 1. Power 2. Hughes 3. Beniers 4. Johnson 5. Eklund 6. Clarke 7. McTavish 8. Guenther 9. Edvinsson 10. Wallstedt - Power is the clear #1 to me. I don’t think he’s going to be a star, but he’s going to be damn good for a long time. - Hughes has great offensive upside. I think he will be limited defensively his entire career, but he would be an amazing fit next to Mo. - Beniers is just solid. I think his upside is limited but he’s a sure fire 45-50 point center. - Johnson has elite offensive skill. I also think he could play C. - Eklund seems less likely to play than Johnson, but he has great speed and very good offensive skills. - Clarke could be fantastic, but his skating is a worry. - McTavish still worries me because of how little he’s played the last year. I like what I have seen, and he seems like a C. I’m just not there yet. - Guenther is probably very good, but he gets a WHL tax from me. - Edvinsson is just really solid. He seems like a guy you plug next to Hronek for five years and you get a really good pairing out of those two. - Wallstedt is very good. I am not sure if I go G at 6 but he’s worth that risk imo.
The fact he isn’t signing tells me we didn’t push hard. There isn’t a more desirable goalie depth chart in the league/
Outside of Ras and Lindstrom (who is a prime candidate to be taken in the expansion draft), the only other player whose rights we still hold is Adams. This was easily one of the worst draft classes in the NHL history.
been wondering why the Cbus goalie who died in that fireworks accident over the weekend was in MI ... party was hosted at Manny Legace's house
i think this weekend blasting till 2 AM and then this story have me wishing the US could move on from it's fascination with mortar-style explosions in our backyards ...
As an owner of two dogs and a dad to a 9 month old son, I'm fully on team fireworks can fuck off. 4th of July is miserable at my house
Be nice if the 4th of July wasn't actually 3-4 weeks long. Allow for 7/3 - 7/5 and be done with it already.
Grand Haven was insane those 3 days, like non stop all night. But it seems to have stayed relatively to those days. I hated royal oak when we lived there, I think we had like 10 straight nights last year. People actually started calling the cops on my neighbor because he was an asshole about it. So to spite whoever called the cops he would light them off every day he was allowed to until the minute he was allowed to.
Milford was pretty quiet aside from the actual 4th. I think most of the residents likely to shoot rockets off their driveways are spending their money on real weapons to keep the King of England from quartering in their home.
Walled Lake had theirs on 6/18 I think, several others to follow in the area too. Once it stopped being around the 4th it really lost me as an Event.
Friedman wrote this 7. Don’t know if it still works, but Toronto liked Tyler Bertuzzi this season — moving elsewhere when it became obvious he wasn’t going to be healthy. Barring a major change, Zach Hyman won’t be back with the Maple Leafs, a big loss for them. It’s expected Detroit will be among his pursuers, although the Red Wings won’t be the only ones. I love Zach but this would be weird to me.
As I think about things, I guess it makes sense to replace Bert with Hyman. It also doesn’t hurt to have Hyman here if eventually the plan is to further work to entice Werenski.
For the trade up people.... Realistic options here. Spoiler: The Athletic Red Wings draft: 3 trade-up scenarios from pick No. 23 and how they’d work By Max Bultman 1h ago 12 Every year, the idea of a first round trade up (or down) is among the most tantalizing pre-draft storylines in the NHL. While sheer numbers suggest a first-round trade must be considered a long shot for any team, some draft-day movement does happen every year. So, the idea of moving a handful of spots in either direction has a way of tugging at the imagination. That certainly applies this year in Detroit, where, because of the Red Wings’ stockpile of early-round picks, the NHL’s flat salary cap and the unique scouting circumstances of the 2021 draft, Steve Yzerman and company could be well-positioned to pull off such a move on July 23 — particularly when it comes to their second first-round pick at No. 23. Hopefully, by now, you’ve seen The Athletic’s most recent staff mock draft, in which Detroit came away with Peterborough (OHL) center Mason McTavish and SKA (VHL) winger Nikita Chibrikov — a pair of forwards who could bring a real boost to the Red Wings’ rebuild. It’s a realistic potential outcome for next Friday’s draft. But it would be foolish to think it’s the only one. And the possibility of Detroit making a move up from its pick at No. 23 (courtesy of Washington in the Anthony Mantha trade) would be one of the surest ways to shake things up. So, below are three scenarios for what such a trade could look like, and how it could change the outlook of the Red Wings’ draft. (And for all of these, remember that any pick after No. 11 will effectively one spot earlier, due to Arizona’s pick being forfeited.) The minor jump The deal: Detroit trades picks No. 23 (via WSH), No. 48 (via NYR) to Nashville for pick No. 19 The precedent: Rangers traded picks No. 26 