TSN now projecting Bowen Byram at #3.. I'd feel a lot better about this if the Hawks hadn't drafted defensemen the last two years.
https://www.tsn.ca/bowen-...-mock-draft-2-0-1.1296083
What do y'all think? Tyler? Wiz?
- Q-stache
I think you can easily
past Button statements:
Button: Could see Kaliyev crack the top ten in the draft.
3. Philip Broberg, D: The best defenceman available for the 2019 draft.
he once had Cozens at #2:Whitehorse, Yukon native Dylan Cozens sits at No. 2 on our first list of the season. The 6-foot-3, 181-pound Lethbridge Hurricanes centre is a rare five-tool prospect who had 22 goals and 53 points in 57 games in his first WHL season. Cozens’ skating, hands, hockey sense, physicality and engine allow him to impact the game over every square inch of ice.
Kaapo Kakko at 4
(Are you
starting to see a guy waving the Canada prospects flag, maybe?)
Sure during the course of the year, you move guys back and forth, but I think Craig Button likes to be read and appreciated and if you stick to your guns and be consistent, you are a real scout.
Now he says Caufield is gone by FIVE, but safely assigns him to Edmonton at 8.
also remember Caufileld who was not on any early Button lists early in the fall because he didn't start the more than 15 players lists until much much later...my point is I really don't think any team is going to. radically change what they thought about ANY 2019 possible first rounder
based on one tournament.
But I guess I will attempt to answer this Byram Bowen question one more time:
If Kelley and the consortium think that Bowen is vastly better than the defenders they have taken in the last couple, and that it is NOT to their advantage to capitalize on picking three and finally getting a possible top two centre (and maybe big one at that), that is what they will do.
but, I HAVE TO WONDER IF THEY AMONGS THEMMSELVES, SAY, "..well what are we gonna do with the other push the pace defender Boqvist, and the possible two-way quick stick defenders in Beaudin and Mitchell?We can ask Boqvist to learn to play wing..."
Do we draft Bowen and use them as sweeteners to fill an immediate need? (there might be a market at the trade deadline for a kid and PART of a deal but they are not plug N play NHL defenders or even minor pro defenders yet
You saw in the 2018 draft both Jesperi Kotkaniemi and Barrett Hayton bigger kids taken in a weak centre year, and this a great centre almost gets them the 2nd pick of the litter if like me you consider Kaapo Kakko a wing exclusively.
Do wait to fill the big centre need that is seemed they were going to fill last season, had the habs not taken Kotkaniemi and the Hawks did? They were liking him a lot at lunch when the took him out...
but back to Bowen.
He is not 6 2 he is more Doug Wilson size - could he play with more bang? maybe
His feet are just so good, and playing in the Dub, he certainly looks like a one man offensive dynamo on those Dub goalies...quick,
who was the last Dub goalie draft and now holding down an NHL crease as a #1?
I just came right out and said Bowen has no hockey sense but I didn't mean when he was attacking or reading the attack zone,
but his speed has allowed him compensate for his what in my humble opinion looks like
a large lack in defensive zone sense, and so you take the good with the bad? You try and make him hockey smarter? Sure, it might could happen, but you are watching the playoffs like me and are the high powered push defenders in down low as much as the season?
So how do you gauge upside on a Canadien kid at a position we are viewers / evaluators are just starting to understand and appreciate?
Does our answer come from how well
Cole Makar looks in his defensive end in the next series?
(Of subject but I thought the top 4 in Carolina were simply excellent as thumpers in their end, but also as transition breakout guys, all series and where solid on the point with keeping sticks in not getting caught. and making a huge impact.
