NHL-readiness is a tricky business. There are numerous factors to consider, including organizational depth, the physical readiness of the prospect and even the willingness of the prospect to sign a contract (or just come across the Atlantic Ocean). But with that caveat there are certainly players in every draft class who are closer to making their NHL debut than others. Today we're going to take a look at the top eight such players, and as we'll explain later in the blog, age is not as big a factor as you'd think. Experience, however, is.
The cut-off date for age-group hockey is Jan. 1. For the NHL draft it's Sept. 15 -- a player must be age 18 by Sept. 15 of the given year to be eligible for the draft. Sept. 16? No dice. Those born from Sept. 16 through December 31 are "late birthdays." They have to wait a year to be drafted.
Taylor Hall, for example, would have been a top pick in last year's draft -- the 1991 birthdays -- but he was born on Nov. 14 of that year, so he had to wait.
Now, you might not think he'd be at a significant advantage being a few months older than some kids, but if we're talking about readiness for the next level -- not about who'll be the best player five years from now, but rather who'll be best able to step into the NHL next fall -- Taylor Hall (Nov. 14, 1991) has a huge advantage over Tyler Seguin (Jan. 31, 1992).
Hall has played three years of major junior (including two Memorial Cup championships), a world under-18 tournament as an under-ager (gold), a summer U-18s (gold) and a world junior tournament (silver). Seguin has two years of major junior (getting as far as the second round of the playoffs each year) and a summer under-18s (gold). Hall has played a lot more hockey at this point than Seguin, thus the consensus among scouts is that Hall's more NHL-ready than Seguin -- not that Seguin can't step into a NHL line-up next season, just that Hall's better prepared. Effectively, he has spent a lot more time going to school.
It doesn't have to play out this way; September-born John Tavares "played up" in major junior at age 15. He had four years in the OHL compared to Matt Duchene's two, but Duchene is a finalist for the Calder Trophy that will be handed out next week. That's not a judgment on who will be the better player in the long run, but it underlines the fact that sometimes the very best players can step into the NHL with a couple of years of major junior or, in some cases, only one. Still, the more experience you have at this level, the better your chances for success.
Besides Hall and Seguin, the likely No. 1 and No. 2 picks in some order and most NHL-ready prospects in the class, the six other prospects most ready to step right in are:
Cam Fowler
Hall's teammate with the Windsor Spitfires was a late birthday with the USDT in 2008-09 and by the reckoning of most scouts he was the best prospect on the roster of a team that won the world under-18s. With a Dec. 5, 1991 birthday, he had to wait until this year's draft to go pro and squeezed in as much hockey as you possibly could over that stretch, including a turn with the U.S. team that won the world juniors. Another player who followed that development track was Patrick Kane, who stepped right into a Calder Trophy.
The blueline is a tougher proposition than playing up front but some can do it -- Drew Doughty did with L.A. two years ago and Dmitry Kulikov did it under the radar with Florida this season. Others are in that number as well. The other top blueline prospects, Kingston's Erik Gudbranson and Moncton's Brandon Gormley, have another year of major junior and some international experience as well, but Fowler has packed a lot more into the last 20 months or so.
Mikael Granlund
He's not a late birthday (Feb. 26, 1992) but Granlund is a teenager who's playing up with pros in the Finnish league. He was almost a point-per-game player there and it's not clear how much more Central Scouting's top-ranked Euro needs to prove at that level. And scouts working the under-18s said that he was old for his age -- closer to a pro than a prospect in the way he carried himself. He'd have to land with a NHL team that could find him 12 to 14 minutes a night; he doesn't seem to be big enough or have the game to play in a third line.
