NEW PERK: 2022 Prospect Cards (Patreon)

Good afternoon everyone!

With the playoffs winding down, we're getting closer and closer to the NHL draft and free agent frenzy. That will mean new perks available to you guys as things amp up.

First up is the long-awaited update to the Prospect Cards, with 756 NHL drafted prospects and 5343 2022 Entry Draft prospect cards represented. 

• If your last name is A-G, click here 
• If your last name starts with H-M, click here 
• If your last name starts with N-S, click here  
• If your last name starts with T-Z, click here 

Like last year's, these cards are build off of TopDownHockey's NHL Equivalency (NHLe) model using data sourced from EliteProspects. You can read part of Patrick's multi-part explainer series here. The gist is that NHLe allows us to compare the production of players in different leagues, putting everybody on the same footing based on past data - NHLe stands for NHL equivalent points. For example, scoring 100 points in 70 OHL games is roughly equivalent to 16 points in 82 NHL games.

Using even more data about how production in other leagues correlates to success at the NHL level, the model can also project how likely a prospect is to carve out a full-time NHL career or become a star at the NHL level. It can't tell the future perfectly of course, but there is strong evidence that even for defencemen (yes, even defensive defencemen), producing at a high rate relative to the league you're in is by far the most important determinant of future success.

One extra fun thing we can do this year that we couldn't last year is present timelines of how those "NHL%" and "Star%" projections have changed compared to last year. Having a huge season outside the NHL, especially in a quality league like Jack Quinn did last year in the AHL, might improve your projection big time.

Like last year, we'll be doing some tableau dashboards around this data, most likely after the draft. In the meantime, enjoy!