No Connor McDavid? No Auston Matthews? No problem.
It’s no secret by this point that the 2017 NHL Entry Draft will be, for the sake of comparison, a relatively weak one. With all due respect to Nolan Patrick and Nico Hischier, the two top prospects in this year’s class, there don’t appear to be any elite, generational talents that will be available this time, the kind of prospects that are worth tanking an entire season for.
Worse still, there’s a widespread notion that the depth of talent available all throughout the 1st round pales in comparison to recent drafts.