Vladimir Tarasenko
This is just pure theory. He isn't going to play in the NHL next season and who knows when or even if he'll end up in North America. But make no mistake, Tarasenko could come over tomorrow and step into a NHL line-up. He's a late-birthday (Dec. 13, 1991), so he played in the 2009 under-18s and then played for Novosibirsk in the KHL, putting up 13 goals and 11 assists in 42 games in a low-scoring league. The great fear for bringing in kids straight out of the draft is injury -- even big guys like Ilya Kovalchuk and Rick Nash suffered injuries playing at 18. That wouldn't be a worry with Tarasenko. At the combine he showed he already has a pro body; at 5-foot-11 and over 200 lean pounds, he's a bowling ball, more likely to inflict damage than take it. But again, it's theory. It could happen if the stars lined up, but they're not going to.
Austin Watson
Unlike Granlund, Watson is made to measure for third- and fourth-line duty while doing his apprenticehip. He's big enough (6-foot-3 and 190 pounds) and game enough to throw out on the wing and go to school on the pro game. Other Peterborough juniors who made that step up: Eric Staal, Jordan Staal and Zach Bogosian.
Nino Niederreiter
The big Swiss winger with the Portland Winter Hawks is the farthest thing from the late-birthdays who have advantages going into this draft. In fact, if he had born a bit more than a week later, he would be eligible for next year's draft. Still, some high draft choices have gone to their first NHL training camps right after their 18th birthdays and left major junior behind: Patrick Marleau and Jordan Staal come to mind. Niederreiter had a great world juniors and despite a very ordinary combine he physically seems up to the challenge. Again, like with Granlund it would come down to fit.
Justin Shugg
Every once and a while someone breaks out of the second round to a spot in a NHL roster straight out of the draft. Patrice Bergeron is a notable case. Ryan O'Reilly did it last year with Colorado. My best candidate for this is the LW Shugg, another kid with the Windsor Spitfires, a late birthday (Dec. 24, 1991) who has played a ton of hockey over the past three years and racked up 39 goals and 40 assists in 67 regular-season games in 2009-10. He was great for Windsor in the '09 Memorial Cup; you could have made a compelling case that he and not Hall deserved the MVP award in that tournament. Shugg is the 53rd-ranked North American skater, according to Central Scouting. Windsor is the closest thing to a pro team and Shugg's numbers are pretty impressive when you consider he was a second-line player.
Gladwell misses the mark ... to a degree
You've probably read the terms "early birthday" and "late birthday" thrown around in this blog a bit. A couple of years back, Malcolm Gladwell came out with a book, "The Outliers," which looked at the hidden advantages enabling many folks to succeed and unseen handicaps that held others back. Within the book, he cited a Canadian study by psychologist Roger Barnsley that showed players born in the first three months of a calendar year hold an advantage over those born later in the year and that a far greater number of players are born in January and February rather than in June and July.
Barnsley tagged this phenomenon as "relative age" and he and Gladwell put it down to the fact that Jan. 1 is the cut-off date for age-group hockey in this country [Canada]. (The same is true throughout Scandinavia and Eastern Europe.) Those who aren't born near the start of the year are presumed to be at a competitive disadvantage when they're starting out in hockey due to different rates of physical development.
There's a couple of things wrong with this theory. For one thing, whether they're age 8, 10 or 12 -- the ages when the advantages of "relative age" should be predominant -- the very best kids aren't playing against others in their birth year; rather, they're "playing up" a year or two. That's true if they were born in January or, like Sidney Crosby, in August. The thinking behind 'playing up' is that the very best young players need not to dominate they're peers but be challenge by better players and try to catch up.
The stars don't usually conform to the rule. As I noted, Crosby was born in August, Alex Ovechkin in September, Evgeni Malkin on July 31 and Drew Doughty in December. This year's Stanley Cup-winning goal was scored by November-born Patrick Kane. Last year's top two picks in the draft, John Tavares and Victor Hedman, were born in September and December, respectively. Yeah, Gretzky was born in January but Lemieux was October. Long story short, those born in January have some advantages along the way to making it to the pros, but a lot of others who go on to be stars do it despite the disadvantage of late birthdays. (Or maybe because of them.)