Ok so once again sorry about the tardiness of this post but since school is winding down my teachers are piling on the work, but it's the morning after prom and everyone else is asleep so I figured I'd write a blog post about the upcoming NHL Entry Draft in Pittsburgh. So by now any informed Jackets fan will know that the Edmonton Oilers won the Draft Lottery thus giving them the 1st overall pick instead of the Jackets, take it from a guy who was looking forward all year of us getting the #1 overall pick in the draft, this moment sucked. What made it worse was that a community of fans had come together to organize a Jackets tweetup event so CBJ fans from twitter could come together and watch the lottery live together at a Buffalo Wild Wings. I guess in the end it helped to know there were other Jackets fans feeling the same things you did astonishment, anger, just downright depressed.
But moving on I trying to look our situation optimistically think that us not getting the #1 pick may be a blessing in disguise. Why? Well it's because the team with the #1 pick'll have so much pressure on them to take Nail Yakupov btw to see what I think/thought of Nail look at my first blogpost. But back on topic. Nail Yakupov is a great and skilled player don't get me wrong, but is he the player the Jackets need? No and if you skim the internet enough you'll find some articles that say that Yakupov'd rather be a supporting player rather than a superstar that we'd need him to be. Now that works out for the Edmonton Oilers who have Taylor Hall and Ryan Nugent Hopkins to be the superstars so it gives Yakupov flexibility in if he wants to be that superstar player or not. Also if you look there are plenty of other great players right behind Nail like Filip Forsberg, Ryan Murray, and Alex Galchenyuk. But if you take a closer look at the Oilers lineup you'll see that they lack a good defensive core so if they take a defensemen like Ryan Murray 1st overall then we take Nail if they take Nail we have a plethora of great players to choose from. So I think it's kind of good that we didn't get the 1st overall pick because then we don't have that added pressure on us to take Nail and then it's a win win if they take Nail we take another great player if they don't take Nail we take Nail. So it's actually kinda nice not having the #1 pick.
Now moving on to who I think we should pick. Well in this situation I'm just assuming that the Oilers will take Yakupov 1st overall, and if they do my pick for the 2nd pick would either be Filip Forsberg or Ryan Murray. Why? Mainly because there is a consensus that they are the safest picks in the draft because Murray almost guaranteed to be an effective player in the NHL, and Forsberg has a good two-way game with a lot of offensive upside. And flat out there isn't anything that stands out as being wrong with them. They aren't Russian so people don't have to worry about that, Nail may have concussion problems, Galchenyuk may have ACL/knee problems, Grigorenko may have work ethic issues and he's Russian (not a good mix can you say next Nikita Filatov although Grigorenko is playing in the QMJHL not a Russian league), when it comes down to it Forsberg and Murray have the least risk involved in drafting them in my opinion. Granted it's been said that Forsberg needs a little more time to develop and Murray doesn't have the same offensive upside as fellow blue-line prospects Morgan Reilly, and Mathew Dumba. But when our pick comes around if we still have the 2nd pick I hope we draft Murray or Forsberg although if Nail is available I say we take him. Also IF the Kings lose this round of the playoffs and that's a big if I say we take Malcolm Subban a goaltender with that pick if he's available. I think that as long as we don't rush Subban he'll be fine and he's being compared to Carey Price and Marc-Andre Fluery already so what's not to like?