and No. 48 to Ottawa for pick No. 22 in 2018 The rationale: The most obvious reason for the Red Wings to make a move like this would be if Detroit really wants to come out of Round 1 with a goaltender. The 2021 draft is seen as having two top goalie prospects in Jesper Wallstedt and Sebastian Cossa. And the Red Wings, notably, have no netminders of their caliber currently in the pipeline. In our staff mock, the second of those two prospects (Cossa) went off the board at No. 20, and while some scouts pushed back on him getting that far in Corey Pronman’s post-mock audit, at least one commented that they saw Edmonton as a reasonable floor for the second goalie off the board. This move, then, would put Detroit in position to get one spot in front of the Oilers, and finally add a top goalie prospect. Now, there are plenty of risks associated with picking a goalie in the first round, much less packaging a second early pick to move up for one. Red Wings fans will surely be familiar with the debate over whether to consider Yaroslav Askarov early in last year’s first round. All those risks still apply, and this type of trade would mean losing out on one more shot in the second round to find the kind of hidden gem the 2021 scouting cycle may have covered up. But outside the top 10, making the goalie pick does become a more palatable consideration, especially if Detroit considers Cossa and Wallstedt to be of similar caliber to each other, as Pronman does (he actually has Cossa ranked one spot ahead on his final draft board). Realistically, Detroit could make a move like this for a player of any position, though — as long as they like the player enough. Beyond the net, one other position that stands out as having a distinct tier that could end before pick No. 23 would be on defense. In our staff mock, Carson Lambos went at No. 18, but Wisconsin-bound defender Corson Ceulemans was still on the board (and didn’t end up making it to No. 23). Making this kind of push for a goaltender would have the stronger narrative force, considering Detroit’s need, but depending on how the Red Wings have this year’s class tiered at each position, there’s a number of different circumstances in which it could make sense. The wave-maker The deal: Detroit trades picks Nos. 23, 38 to Philadelphia for pick No. 14 The precedent: In 2012, Buffalo traded picks Nos. 21 and 42 to Calgary for pick No. 14 The rationale: If moving up four spots is assertive, moving up nine is aggressive. For that reason, the comp of the 2012 Buffalo-Calgary trade (in which the Sabres gave up a pick in the early 40s to move up seven spots) may even slightly undersell the price for this type of deal. And perhaps that’s reason to favor the more conservative approach. But this avenue would make sense (even at a slightly higher price than listed) if there’s one particular player on the board who the Red Wings love. Maybe that’s Wallstedt, who could very well be gone by this point. Or maybe, if the Red Wings go defense (or even goalie) at No. 6, that’s a forward such as Chaz Lucius, Cole Sillinger or Matthew Coronato. All three of those forwards were gone by No. 14 in our staff mock, but it would only take one curveball in the top 13 for one to fall. Lucius is Pronman’s No. 7 ranked prospect and Scott Wheeler’s No. 8, so maybe the idea of him slipping is too much of a stretch. But either of the other two would offer compelling reasons to make an aggressive move up, especially if Detroit passes on a forward early. Coronato won the USHL goal-scoring race this season by an astounding 16 goals. And as one evaluator put it in Pronman’s NHL Draft Confidential, “All Sillinger ever does wherever he goes is score, score a lot and play a reliable two-way game. I don’t see why he can’t do that in the NHL.” And, of course, there’s Wallstedt. This is more similar to the range where the last two drafts have seen the top goalie picked — Askarov went 11th last year and Spencer Knight went 13th in 2019 — and if Detroit strongly views him as that level prospect, then it’s reasonable to not leave anything to fate. But no matter who the Red Wings would be targeting with this kind of move, it has to be completely sold on that player, because moving two top 40 picks is punting on one of the main advantages of being pick-heavy in this 2021 draft: the potential variance from list to list and who that variance could cause to drop. They could justify that opportunity cost if the player they moved up for were near (or in) their top 10. But the pressure to be right would grow significantly. The blockbuster The deal: Detroit trades pick No. 23 to Vancouver for pick No. 9, Loui Eriksson The precedents: In 2019, Toronto traded Patrick Marleau, a 2020 conditional first-round pick and 2020 seventh-round pick to Carolina for a 2020 sixth-round pick; In 2016, Arizona traded picks Nos. 20 and 53 and Joe Vitale to Detroit for pick No. 16, Pavel Datsyuk The rationale: Finding an apt price for taking on Eriksson’s contract is the challenge in a deal like this. One useful comparison is Patrick Marleau example from 2019, when the Maple Leafs gave up a first-round pick (top 10 protected and ultimately No. 13) in order to get Carolina to take Marleau’s contract off their