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Habs Season Thread: 2024-25 Regular Season

GGpX said:
He wasn't a project. He wasn't even a real prospect at the time.

Name me the long list of 6'4 d-men with 3 points in their 18 year old season that got drafted. They don't get drafted unless they're giraffes, end of story.

Xhekaj's name wasn't mentioned anywhere or by anyone in either of his first two draft eligible seasons. It's not like he was a divisive prospect or a keep-your-eye-on-him type of prospect, he wasn't.

There are players that get bypassed all the time. There are 19 & sometimes 20 year old players that get drafted in the 3rd/4th round every year. Xhekaj's one of those players.
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Doesnt matter , its your scouts and connections who look around for talent and or players who might project down the road

Habs drafted Volokhin and Konyushkov who were not on any list except the military because they see something in them

All I am saying is WIFI is huge , good skater , physical and have no issue using a 7th round gamble on him

Just like I would draft goalie every year in the later rounds
 
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GEEMAN said:
Doesnt matter , its your scouts and connections who look around for talent and or players who might project down the road

Habs drafted Volokhin and Konyushkov who were not on any list except the military because they see something in them

All I am saying is WIFI is huge , good skater , physical and have no issue using a 7th round gamble on him

Just like I would draft goalie every year in the later rounds
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Well in retrospect Xhekaj being Xhekaj could have precipitated the Habs picking those Russian D trying to hit yet again. It's what regimes do when they are successful once. They think they can find a herd of unicorns.

They won't. That's why they're unicorns. The incredible progression from D+1 (age 19) to now is not normal.

Although I wouldn't trade him yet I can bet easily that there's teams out there that would trade for Xhekaj.
 
Habsy said:
Well in retrospect Xhekaj being Xhekaj could have precipitated the Habs picking those Russian D trying to hit yet again. It's what regimes do when they are successful once. They think they can find a herd of unicorns.

They won't. That's why they're unicorns. The incredible progression from D+1 (age 19) to now is not normal.

Although I wouldn't trade him yet I can bet easily that there's teams out there that would trade for Xhekaj.
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Yup , Habs got one of those one freaks who broke the norm

Only takes 1 team to overpay and Hugo loves those deals
 
GEEMAN said:
Doesnt matter , its your scouts and connections who look around for talent and or players who might project down the road

Habs drafted Volokhin and Konyushkov who were not on any list except the military because they see something in them

All I am saying is WIFI is huge , good skater , physical and have no issue using a 7th round gamble on him

Just like I would draft goalie every year in the later rounds
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One was a prototypical goalie size-wise with a .930 save % in a weak Russian league, while the other was a 20 year old playing first pairing minutes in (arguably) the second best league in the world. While many might disagree whether they were worth drafting or what their future outlook might be, I can point to at least one thing that could be worth taking a flyer on.

How you describe Xhekaj is what you see as the current product, not what he was in Junior. Xhekaj was a depth d-man at 18 who had one point in 5 months. Asking, Why didn't anyone take a flyer on him??? is basically telling on yourself because the CHL is full of players like Xhekaj at 18. Give me 10 minutes and I'll find you a dozen of players who are exactly like Xhekaj at 18 years old: Big with no attributes. My opinion on big players: Their size should be seen as a compliment. Were they not giants, what hockey skills do they have? Xhekaj had nothing. "They should have known!" Bullshit. Why didn't anyone know Tanner Pearson was going to be a long-term NHLer and he only got drafted in his third attempt late in the first? Because teams "should have known"? Get real.

It's completely unnormal that a player who was a 6G-11A-17PTS defenseman at 19-20 years old in the Junior level is almost a PPG defenseman in the AHL at 22. It makes no sense whatsoever.
 
Obviously tools matter. If teams just looked at junior stats, they wouldn't need a scouting staff.

Scouts get paid to uncover the occasional hidden gem. A lot of that involves projecting a future development that hasn't been captured by the numbers yet.

But, yeah, it's the rare exception...but the allure of sports is that the unexpected happens.
 
CH1 said:
Obviously tools matter. If teams just looked at junior stats, they wouldn't need a scouting staff.

Scouts get paid to uncover the occasional hidden gem. A lot of that involves projecting a future development that hasn't been captured by the numbers yet.

But, yeah, it's the rare exception...but the allure of sports is that the unexpected happens.
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Well...................................................................................................

