Welcome to the Thursday Prospect ramblings where I have decided to put my “Decade of Drafting” series on hold because no one here at DobberProspects has gone over the prospect report yet. I will go over some highlights and notes from the prospects report because you should really buy it if you want all of the best prospects to own for your fantasy leagues. Also I am sure you need something to read.

Here are the past parts of my Decade of drafting series:

• BCHL/AJHL: https://dobberprospects.com/prospect-ramblings-decade-of-drafting-bchl-and-ajhl/
• USHL: https://dobberprospects.com/prospect-rambling-decade-of-drafting-ushl/

Also buy the fantasy prospect guide here: https://dobbersports.com/shop/

Here is my #GoodTweet of the week:

Here is a lame tweet of this week because … somehow (AGAIN!!!!!!) Alexander Mogilny was ignored for the HHOF

Seriously Kevin Lowe? How many other players from the Oilers in the 80’s can we get in the HHOF that won some cups? Next up is probably the favorite pizza delivery person for those teams at 3am as well.

******************

Most of the highlights will come from all of the writers top 50 rankings, which this year was probably the most varied I have seen in my five years of contributing. Lots of players all over the place, and personally I had about 75 prospects I wanted to fit on to my top 50. I ended up sending in about 62 in case I have 12 that had somehow played an NHL game that I missed, and also because I just could not get rid of them

For 2019 I swear I had a tough time filling my list from 35-50 as I found a lot of prospects could have been in my 50-70 range, but for 2020 I wanted to include 25 extra players because I felt 30-70 are all very close in the end. Most of it came down to preference for me. In 2018, I had a tough time cutting from 60 to 50 because so many prospects of those were better than any I had ranked after 60. I do not remember my thinking from 2015-2017 but I will assume my lists were 100% correct (please do not go and check)

My Personal Highlights

Dobber put a note in his ramblings from June 15, that any writer that had Kaprizov rated at #3 or lower would “quickly realize how wrong they were.” Well I have pretty much been the biggest Kaprizov pusher on this website from 2016 to present but the reason I put him at #3 to Byfield at #2, is that if everything was to go right for both players in the NHL, I see Byfield as having the higher ceiling. To me Kaprizov can be a 60+ player immediately when he comes to the NHL but his optimal peak will probably be the 80-95 range. Byfield at his peak (with everything going right) would be 90-105 range, in my un-professional opinion. So just slightly ahead with all of my chips on the table. Somehow two writers had Kaprizov out of their top five, with one having KK out of their top 10 rank completely

Trevor Zegras was the consensus #4, I had him at #9. For me my #9 and #10 were interchangeable

At #10 I had Connor McMichael, Dobber and I both had him at #10 which is his highest ranking. Additional thinking on prospect interchangeability referenced above (on my list anyway): #4 to #10 are all very close for me and there is a case for anyone of them to be #4 the same as being at #10 behind the others. I had his fellow Capitals draft pick Alexander Alexeyev at #51

My highest rated defenseman on the list was #17 Bowen Byram. I have the lowest starting ranking for a defenseman of all writers as I took a different approach than most in my thinking here. For me this year so many of the top defense prospects available already have players blocking their path for the foreseeable future: Makar over Byram, Fox and DeAngelo over Lundkvist and K’Andre Miller, OEL over Soderstrom, Klingberg and Heiskanen over Harely Thomas (I will never stop calling Harley Thomas that), and Pietrangelo over Perunovich

I had Ty Smith at #33, I wanted to put him higher but I felt I was overrating him as a Devils homer. This was a giant case of over-thinking. I had him the lowest rated out of the writers that had him in their top 50, two writers had him off of their top 50

I did not have Alexander Romanov on my top 50 list because I think he will be a much better real-life NHL defenseman than a fantasy worthy NHL defenseman

Highs and Lows

• Lucas Raymond was rated as high as #5 and as low as #29
• Cole Perfetti was rated as high as #8 and as low as #26
• Nicholas Robertson was rated as high as #7 and as low as #36
• Alexander Holtz was rated as high as #6 and as low as #30
• Nils Lundkvist was rated as high as #8 and as low as #41, and off of two writers top 50
• Matthew Boldy was rated as high as #17 and as low as #47, and off of three writers top 50
• Arthur Kaliyev was rated as high as #13 and as low as #44, and off of one writer top 50

On some lists and not on others

Part of the variation this year was a lot of writers having players on their top 50 that no one else had (could be potential steals everyone else forgot), notable players include:

• Joey Keane rated #27 by Hayden Soboleski
• Andrei Altybarmakyan rated #29 by me. I am a big fan of his, and if he can land in Chicago’s top six he can produce good results (I also may have ad him too high….)
• William Wallinder rated #35 by Keith Duggan
• Jack Drury rated #29 by Chris Mazza
• Olli Juolevi rated #26 by Cam Ro Tony Carr
• Glenn Gawdin rated #48 by me. I think there is serious potential for him in Calgary, I think lots of people missed out on him
• Dmitry Zavgorodny rated #46 by Brayden Olafsson
• Matthew Phillips rated #43 by Dobber
• Pavel Dorofeyev rated #44 by Tony Ferrari

Staff Chirps:

• Tony Ferrari did not have Denisenko or Kravtsov on his top 50 list! Does he only watch draft eligible players? #CallOutTony … He also ranked Jan Mysak as high as I did, so I guess he did some good
• Cam Robinson only overrated ONE Canucks prospect this year, as Tyler Madden does not count since he was traded to LA
• Brayden Olafsson (who also has his name spelled Brayden Olofsson in the guide) is a massive fan of Dawson Mercer as he had him at #11, no one else had him higher than #33. Must have been influenced by the WJC!
• Jokke Nevalainen still tried to put Miro Heiskanen on his list at #1 and #27 but it was, of course, not allowed (same thing happened in 2018 and 2017)
• Pete Harling is very smart as he and I were the only ones to have Lassi Thomson in our top 50 lists, but since I have to try to poke fun at him… I think we can all agree he has the perfect face for the dobber radio podcasts (@DPR_Show)
• Lucas Main, the person who will not reward me with one of his prestigious hockey card draws, is for sure the Vegas writer with Jack Dugan rated at #20, rating him that high probably means he got a free soup with that rank… or they are best friends?

*****************

Thanks for reading, remember to buy the guide and follow my twitter: @FHPQuinn

Next week I will be back with my “Decade of Drafting” series