Abel to Yzerman

Abel to Yzerman

Reviewing Detroit's 2016 Draft Picks

05/25/2019 at 3:39pm EDT

from Helene St. James of the Detroit Free Press,

This is the third in a series examining the Wings’ last five drafts leading up to the 2019 event June 21-22 in Vancouver, British Columbia..

D Dennis Cholowski
Drafted: 20th.

Scouting report: Excellent skater with high-end offensive abilities.

Wingspan: Cholowski, 21, made the opening night roster after a good camp. At Christmas, he had six goals and eight assists and ranked second among team defensemen with 14 points. He was also a team-worst minus-11.

From Christmas until mid-February, Cholowski had one goal and one assist in 16 games, and was a team-worst minus-9. That prompted an assignment to Grand Rapids, where Cholowski finished the season with 12 assists in 25 games.

Cholowski is a smooth skater who isn’t afraid to play the puck, but he needs to improve his decision making in determining reward versus risk. The Wings can live with his mistakes so long as they don’t outweigh his assets.

Assessment: He'll be a top-four d-man, maybe even top pairing.

F Givani Smith
Drafted: 46th.

Scouting report: Hard worker with an infectious attitude.

Assessment: Could find a fit as physical grinder.

more on the two above plus other names...

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Welcome to Abel to Yzerman, a Red Wing blog since 1977. No other site on the internet has better-researched, fact-laden and better prepared discussions than A2Y. Re-phrase: we do little research, find facts and stats highly overrated and claim little to no preparation. There are 19 readers of A2Y. No more, no less. All of them, except maybe one, are juvenile in nature. Reminding them of that in the comment section will only encourage them to prove that.

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