To move or not to move ... such is question Hextall asks himself
PHILADELPHIA » Don’t cry for the Flyers and Ron Hextall, since they traded the kind of postseason excitement and drafting rewards they had in 2017 for a firstround playoff thumping by the Pittsburgh Penguins in April.
Debate all you wish on whether it was worth it, but remember that young players like Ivan Provorov, Travis Konecny and last year’s No. 2 overall draft pick Nolan Patrick all got valuable playoff experience ... even if they were eliminated five games in.
No longer a lottery team — though they certainly weren’t much better than one last season — the Flyers couldn’t wish for a magic ping-pong ball this time around for a draft that general manager Ron Hextall has voluminously termed, “a good draft.”
But it’s one that has two outstanding prospects at the top, Swedish defenseman Rasmus Dahlin and skilled Russian winger Andrei Svechnikov. They will almost certainly go 1-2 Friday night when the draft commences (7:30, NBC Sports Network) in Dallas.
Though Dahlin has been the consensus top pick for quite some time, that’s mostly because the Buffalo Sabres own the first pick and they need a puck-moving defenseman. The match is made in draft heaven.
So that would put Svechnikov, every bit a No. 1 overall level talent, as the second pick to the Carolina Hurricanes. That, too, is a nice fit since the ’Canes need all the scoring help they could possibly get.
So much for top-pick drama this year. That will have to wait until pick No. 3, and that’s where things could start to get interesting. That’s because No. 3 selector Montreal has made some noise about possibly moving down. Not a surprise since draft experts haven’t seen much difference in the level of prospects who could go anywhere from third to 13th or so. Probably the most intriguing prospect in that group is yet another son of Keith Tkachuk, Boston University winger Brady, who is thick and 6-foot-3 and plays a lot like dear old dad (and brother Matt, the No. 6 overall pick two years ago).
He’s the type of physical left wing the Flyers would covet if they had the chance. They probably won’t, of course.
Tkachuk will likely go in the latter stages of the top 10, but don’t completely discount the Flyers from having at least a sliver of a chance to get a shot at him. That’s because they have both the 14th pick (from St. Louis via the Brayden Schenn deal last year) and their 19th overall pick. Add the two together, throw in a significant player and maybe they get into the bottom rungs of the top 10.
Should Brady Tkachuk fall that far, the move northward would be worth it for a general manager in Ron Hextall who does have a bit of history in moving up in the draft.
“I anticipate making our picks, (though) certainly we would move up if the right deal were there, and we’d look at moving back if the right deal were there, too,” Hextall said recently. “It’s really hard to project or predict. I don’t even know in my own mind what might come our way.”
The Flyers have nine picks over the seven rounds of the draft, but it’s those two first-rounders that could yield players of impact whether Hextall moves or doesn’t. The draft is considered deep, with low-level first-round and secondround prospects well regarded in NHL-level projections.
“I know some organizations say, ‘Well, you have two first-round picks, you can take a swing on a high upside guy.’ We’re going to know more on that high upside guy,” Hextall said. “If we’re going to take a swing, it’s going to be a pretty good swing. It’s not going to be, ‘This guy could be a firstline player, but he’s got a 20 percent chance of being this.’ We’re not going there.”
In a recent study by The Hockey News, Hextall’s organization got very high marks for the depth they’ve built in recent years. Hextall admitted that having a lot of talent in the AHL and juniors could be just cause to combine picks and move up for a bigger prize rather than use as many picks to stock the system as possible.
“We’d at least look a little harder (because of that),” Hextall said. “If our prospect depth pool was shallow, I’m sure we’d make all of our picks. The way it is right now, we’d at least listen (to trade pitches).”
Hextall would fall in line with the great drafting minds that always opt for “choosing the best player available,” but he did drop hints that he has to find a right-handed shot defenseman (good luck with that) either via the draft and/or via trade. He also wouldn’t mind getting another center prospect. And then there’s the physical left wing need and a skilled right wing...
There are a couple of defenders in the mid-to-late ranks of the first round that could yield a defenseman if his scouts team move him to go there. One strong possibility is Ty Smith, considered one of the fastest skaters in the draft and a kid who has shown offensive skill to burn while playing for Spokane of the Western Hockey League. Another possible defensive choice is Rasmus Sandin of Sault Ste. Marie, more of a twoway talent.
Otherwise, if Hextall can’t move up he might be looking at prospects such as American teen winger Joel Farabee, Russian scoring winger Grigory Denisenko, Quebec League center Joe Veleno or Czech winger Martin Kaut.
“There’s seven or eight players that’s pretty close,” Hextall said. “Probably organizations have them a little different. Then you go back a little bit more and there’s probably 20 players in the same group. That’s not bad. I guess in a bad year that would mean in these 20 there’s not a lot of good players. But (this year) in that 20 there’s a lot of good players.”