Top Draft Prospects, CSS Talk NHL Comparisons at BetLM

Top Draft Prospects, CSS Talk NHL Comparisons

VAUGHAN, Ont. - Prior to every sea­son, NHL Cen­tral Scout­ing has already eval­u­ated hun­dreds of the top prospects avail­able in the upcom­ing NHL Draft.

In addi­tion to metic­u­lous reports that detail a player’s good and bad points, and then shar­ing them with their col­leagues, it’s also help­ful to have those prospects file some paper­work.

So, long before Nail Yakupov of the Sar­nia Sting, Mikhail Grig­orenko of the Que­bec Rem­parts, Ryan Mur­ray of the Everett Sil­ver­tips, Radek Faksa of the Kitch­ener Rangers and Mor­gan Rielly of the Moose Jaw War­riors begin a new sea­son, they’ve already com­pleted Cen­tral Scouting’s ‘ques­tion­naire.’

There’s a good chance one of the afore­men­tioned play­ers, all among the top five North Amer­i­can skaters on Cen­tral Scouting’s mid-term list in Jan­u­ary, will earn the No. 1 rat­ing when the final release is pub­li­cized in two weeks.

One of the more intrigu­ing responses on the ques­tion­naire hap­pens to be in the sec­tion that asks each prospect for their strongest asset, weak­est area and that NHL player he feels he would most resem­ble. The self-assessments, for the most part, are usu­ally pretty accu­rate. The two defense­men among the top five North Amer­i­can skaters, Mur­ray and Rielly, com­pared their style to Chicago blue liner Dun­can Keith. Not sur­pris­ingly, the top two Rus­sians on the board, Yakupov and Grig­orenko, com­pared them­selves to a fel­low coun­try­man.

The scouts seemed to think each player wasn’t too far off in their responses.

Here’s a sum­mary of what each of the top five North Amer­i­can prospects, top North Amer­i­can goalie and top Euro­pean skater at the time of the midterm rank­ings in Jan­u­ary pro­vided on their ques­tion­naire.

As top-ranked Yakupov had not yet com­pleted his ques­tion­naire at the time of this fea­ture, responses to ques­tions were acquired dur­ing past inter­views. The top Euro­pean prospect at the midterm release, Filip Fors­berg of Swe­den, did not list a com­pa­ra­ble NHL player. He did, how­ever, list Anaheim’s Ryan Get­zlaf as his favorite player. Yakupov didn’t like com­par­ing him­self with an NHL player, either, but wears jer­sey No. 10 in honor of Pavel Bure.

Play­ers are listed in the order they were ranked at the midterm rank­ings in Jan­u­ary.

1. Nail Yakupov, RW, Sar­nia Sting, OHL

2011-12: 42 games, 31 goals, 38 assists, 69 points, plus-15, 12 power-play goals

Com­par­i­son: “I want to be my own player; I don’t com­pare my style to an NHL player.”

Best asset: “My bread is my legs, and I have good hands, just not as good as [Alex Galchenyuk].”

Where do you need improve­ment: “Can never do enough to become all-around bet­ter player.”

NHL Cen­tral Scout­ing: “His first step and abil­ity to con­trol bounc­ing pucks, knock them down and make a play are the best of any of the guys in the draft, in my opin­ion,” Cen­tral Scouting’s Chris Edwards said. “He really gets up to top speed very quickly and his hands our out­stand­ing. Like Pavel Bure, Yakupov is dan­ger­ous every shift. He may not have been dom­i­nant on every shift like Bure was, but he cre­ated some­thing every shift … you have to be aware where he is on the ice all the time.”

2. Mikhail Grig­orenko, C, Que­bec Rem­parts, QMJHL

2011-12: 59 games, 40 goals, 45 assists, 85 points, plus-35, 8 power-play goals

Com­par­i­son: Evgeni Malkin

Best asset: “My hands.”

Where do you need improve­ment: “Play in the defen­sive zone.”

NHL Cen­tral Scout­ing: “He’s the type of player that con­trols the whole pace of the game, he can play with the puck at the same pace he plays with­out the puck,” Cen­tral Scouting’s David Gre­gory said. “He sees the ice and oppor­tu­ni­ties really well. He can hang onto it longer than most play­ers; some play­ers might feel that they have to move it quickly. But Mikhail has the patience and the abil­ity to see oppor­tu­ni­ties and let them develop, which is a spe­cial skill. He’s got a big long reach and an abil­ity to move in traf­fic with his size (6-foot-3.25, 200). He’s the kind of for­ward who will con­trol the play and make things hap­pen.”

3. Ryan Mur­ray, D, Everett Sil­ver­tips, WHL

2011-12: 46 games, 9 goals, 22 assists, 31 points, 31 penalty min­utes

Com­par­i­son: Dun­can Keith

Best asset: “Skat­ing, pass­ing.”

