The NHL Central Scouting Bureau released their mid-term rankings today.The US is quite well represented in the first round, including Minnesota State's Tyler Pitlick at 21. I thought he'd come in way higher than people expected, but not top 30. Notre Dame's Riley Sheahan is all the way up at #5, which again, I thought he'd be higher than some expected, but not  that high.

Puck Prospectus put out at least an interesting read on the top 100 players for next summer's draft. The writer works in the USHL, which explains why most of the kids I think are really overrated--Jaden Schwartz, Yasin Cisse, TJ Tynan--all play in the USHL. It's a pretty solid attempt at a list like this though.

I was among those really impressed with Taylor Hall at the World Juniors. Hall and Jordan Eberle were really the only two Canadians that scared me when they had the puck. Cory Lavalette from Canes Country wanted a little more out of Hall though.I'm not sure I necessarily agree. The only way Hall's chances at going number one could have been hurt, is that Cam Fowler played well enough that a team that needs a franchise defenseman may take a long look at him in the number one spot.

Meanwhile, on the topic of the number one pick, there was a bit of a dust-up here a couple months when I called BS on Redline Report's Kyle Woodlief moving Tyler Seguin to number one over Taylor Hall in his rankings. It was nothing personal against Seguin, I just felt Woodlief's motives for doing so were more business-driven than hockey-driven. That's why his headline for his December edition of RLR was so utterly predictable. Strap yourselves in for the race for the number one pick, because there's going to be one, regardless of reality.