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

MindzEye said:
Is someone gonna tell Larkin that Detroit isn't actually in Canada?
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Im sure this started with fuck Steve Yzerman and his everlasting coward rebuild that involves some of the worst FA signings in recent memory and evolved into im a special snowflake Maga bitch and want to play with my fwends.
 
MindzEye said:
Smartest guy they asked:

“People are overthinking this one,” said a scouting director. “His scoring track record is special. His offensive brain and stick are special. He rips up the WHL for years and then rips up college hockey and was a top scorer at the World Juniors.”

Galaxy braining is so fucking endemic in NHL front offices that they can't even recognize special talent anymore. They're worried about his "profile" when the consensus #2 is also a small winger who is notably less skilled than McKenna.
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I keep beliving this ultimately is our shmuck insurance:

The issue is his profile isn’t amazing, and there are guys who are close to him. But if you don’t take him and he becomes what some think he can, you look like an idiot.

You just can't risk ending up being the dummy that doesn't take him.
 
Isn't it an accurate statement to say that McKenna has been better than everyone his age at every level he's ever played at?

WHL, NCAA, WJC?
 
LeafOfFaith said:
Isn't it an accurate statement to say that McKenna has been better than everyone his age at every level he's ever played at?

WHL, NCAA, WJC?
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No. There's some context involved in the NCAA. He had a...pedestrian...1st half of the season for a generational prospect from a counting stat standpoint which impacts the overall picture. There's been some work done by people who track NCAA hockey on what his chance generation and on ice shooting percentages were during that stretch and he was a combination of a historic level chance generator, and cosmically unlucky in the 1st half (the work I've seen suggests that he was sitting at about a 5% on ice shooting percentage, when a typical number is around 11%...as in, for every 9 shots taken when a player is on the ice, 1 goes in. McKenna was 20 to 1 in the 1st half...so fewer goals to accrue points on). But that all regressed in the 2nd half where his chance generation went fucking nuclear, and his point generation in the 2nd half, if extrapolated over the entire season would he as good as any freshman ever.

For the WHL, yes, depending on how you slice age groups, McKenna was historic. Include the OHL and the only 16 yr old better was Gretzky. The only 17 yr olds better than McKenna's 16 yr old WHL season are McDavid and Lindros. The Q doesn't count imo, but only Crosby is the only one worth adding to the conversation.
 
It's on a different scale, but I'm seeing a lot of similar complaints that people had about Nylander. Granted, they all turned out to be true, but they also kind of don't really matter.
 
Volcanologist said:
if McKenna had simply stayed in juniors there would be no conversation whatsoever about who goes 1st overall. slam dunk.
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Yep. There would have been no adjustment period to playing with young men instead of boys, no 1st half slump, etc. When he got a chance to take a step back and steamroll competition that was his age at the juniors, his mojo was back immediately and he went full superstar again.
 
MindzEye said:
No. There's some context involved in the NCAA. He had a...pedestrian...1st half of the season for a generational prospect from a counting stat standpoint which impacts the overall picture. There's been some work done by people who track NCAA hockey on what his chance generation and on ice shooting percentages were during that stretch and he was a combination of a historic level chance generator, and cosmically unlucky in the 1st half (the work I've seen suggests that he was sitting at about a 5% on ice shooting percentage, when a typical number is around 11%...as in, for every 9 shots taken when a player is on the ice, 1 goes in. McKenna was 20 to 1 in the 1st half...so fewer goals to accrue points on). But that all regressed in the 2nd half where his chance generation went fucking nuclear, and his point generation in the 2nd half, if extrapolated over the entire season would he as good as any freshman ever.

For the WHL, yes, depending on how you slice age groups, McKenna was historic. Include the OHL and the only 16 yr old better was Gretzky. The only 17 yr olds better than McKenna's 16 yr old WHL season are McDavid and Lindros. The Q doesn't count imo, but only Crosby is the only one worth adding to the conversation.
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It's just such a no-brainer.

Thankfully our GM isn't one anymore, and the new one with a brain seems pretty set on making the right pick with McKenna.
 
Preston said:
It's on a different scale, but I'm seeing a lot of similar complaints that people had about Nylander. Granted, they all turned out to be true, but they also kind of don't really matter.
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Willy is one of the best Leafs ever, and fuck the nonchalant stuff because if anything it makes him more suited for this market.
 
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