POLL RESULTS: Sutter predicted to be 1st Tip chosen in draft

Riley Sutter is the highest-profile NHL prospect on the Everett Silvertips’ roster who’s eligible for this year’s NHL draft, and therefore Sutter is the readers’ selection as the Everett player who will get picked first.

This week’s Seattle Sidelines poll concerned the Tips and the NHL draft, which begins Friday with round one and continues Saturday with rounds two through seven. Everett has three players who were listed on NHL Central Scouting’s final rankings for this year’s draft, forwards Sutter and Connor Dewar and defenseman Wyatte Wylie, all of whom were ranked in a similar range. Therefore the question was: Which of the three will hear their name called first in the draft? Here’s how you voted:

POLL: Which @WHLsilvertips player gets picked first in this weekend’s NHL draft? Full context and poll here: https://t.co/GScNp99A15 @JesseGeleynse @EverettHerald

— Nick Patterson (@NickHPatterson) June 18, 2018

Tally it all up and Sutter was a comfortable winner, garnering 52 percent of the vote. Wylie and Dewar were probably within the margin of error of one another, with Wylie getting 25 percent and Dewar getting 23 percent.

On one hand this makes a lot of sense. Sutter is without question the prospect people know about most. He’s the only one of the three who was invited to the CHL Top Prospects Game in January, and he’s the only one of the three who was invited to the NHL Scouting Combine at the beginning of June. Add in his height (6-foot-3) and his family pedigree and he’s a natural choice for the first name to come off the board.

However, this week’s poll seems to illustrate the difference between making a snap decision like when voting on Twitter, and getting all the context I provide by voting on the blog. On the blog it was actually Wylie who received the greatest percentage of the vote, outpointing Sutter 42 percent to 35 percent. I suspect that has a lot to do with the blog post introducing the poll, which contained where each player was ranked by Central Scouting — Wylie was rated nine spots ahead of Sutter (71-80) among North American skaters. I acknowledge, however, that it might also have to do with Wylie being an Everett native, and the fact that the blog is likelier to get local voters while the Twitter vote tends to have a greater geographic spread.

None of the three are expected to be selected in Friday’s first round. Based on their Central Scouting rankings, it’s not guaranteed that any will be picked Saturday, either, though I’d say the rankings for Wylie and Sutter have them in a range where they’re more likely to be picked than not.

Talking with Everett general manager Garry Davidson this week, he thinks all three will be picked based on the feedback he’s been given by NHL personnel. But even Davidson said he didn’t know which player will get picked first.

If you want to find out for yourself first-hand, Saturday’s portion of the draft begins at 8 a.m. PT, and if you get the NHL Network you can watch it on television. Otherwise, you can follow along real time on the NHL’s website.