CanucksArmy Monday Mailbag: The Draft, Trades and Chris Tanev

I’m sure the comments section is going to love this answer — Quinn Hughes.

There will be several defencemen available at seven. I’m assuming you want to know if there will be any worth picking in that spot, though. If Hughes, Noah Dobson or Adam Boqvist are there (preference in that order), then they’d all be worthy selections. I’d even have time for Ty Smith or Evan Bouchard, again, in that order.

A realistic goal for the Canucks would be to see underlying signs of a team that is playing good hockey, even if the results don’t follow — the latter of those two seems like a near certainty. If the Canucks of next year can resemble the Toronto Maple Leafs of the 2015-16 season, that should be considered a success. That team had excellent underlying results but lacked the requisite finishing and goaltending talent to see it bear fruit, and were rewarded in the form of an excellent draft pick and an easy turnaround.

At that point, I’d probably trade down from seven. The prospects are fairly tightly grouped at that stage, and if one can get an extra pick for the trouble of second or third pick from the litter, that’s a value-positive proposition in all likelihood.

Assuming I couldn’t find a trade for additional assets, I’d have a tough time choosing. The upside of Boqvist is tantalizing, certainly, but he’s a terrifying risky bet; Smith wouldn’t be a half-bad pick either, but I feel like that’s a player that would otherwise slide out of the top ten; Bouchard would be defensible, but his skating worries me. That leaves me with Jesperi Kotkaniemi — that’s my pick.

I would hope not. Washington Capitals defenceman John Carlson is a damn good player, and I think highly of the way he performed on their run to the Stanley Cup this post-season. The problem? Those players almost always end up with problematic contracts that inhibit their team’s ability to build a well-rounded, contending hockey team.

It’s difficult to imagine a scenario where Carlson gets anything less than $8-million annually on a long-term deal. If the team that signs him to that deal has ample cap space and realistic aspirations of contending in the short term, it can make sense. The Canucks aren’t that team. By the time they’re a threat even to make the playoffs, Carlson is going to be well outside his prime and not contributing at a level commensurate with his salary.

I’d make that trade without even a moment’s hesitation.

Yes.

Actually, though, I think that I’d say the Ottawa Senators are in an uglier spot. They’re an utter disaster on and off the ice, and they don’t have the financial backing to compensate for their legion mistakes made along the way.

That’s a good question. I think that we should be discussing Kotkaniemi as someone worth considering with the seventh overall pick, frankly. That’s right around where I have him on my draft board. Kotkaniemi’s skating could stand to improve, but otherwise, he’s got a projectable game at the NHL level. He might be the best pure centre in this year’s draft.

It’s not just attitude and off-ice concerns that are dogging Guelph Storm defenceman, Ryan Merkley. His defensive-zone play is downright awful and his effort at times is laughable. Concerning talent, Merkley is a top ten pick. It’s just not that simple though.

Everything I hear suggests that the Canucks are all-in on the best player available strategy, so I’m willing to give them the benefit of the doubt until they prove otherwise.

I’m not terribly familiar with Jordan Harris, to be quite honest. As for the Jack Rathbone comparison, we should be careful about how enthusiastic we are about that pick. He’s just finished his draft-plus-one season and has yet to play more than a handful of USHL games. It’s hard to say whether the Canucks got good value out of that pick or not at this stage.

It’s been relatively quiet of late on the Carolina Hurricanes’ front, but I suspect that will pick up as we get closer to the draft. Noah Hanifin has generated a lot of the buzz, especially in these parts, but I could see Jeff Skinner being the first player they moved.

There is so much talent in the first-half of this year’s first-round. It’s hard to find with any of the potential draftees in the seventh overall spot. I don’t think there are any apparent landmines, but there are players that I would deem a touch risky for the Canucks. I wouldn’t begrudge them if they drafted Boqvist, Bouchard or even Brady Tkachuk, but those are the three that they should probably avoid, depending on who else is available.

I wouldn’t trade Bo Horvat to the Montreal Canadiens for the third overall pick. Horvat is a proven first line centre who still has room to grow his game. Those type of players are hard to find. That is especially true of this year’s draft, where the centre talent is a little underwhelming.

It seems like those circumstances would lessen the price, but there’s more context that needs to be added to the conversation. The way I see it — the team that trades down is trading for draft picks; the team that trades up is trading for a specific player. That makes trade-up scenarios far more difficult to predict — you’re not going to care about the fourth or fifth overall pick if the player you have in mind is gone at three.

Ben Hutton probably isn’t going to move the needle in such a high-stakes trade like that, either.

If Filip Zadina, Hughes or Wahlstrom are there, I’d probably feel inclined to keep the pick. Then again, at 11 and 12, it’s possible to leave the draft with Joe Veleno and Ty Smith, and wouldn’t that be a spectacular haul?

That depends on where I’m moving up in the draft. I’d be willing to part with Sven Baertschi, for example, to move up to fourth overall if the Habs take Tkachuk, leaving Hughes or Zadina there for the taking. As for going in the opposite direction, I’d swap first round picks with the Dallas Stars (13th overall) if they included defenceman Julius Honka in the package.

Adam Boqvist. The potential for him to boom is immense. He could be the next Erik Karlsson, or something similar anyway. Or he could fan out entirely because he doesn’t play defence and has already suffered numerous head injuries.

That price seems about right for Chris Tanev. Maybe the Isles/Oilers would have to throw in another pick or prospect, but nothing ridiculous.