hands. Another is a deal Red Wings fans should be plenty familiar with — the one that unloaded Pavel Datsyuk’s contract back in 2016 and cost Detroit the chance to pick Jakob Chychrun. The Red Wings still got a pair of young defensemen in Dennis Cholowski and Filip Hronek with those picks, in addition to cap space, but they lost out on Chychrun, a legitimate Norris Trophy candidate this past season. This concept, then, attempts to split the difference between those trades in the current flat-cap environment. For Vancouver, the motivation has everything to do with Eriksson’s $6 million cap hit for next year and how much it stands to limit the Canucks — who have Elias Pettersson, Quinn Hughes, Alex Edler and Travis Hamonic all up for new contracts. Even burying Eriksson’s contract would only alleviate a little more than $1 million of that charge. And unlike Marc Staal — who logged 18 minutes a night for the Red Wings in 2021, after the Rangers gave up a second-round pick to trade him last fall — Eriksson already played just seven games for the Canucks last year. That’s a heavy weight to carry on the cap sheet for a player seldom dressing. That’s where the Red Wings come in, with the ability to turn their significant cap space into a blockbuster trade up from 23 to 9. A few crucial caveats apply, though. First Eriksson has a modified no-trade clause, giving him a 15-team no-trade list, per CapFriendly. Second, Detroit would need to be willing to pay the $3 million in cash salary Eriksson is owed, for a player who may play sparsely for them. And third, Detroit would need to have a player on the board at No. 9 it liked enough to pay that price for. None of that is a given. Still, publicly, there seems to be a group of nine top skaters who have separated themselves at the top of the draft. Picking at No. 9, Vancouver (or Detroit in this scenario), would be guaranteed the chance to pick one of them. In our staff mock, that last player available was William Eklund — a Swedish winger who would fit superbly with the Red Wings. Eklund may not actually make it to No. 9, but if he doesn’t, that means another member of that top group will. Maybe that’s Kent Johnson, the dazzling forward out of Michigan. Maybe it’s Brandt Clarke, the skilled defenseman from the OHL. For the Red Wings, taking on Eriksson’s contract would be a big ask. And for the Canucks, so would coming off a top 10 pick. But if Vancouver decides it needs the cap space more, and is willing to move back into the early 20s, the potential reward of moving up for a second pick in the top 10 has blockbuster potential for the Red Wings.
The blockbuster The deal: Detroit trades pick No. 23 to Vancouver for pick No. 9, Loui Eriksson I'd do that in a heartbeat
I am sure we don’t want to commit to Bertuzzi long term, but I am also not sure what his value is coming off the injury. I think the biggest risk is walking him to UFA. The positive is if he’s healthy and performs, you could get a nice deal for him around the TDL. The negative is if he’s totally busted, you don’t get any assets for him. If you trade him now, you likely limit how much value you’ll get back, but you’ll ensure you get something for him. Going to be a fascinating situation to watch play out. I can’t imagine anything happens before the expansion draft.
Fedorov was just named the coach of CSKA Moscow. They have quite a few draft eligible kids so it could possibly influence a few of our mid round picks.
LA wants Bertuzzi apparently Bertuzzi and 37 for 8 And then the rumored trade from earlier of 9 and Eriksson for 22 Boom, 3 top 9 picks. Get wallstedt, one of top Dmen and a center
I don’t think we go so far off the board this year but the more I read about Fydor Svechkov, the more I think he could be another Seider pick. He’s probably the best defensive C in the draft, the question is do you think his offense can be better than he’s shown in Russia. I wouldn’t take him at 6, but outside of Beniers, he’s the most likely guy to go on the first round that is a no doubt about it C.
Spoiler Detroit Red Wings Mason McTavish, C, Peterborough-OHL (6) Isak Rosen, RW, Leksands-SHL (23) Logan Stankoven, C, Kamloops-WHL (38) Prokhor Poltapov, LW, CSKA-MHL (48) Danila Klimovich, RW, Minsk Zubry-Belarus Jr. (52) Benjamin Gaudreau, G, Sarnia-OHL (70) Liam Dower Nilsson, C, Frolunda-Sweden Jr. (94) Ben Roger, RHD, London-OHL (102) Joe Vrbetic, G, North Bay-OHL (128) Manix Landry, C, Gatineau-QMJHL (134) Brody Lamb, RW, Dodge County-US High School (138) Simon Motew, RHD, Kitchener-OHL (166)
I am not overly concerned here, since I don’t think we would go long term on an offer. That said, it’s bad judgement imo.
Yeah hard pass on him. He’s been carried his whole career and seems like the type whose game falls off quick
Leddy is on the last year of his deal, which is a plus. I assume we try a pump and dump at the deadline but who knows? Also, Stetcher is probably not being protected now.
Anyway, this is a fairly bad trade by Yzerman, but maybe it gets better at the deadline. It’s also slightly concerning that on top of the Leddy trade, we are also being linked to Hyman.
The positive to this trade is if we trade Larkin in the next few days we could have zero players under contract in 2023.