Draft Lottery Ramblings

It’s old news now, but last night’s NHL Draft Lottery confirmed that the Red Wings will pick ninth in the 2023 NHL Entry Draft.  To that, I say what I’ve said often in response to draft lottery results over the last several years.

¯\_(ツ)_/¯

— DetroitHockey.Net (@detroithockey96) April 10, 2019

The Wings will pick ninth, the odds were that they’d pick ninth, math did what it was supposed to.  Of course it would have been nice to move up, but math dictates that no one should have expected that the Wings would move up.

Logically, I absolutely understand that.  I’m also so freaking tired of beat writers trotting out that line.  Wings fans have heard that so much in recent years.  When other teams are beating the odds, it’s mind-numbing to hear about how Detroit is doing exactly what the odds say they should do.

Montreal moved up in 2018 and stayed up in 2022 and New Jersey moved up in 2017 and 2019 and 2022 and Chicago moved up in 2019 and 2023 and Buffalo preserved first overall in 2018 and 2021.  But Detroit?  They do exactly what the odds say they should do.  Math is real in Detroit.  It’s just a suggestion in Newark and Chicago.

As I said, I get how the math works.  Precisely because of that, I didn’t get my hopes up.  I’m just tired of seeing writers paid to cover the team imply that fans shouldn’t have gotten their hopes up.  Don’t tell people how to fan.

This is a relatively deep draft.  There’ll be someone solid for the Red Wings at ninth overall.  Just like there have been solid players at sixth overall and fourth overall and eighth overall.  And the Wings pick again at 18th (a pick that will move up to 17th if the Florida Panthers can finish off the Toronto Maple Leafs in their Division Finals matchup), so that’s two great opportunities to pick up a decent player.

But neither of those players will be Connor Bedard or Adam Fantilli and it’s understandable for Wings fans to be frustrated about that, no matter what the math says.