[BirdWatcher]

I'm not going to go into the same detail about this entry draft as I did the last one. I will quickly go through pick by pick for the Avalanche below with brief descriptions of the players and their potential roles on the club.
But first I'd like to discuss a bit the learning experience component of all of this for me. Basically, I don't yet have much of an idea about what reasonable expectations are regarding drafts in terms of how the NHL IRL works and how FHM works. I have a better sense of what to expect from, say, a 7th round draft pick in baseball, where there are far more draft rounds, than a 7th round pick in the NHL Entry Draft. I know what the expect from a high draft pick 18 year old in baseball (which is to say, many years of seasoning in the minor leagues with a good chance that they never live up to their potential). My sense is that most every other major team sport in North America operates in such a way that at least 1st round draft picks are expected to have some sort of impact on the team that drafted them- on their top level club- the season that follows the draft.
But how true is that of 2nd round picks, 3rd round picks, etc.? How long does the average 5th round NHL Entry Draft pick play in a minor league before being contracted by the team but also before getting a taste of the NHL? I really don't know.
And what about the FHM game engine? The draft just ended and the one before it in my save seemed very deep in talent. There were 5-star potential talent players available at least into the 4th or 5th round. This would never happen in OOTP. And it makes me think that it is likely that a large percentage of these players will never reach their perceived potential in FHM. But I don't know that for sure. (If they do, though, I have to wonder if there is going to be a talent oversaturation in my league, or if these two draft classes are abnormal, possibly having something to do with the beginning talent in a fictional save.)
At this point I should probably state that these are largely rhetorical questions. They are also questions I am gradually researching and trying to find answers to. But in terms of how FHM works, part of the fun for me is to test things by just doing.

So at this stage of the Avs development, I am going not exactly all-in on a youth movement, but close to that. We have established players, some a bit older like Brian Hughes and Sherwood Sharp, some still pretty young like Aleksandr Dugin and Michal Lezak, and some other relative veterans in roles, but the chances are very good that a number of very young players will be getting a good deal of playing time this upcoming season.

Before I go more into that though, let's actually talk about the Avs picks in the just completed draft:

1st Round pick: Our first pick, 29th overall, was Center/re James Wilson. Wilson wasn't on my radar for the draft but that was mostly because he was supposed to be long gone before we got our first pick. Wilson was expected to be drafted 2nd in the draft. And he is now not only the top ranked forward prospect but the #1 prospect overall in the NHL. Our scouts see him as already a 4-star player with 5-star potential and #1 on our depth chart at his position. How realistic is all of this? I don't know, but we'll start to find out soon. He is a 2-way forward with strong passing skills and offensive read abilities as well as strong defensive read skills and positioning. He is a team player, has great balance, and overall pretty solid physical and mental ratings. He's not the premium goalscorer we were intending to target, but we couldn't pass him up at this spot in the draft.

2nd Round pick: I was eyeing some goal-scorer/sniper types for my 2nd round pick. And then I did a silly thing. I got caught up in all of my research around the draft and in crossing names off my positional lists and didn't realize it was my turn and accidentally pushed the button to let the AI pick for me. Whoops! So our next pick was LD Joni Bjorkqvist. Not my pick, but our pick nevertheless. Which isn't to say he isn't a good player. He is now #6 on the depth chart among defencemen for the Avs. He is 2-way defenceman (of course, he's an Av), he is a strong leader (probably a future alternate captain at least), a good skater (great acceleration, good speed), excellent shot blocking and defensive read, and great shooting range.

3rd Round pick: With our 3rd pick we took the top Goalie available in Loren Sweeney. He is very durable, reportedly good under pressure, has great reflexes and handles rebounds well. He is likely our future starting Goalie. At this point he already is listed as 2nd on the depth chart after our free agency acquisition Andriy Polischuk. He isn't going to take Terry Ross' place yet and will start the season in the AHL, unlike Wilson and Bjorkqvist who will almost surely be on the active roster when the season begins.

4th Round pick: We actually had 2 4th round picks though at the moment I can't quite remember what trade we got the second one from and don't feel like looking that up right now. With the first one we took RD Mirza Begovic. The Avs don't have any top 100 prospects among defencemen but Begovic comes closest at #114. Begovic is a sturdy defensive defenceman with great stamina and defensive positioning, but is also an excellent passer and good puckhandler with great shooting range and not bad shooting accuracy. He is also considered a big-game player.
Our second 4th round pick was LW David Williams. Williams was another player who was expected to be picked much higher. In fact, he was expected to be picked in the 1st round at #22 and fell to #124. This might have something to do with concerns about his injury proneness. I don't usually like to draft the very injury prone, but this was sort of a free pick and I decided to take a chance on this very talented, two-way player. He is ranked as the #39 prospect and is 4th on our depth chart at LW. We will give him a chance to play this year and hope he can stay healthy and live up to his billing.

5th Round pick: Our next pick was LW Austin Foreman. Foreman is now 6th on our depth chart at his position and he is the first player on this list so far who has not yet been signed to a contract. We will probably let him play this coming season with his team in the QMJHL and monitor him for the future. He's a good skater, has good vision on the ice, another guy who profiles as a 2-way forward.

6th Round pick: In the 6th round we took RW Derek Bentley. Bentley is a big, durable, tough kid who profiles as an agitator, a power forward, a grinder. His puckhandling is strong, he's a team player, and he hits hard on defense. Might be a decent 4th liner eventually. We'll let him develop a bit and see how it goes.

7th Round pick: Our last pick was C Tom Ferrell. Ferrell is another power forward/grinder type. He is listed behind Nikolay Ivanov, at 6th, on our depth chart at that position. He's another guy that we aren't rushing to get on a contract, but he profiles as big-game player with NHL potential- possibly as high as 2nd or 3rd line.

This is going long so I'll discuss a few things that are related to what the draft in terms of roster moves, etc. in the next post.