Should Swedish Prospects stay in Sweden Longer?

[hf101]

An interesting read out of the meetings as some of Sweden's officials attended the meeting.  They wanted to convince the GMs that it would be best for everyone if NHL teams allowed Swedish prospects to stay home longer to develop.

 

Quote

From the Swedish perspective, the problem is NHL teams draft Swedish players and often bring them to North America at a young age. The Swedes question why they should pour money into their junior system when they never see their players perform at home. If they lose the incentive to invest in their junior program, that not only will hurt the junior program in the short term, it will hurt Swedish hockey and the NHL in the long term. They argue they have a strong developmental program and outlined it in a presentation to the GMs. They want to produce NHL-ready players.

 

"If they go too early, they aren't NHL-ready," Boustedt said. "Maybe every second player that goes too early will never, never reach their own potential. They will stop developing. Of course, that doesn't matter when you have big numbers of players to choose from, but we have so few players because we're such a small country. Everyone that has a talent for hockey must become an elite athlete."

 

Lindgren said the SHL loses about 25 players a year to other leagues, not just in North America but elsewhere in Europe, so it is losing the equivalent of a team a year. He said there are more than 50 Swedish players in the AHL.

 

"We know that 100 percent of those 50 players would make a huge difference for us," Lindgren said. "We would make a difference for the player because we train them in the system. They are playing leading roles in men's team, in the senior team, and really, really on a high level and would probably make by the end of the day a good possibility for the NHL team to have a more NHL-ready player coming over by staying a year or two longer."

 

 

https://www.nhl.com/news/swedish-officials-trying-to-keep-young-players-home/c-287511984

[OccamsRazor]

8 hours ago, hf101 said:

An interesting read out of the meetings as some of Sweden's officials attended the meeting.  They wanted to convince the GMs that it would be best for everyone if NHL teams allowed Swedish prospects to stay home longer to develop.

 

 

https://www.nhl.com/news/swedish-officials-trying-to-keep-young-players-home/c-287511984

 

 

Yes i read this yesterday day. There is more to it than just leave the kids over in Sweden.

 

I can't see it Flying but isn't this he problem the AHL faces to guys going over to Europe to play.

 

I'd be incline to listen more if they were willing to reduce the size of rhe rink.

 

This almost could use it's own thread.

[More Hockey Stats]

The Swedes should not "pour" money into the junior system. If they do, they should own rights to a player sort of like in European soccer. If the player gets drafted into the NHL, either the player himself, or the drafting club has to buy the rights out and the money goes back to the junior system.

 

Otherwise it's a free country, don't turn hockey leagues into the jails the way the KHL is trying to.

[flyercanuck]

Oscar Lindblom has gone from being Hextalls first ever 5th round pick (woop-dee-doo!) to their best chance at a scoring winger since...JVR? 

 

 Lindblom may not have JVRs talent, but his will to drive to the net and get dirty in the corners should make Flyer fans happy in the coming years. He was playing his final regular season game today, and was 1 goal back from being the league leader. If he scored he'd be the youngest player ever to lead the SHL in scoring. He also sits 4th overall in points.

 

 If he'd come over at 18, I wonder if we'd be talking about him the same way...or would he just be another no name 5th round plumber.