Are you an expert? Prospect Scrimmage edition

To start off my return to the blogworld, let me post a video of New Ducks defensemen Andy Sutton



Am I an expert? The answer is no, these are just my opinions and should be taken for what they're worth...an anonymous blogger posting about hockey, now I know what you're thinking, that other anonymous blogger is a running joke around hockey message boards, and websites everywhere. So don't worry guys you won't be getting any "Bobby Ryan to the L3@fz!!!1" posts from me.

Now onto Business.

Anaheim Ducks prospects have taken to the ice for the Pentincton Rookie Tournament hosted by the Vancouver Canucks, which is a real coup for the Ducks to be invited in, over the past few years Anaheim has participated in half assed scrimmages with Sharks prospect. This is a big upgrade in competition level.

The Ducks have lost their first two games, but honestly that doesn't really matter. Let's put this into context folks, this is the first time these players have played any competitive hockey in several months. Some players will be ahead of the curve and some will be behind. With that said, let's talk prospects!

2010 First Round Picks

Cam Fowler, Defenseman 2010 first round pick, 12th overall
When Cam Fowler fell all the way to the 12th pick in Junes draft, the Ducks did not hesitate to swoop him up. It has been rumored Phoenix wanted to make a deal with the Ducks to grab the American defenseman. Anaheim of course said "NO" and the rest is history. There are many split opinions on Fowler as to why he dropped so far when a year ago at this time he was getting some hype as possibly being the first pick in the draft. Whatever your opinion is, the fact of the matter is this, winning follows this guy.

In the last year and a half Cam Fowler has been apart of 3 Major championship teams.
The first being at the 2009 IIHF Under 18 Tournament.

This was the start of a great year for USA hockey, The Americans were dominant in the medal rounds of the tournament taking out 3 traditional Power Houses, The Czechs, the Canadians, and Russians by a combined score of 12-3. Cam Fowler was a gigantic part of the outcome and was named the Top Defenseman and also named to the tournament all star team.

Then we hit January, where Fowler was named to the American Under 20 squad for the World Junior Championships in Saskatoon. Fowler once again was a big part of the team, playing in team USA's top 4 and tasked with more of a defensive role, which he excelled in, especially against Canada and Taylor Hall. Hall had 3 points total in 2 games but when you watch the video of his points You cannot fault Fowler for a single one. Halls only goal was because of a terrible mishap by American Goalie Mike Lee, who was eventually benched for Jack Campbell. the two assists? Secondary assists and Fowler wasn't on the ice for one of them. Team USA went on to win Gold and at that time there was no negativity at all around him, the reviews were all very positive.

Fowler went Back to his Junior team afterwords and had a strong second half to help the Windsor Spitfires win the Memorial Cup, Where he played his best hockey it seems to be a trend with this guy.

The criticisms to me, came out of nowhere I didn't read much at all except for Kyle Woodlief of the Red Line Report, and to his credit he was consistent all year long with his critiques of this years D class. It seems to me after Fowler went 12th alot of people jumped on that bandwagon. What people forget is the fact that the selection of Ryan Johansen at 4th overall really threw the draft off, Bob Murray is even quoted as saying this. There was a run of forwards from picks 4-9 and this worked to Anaheims advantage. this does not mean teams did not think highly of Fowler, after the top 2 alot of teams viewed the draft differently from 3 on down. He could have easily been top 5 on every teams board that passed on him, we know he was No.3 on Anaheims.

He has work to do, he's 19 years old. He has to fill out his frame, he's not a small kid he's 6'2 190 pounds once this guy gets in shape and jumps up to 210 pounds he'll be able to handle the physicality aspect of the game much better. Defensively I don't personally see a lot of flaws, he uses his skating and stick to his advantage and plays angles very well we saw this in Mondays game against the Flames, he single handedly broke up a 3 on 2 with his skating, his stick, and the angle he took. These are things that are hard to teach, and to me it shows he has a mind for the position.

It's just one play, but there are others, on one occasion on a Power Play there was a loose puck coming his way, a defender was charging at him, he calmy skated backward, quickly controlled the puck and made a accurate strike to Emerson Etem who generated a scoring chance out of it. This is the EXACT opposite of how Former Ducks defensemen Ryan Whitney would handle the same play, so in that regard I'm not worried about him turning into that kind of player.

Several times in the defensive zone he'd have the puck, get pressured and simply skate with it, you know who was the master at that? Scott Niedermayer. He does not panic at all with the puck and he makes great outlet passes. On the PowerPlay I thought he did a really nice job of Quarterbacking the unit. He does not force anything, he takes what the defense gives him, as a result he generated a goal with another Niedermayer type play....Wristing the puck on the Power Play with traffic. It hit a stick and went in the net. Some guys think shooting the puck harder is better, that's not always the case, on a team like the Ducks this type of play works very well, it gives someone like Corey Perry time to angle his stick properly for a deflection.

Overall I thought Fowler played very well most of the game, but showed some fatigue from the b2b situation, which is why we saw him less in the 3rd period. Conditioning is the major issue right now, Sean Skahan will take care of him.

2010 First Round Pick, 29th overall, Forward Emerson Etem

Let's get right to business on Etem. He's a project, everyone needs to be patient with him, the reason he fell in the draft is because teams didn't want to wait 3 years before he could play in the NHL. He scored 37 goals as a rookie in the WHL last year, which is not easy to do, he has alot of raw talent with his blazing speed, wrist shot and hands within 5-10 feet of the net. He needs to get stronger, he needs to trust his teammates more, but I thought tonight we saw some flashes of what he can do, find open seems in the ice and create 1 on 1 and break away chances. Give him time Duck fans, he's an exceptionally hard worker for that reason I believe he will significantly improve over the next couple of years.