Trade: Gudas traded for Niskanen

[OccamsRazor]

37 minutes ago, Podein25 said:

 

This sentiment should be on your tombstone.

 

DING! DING! DING!

 

We have a funniest post of the week winner!

 

[mojo1917]

1 hour ago, CoachX said:

You make a compelling argument, but Im not swayed. If the scouting department was so good, "one of the best", it would translate to top notch players delivering winning products on the ice.

 

 

That hasnt happened 

...yet

 

Although today  the team is in 3rd place in the Metro with a 36- 20 and 7 record good for 79 points after 63 games.

 

That's not losing.

 

Truly I think a fair reading for the scouting department's recent success will be from this year and forward.  There weren't  any assets by way of actual picks available until 2013/14 so those guys are now in their mid 20's and are contributing. 

When the 2016 and 2017 draft kids come of age, I think there will be a lot of very good players on the roster and throughout the system.

 

[CoachX]

1 hour ago, mojo1917 said:

...yet

 

Although today  the team is in 3rd place in the Metro with a 36- 20 and 7 record good for 79 points after 63 games.

 

That's not losing.

 

Truly I think a fair reading for the scouting department's recent success will be from this year and forward.  There weren't  any assets by way of actual picks available until 2013/14 so those guys are now in their mid 20's and are contributing. 

When the 2016 and 2017 draft kids come of age, I think there will be a lot of very good players on the roster and throughout the system.

 

so if the flyers win the cup in four years, you will be right today., assuming that all the kids in the pipeline haven't been traded....again

 

[mojo1917]

26 minutes ago, CoachX said:

assuming that all the kids in the pipeline haven't been traded....again

Well, Homer seems to be far away from the levers of power so we can hope, right ?

 

[CoachX]

35 minutes ago, mojo1917 said:

Well, Homer seems to be far away from the levers of power so we can hope, right ?

 

Hell yes! In fact I want you to be right. Make sure in four years you call me on this

[elmatus]

22 hours ago, CoachX said:

You make a compelling argument, but Im not swayed. If the scouting department was so good, "one of the best", it would translate to top notch players delivering winning products on the ice.

 

 

That hasnt happened 

 

I agree. I've spent plenty of posts around here defending draft picks over the Hexy era especially, and yet this team has been "in the works" now for a decade. If the scouting was so good, we would have had better than such marginal hockey over the last ten seasons. Ten seasons is plenty of time to have a few success stories in there. 

 

That's not to say it's all been bad. I just have to agree with you that a very good scouting staff would almost certainly have had a number of real gems in a ten year period, and I dont' think we have. Lindblom? Okay, sure... Provo? Yeah, but he was a top pick anyway, it's not a stretch. Hart? He still has a lot to prove to live up the hype, and he was also a very highly regarded pick, so not much of a stretch.

 

Most of the possible gems have yet to really find their footing in the NHL, and many of them have been around long enough that they should have by now if that potential was to be real. So how good is the scouting staff? Well, it's probably better than many, but I'm not sure i'd consider it one of the best in the league.

[flyercanuck]

5 minutes ago, elmatus said:

 

I agree. I've spent plenty of posts around here defending draft picks over the Hexy era especially, and yet this team has been "in the works" now for a decade. If the scouting was so good, we would have had better than such marginal hockey over the last ten seasons. Ten seasons is plenty of time to have a few success stories in there. 

 

That's not to say it's all been bad. I just have to agree with you that a very good scouting staff would almost certainly have had a number of real gems in a ten year period, and I dont' think we have. Lindblom? Okay, sure... Provo? Yeah, but he was a top pick anyway, it's not a stretch. Hart? He still has a lot to prove to live up the hype, and he was also a very highly regarded pick, so not much of a stretch.

 

Most of the possible gems have yet to really find their footing in the NHL, and many of them have been around long enough that they should have by now if that potential was to be real. So how good is the scouting staff? Well, it's probably better than many, but I'm not sure i'd consider it one of the best in the league.

 

Holmgren traded a lot of picks away, as mentioned. It's tough for your scouts to do well when you can't select a full draft. 

