Toronto Winning the Lottery & the Media’s Shift in Reporting
Since the Leafs won the lottery, there has been a dramatic change in how the media is reporting on the draft and the prospects. I’m sure a lot of you have noticed.
Prior to last week it was McKenna at #1 for years, with Stenberg at #2 (who is no doubt having an amazing season in the SHL).*
Following those two it was a group of three or four defenseman a solid tier below (Reid, Verhoff, Carels, Smits etc. ).
And then after the groupings on D it came to Malhotra, Lawrence, and Bjork at C (all of whom were viewed to lack offensive upside).
Now that Toronto won the lottery (and a particular order of teams fell in the draft standings)? We’re hearing things we’ve never heard before about this upcoming draft.
-San Jose is going to take a defenseman and not the best player available because of a positional need. When has this recently happened at the top of NHL draft? And they’ll be dropping down a tier of talent to do so. There’s a clear cut tier 1 in this draft. I know that trading picks this high rarely happen, but surely that would be their better option, no?
-Vancouver needs a center so they’ll also be dropping down. But this time it’s two tiers! (But somehow Malhotra’s offensive upside has drastically increased over the last two weeks.)
-And that surprisingly leaves Chicago with the #2 player, Stenberg with the 4th pick (who remember, is having such an amazing season and is in consideration for the number one pick?).
Don’t believe me? This is the newest mock from The Athletic’s Corey Pronman. Funny how all of the teams in the bigger markets (Vancouver, Chicago, New York) get the players who will satisfy their fans.
And it’s not just Pronman. Every talking head has been doing this dance of somehow questioning if McKenna is the pick/should it be Stenberg, yet they turn around and find a way to mock Stenberg to Chicago. I’ve seen it from Craig Button, Wheeler, TSN, SN, ESPN, you name it.
The mental gymnastics these draft “gurus” are pulling are insane.
*Edit- I was not clear on something. I’m absolutely aware that the debate on McKenna/Stenberg goes back further than a week ago. I’m not going to just reword what I wrote because that’s disingenuous.
McKenna/Stenberg is a very real debate and has been for this whole year. It seems like a lot favor McKenna, but there are quite a few who like Stenberg. Frankly I don’t know the answer. That’s not my point.
My point is how can Stenberg be on the same level as McKenna and be pushing for the #1 overall pick, yet also be falling to the #4 spot in a ton of mock drafts? That seems like these writers and draft guys are simply trying to satisfy a big market team like Chicago (while doing something similar with Malhotra and VAN). I think that’s BS.
If Stenberg is on the same tier as McKenna (and I believe he is, Toronto faces a difficult choice) there’s no way he’s falling to #4. This isn’t the NFL; teams don’t let elite talent go in the draft to pick by positional need.