Joined: Sun Oct 17, 2004 4:34 am Posts: 12700 Location: ...a town in north Ontario...
Mickey wrote:
This is certainly true, and it holds for Montreal as well--Subban, Price, the Kostitsyns. Any market where the hockey press is that overwhelming is going to uptalk their prospects to the point of absurdity. But I think it's worse for Toronto because, unlike Montreal with Price, they haven't had a legitimate prospect develop in a while now (to my knowledge). For an outsider, we see all these guys getting hyped and ending up as 2/3rd line talent.
I honestly can't even think of the last overhyped prospect to come through the Leafs organization, aside from Schenn and Kadri, and they still have plenty of time to try to live up to those expectations.
Your point stands, though, because it's not so much a product of the prospects being overhyped. It's a product of the Leafs not having any prospects until about the last three years.
_________________ I think we relinquished enough... and it's still dark enough... and it goes on and on and on...
Joined: Sun Feb 26, 2006 3:28 am Posts: 28541 Location: PORTLAND, ME
PhilPritchard wrote:
Mickey wrote:
This is certainly true, and it holds for Montreal as well--Subban, Price, the Kostitsyns. Any market where the hockey press is that overwhelming is going to uptalk their prospects to the point of absurdity. But I think it's worse for Toronto because, unlike Montreal with Price, they haven't had a legitimate prospect develop in a while now (to my knowledge). For an outsider, we see all these guys getting hyped and ending up as 2/3rd line talent.
I honestly can't even think of the last overhyped prospect to come through the Leafs organization, aside from Schenn and Kadri, and they still have plenty of time to try to live up to those expectations.
Your point stands, though, because it's not so much a product of the prospects being overhyped. It's a product of the Leafs not having any prospects until about the last three years.
guys, Tuuka Rask was a great prospect. Tyler Seguin & Dougie Hamilton obviously have tremendous potential, too.
Joined: Sun Oct 17, 2004 4:34 am Posts: 12700 Location: ...a town in north Ontario...
EllisEamos wrote:
PhilPritchard wrote:
Mickey wrote:
This is certainly true, and it holds for Montreal as well--Subban, Price, the Kostitsyns. Any market where the hockey press is that overwhelming is going to uptalk their prospects to the point of absurdity. But I think it's worse for Toronto because, unlike Montreal with Price, they haven't had a legitimate prospect develop in a while now (to my knowledge). For an outsider, we see all these guys getting hyped and ending up as 2/3rd line talent.
I honestly can't even think of the last overhyped prospect to come through the Leafs organization, aside from Schenn and Kadri, and they still have plenty of time to try to live up to those expectations.
Your point stands, though, because it's not so much a product of the prospects being overhyped. It's a product of the Leafs not having any prospects until about the last three years.
guys, Tuuka Rask was a great prospect. Tyler Seguin & Dougie Hamilton obviously have tremendous potential, too.
_________________ I think we relinquished enough... and it's still dark enough... and it goes on and on and on...
This is certainly true, and it holds for Montreal as well--Subban, Price, the Kostitsyns. Any market where the hockey press is that overwhelming is going to uptalk their prospects to the point of absurdity. But I think it's worse for Toronto because, unlike Montreal with Price, they haven't had a legitimate prospect develop in a while now (to my knowledge). For an outsider, we see all these guys getting hyped and ending up as 2/3rd line talent.
I honestly can't even think of the last overhyped prospect to come through the Leafs organization, aside from Schenn and Kadri, and they still have plenty of time to try to live up to those expectations.
Your point stands, though, because it's not so much a product of the prospects being overhyped. It's a product of the Leafs not having any prospects until about the last three years.
It's definitely the media in Montreal and Toronto that hypes those players, but we all buy into it. At one point I remember people talking about Sergei Kostitsyn while he was still in Junior (playing with Patrick Kane and Sam Gagner I might add) and they were saying that his play-making vision was like Wayne Gretzky. I'm not joking.
Meanwhile I was just shooting the shit with guys here at the office and we were joking that Kadri has been "up and coming" for 4 years now.
_________________ Toronto '96/Montreal '98/Barrie '98/Jones Beach I & II/Montreal '00/Toronto '00/Albany '03/Montreal '03/Montreal '05/MSG I '08/Toronto '09/MSG II '10/Montreal '11 Vinyl Thread
Joined: Sun Oct 17, 2004 4:34 am Posts: 12700 Location: ...a town in north Ontario...
southp wrote:
Meanwhile I was just shooting the shit with guys here at the office and we were joking that Kadri has been "up and coming" for 4 years now.
That's the problem with the NHL in general, I think, and specifically big markets like Toronto. So many people are looking for reasons to bash the Leafs (as if they really need to look for them) so they say the organization blew it by rushing Schenn. Then they see them taking their time with Kadri, and they say he's obviously never going to amount to anything because he's already 21 and isn't an NHL regular yet. Kadri's development so far has been almost identical to Andrei Kostitsyn's, actually: top 10 pick, a couple years having a lot of success in the AHL with limited success in a couple NHL opportunities by the age of 21. Kostitsyn's breakout year (and still easily his best season) was his age 22 season.
At the same time, everyone bows down to Detroit and all of their 23-24 year old prospects because they have a good track record.
