Some have risen or fallen since, but trying to rank this years top centers at similar points (ie, a month or so before draft) to those that have gone in previous few drafts.

Where would you rank Wright, Cooley and Savoie among this group?


2019: Hughes (#1), Dach (#3), Turcotte (#5), Cozens (#7), Zegras (#9)
2020: Byfield (#2), Rossi (#9), Perfetti (#10)
2021: Beniers (#2), McTavish (#3), Johnson (#5)
2022: Wright, Cooley, Savoie

My Draft Year Ranks

1. Hughes

2. Zegras
3. Wright
4. Perfetti
5. Byfield
6. Cooley

7. Turcotte
8. Beniers
9. Cozens
10. Rossi

11. Johnson
12. Dach
13. Savoie
14. McTavish

(I was unusually high on Zegras and Perfetti in their draft years, and quite low on Johnson and Dach)

(Obviously my list would look different using May 2022 ranks.)

If we added previous two drafts...

2018: Kotkaniemi (#3), Hayton (#5)
2017: Hischier (#1), Patrick (#2), Pettersson (#5), Glass (#6), Mittelstadt (#8)

....I don't think any of the 2017/2018 guys would have broken in that top-6.

Think this thread would be better under a forum. That stated I think the Wright rating is right on. Maybe it's me, but I dont think Cooley is going to be as good as advertised. He's terrible defensively, he holds on to the puck too much and even gets in trouble playing against kids his age with his stickhandling. Many of those skills don't translate to the NHL level. He doesn't dig in the corners nor goes to the front of the net.
His perceived ranking I'd say is even above Perfetti and possibly Wright.

I’d have Turcotte lower and McTavish higher. Also I guess Stutzle counts as LW?

He was drafted as a winger with the potential to play center. But I think the purpose of the ranking is the "perceived" value relative to the others, not value now.

My only takeaway here is you slept far too hard on my Sweet Austrian Prince.

Oh ok that makes sense .

Dach, Rossi and Berniers up.
Perfetti and Byfield down.

1/3 of Cooley's best games came against much older opponents, where he performed admirably.

But using that context, Frank Nazar probably earns some consideration on this list as he really shined in the college series (games vs ND, Wisconsin, Michigan, Minnesota, BU)

Didn't say he hasn't had any success. But all of that work trying to do it himself he could instead dump it down to keep the puck in the zone or look for a linemate.

he doesn’t project as an nhl center and i don’t think that’s the expectation of the team drafting him, unlike with say beniers and mctavish, so i wouldn’t include him

The point of the post is their perceived rankings at the time of the draft. He was drafted as a center at the time so the reality of what he will be later is a different game.

If people are curious about how those two jumped in rankings mid-year, these are the games where it happened....

Oct 2 2021: NTDP 3 Michigan State 0
Oct 3 2021: NTDP 4 Notre Dame 3
Oct 15 2021: NTDP 3 Northern Michigan 5
Oct 16 2021: NTDP 2 Michigan Tech 1
Oct 23 2021: NTDP 2 Cornell 4
Oct 24 2021: NTDP 3 Mercyhurst 7
Dec 2 2021: NTDP 4 Wisconsin 0
Dec 11 2021: NTDP 4 BU3
Jan 1 2022: NTDP 2 North Dakota 0
Jan 3 2022: NTDP 3 Minnesota 5
Jan 21 2022: NTDP 1 Lake Superior State 5
Feb 2 2022: NTDP 3 Michigan 4 (OT)

A bunch of 17-year olds going 6-5-1 against top teams in NCAA (19-24 year olds).