Inside the NHL Draft War Room: Experts Clash Over Surprising Round 1 Picks for 2025

This is going to be a challenging and potentially unpopular pick with our fans. The organization is dying for a premier center talent. Jake O’Brien is staring us in the face. He’s a great player. I just did a similar analysis at 3 with Chicago where I opted for Desnoyers. The difference now is centers went off the board three picks in a row, we’re now at the fourth option, and the difference between O’Brien and Martone is larger than the analysis was at 3. I feel I’m going substantially off my list if I take O’Brien over Martone for positional reasons. I think O’Brien is probably a second-line center on a good team. The Flyers rebuild is probably years away from completion, you have to imagine they will be back picking high again, even if next year’s draft early on doesn’t seem overflowing with premium center talent. We elect for the big, powerful winger with star upside even if his skating is a flaw. I hope this doesn’t bite us in the ass. — Pronman

Pages: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35