This was mentioned in another discussion, but I figured that it should probably have its own thread as the day goes on.
The WHL bantam draft goes today.
"TeamCanada" asked in another thread what positions the team might be more in need of players at.
It can be so hard to gauge because of how past drafted and listed prospects have developed over the past season, but last year the team chose defencemen with each of its first two picks... Eric Roy and Dylan Kuczek. By the time the draft was over, they'd made up for it by taking eight forwards out of their 11 total picks.
The Wheat Kings don't pick until the third round this year. Whether its the NHL or WHL, many teams' draft philosophy is to pick who they figure is the best player available regardless of position... and let the position distribution shake itself out over time. Maybe considering their first two picks were defencemen last year, they will try to balance that out by trying to get as good of a forward or goalie as they can out of this draft?
No matter what the position, you can get that they'll be quite a few more Manitobans becoming a part of the organization through the draft. Throughout Kelly McCrimmon's time as GM, there has always been significant Manitoban Wheat King content... including last year's draft where 7 of the 11 players chosen were from this province.
The WheatKings.com draft preview is at:
http://wheatkings.com/news_item.aspx?news_id=5369
and Lubers Lounge:
http://luberslounge.blogspot.com/2010/04/whl-bantam-draft-thursday.html