Notes From Prospect Camp, Day Two

Another productive day at Prospect Camp is in the books.

I’m taking a day off from camp tomorrow, so as to spend some time with my family (my aunt, specifically, my mother’s sister, who has been like a second mother to me pretty much all my life). Will be attending the Cardinals’ game tomorrow night, so I will look for the prospects there, since taking the kids to a Cards’ game is a traditional part of Prospect Camp for the Blues.

Since there will not be a “Notes From Prospect Camp: Day Three” tomorrow, we’ll post a few more notes and observations -- and many more photos —- than we did yesterday.

Brian Weidler / “St. Louis Game Time”

• Some of the best skaters we observed in Thursday’s drills were: Alexei Toropchenko (fairly smooth for a big man), Trenton Bourque (who is as fast as Bill Armstrong noted in his post-draft interview with FSMW), and Niko Mikkola (turns and corners very well for such a big guy).
• One player who stuck out as needing a little more work on his skating was Czech import and 2016 pick Filip Helt. While not a poor skater by any means, Helt looked a little stiff in the stop-start drill.
• In the stickhandling drill, Bourque and Robert Thomas both looked pretty smooth dipsy-doodling around the cones; Thomas’ pace was noticeably slower than Bourque’s, however. Toropchenko moved well in the drill, but had the puck get away from him at the first cone and had to go back and start over.

Brian Weidler / “St. Louis Game Time”

• The Russian fourth-round pick redeemed himself in a shoot-and-skate drill, however. He came in and fired from the slot against Ryan Fitzpatrick, then collected his own rebound and went high stick side with it.
• Finally, Jeremy Rutherford of the “Post-Dispatch” is a class act. He’s the only one of the beat writers who has gone out of his way to introduce himself to me, and has made me, the lowly blogger, feel somewhat welcome. Thanks, JR...

Through two days of camp, Your GTPD has managed to interview Bourque, Kaspick, Luke Opilka, Thomas, Tage Thompson, Toropchenko, and Jake Walman. Also have a snippet of a conversation with Craig Berube that we need to mine for any nuggets, and audio from Doug Armstrong’s address to the media on Day One. Look for the highlights of the Armstrong interview here on the “Game Time” site in the near future, and the player interviews in future print editions of the paper.

Finally, the photos in today’s piece are extracted from the hours of video I’ve shot from the comfort of the press bullpen at the east end of the Mills rink. When I have had more time to do some editing of this video, and whatever else I can get on Saturday, you can expect to see more pictures here, and also accompanying more of Your GTPD’s articles in the paper.

Brian Weidler / “St. Louis Game Time”