Toronto Maple Leafs Do Exactly What We Should Have Expected

In the end, the Toronto Maple Leafs kept their pick.

If you were watching live, you know that the Toronto Maple Leafs almost traded it.  Each team was given five minutes, and when the Leafs five minutes were up, the camera cut to Mitch Marner to announce the pick.

Marner himself seemed unsure if the team was going to call a timeout and make a move, but in the end he just announced the team’s draft pick.

The Leafs selected Rodion Amirov out of Russia,

Toronto Maple Leafs and the Draft

Clearly, the Leafs did the right thing and kept all their options open until the last few minutes.  One suspects that had Amirov been taken before they picked, that they would have traded down, or out.

Some have complained that the Leafs should have traded down because no rankings had Amirov ranked so highly, but a) you don’t know he’ll be there, b) you don’t know who the next player they liked is, or how much they liked him or c) you don’t know which teams would move down.

In the time Kyle Dubas has been here, he’s gained a reputation for shrewd drafting (Sandin, Robertson)  and for moving down in the draft (Dermott, Sandin).  So to my mind, there is no reason to think he made a mistake here in not moving the pick.

The Leafs need to keep a pipeline of prospects in order to compete over a long time, and if a trade comes along, they can always move next year’s pick if they have to.  In fact, since teams seem to underrate the Leafs based on results (the stats tell an opposite story) the unknown factor of next year’s pick might make it more valuable.

Anyways, on to Amirov.

Rodion Amirov

Before last night, I had never heard of Rodion Amirov.  After reading extensively about him, I like what I heard.

It was almost cute watching Sportsnet’s coverage, as their panel seemed pretty confident that Kyle Dubas had seen the light when it comes to team building  due to some placating comments he made earlier in the week (in fact, he hasn’t changed at all. The Leafs have always wanted to get harder to play against, it just isn’t easy to find good players who also grind).

In the end, the Leafs left the stay-at-home defender on the board, much to Brian Burke’s horror, and chose…….the long-term project with elite potential.

The fastest player in the draft, one with high-end potential, according to multiple sources, Rodion Amirov sure sounds like a Leafs pick.  I’m paraphrasing, but the Sportsnet guys said something like “he shows flashes of brilliance and then against harder competition nothing.”

If that is true, and I am sure it is, that is the reason why the fastest players in the draft was still available at 15, and probably why the Leafs wanted him.  If you don’t have flaws, you aren’t available at 15.

And if your biggest flaw is that as a child you have a hard time playing vs men (he played in the KHL last year, while most of his peers were playing Junior) then that isn’t really a flaw so much as it is a normal thing.

Let’s say Amirov played last year in the OHL, he probably gets drafted higher – the ironic thing about his supposed flaw is that most of his peers can’t even be evaluated on whether or not they can play vs older players because they haven’t.

Oh, and with five points in ten games under his belt already this year, he’s on pace to be the highest scoring player of his age in KHL history, according to several tweets I read this morning.

In case this pick doesn’t seem awesome enough, the two comparisons people are throwing out are Nikita Kucherov and Artemi Panarin.  Yowza!

The Toronto Maple Leafs aren’t interested in what you, me or the media think. For better or worse, they have a philosophy and they are going to stick with it.  Considering they have three elite players that they drafted in their lineup under 24, its incredible to think that they also have four potentially high-end prospects now.

If you’re being objective, it’s hard to see the Leafs as anything but the best run organization in the NHL.