The Official 2026 Off-Season Thread: Revenge of the Nerds

[MyNameIsJonas]

He seems like a good hire

 

[mbow30]

Oh you know he got some maga surgeon.

Wonder if he did what eichel did.

 

[zeke]

Fwiw the last 6 drafts the leafs didn't have any picks as high as those 7 minny 1sts (other than Amirov) and came out of it with Knies, Cowan, Minten, Grebenkin, Hildeby, Akhtyamov...and maybe Danford/Koblar/Johansson.

 

[zeke]

He also drafted Quinn Hughes when he was with the Canucks. And then he drafted every player that was traded for Quinn with the wild.

He also drafted pettersson, boeser, etc. But then he drafted juolevi. So there are misses too obviously!

Just a scout with vancouver tho right?

 

[zeke]

He was apparently part of the brain trust that pushed for trading for Faber as well.

That's huge tbh.

 

[Preston]

Just a scout with vancouver tho right?

Same position. He ran the draft, director

 

[Preston]

Fwiw the last 6 drafts the leafs didn't have any picks as high as those 7 minny 1sts (other than Amirov) and came out of it with Knies, Cowan, Minten, Grebenkin, Hildeby, Akhtyamov...and maybe Danford/Koblar/Johansson.

And ol' judd passed on Knies 3 times in his draft. Fwiw.

 

[Preston]

Same position. He ran the draft, director

From 2015-2020, then the wild poached him

 

[leafman101]

The drafting record in Minny and Van just seems ok. Not like Wes Clark good.

But there is a clear focus on skill and upside. Which you want from an AGM, where they have to rely on the analytics and scout teams here anyway and aren’t actually scouting themselves.

 

[zeke]

Canucks 15-19 5 drafts

#5 C Pettersson (27): 545gms, 19:02, 30gl/76pt pace
#5 D Juolevi (27): 41gms, 13:01, 4gl/6pt pace
#7 D Hughes (26): 507gms, 24:51, 11gl/78pt pace
#10 W Podkolzin (24): 301gms, 13:22, 12gl/26pt pace
#23 W Boeser (28): 629gms, 18:25, 29gl/63pt pace
#40 W Hoglander (25): 331gms, 12:47, 15gl/30pt pace
#55 W Gadjovich (27): 170gms, 8:21, 5gl/10pt pace
#139 C Gaudette (29): 367gms, 11:15, 14gl/27pt pace
#156 G Silovs (24): 58gms, .885


Seems to swing for the fences at least. Sometimes hits sometimes flops.

Wish there were more depth picks that turned into something tho.

 

[zeke]

Today's exercise reinforces my position that the Leafs drafting has been pretty dang good for a while now.

 

[Preston]

Ya and this guy has a great rep. Canucks fans miss him dearly and wild fans are thankful he stocked the cupboard enough to get them Quinn Hughes. But I don't see some huge outperformance on the Leafs since he's been director at the NHL level.

 

[MyNameIsJonas]

Today's exercise reinforces my position that the Leafs drafting has been pretty dang good for a while now.

Even Crab Dankford?

 

[zeke]

Even Crab Dankford?

The 19yr old rookie currently studding for the soon to be calder cup champs?

Yeah

 

[Preston]

View: https://x.com/ThomasDrance/status/1266433331572301824?s=20

A bit of backstory on why Judd left the nucks. I don't think he was fully getting his way there in the draft.

 

[MindzEye]

Today's exercise reinforces my position that the Leafs drafting has been pretty dang good for a while now.

We just need to stop burning picks on bums and be patient

 

[Preston]

View: https://x.com/i/status/2061110710629777918

Regardless of what you think of the dude, it feels like a nice upgrade on Treliving's guy, Clancey. Granted, for a role that is not something he has ever done. But it's a low bar.

 

[zeke]

​

View: https://x.com/ThomasDrance/status/1266433331572301824?s=20

A bit of backstory on why Judd left the nucks. I don't think he was fully getting his way there in the draft.

Good news is that the canucks drafting is hilaribad since he left.

​

 

[zeke]

We just need to stop burning picks on bums and be patient

And stop trading away good players cuz "they can't win in the playoffs".

 

[leafman101]

Chayka landing a highly respected and coveted AGM kinda dispels everything the media said about him when he was hired.