Anaheim Ducks 2015 Draft Strategy Part Two
The Ducks will enjoy four picks between the third and seventh rounds on Saturday. Here’s what to expect.
After the Anaheim Ducks use the 27th pick in the 2015 NHL Entry Draft Friday night, the team will have a lot of time to consider what it is going to do with its next pick.
That’s because the Ducks do not currently own a pick in the second round. Instead, the Ducks own the 80th, 84th, 148th and 178th pick in this year’s draft.
Translation: don’t look for many of the players that Anaheim drafts this season to make it into the NHL in this lifetime.
Sure, the Ducks are thin down the middle, and could be in even worse shape next summer if they cannot find a way to re-sign Ryan Kesler. Because of that, I wouldn’t be surprised to see the Ducks draft a center with the 27th pick, but if Anaheim goes with a winger instead, don’t look for a second or even third-line center to come out of the team’s 80th or 84th pick.
Instead of using the 80th pick on a center destined to spend his career in the minors, then, I would like to see the Anaheim Ducks go after a goaltender. I’m still not convinced that the Ducks have the sort of goaltender who can steal a series in either Frederik Andersen of John Gibson, and say what you want to about Corey Crawford, but the man has lifted the Cup three times. Crawford may have been shaky early in the most recent playoffs, but he got better as Chicago’s run went on and deserves a ton of credit for his team’s success.
Goaltending was a major question mark heading into the playoffs, and while Andersen played great against Winnipeg and Calgary, he hit a wall in the Western Conference Finals, giving up 19 goals in the final four games. Looking back on Anaheim’s run, it’s pretty obvious that the Jets and Flames were never true threats to the Ducks, which helped Andersen look to be a bit better than he really was.
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Meanwhile, Gibson battled injuries last season and barely saw any ice time. It will be interesting to see how the duo of Andersen and Gibson play together in 2015-2016 . . . but I would prefer to see Anaheim have a top ten goalie in between the pipes, rather than two top thirty players.
Both Andersen and Gibson are still young, of course, and either one of them could become that top ten goalie. Even so, there are a handful of exciting young netminders in this year’s draft, and with no pick in the fourth round, Anaheim would be wise to swoop in and grab a goalie in the third round. Should Daniel Vladar, Ilya Samsonov, or MacKenzie Blackwood still be on the board when the Ducks draft 80th, I would love to see Anaheim pick up one of these guys. All three are a combination of size (Samsonov is the shortest at 6’3″) and athleticism, and since all of them could conceivably go in the second round, the Ducks should not pass on either of these players if they are still up for grabs.
Overall, I expect Anaheim to draft a little bit of this and a little bit of that once the third round of the 2015 NHL Entry Draft begins. Since the Ducks are solid in every department right now, the team has the luxury of stockpiling players at every position with the hopes that one of them is a sleeper. Even so, Anaheim would be wise to jump on one of the best five goaltenders in this year’s draft should any of them still be on the board.