Where do you need improve­ment: “Skat­ing, shoot­ing, vision and strength.”

NHL Cen­tral Scout­ing: “I think Mur­ray is more like a [Scott] Nie­der­mayer; he just does every­thing under the radar and so smooth you hardly notice it,” Cen­tral Scouting’s B.J. Mac­Don­ald said. “His skat­ing is prob­a­bly the best in the [WHL], but you don’t really notice that so much because you almost take it for granted he’s been there for three years. He never gets out of posi­tion and I’ve never seen him lose a one-on-one bat­tle. He’s always, defen­sively, in the right spots. He just does every­thing so seam­lessly that he reminds me of Nie­der­mayer only because he does every­thing so well at such a high level and after a while, you don’t even notice it.”

4. Radek Faksa, C, Kitch­ener Rangers, OHL

2011-12: 62 games, 29 goals, 37 assists, 66 points, plus-19, 8 power-play goals, 3 short­handed goals

Com­par­i­son: Mar­tin Havlat

Best asset: “Strongest asset as a player is my hockey sense.”

Where do you need improve­ment: “To main­tain the puck for longer times.”

NHL Cen­tral Scout­ing: “He has great quick­ness right out of the gate, and can cre­ate open­ings for him­self, moves the puck well and can really shoot it,” Gre­gory said. “If the goalie is going to give him a spot to shoot, he bet­ter be able to cover it up, because he’s going to be able to get the puck there. He’s really dynamic that way … com­ing through the neu­tral zone and the attack­ing zone. It’s almost like the eyes get big, and he’s going to attack the net. I think that dynamic to his game, that abil­ity to really cre­ate with speed and going hard to the net, make him a force and such an attrac­tive player.”

5. Mor­gan Rielly, D, Moose Jaw War­riors, WHL

2011-12: 18 games, 3 goals, 15 assists, 18 points, plus-6 (ACL surgery)

Com­par­i­son: Dun­can Keith

Best asset: “Skat­ing and pass­ing.”

Where do you need improve­ment: “Phys­i­cal play.”

NHL Cen­tral Scout­ing: “I’ve seen Rielly do things on the ice that nobody else was doing,” Mac­Don­ald said. “I saw him make those lit­tle passes to guys who weren’t expect­ing the puck to get there. He’s the type of player who can lead the rush and he’ll be the first guy back. I think his cre­ativ­ity makes him one of the top play­ers in the league.

“He’s like a chess player; he’s think­ing one or two moves ahead. He sees stuff com­ing that a lot of play­ers don’t see.”

1. (Europe) – Filip Fors­berg, C, Lek­sand, Sweden-2

2011-12: 43 games, 8 goals, 9 assists, 17 points, plus-3, 33 penalty min­utes

Com­par­i­son: Didn’t respond.

Best asset: “My skat­ing, speed and mobil­ity.”

Where do you need improve­ment: “The offen­sive part … I have a good shot and good skill level.”

NHL Cen­tral Scout­ing: “A leader who shows by exam­ple — I would com­pare him to Anaheim’s Corey Perry a lit­tle bit,” NHL Direc­tor of Euro­pean Scout­ing, Goran Stubb, told NHL.com. “Has a nose for the net, and often scores the big goals. He’s a cre­ative play­maker, good skater with fine straight-ahead speed. He’s a right-handed for­ward with an excel­lent shot and an effec­tive two-way player with a great win­ning atti­tude. Filip’s a solid puck car­rier with very good puck han­dling skills; mature, good size and phys­i­cally strong. On top of that, he’ll sac­ri­fice him­self to make the play.”

1. (Goalie) – Mal­colm Sub­ban, G, Belleville Bulls, OHL

2011-12: 39 games, 25–14-0, 2.50 goals-against aver­age, 3 shutouts, .923 save per­cent­age

Com­par­i­son: Marc-Andre Fleury

Best asset: “Lat­eral abil­ity, using my size and flex­i­bil­ity.”

Where do you need improve­ment: “Rebound con­trol, play­ing the puck.”

NHL Cen­tral Scout­ing: “I see Mal­colm as Carey Price,” Cen­tral Scouting’s Al Jensen said. “He’s calm and poised. I find Fleury as more of an acro­batic goalie and get­ting out there but Mal­colm is very good with his posi­tion­ing with out­stand­ing lat­eral abil­ity and quick­ness. He can make the big save to turn a game around but he cov­ers post-to-post so well with his but­ter­fly. His leg exten­sion is incred­i­ble and he has a very quick glove hand.”

Fol­low Mike Mor­reale on Twit­ter at: @mike_morreale
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