Joe's Reaction of the Week: The Lottery and Drury's Direction
Everything riding on May 5: McKenna or bust, the Carolina/Dallas pick situation, and why Drury's patience with Vincent Trocheck is about to pay off.
It's not unusual for a team pining for the ping pong balls to fall their way in a draft lottery to be hyper-focused on the draw, but the New York Rangers might be a version of that on steroids.
Let's dig into this, musings style.
The Draft Lottery
I just want to take a moment to ensure everyone understands what is at stake during the lottery on May 5. Below is an image from Tankathon that shows the percentage odds each team in the top (bottom?) three has in terms of draft positioning. The Rangers can fall as far as fifth, and are most likely to be fourth. Ironically, they're statistically least likely to select third, which is the position they finished the NHL regular season in.
This is pretty important, mainly because outside of the top two picks in this year's draft, everything else is a crapshoot. Eric and I interviewed The Athletic's prospect genius Scott Wheeler on the podcast a few weeks ago about this, and you should listen to it if you haven't.
Main takeaway: Either first or second gets the Rangers a needle-moving winger. Anything else becomes a longer-tail return, and a riskier selection (especially among forwards).
