Ducks Links: Will Francis diagnosed with Leukemia, Mock Draft, Playoff Lookback
This will be a recurring weekly segment highlighting articles from other blogs on both the Ducks and the NHL as a whole.
DUCKS NEWS:
Scott Wheeler of the Athletic assessed every draft lottery team’s biggest need. The Ducks’ biggest need per Wheeler is a goal scoring winger and right handed shot defenseman. Personally I would like to see the Ducks take Stutzle if he is available, but it seems like Holtz might be the most likely option for the Ducks ($).
Eric Stephens of the Athletic provided an in depth look at the tragic news of Ducks prospect, Will Francis, being diagnosed with leukemia. Will Francis sounds like a really good kid, and hopefully he is able to fight through this and don a Ducks sweater in the future. All of our thoughts are with him in this fight! ($)
Stephen Dohner of Anaheim Calling had a fun concept of putting together the best 6 man lineup of players with numbers that ended with the same number. My personal favorite is the number 4.
The Anaheim Ducks youtube channel posted a video interviewing Adam Henrique, Josh Manson, and Hampus Lindholm. Adam Henrique is utilizing the time off to grow a pretty massive beard, while Lindholm and Manson have been rehabbing. Take a look at the video for more tidbits from the Ducks as to what they are doing during the break.
As our own CJ Woodling wrote about, the Ducks announced that the Samueli’s will be paying all employees of the Ducks, Gulls, Rinks, and JT Schmids until June 30th. In a world where it seems like most NHL teams are cutting back salaries and laying people off, it is heartwarming to see the Ducks owners take care of their employees and try to relieve one avenue of stress in this crazy time.
Anthony Ciardelli of the Hockey Writers took a look at the ones that got away for the Ducks. My personal opinion for the biggest one that got away is Shea Theodore. There was some justification for the move at the time, but with the way things have played out, it is a major black mark on Murray’s track record.
The Athletic ran a mock draft, with the beat writer for each team making the draft pick. Eric Stephens surprisingly took Marco Rossi for the Ducks, when a guy like Alexander Holtz was still on the board. ($)
AROUND THE LEAGUE:
Stephen Dohner, of Anaheim Calling, makes his second appearance on this weeks links. He wrote an article with his proposed changes to the NHL, and got the opinion of various writers from SBnation on these proposed changes. The easiest change for the NHL to make is fix the trade deadline. Stephen’s proposal on this would add drama and more trades in my opinion to the NHL’s deadline day.
Emily Kaplan of ESPN showed the plenty of NHLers are using their time off to adopt or foster dogs.
Dom Luszczyszyn of the Athletic used his analytical model to see how the past playoffs “should” have played out. From the Ducks perspective, it is interesting to look at the playoff seasons for the Ducks and how the Ducks stacked up to the rest of the league per Dom’s model. The best chance the Ducks had to win the cup, per Dom, was in 2014-15, where the Ducks had a 10% chance to win the cup, which was actually better than the eventual cup champion Blackhawks ($).
NHL Central Scouting released their updated prospect ranking. As expected, Alexis Lafreniere tops the NA skater list, but the slight surprise is Tim Stutzle topping the European skater list.
Florence Schelling, former Swiss Olympic goalie, becomes the first woman to be named GM of a top level mens team. She was named GM of SC Bern, which is in the Swiss league. This got me thinking about who would be the first female GM in the NHL, and which team would be the first to hire a woman. I am not sure who it would be, but Seattle is starting to push in that direction.
CCM is working with their manufacturers to help provide face masks to healthcare personnel.
Feel free to discuss any of these articles in a comment below!