Blown Pick Or Draft Steal? Blackhawks’ Select Lukas Reichel

The Chicago Blackhawks selected Lukas Reichel with their first pick in the 2020 NHL Draft. This might have been a stretch from Stan Bowman.

Lukas Reichel was selected by the Chicago Blackhawks with the 17th overall selection in the draft. Chicago left two key forwards on the board in Connor Zary and Hendrix Lapierre to pick Reichel. Was this a blown pick or a draft steal?

Well, recently the Blackhawks have had some great success taking players from overseas and turning them into stars in the NHL. Dominik Kubalik and Artemi Panarin are the two biggest names in recent memory.

The issue with this pick is, Chicago left some great talent on the board. Zary and Lapierre are expected to be great scorers in the NHL, and instead, they elect to go with a late first-round/early second-round two-way forward out of Germany.

Fans are not happy with this pick. The thing is, they weren’t happy with the Kirby Dach draft pick and Dach has turned out to be a solid player, so far, for the team. This truly has divided the fanbase yet again. We have those who are happy and those who aren’t. One thing is for sure, this has to work out for the team to improve.

Last season, Reichel had 12-goals and 12-assists in 42-games for Eisbären Berlin in the DEL. He will continue to play this season in the DEL league. It’s unknown when we’ll see Reichel join the Blackhawks, as he is just 18-years-old and wasn’t a top prospect in the draft.

Reichel is a late-round project, not the 17th overall pick in the draft. Besides Bob McKenzie ranking him the 20th best player in the draft, he filtered from the 31st to the 43rd-best player in the draft.

Leaving such great talented players on the board for a player who could easily bust in the NHL is a big deal. The great thing is, Reichel can prove the fans wrong when he makes his debut with the team in the near future.

My guess is he’ll play this upcoming season in the DEL and maybe see some time in the AHL next year (2021-22). He could even play for the Blackhawks in 2021-22.

Right now this looks like a blown draft pick, but never judge a book by its cover. Reichel could end up being a draft steal years down the line. Hopefully, the scouts knew what they were doing when they picked Reichel. It’ll be interesting to see what Stan Bowman has to say about this pick.