_________________ I think we relinquished enough... and it's still dark enough... and it goes on and on and on...
Joined: Sat Oct 16, 2004 11:41 pm Posts: 23014 Location: NOT FLO-RIDIN Gender: Male
I think it's a problem of perception with any long-suffering franchise in any sport. Regardless of how the Pittsburgh Pirates treated their prospects, we saw it as an organization out of control. They're bringing them up too fast. Now they're dumping talent. Now they're wasting talent. Now they should dump and rebuild. When a team is pretty bad for so long, it's hard to imagine them making the right moves again and it becomes especially hard to distinguish between team failure and natural failure. Detroit can draft a few bust prospects and no one would care, but because Toronto sort of depends on their prospects now, the failure of Kadri to make an immediate impact is really heightened, and if he's a bust, we'd see it as the team's fault, even if there's no possible world in which Kadri becomes an NHL player because of work ethic or natural talent or mental toughness or whatever it is that causes top prospects to dry up. I think Toronto has it worse than maybe any other organization in sports right now because they're such a huge hockey market with such a long history--it'd be like the Braves missing the MLB playoffs for ten years.
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given2trade wrote:
Oh, you think I'm being douchey? Well I shall have to re-examine everything then. Thanks brah.
Meanwhile I was just shooting the shit with guys here at the office and we were joking that Kadri has been "up and coming" for 4 years now.
That's the problem with the NHL in general, I think, and specifically big markets like Toronto. So many people are looking for reasons to bash the Leafs (as if they really need to look for them) so they say the organization blew it by rushing Schenn. Then they see them taking their time with Kadri, and they say he's obviously never going to amount to anything because he's already 21 and isn't an NHL regular yet. Kadri's development so far has been almost identical to Andrei Kostitsyn's, actually: top 10 pick, a couple years having a lot of success in the AHL with limited success in a couple NHL opportunities by the age of 21. Kostitsyn's breakout year (and still easily his best season) was his age 22 season.
At the same time, everyone bows down to Detroit and all of their 23-24 year old prospects because they have a good track record.
It's funny Toronto is going through that with Kadri. I was just arguing with another Islanders fan that wants to get rid of Neidereitter and De Haan. He claimed it's obvious both of them are busts and he bases this on one pro season. I can't wait to see the reaction when Strome doesn't make the team this year.
I agree with you about Detroit, I wish I had time to go through their drafting over the last 10 years, because I don't think it's nearly as great as everyone says it is. People always point to all of their late round gems, but I don't think they've had one since Zetterberg which was 10+ years ago. I do like how they keep prospects in the minors until they are over ready, I wish the Islanders had the ability to do that.
Joined: Sun Oct 17, 2004 4:34 am Posts: 12700 Location: ...a town in north Ontario...
shinkdew wrote:
It's funny Toronto is going through that with Kadri. I was just arguing with another Islanders fan that wants to get rid of Neidereitter and De Haan. He claimed it's obvious both of them are busts and he bases this on one pro season. I can't wait to see the reaction when Strome doesn't make the team this year.
I agree with you about Detroit, I wish I had time to go through their drafting over the last 10 years, because I don't think it's nearly as great as everyone says it is. People always point to all of their late round gems, but I don't think they've had one since Zetterberg which was 10+ years ago. I do like how they keep prospects in the minors until they are over ready, I wish the Islanders had the ability to do that.
Part of it is because a handful of prospects come in every year straight out of the draft and play well. Hockey fans develop this strange expectation that anyone who doesn't have an immediate impact can't possibly be good enough to have one in the future. Niederreiter is the perfect example, and he's in the same situation as someone like Kadri, except it's not quite as magnified because of the team he plays for. I think it's completely obvious that the Isles rushed him and that he wasn't ready to play in the NHL this year, but for anyone to suggest that he has no room for improvement is just crazy. He's not even 20 yet.
You hear a lot of Leafs fans declaring Kadri (7th overall in '09, 19 points in 51 games) a bust while pining over someone like Brayden Schenn (5th overall in '09, 20 points in 63 games), who's obviously going to be a star. It just comes back to the perception that because a team has a history of making mistakes, anything they do is the wrong decision.
_________________ I think we relinquished enough... and it's still dark enough... and it goes on and on and on...
$7m for Semin is way too much. 54 points in each of the past two seasons.
One of those seasons he played 65 games. He averaged .76 points per game over the last two years. More than likely, after the new CBA is signed, it'll be closer to $5.5-6m.
Joined: Sat Oct 16, 2004 11:41 pm Posts: 23014 Location: NOT FLO-RIDIN Gender: Male
Sure. But for a guy with multiple 30 goal seasons who doesn't provide too much otherwise, Rick Nash is pretty well though-of, whereas Semin doesn't even remotely get that consideration--even when the numbers fly directly in the face of the arguments against him. "He disappears in the playoffs." He averages .67 PPG. "He doesn't work hard defensively." He's a plus-92 in the last four years with some hugely suspect defensive play around him. "He's not a good locker-room guy." Yeah, his teammates hate him: http://www.russianmachineneverbreaks.co ... backstrom/ I'm not saying Semin's a great player, and more or less, the reasonable knocks on him are true. He's inconsistent (but so is Phil Kessel). He makes defensive mistakes (but so does Gaborik). But good god, some of the shit I've seen about him makes it look like he single-handedly raped Voukon in the showers last year before peeing in Ovechkin's Gatorade. Caps have had a lot of problems for a while now, and Semin seems to, unfairly, catch the blame for all of them. Like I said, I think 7 mil is a steep price, but for a little less, maybe 5, I'd take him in a heartbeat--especially on a team where he isn't even remotely expected to be a leader (the Staal brothers have that locked up) or the flashy, exciting new player (Skinner). I think he's going to do just fine.
_________________
given2trade wrote:
Oh, you think I'm being douchey? Well I shall have to re-examine everything then. Thanks brah.
Joined: Tue Nov 27, 2007 3:16 am Posts: 2576 Location: Maine, formerly MA
I'm pretty sure Rick Nash's numbers would be a lot more impressive had he been riding on a power play with Ovechkin, Backstrom and Mike Green for the last 4-5 years
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