There once was the Dave Nonis Vs a Potato experiment, where the potato grossly outperformed Dave Nonis by selecting only CHL forwards with the highest point totals. Also grossly outperformed Dave Nonis in free agency.

Don't under-estimate the hockey community and their neanderthal thinking.
 
GGpX said:
One was a prototypical goalie size-wise with a .930 save % in a weak Russian league, while the other was a 20 year old playing first pairing minutes in (arguably) the second best league in the world. While many might disagree whether they were worth drafting or what their future outlook might be, I can point to at least one thing that could be worth taking a flyer on.

How you describe Xhekaj is what you see as the current product, not what he was in Junior. Xhekaj was a depth d-man at 18 who had one point in 5 months. Asking, Why didn't anyone take a flyer on him??? is basically telling on yourself because the CHL is full of players like Xhekaj at 18. Give me 10 minutes and I'll find you a dozen of players who are exactly like Xhekaj at 18 years old: Big with no attributes. My opinion on big players: Their size should be seen as a compliment. Were they not giants, what hockey skills do they have? Xhekaj had nothing. "They should have known!" Bullshit. Why didn't anyone know Tanner Pearson was going to be a long-term NHLer and he only got drafted in his third attempt late in the first? Because teams "should have known"? Get real.

It's completely unnormal that a player who was a 6G-11A-17PTS defenseman at 19-20 years old in the Junior level is almost a PPG defenseman in the AHL at 22. It makes no sense whatsoever.
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I agree but in a 7 round draft taking a flyer makes sense and there is no risk in later rounds

The odds are slim to none that pick ever sniffs the NHL but I will take the monster with size and some skill at any position over some finesse shorty
player whose odds are totally zero .

His brother though made no sense in the fourth round
 
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GGpX said:
Well...................................................................................................

There once was the Dave Nonis Vs a Potato experiment, where the potato grossly outperformed Dave Nonis by selecting only CHL forwards with the highest point totals. Also grossly outperformed Dave Nonis in free agency.

Don't under-estimate the hockey community and their neanderthal thinking.
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for sure.

the same thing happens in investing (at least for the last several decades)

just buying shares in SPY every month has outperformed 99% of licensed and paid money mangers
 
I don't understand why this is so hard to grasp.

In the upcoming draft, there's literally - no exaggeration - 50 players with the exact body type and attributes that Xhekaj had when he was 18. There was, again, no exaggeration, 50 players in last year's draft that were Xhekaj.

6'4"+ defensemen who are depth d-men and put up almost no points - 3 points!!! - in their draft year never get drafted.

Every year, I can find you a Johnnie Lipstick out of the WHL's Kamloops Blazers who's 6'3" / 6'4" 210lbs who played 61 games and got 5 total points.

You know how often those players get drafted? Almost fucking never. You know how often those almost-fucking-never players actually play a single game in the NHL? The square root of almost-fucking-never.

If you're so confident in one of them, don't waste a draft pick. Invite them to your development camp and sign them to an ELC, free asset.

...which is what we did with Xhekaj.

Xhekaj is a unicorn. I think he can be at the very least a bottom pairing d-man with unusual toughness for the modern NHL game. Using him as a comparable for others players is illogical.
 
Habsy is right

People return to the well that was good to them the first time
 
GGpX said:
I don't understand why this is so hard to grasp.

In the upcoming draft, there's literally - no exaggeration - 50 players with the exact body type and attributes that Xhekaj had when he was 18. There was, again, no exaggeration, 50 players in last year's draft that were Xhekaj.

6'4"+ defensemen who are depth d-men and put up almost no points - 3 points!!! - in their draft year never get drafted.

Every year, I can find you a Johnnie Lipstick out of the WHL's Kamloops Blazers who's 6'3" / 6'4" 210lbs who played 61 games and got 5 total points.

You know how often those players get drafted? Almost fucking never. You know how often those almost-fucking-never players actually play a single game in the NHL? The square root of almost-fucking-never.

If you're so confident in one of them, don't waste a draft pick. Invite them to your development camp and sign them to an ELC, free asset.

...which is what we did with Xhekaj.

Xhekaj is a unicorn. I think he can be at the very least a bottom pairing d-man with unusual toughness for the modern NHL game. Using him as a comparable for others players is illogical.
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Yep. Habs actually had them on their draft lists for 2 years before inviting him to camp, but they 1) felt he would fall through the draft 2) had likely better prospects to waste draft picks on.
 
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