 

Hextalls picks haven't fully developed. Not even his first one. Let's wait and see where this team is when they're there...and healthy. Picture this team with a healthy Patrick and Lindblom...let alone a fully developed Sanheim/Provorov/Konecny/Hart/Frost/Farabee/Myers and some of O'Brien/Ratcliffe/Allison/Zamula/York/Brink etc. 

 

 We're 8th in the league right now...2 points out of 5th. Most of our D is under 25. Our best goalie is under 25. Plenty of forwards are too. The team, FINALLY, is built for years as long as pieces continue to be added.

[CoachX]

10 minutes ago, flyercanuck said:

 

Holmgren traded a lot of picks away, as mentioned. It's tough for your scouts to do well when you can't select a full draft. 

 

Hextalls picks haven't fully developed. Not even his first one. Let's wait and see where this team is when they're there...and healthy. Picture this team with a healthy Patrick and Lindblom...let alone a fully developed Sanheim/Provorov/Konecny/Hart/Frost/Farabee/Myers and some of O'Brien/Ratcliffe/Allison/Zamula/York/Brink etc. 

 

 We're 8th in the league right now...2 points out of 5th. Most of our D is under 25. Our best goalie is under 25. Plenty of forwards are too. The team, FINALLY, is built for years as long as pieces continue to be added.

I also get your points, but I'm going back to the original point about having one of the best scouting staffs. The traded picks are irrelevant. you can't get graded on resources you don't have. Does it suck for them that so many picks were traded? Sure. But if you are that good you would still produce players that have a postive impact on the ice. Im all for waiting to see what happens moving forward. If these young players we have now turn out to be good, and the team wins a cup because of it, YAY scouts! I stand cirrected

 

But the argument that we have one of the best scouting staffs, is like saying our franchise has been one of the best, we just havent won because we traded away all our good players who flourished elsewhere

[elmatus]

1 hour ago, flyercanuck said:

Hextalls picks haven't fully developed. Not even his first one. Let's wait and see where this team is when they're there...and healthy. Picture this team with a healthy Patrick and Lindblom...let alone a fully developed Sanheim/Provorov/Konecny/Hart/Frost/Farabee/Myers and some of O'Brien/Ratcliffe/Allison/Zamula/York/Brink etc. 

 

 

Yeah, this is fine, but I'm hesitant to claim this is one of the best scouting staffs until we have evidence of their effectiveness. So far, we really don't, so the claim they're one of the best seems dubious to me. It's worth noting that other teams have had some real success stories from their picks over that same time span. We haven't really, at least not such impactful ones.

 

Draft picks w/ decent nhl experience since 2011 (w/ my own admittedly subjective ranking based on impact on the ice to date):

 

2011: Couturier 5/5

2012: Laughton 3/5, Ghost 2/5

2013: Morin 0/5, Hagg 1/5

2014: Sanheim 2/5, NAK 2/5, Lindblom 4/5

2015: Provo 5/5, TK 4/5, Vorobyev 0/5

2016: Rubstov 0/5, Hart 3/5

2017: Patrick 2/5, Frost 2/5

2018: Farabee 2/5

 

Everyone else in the system is guesswork at best. It makes no sense to judge the scouting staff on players who have no NHL experience of note. That's four or so players who have become impact players at the NHL level over the last decade (Couts, Provo, TK, and Lindblom). Of the four, Lindblom is the only one who might have been considered a stretch, chosen based on some sort of scouting hunch. TK was taken later than he was projected to, and Couts and Provo were both very highly touted prospects in their respective draft classes. Even if you add Hart to that list (which I might if he plays well down the stretch here), that's still only four such players, and Hart also was very highly touted as a goalie prospect.

 

Again, is that a bad record overall? No, it's not bad. I'm sure there are other teams with worse records in the last ten years. But I'm not sure that record is enough for me to get behind "one of the best scouting staffs in the league". 

