
By Bob Trask – Mock drafts are appearing with increasing frequency as July 7th approaches. Some limit themselves to the first round, others predict the first two rounds while only a few are bold enough to include all seven rounds of the draft.
One challenge with putting together a draft list for your favourite team is that so many of your choices depend upon what other teams pick. Another challenge is deciding on whose rankings to trust. Do you use those of Bob McKenzie, Craig Button or one of the multitude of draft ranking services?
Methodology
For the purposes of this draft, I used Future Considerations mock draft tool.
In the first draft, FC picked the players for all teams but Montreal and I chose the players for the Canadiens from those available. In some cases I chose players not on FC’s list but who were available at the time.
In the second draft, I chose the players for the Colorado Avalanche selecting the highest ranked player available at the time. FC chose the players for all other teams including Montreal. The reason I adopted this approach was because Colorado was the lowest ranked team in each round and had only four picks in the draft. In other words, my choices for Colorado would have the least impact on the choices available for FC.
The Results
The results represent the picks for the Montreal Canadiens using two different approaches. Only two players appeare on both lists – Shane Wright and Vincent Rohrer – and it illustrates the futility in trying to predict the choices made by your team in the upcoming draft.
Draft day trades will also impact where the picks for various teams will fall and could impact who is availalble to the Canadiens when their name is called even if they aren’t the team involved in the trade.
ROUND | PICK # | MY PICKS | FC PICKS |
---|---|---|---|
Round 1 | 1 | Shane Wright | Shane Wright |
26 | Tristan Luneau | Filip Bystedt | |
Round 2 | 33 | Jimmy Snuggerud | Elias Salomonsson |
62 | Ludwig Persson | Mattias Havelid | |
Round 3 | 66 | Noah Warren | Cole Knuble |
75 | Vincent Rohrer | Aleksanteri Kaskimaki | |
92 | Danny Zhilikin | Vincent Rohrer | |
Round 4 | 98 | Logan Morrison | Jake Livanavage |
127 | Ryan Greene | Nick Baer | |
128 | Topi Ronni | Willaim Rosenfors | |
Round 5 | 130 | Connor Kurth | Victor Smeds |
Round 6 | 162 | Daniil Ivanov | Kasper Lundell |
Round 7 | 194 | Ian Blomquist | Sebastian Aarsund |
216 | David Spacek | Dmitri Ivanov |
Conclusion
This is not meant to be a mock draft but simply an illustration of how the actual picks can and probably will vary from our own personal choices. Have fun making your own predictions and don’t be shocked if none of your preferred players is chosen.
More reading…
- “More Than 10 Teams Consider Slafkovsky As Their 1st Pick” by JD Lagrange
- Kent Hughes Provides Insights On The Draft by JD Lagrange
- NHL Draft: Habs Fanbase Set-Up for Disappointment by JD Lagrange
Good point. Since even the first pick is not really known the exercise could be even more futile.