A brief wrap-up tonight. Eleven teams had two picks today, Paris had one and the other 12 teams could only watch. Some might have also caught some of that secondary draft that was going on in Pittsburgh. The draft is to the point where most teams have their top two forward lines and top two…
By Volker Vollpfosten After being named the GM of Berlin, Winfling set the strategy to draft young and hungry players with attractive contracts. But the owner of the Berlin Smurfs, a guy who looks like Papa Smurf or Santa Claus and has the characteristics of Al Davis and Jerry Jones thought otherwise and blindsided Winfling…
By Sergei P When Sergei Pevtzov heard for the first time about a crazy idea to create an European league he thought it will never happened. Seriously who could imagine NHL super-stars playing over-seas? Luongo in Copenhagen? Weber is Oslo? Stamkos in Madrid? Give me a break! The next time he was contacted it was…
Bratislava and Minsk each picked up three players today thanks to previous trades. If Bratislava’s draft strategy seems like an incoherent mixed bag … well it is. GM Chuck Massaro said his plan never really got off the ground. It was too heavy. “I tried to do too much. I wanted to keep my salaries…
Prospects were very popular today. Eight of 31 picks made today were players who have promising careers but, according to Websim rules, not a game of experience yet. Paris and Bern each picked two prospects in the 15thround, Paris claiming Ryan Ellis and Jaden Schwartz, and Bern securing Evgeni Kuznetsov and Mika Zibanejad. If Kuznetsov…
Today’s draft picks were the usual: really astute picking by a really good group of GMs. No real trends, no run on one position or type of player, just really good picking. It’s likely that every time a player’s name was announced, a half-dozen or more GMs went “Oh, I looked at him. He was…
Today’s big trade (see most recent post, “Trade sends Ovechkin home”) changes the complexion of the Moscow Dynamo team pretty quickly. The athletic Ovechkin will surely find himself skating with creative center Anze Kopitar, but it will be interesting to see who GM Ezec puts on the right side with them. Right now, his…
The long-rumored trade of Dublin’s top draft pick, left winger Alexander Ovechkin, became reality this afternoon when the Fighting Irish sent Ovie and a 2014 first round pick to Moscow in exchange for two 24-year-old U.S.-born forwards, Phil Kessel and Bobby Ryan. The Dynamo take on Ovechkin’s five-year, $9 million salary. Kessel, a right wing, …
Milan narrowly missed a computer pick, beating the buzzer on the last pick of Round 12 by less than 15 minutes. But everything turned out fine for GM jkellyAT, as he scooped up a pair of 29-year-old forwards in quick succession. Pest Steve Ott will now wreak havoc along the left wing in Milan, while…
Here are a few highlights from today. The best player chosen today in the draft was taken … well by force. Gothenburg missed the pick and had the computer pick high-priced center Vincent Lecavalier. On the plus side, Vinny is a finesse player with stamina and will rack up points with the best of them,…
