Gare Joyce

Gare Joyce writes regularly on junior hockey for Sportsnet.ca. A veteran journalist, Joyce is the author of Future Greats and Heartbreaks: A Year Undercover in the Secret World of NHL Scouts, When the Lights Went Out: How One Brawl Ended Hockey's Cold War and Changed the Game and Sidney Crosby: Taking the Game by Storm. He also writes for ESPN The Magazine, espn.com and several Canadian magazines.

Stuff that fell out of Gare Joyce's notebook (NHL Central Scouting edition).

Another class of elite NHL prospects were hazed in at Central Scouting's combine last week. What does all the jumping, benching, balancing, pedalling and heavy-breathing mean? Something more than nothing, something a lot less than anything definitive. Still, just about every player at the combine is a story and, whether it's stuff out on the testing floor or rumbles from team interviews, you come away from combine week knowing a bit more about the draft class and you can start to see the draft itself taking shape.

It's just baby fat ... You have to wonder about the value of body-fat percentage as a measure of prospects when the highest number, 13.2 percent, was registered by Windsor defenceman Ryan Ellis, by my figuring the most valuable player in the Memorial Cup. Maybe the parallel is to Drew Doughty, who told me he managed to bring his body weight (and presumably body fat) down after Guelph was knocked out of the playoffs. At the start of this season Ellis cited Doughty as one of the players who influenced him when he was growing up. (Tempus fugit.) Ellis, I guess, just didn't have time to train off the suet in time for the swimsuit competition. Not like it ever seemed like he was gassed out there. It reminds me of an anecdote about Ray Bourque. At the training camp of the Canadian team prior to one of the Canada Cup tournaments, the guys in the white lab jackets got out the calipers to check Bourque's body fat. It was a remarkable 20 percent, about double the next highest reading on the team. Not that he was out of shape -- he was down close to his regular-season playing weight. And not like it ever affected his game.

Unarrested development ... For all the high science around the combine testing I've always thought the simplest measurement of athleticism is the eye of the expert beholder. Each prospect is given the once-over-twice by attending physicians and then rated on the physical development for both upper and lower body: BA for below average, A for average and AA for above average. (In the past there was also a rating of E for extreme development, rare stuff, maybe a couple every draft class, but it seems like the medical crew scrubbed it from the assessment this year.) AA's are hard to come by. Out of all the top prospects, only seven received the high grade for both upper and lower body development: Alphabetically, Minnesota high schooler Zach Budish (headed to U of Minn), Brampton's Matt Duchene, Sweden's Victor Hedman, Guelph's Michael Latta, US under-18s Jeremy Morin (headed, I suspect, to Kitchener), Shawingan's Philippe Paradis and US under-18s Kenny Ryan (headed to Boston College). I expected that of Budish, who was all-state as both a forward in hockey and linebacker in football before tearing his ACL last fall. And I could see it with Morin. I thought the interesting ratings here were Duchene and Hedman. A lot of the time the AAs register with an "early-maturer." (A couple of drafts ago, I remember Nick Petrecki looking like he was a 30-year-old longshoreman.) Duchene and Hedman aren't early maturers by any stretch. Neither one of them could grow a playoff beard if they started in January. So it seems like they might still have room for jumps in strength and physicality. Other interesting readings (upper- and lower-body): Oshawa's John Tavares, A A; Oliver Eklund-Larsson, the Swedish defenceman whose stock climbed dramatically this season, BA BA; Ryan Ellis, BA BA; London's Nazem Kadri, BA BA; Vancouver's Evander Kane, A A; Peterborough's Zach Kassian, A A; and Brandon's Scott Glennie and Brayden Schenn, both BA BA.

Head shots ... Read into it what you will but 17 players at that combine were listed with at least one concussion. (Your guess is as good as mine how many were either not reported or not diagnosed.) The only player with three reported concussions: Marcus Johansson, who dropped from No. 6 in Europe in the mid-terms to No. 8.

What's under the hood ... Teams are always looking for prospects with good motors. There's no telling who will churn but at least you get an idea who might with the VO 2-intake, peak heart-rate and recovery, and Wingate tests. Worth noting: 1. Kingston's towering defenceman Taylor Doherty posted better numbers than Hedman; Doherty also posted some huge leg power numbers. 2. Very mediocre readings from forward Louis Leblanc, the kid who eschewed the Quebec league this season to play with Omaha in the USHL and commit to Harvard for the fall; 3. The best VO 2 max numbers were posted by Lethbridge's Carter Ashton, the only prospect to last the 17-minute duration.

Windsor update ... I spoke with an OHL coach this week who told me that the book on Richard Panik, the Slovak winger on the Spitfires' import list, is that he's "skilled but fat." Well, maybe. Panik's numbers aren't the material of an Olympic decathlete or anything like that: BA A on development, over 11 percent in body fat when the average is below ten, pretty winded in the max heart beat and recovery drill. And he was listed with a clavicle injury. But, as I told the coach: "Skilled but fat you can work with. There's not much upside to unskilled but fit." I guess the good news is that he told testers that he had worked out the day before the combine.

Injury updates ... Both Spokane's Jared Cowan and Minnesota high schooler Zach Budish made it sound like their rehab is on schedule. Cowan didn't do the jumping and bike tests but Budish did. Understandably, after months off, his aerobic performance was down a couple of notches but it wasn't the lowest by any stretch. And his anaerobic stuff was above average ... Windsor defencemen Ryan Ellis and Jesse Blacker did not do any heavy lifting or grunting at the combine due to injuries carrying over from the Memorial Cup ... Among those who didn't do the upper-body portion: Tavares (rehabbing shoulder), Brayden Schenn (chest injury), Panik, and Saskatoon's Stefan Elliott (shoulder needing surgery). Scott Glennie toughed out the bench and did some decent work although he could have begged off due to a bum elbow that knocked him out of the line-up late in the season.

Beach lifts ... Most impressive upper-body strength performance was put in by Kyle Palmieri, who set high marks in the bench (17 reps) and push-ups (41). If you think those numbers aren't impressive, understand that the testors demand the strictest form, no bounce or short-arming. U of Minnesota's Jordan Schroeder also posted big numbers even though he's short and pretty slight.

Out of the interviews ... Prospects who helped their causes in talks with teams included Erie's Ryan O'Reilly, Rimouski's Jordan Caron, Leblanc, Kassian, Drummondville's Dmitry Kulikov, US under-18s William Wrenn. In fact, O'Reilly, Kassian and Wrenn probably didn't have to talk too much. They were the players singled out by other kids as their favorite teammates from national sides ... Kids who had some explaining to do included, well, almost any kid from the US under-18 program but most certainly Palmieri and Morin. The way it was told to me, though, the scouts had more problems with the management of the development team than the kids themselves ... Those who might have talked themselves into disrepute: Guelph's Holland and UMinn's Schroeder. Scouts I talked to weren't much impressed.