2016 Draft: First Round Selections SEAL-Adjusted Scoring Ranking

We’ve talked quite a bit lately on how important scoring is in determining how likely a draft pick will succeed. Scoring is a huge signal in determine which prospects will likely make it to the NHL and how high of an upside they have. Even most of the defensive players in the NHL were respectable scorers in junior.

Let’s take a look at how the first round breaks down in terms of scoring.

Over at Hockey-Graphs, I developed SEAL-Adjusted scoring, which adjusts a player’s point per game production due to four variables: Secondary assists, Era, Age, and League.

Scoring is not made to represent completely how good a player is, as there is more than scoring that goes into how good a player is. However, scoring has a relationship with those who are good at other things and also both prospect upside and safety are related.

We can see here that there definitely is a correlation to a scouts choices and scoring. It is intersting though that the things seem to get “looser” the further back you go.

There is still a tonne of high scoring skill available in the draft, and not all of the players are your prototypical “undersized scorers” that people avoid (sometimes wrongfully).

Again, there’s still quite a bit of scoring talent. Most of these players, even if undersized offer quite a bit of upside.