 

Also, I'm not convinced this team is measurably better with a fully healthy Patrick... He was hardly a force in his time to date. If anything, he was disappointingly overrated and a lesser player than a number of others taken after him and in lower drafting positions since. That's not really on the Flyers scouting staff though. He was the consensus 2nd pick (even possible 1st, if you can believe it). They picked who anyone else would have.

[flyercanuck]

@CoachX  @elmatus

 

 Ya, I'm not arguing that we have "one of the best"...but I do believe they're easily a top half scouting team. They've been pretty consistent hitting on 1st round picks, especially considering they're not usually top 5ish..I think once you get further down in the rounds it's a lot of luck hitting on them, but some teams do seem to be better than others. 

 

 Another thing is the actual drafts. Philly has had 2-2nd overall picks...JVR and Patrick. Think we'd have a better team maybe if we'd have got Drew Doughty instead of JVR (drafted #2 the next year) and Eichel instead of Patrick ? Would Pittsburgh have won 3 cups with Bobby Ryan and Erik Johnson, who went 2nd overall and 1st overall in the following drafts? 

[radoran]

2 hours ago, flyercanuck said:

We're 8th in the league right now...2 points out of 5th.

 

I like this. Flyers are also five points out of first place in the Metro.

 

And five points out of not being in the playoffs.

[brelic]

11 minutes ago, flyercanuck said:

@CoachX  @elmatus

 

 Ya, I'm not arguing that we have "one of the best"...but I do believe they're easily a top half scouting team. They've been pretty consistent hitting on 1st round picks, especially considering they're not usually top 5ish..I think once you get further down in the rounds it's a lot of luck hitting on them, but some teams do seem to be better than others. 

 

 Another thing is the actual drafts. Philly has had 2-2nd overall picks...JVR and Patrick. Think we'd have a better team maybe if we'd have got Drew Doughty instead of JVR (drafted #2 the next year) and Eichel instead of Patrick ? Would Pittsburgh have won 3 cups with Bobby Ryan and Erik Johnson, who went 2nd overall and 1st overall in the following drafts? 

 

Crazy that of the two times we had the 2nd overall pick, we basically ended up with two of the weakest picks in the last 15 years.

 

 

[Podein25]

2 minutes ago, brelic said:

Crazy that of the two times we had the 2nd overall pick, we basically ended up with two of the weakest picks in the last 15 years.

 

No kidding. It sounds like whining, but it's just so objectively true. We have chosen to suck at really bad times, lol.

[radoran]

4 minutes ago, brelic said:

Crazy that of the two times we had the 2nd overall pick, we basically ended up with two of the weakest picks in the last 15 years.

 

Columbus might like to have a word about Ryan Murray. And Sam Reinhart isn't exactly blowing doors off in Buffalo.

 

I'm also not sure that Jordan Staal and Bobby Ryan are significantly better overall than JVR. So if we go with the statistics that #2 overall is 1/3 "disappointing" there are many people who lose significant money on odds worse than that every day.

 

It just happens that they traded JVR's best years for Luke Schenn - a defenceman coming off back to back 22-point seasons.

 

Heckuva job, Homer.

 

I'd like to think that if a player was putting up 30+ goal seasons (as JVR did in Tronno) the fans in Philadelphia might appreciate that a little more. But then there's always Jeff Crater.

[flyercanuck]

26 minutes ago, radoran said:

 

Columbus might like to have a word about Ryan Murray. And Sam Reinhart isn't exactly blowing doors off in Buffalo.

 

I'm also not sure that Jordan Staal and Bobby Ryan are significantly better overall than JVR. So if we go with the statistics that #2 overall is 1/3 "disappointing" there are many people who lose significant money on odds worse than that every day.

 

 

 Ya, they weren't the WORST 2nd overalls (JVR?PATRICK) they're just far from the best. Some years the 2nd overall is better than a few 1sts. 

 

26 minutes ago, radoran said:

 

It just happens that they traded JVR's best years for Luke Schenn - a defenceman coming off back to back 22-point seasons.

 

Heckuva job, Homer.

 

 Wasn't it?

