Silver Nuggets: Madness on Draft Day
The day is finally here. A day of optimism and potential and all kinds of excitement. Trade deadline day has become a bust, with too many teams still in the hunt (or more correctly- more teams BELIEVING they are in the hunt) in February. Free agent day always makes fans feel uneasy as they watch stupid amounts of money given to players who should be making a lot less.
But draft day, now there is a day for all hockey fans (except for Leafs fans the last couple years). It is a day of wild blockbuster trades, plenty of movement with picks and the end of the day results in your favourite team at the very least adding bright eyed, excited prospects to their stable, players who could be making a serious impact in the coming years.
What will our very own Bryan Murray do today? He has been a rockstar when it comes to the draft ever since he was moved from coach to GM, and I expect the end of June is his favourite time of year. Together with nephew Tim Murray and Pierre Dorian, the Senators have put together a great staff to ensure draft day is a success year in and year out for the Senators. Will we see Murray grab one of the many defencemen available in the first round? Will he move up? Will he move down? Will he draft goalie Malcolm Subban? Will both Ben Bishop and Robin Lehner still be Sens at the end of today? Will Rick Nash be a Senator? Questions and excitement are both to be found by the barrel full. And that's just for Sens fans.
When you look at the rest of the league, will we see strong young players like Bobby Ryan and Jordan Staal move? Will Roberto Luongo have a new home by tomorrow?
Certainly an exciting day, and I hope you all enjoy it, I know I will. For me, I'd like to see the Sens draft Hampus Lindholm or Cody Ceci or perhaps Matt Finn. Are there any players you REALLY want to see? What about some you don't?
Links after the jump.
Sens Links
- UFA dossier on divisive Senator Zenon Konopka, written by our very own Mark Parisi. With the new rule about not winning face-offs with your hands, I will honestly be interested to see how that affects Zenon's career- there is no one in the league half as good as him at it. [SSS]
- In case you missed it, fan-post-news-breaker-extraordinaire B_T hooked the community up with the Senators regular season schedule. He broke it down nicely too, check it out! [SSS]
- Sens official site with some last words from Pierre Dorian before the draft. But mostly I linked this here because of the new background on the Senators site, Alfie and his Clancy on one side, Erik and his Norris on the other. So sweet. [Sens]
- Here is the Sun breaking down 5 possible defencemen available around where the Sens will be picking. The Sens are thin on the blue line, and could really use a stud d-prospect. [Sun]
- An extremely well written article by Wayne Scanlan about how the Senators brass (and the rest of the league) have fallen in love with Swedish players. He also reminds us that ten years ago, it was Czech and Slovak players, now, it is the era of the Swede. [Scanlan]
- Tim Murray plays cut throat with some of the defensive prospects in the system, namely Eric Gryba and Patrick Wiercioch and tells them the heat is on. Also guarantees the picking of a goalie this weekend, at some point. [SensExtra]
- Lastly, Allen Panzeri puts together a very subjective list of the Top Ten draft picks from the organizations first 20 years. Mostly I linked this one for the bitchin' picture of Alfie in those shades, but I am genuinely curious to see how you guys take the list. What would yours look like? [Panzeri]
Hope everyone has an excellent weekend and that the Draft Gods guide our scouts. Go Sens!