FN Draft Coverage Primer

For the longest time, the NHL Entry Draft was the only
event Calgary Flames fans had circled on their calendar and anticipated restlessly. The team
was generally bad, and up until a few years ago the management was bad too. Basically
everything was bad.

Ah, but every June we would huddle around our TVs and pray
our local hockey heroes would land the next big thing at the National Hockey
League’s yearly talent raffle.

We sipped from the glass of euphoria when the Flames drafted
Sven Baertschi – the second coming of Jesus Christ, Jay Feaster promised – and
rewound our PVRs multiple times the year following because it sounded a lot
like Feaster said “Jankowski”, but who the hell is that?

Then the real sucking began and we experienced back-to-back
drafts where the fruit of the Flames’ terribleness was all but decided at the
Draft lottery. In 2013, it was between Aleksander Barkov, Elias Lindholm and
Sean Monahan, while in 2014 it was between Sam Reinhart, Leon Draisaitl and Sam
Bennett.

There was little guesswork and we all came away pleased with
the results, and that no “-owski’s” made an appearance.

This year was also supposed to be clear: if not Connor
McDavid or Jack Eichel, then Noah Hanifin or Dylan Strome. The only problem is,
the actual hockey team wasn’t on the same wavelength as us and went to win far
too many games to qualify for a chance to draft the aforementioned wunderkinds.
I can’t speak for everyone, but I personally didn’t mind the way this season went.

So now, with an incredible year behind us, we look forward
to the 2015 edition of the National Hockey League’s Junior Entry Draft with a far muddier idea of what the
Flames will emerge with. The 1st round pick sits 15th –
smack dab in the middle of the first round, and also the highest possible draft
pick among playoff teams – and there are countless possibilities of how it could
play out. The draft itself is most unpredictable, and every year we are met
with surprises that settle into unforeseen results. 

This will be my second official year heading up our draft
coverage here at Flames Nation, and while last year was very successful, we
want to make it bigger and better this time around.

The “NHL Draft Scout Series”(ex: WHL edition found here)
made its debut last year and will be back again this year to break down not
only who the Flames might take in the first round, but also with their five 2nd
and 3rd rounders and anything else you need to know from every
prospect producing league in the world. 

We’ll be profiling possible targets with the 15th
overall pick and also discuss further as to what might be done with their
wealth of picks in the 2nd and 3rd rounds. It’s a
tremendously deep draft – not unlike 2013 – and those 2nd round
picks will be steaming hot commodity on June 27th, with 1st
round caliber talent sure to be still kicking around. 

We’re six weeks away from the most important draft in Flames
history since the last one (seems like each draft is the most important in
every teams history), and we’ll be gearing you up better than ever to yell at
the TV screen when Brad Treliving doesn’t pick any of the guys we profiled and we
just can’t understand why. It really is exciting stuff.

Seems like everything concerning this team nowadays is exciting. 

If there’s anything in particular you’d like to see from our coverage this year, be sure to leave a comment below.