 

26 minutes ago, radoran said:

 

I'd like to think that if a player was putting up 30+ goal seasons (as JVR did in Tronno) the fans in Philadelphia might appreciate that a little more. But then there's always Jeff Crater.

 

 Lol...good one Rad.

[CoachX]

3 hours ago, Podein25 said:

 

No kidding. It sounds like whining, but it's just so objectively true. We have chosen to suck at really bad times, lol.

yeah, since 75

[LegionOfDoom]

I think that comment of high level drafting staff that the Insiders in the NHL have given us, has to also include the past drafts such as Gagne, Richards, Carter, G, Lindblom, TK due to where we had mid level first round picks and nabbed those players who pundits seem to like. I would say we can hold our own. But ya having top overall picks in a weak draft hasn't helped us in the past as much as other teams top first/second picks.

[ruxpin]

On 2/28/2020 at 1:56 PM, elmatus said:

 

2011: Couturier 5/5

2012: Laughton 3/5, Ghost 2/5

2013: Morin 0/5, Hagg 1/5

2014: Sanheim 2/5, NAK 2/5, Lindblom 4/5

2015: Provo 5/5, TK 4/5, Vorobyev 0/5

2016: Rubstov 0/5, Hart 3/5

2017: Patrick 2/5, Frost 2/5

2018: Farabee 2/5

 

Respectfully, I don't really agree on some of the rankings, though some to date are fair. 

 

Just going to randomly throw this out there, though:   when Coots was the age of some of those we're giving 2/5 to, I think many here would have given Coots a 2/5.

 

Just saying there's alot more here than what is being allowed for - - though as a Flyer fan burned many times, I competely sympathize with hedging bets. 

[elmatus]

48 minutes ago, ruxpin said:

Respectfully, I don't really agree on some of the rankings, though some to date are fair. 

 

 

That's fair. It's definitely my own subjective view of things, and it's completely based on what I feel they've offered to date, not what potential they may or may not have going forward. If the exercise is meant to judge how good our scouts are, I don't think it makes much sense to base their success on projections. 

[radoran]

3 hours ago, LegionOfDoom said:

I think that comment of high level drafting staff that the Insiders in the NHL have given us, has to also include the past drafts such as Gagne, Richards, Carter, G, Lindblom,

 

Sure, going back 21 years. You might also include Williams and Provorov in that list. JVR probably qualifies even as a "disappointing" 2nd overall. Laughton is shaping up to be a solid middle six/third liner. Pitkanen?

 

Patrick is a problem because of an entirely unforseen medical problem. It doesn't appear directly related to his injuries in Junior and definitely has put a damper on his potential development in what c/should have been a breakout 3rd year.

 

For firsts in that span, you've also got Woywitka, Ouelett (12 NHL games), Morin, and Rubstov... Even Sbisa, who has had a 500+ game career hasn't been more than a journeyman. Morin is another unfortunate injury victim but it could be noted Max Domi went with the next pick and Shea Theodore was still on the board.

 

That said, Lindblom, as a 5th, is the only productive player the Flyers have gotten that deep since Seidenberg (6th), Cechmanek (6th), and Niittymaki (6th) - and Seidenberg was the most recent of them in 2001. Maybe Maroon in 2007, but that's still 12 years ago and the Flyers didn't really "develop" him as a player. Zac Rinaldo??

 

You've also got players like Patrick Sharp (who the Flyers certainly didn't develop), Gotstobehere (3rd), and probably most importantly Hart as a 2nd. Hagg is even serviceable.

 

The Flyers also had three years in that span where they had no 1/2 round picks at all. Certainly a strange phenomenon for a team with a supposedly strong draft staff - and one which led to the problem Hextall identified of there being no real home grown depth talent in the system when he took over.

 

Overall - especially recently - they've been a much stronger drafting team even at depth in the first round.  Hextall then drafted Sanheim, NAK, Lindblom, TK, Provorov, Hart, Patrick, Frost, Farabee, and O'Brien in his tenure. Not a bad five year run when you've got five of them on the roster, Patrick as a wild card, and at least three more with pretty solid potential.

 

I've got to think that recent success is what's caught the eye of modern analysts.