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Not going to lie, inception credit for this rambling topic goes to our Calgary Flames writer Joel Henderson, along with the rest of the editors here at DobberProspects (Cam, Jokke, and Pat). We are all seasoned DobberProspect contributors and are honored to have contributed to the Top-50 ranking within the 2018 Dobber Fantasy Hockey Prospects Report was released last week (click here to check it out). Naturally, the day it was released, the chirping began between us proud fantasy hockey know-it-alls based on our individual rankings (seen in table form in the report).

I got picked on for my lack of 2018 soon-to-be draftees. Others got bullied for forgetting one or two big names. But most of the talk has been about the hot takes near the bottom of the Top-50 list, and how crazy people were for including them. So, here is a list of some of the players NOT included on the consensus Top-50 list that at least one writer DID have in their ranking.

***Note: no hot takes listed are by the lead writers for that team***

I did my best to categorize but I’ll leave it up to you to decide how hot these takes really were…

Lukewarm takes: 

Dominik Bokk (2018) at #16

Max Comtois (ANH) at #32

Max Jones (ANH) at #33

Carl Grundstrom (TOR) at #35

Are they really Top-50 fantasy worthy? Maybe, maybe not, but the upside is obvious and a couple writers took the liberty of throwing their names into the ring. You can’t hit any home runs without swinging…

Medium-spicy takes:

Grigori Denisenko (2018) at #23

Mathieu Joseph (TBL) at #30

Rasmus Kupari (2018) at #30

Denis Cholowski (DET) at #32

Rudolph Balcers (SJS) at #35

Cooper Marody (EDM) at #36

Jaret Anderson-Dolan (LAK) at #40

Jason Robertson (DAL) at #42

Jesper Boqvist (NJD) at #44

Kudos for swinging for the fences with some of these picks, but Top-50? That would be a bold statement for these guys (…actually Cholowski was one of mine…). Don’t ever accuse DobberProspect writers of not digging deep when it comes to making prospect lists. We love lists.

Flaming hot takes:

Ostap Safin (EDM) at #28

Riley Tufte (DAL) at #31

Riley Tufte at #31

Martin Kaut (2018) at #40

Urho Vaakanainen (BOS) at #46

Ian Mitchell (CHI) at #47

Ryan McLeod (2018) at #49

On the one hand – bragging rights for a while if these actually pan out,

On the other hand – teasing for the foreseeable future if they don’t. That is the hand I will be pointing and laughing with.

Once again, for full disclosure of who made these picks, check out the Full Report here: https://dobbersports.com/product/dobbers-2018-fantasy-hockey-prospects-report/

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In AHL news, Texas forced Game 7 in the Calder Cup Finals – tune in on Thursday for a final showdown to determine the champion. Toronto and Texas have been alternating games all series long…Toronto had better hope that trend continues.

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Thanks for reading, and good luck banking those sick days to catch the 2018 draft in just over a week!

Hayden Soboleski

@soboleskih