Analyzing Detroit’s Prospect Pool: Forwards

Is the future bright? For the past decade, Detroit hasn’t had much to worry about up front with stars like Pavel Datsyuk and Henrik Zetterberg running the show. But looking ahead, the forward group in terms of prospects (not including Dylan Larkin, Anthony Mantha, and Andreas Athanasiou) is not looking so good.

When you look at the Wings best prospects at forward, you will see players like Evgeny Svechnikov, Tyler Bertuzzi, Givani Smith, and Michael Rasmussen come up. What is alarming about this is no one looks to be a future star that is needed to become a contender. Svechnikov and Rasmussen are the only ones who show true top-6 potential, but don’t project to be top line guys. After that, there is very little depth.

Tyler Bertuzzi, Givani Smith, and Axel Holmstrom all project to be bottom-6, possibly middle-6 forwards with some scoring upside. Other prospects include Zach Gallant and Lane Zablocki who were just drafted in 2017, but both have little upside. There overall, is not enough depth or star power found in the forward prospect pool, making it very weak.

For comparison, the Philadelphia Flyers are viewed as having possibly the best prospect pool in the NHL. When looking at their forwards, they are headlined by Nolan Patrick who looks to be a number 1 center one day. Detroit lacks a Nolan Patrick type player, or someone near the level of a Nolan Patrick. Philadelphia has also surrounded him with several top prospects such as Morgan Frost, Isaac Ratcliffe, German Rubstov, and Pascal Laberge. It continues with depth in players like Oskar Lindblom and Wade Allison.

It is clear that the Flyers have both several top prospects and depth to round out a solid core of forwards, both of which is what the Wings are in need of.

While the Wings are in desperate need to add a star into the mix, I am mainly concerned with the depth. There isn’t enough to support the hole left from not having a cornerstone player. While we did add 4 forward prospects in the later rounds of the 2017 draft, they all either have little upside, or are too early into development to see what they project to be.

Fortunately for Detroit, 3 young promising forwards are already in the NHL. Dylan Larkin, Anthony Mantha, and Andreas Athanasiou being future core pieces does lessen the wound of the current forward prospect pool. Out of those 3, Anthony Mantha appears the most likely to become a top line player, while Larkin and Athanasiou still have enough potential to reach that point, but it is a long stretch for that to happen. Having them does not fully make up for not having a star prospect, but it definitely helps.

With that being said, Detroit’s main focus when addressing the forward prospect pool is to add depth, especially in the later rounds of upcoming drafts. This will be very significant when making upgrades, as not only does it add more depth and structure, but it increases the chances of finding a draft steal, although still very difficult and unlikely.

The current state of the Wings forward prospect pool, is not good for a rebuild on the fly, and needs to be focused on more. I would rank our forward prospect pool in the bottom 15 of the NHL.