Darryl's Dispatch: Top 300 NHL Prospects

The goal of this list is to place a raw ranking or value on a given young player's ability to adapt and mature his game during those crucial first few seasons after he is drafted or signed by an NHL team. There were 214 prospects who reached the NHL this past season, with fully thirty-six percent of those surpassing the 25-game milestone. Every NHL team has a similar list of prospects but the exact makeup of each one is a well guarded secret. While it is true that no one has access to all 30 complete lists, after talking with scouts and front office personnel from across the NHL, it is safe to say that there are not a lot of secrets where the top prospects are concerned (a couple of hundred of these names would likely be found on every team's list). The key differences would lie in the myriad of opinions held by each team about these players. 

Each of these elite prospects is considered by industry consensus to be the best of the best, the order is my own. Think of it as a very early post-draft snapshot of an emerging talent pool. But realistically, almost all of these players are several years away from being effective NHL regulars and only a few will ever reach true NHL stardom. A list of this sort is by nature very fluid and one that is perpetually in motion. Complicating matters further are the recent additions of those players selected in the 2011 NHL Entry Draft. Thus is the imperfect nature of talent evaluation and development.

Prospect Criteria: Players under 26 years old who have appeared in no more than 25 NHL games are considered prospects. A player's current ranking combines two grades; the first is his current state of NHL preparedness and the second measures his long-term potential.