2021 NHL Draft winners and losers: Ranking every team’s first round - The Athletic

Just 289 days after we put one draft in the books, here we are for another.

After an unconventional season spent scouting these players predominantly by video, learning about them predominantly over phone calls and text exchanges with sources, hundreds of viewings and conversations, and tens of thousands of words, my coverage of the 2021 draft concludes this weekend with my complete evaluations of all 32 (that’s new!) teams’ draft classes and likely almost (almost!) all of the 224 players that will be chosen.

That starts with this breakdown of Friday’s 31 selections, offering pick-by-pick analysis of the first round.

This analysis does not evaluate any of the trades, nor the teams that didn’t pick. Instead, it will rank each of the teams that did pick based solely on their choices relative to my draft board, considering factors like organizational fit, the available players, and each prospect’s expected range.

This is also not an evaluation of the total value the teams got out of their pick(s) but rather of the relative value they mined compared to where they picked. As such, teams with higher picks, or multiple first-round picks, are not guaranteed favourable grades.

As always at The Athletic, the ranking will also be sorted into the following tiers:

Winners: Teams I believe won out over their competition with sleuth, home-run-level selections relative to where they picked.

Overtime winners: Teams I believe did well with where they were slotted, even if they might not have picked the exact player(s) I would have.

Overtime losers: Teams I believe could have done better but might, in time, be happy with their pick(s) regardless.

Losers: Teams I believe will regret taking the player(s) they chose.

Adblock test (Why?)

https://news.google.com/__i/rss/rd/articles/CBMibWh0dHBzOi8vdGhlYXRobGV0aWMuY29tLzI3MTc1OTgvMjAyMS8wNy8yNC8yMDIxLW5obC1kcmFmdC13aW5uZXJzLWFuZC1sb3NlcnMtcmFua2luZy1ldmVyeS10ZWFtcy1maXJzdC1yb3VuZC_SAXFodHRwczovL3RoZWF0aGxldGljLmNvbS8yNzE3NTk4LzIwMjEvMDcvMjQvMjAyMS1uaGwtZHJhZnQtd2lubmVycy1hbmQtbG9zZXJzLXJhbmtpbmctZXZlcnktdGVhbXMtZmlyc3Qtcm91bmQvP2FtcA?oc=5

2021-07-24 04:03:20Z
52781743485621