Prospect Camp, 2008/07/10 (in words)

As you can see through my previous post, I went to Duluth to take in the yearly prospect camp that the Atlanta Thrashers host. What's so awesome about these events is that you're seeing into the future. At last year's prospect camp, Toby Enstrom, Bryan Little, and Ondrej Pavalec were featured and we all know how their run-ins with the NHL were. Toby was a serious contender for the Calder Memorial Trophy (rookie of the year), Little started the season in the bigs (but couldn't quite fit into the system, or whatever you could call it as there was no "real" coach, more-or-less, all season long), and Pavalec stepped up big time while Kari was out with injuries early on. So you know that the players you're watching at these camps have great potential to be the real thing.

This year, tons of focus was given to the Thrashers' most recent draft pick, Zach Bogosian, who was drafted third overall. There is a lot of talk that he's soon-to-be the eventual savior of the Thrashers' blueline. For a kid who isn't even 18 yet, he has a lot of weight on his shoulders. But after watching him skate, like everyone else, I was impressed with how he was on the ice and how the ice seemingly belonged to him. His skating was smooth, his passes were money, and his shots would result in a lot of ducking and cowering. He's clearly a defenseman with an offensive edge to him, someone the Thrashers needed for a long time now. As soon as he was drafted, Blueland should've just rolled out the red carpet for this guy because he's getting that kind of fan-fare. It's insane. People to the left and right of me were talking him up and down and it was crazy. Naturally, that's all I wanted to watch was Bogy. But with other highly qualified skaters on the ice, it was hard to just cast them aside for the wunderkind.

My focus eventually strayed from Bogy (who was sporting number 44 for the camp) and just tried to absorb the big picture, paying more attention to guys who were standing out in their own ways. Angelo Esposito was a highly-touted draft pick of the Pittsburgh Penguins and I wanted to pay attention to him because of that and because of how he was talked-down up until the the 2007 draft. Riley Holzapfel's abilities warranted some discussion at last year's camp and I tried to keep an eye on him for a while. Defensive favorites of mine include Grant Lewis and Chad Denny, both of whom I watched last year.

So while I had my list of highlighted names to look out for, and my actual list to match numbers with names, it was damned near impossible to keep track of these relative unknowns. Because I'm exposed to these types of players once a year, it's hard to leave a lasting impression with me, especially when I only see them one day of camp (and the camp runs about a week). I'd try focus on Holzapfel's passing, but while I'd do that, I'd miss some insane skating from someone who I never heard of. Then I started watching the new guy, and then I'd realize that I'd miss what's going on in the corner over there (like a Bogosian hit or something).

With that said, I sadly cannot provide great objective descriptions of these players that other sites have recently. What was interesting was that I was fortunate enough to watch the teams scrimmage and attempt a few shootout maneuvers. The scrimmage ended up in a rout, something like 6-2, in favor of the blue team (that featured Bogosian and Holzapfel). Lucky for me, most of the scoring was by my end of the rink, so I witnessed most of the goals as they happened, instead of trying to figure out what happened across the rink. Esposito's passing set up at least one of the goals, and two guys managed to score twice each. One of the players who scored twice was recent draft pick Zach Redmond, another defenseman. One of his goals was a result of a ridiculous move through several members from the white team.

It's players like Redmond that make the prospect camps so worthwhile. You start paying attention to the bigger names, the higher profiled guys, and the kids who really end up standing out are the lesser-known ones, like Zach Redmond.

Something that I never noticed in the past was the presence of the head coach at the prospect camp. Granted, Coach Anderson is very familiar with the youth and some of the players that were at the camp. I'm unsure if this played any role into his appearance at this. But it was refreshing to see the new head coach of the Atlanta Thrashers directly getting involved with the younger members of the organization, something Bob Hartley seldom did.

Also, while Bogosian simply dominated the day I went (and I've heard similar reports from other days of camp), I'm still skeptical about him. The kid's 18 in a matter of days and people are already penciling him on the opening day roster. I don't question his abilities at all, but I'm just wondering how he'll perform with guys that have played hockey as a career. How will Bogosian fit onto a team that features players like Kovalchuk, Kozlov, Hedberg, etc.? More importantly, how will he play against ridiculously-skilled players like Lecavalier, Ovechkin, Crosby, Malkin, etc.? To make comments about his play that suggested otherwise, that would be cause for concern. Bogosian is supposed to dominate these other prospects, apparently (according to the hype), and he's achieved that. But is he really ready to be a full-time NHL player? Time will tell. I'm sure that after his performance with this past week's camp, however, he earned an invite to training camp in September.