The Everett Silvertips have a bear mascot, the Bruins have a bear mascot…why not have a player named Bear?
Analysis
This kid, if picked, will become someone’s favorite player almost instantly.
Carter Bear comes to us from the Everett Silvertips as their premiere forward; one of the straws stirring the drink for the club as they duke it out for WHL supremacy (though that might be on hold with Gavin McKenna on the way), and the way he does it is gloriously unsubtle.
He just…never really stops moving.
While he’s only 6’0, Bear absolutely loves getting involved physically and initiating forechecking through the body; all the while constantly moving his feet. Bear’s sheer willingness to be engaged and stay engaged stands out because frankly, it stands out against a number of players who seem to have higher skill ceilings than he does end up with at least one allusion that they sometimes cheat for something; skating, shooting, defense, you get the picture. Bear on the other hand, goes at 110% and 110 miles per hour no matter what he’s doing.
While it sounds like he’s a pure power forward, Bear compliments his ferocious game style with an ample amount of skill; He’s got a powerful shot that he can wire through traffic directly to the net, or beat a goalie clean by getting a lot more power behind it than most goalies are ready for. But that’s during cycles; where he can be really dangerous is with his hands in transition; finding silky passes and maneuvers while being actively defended in order to keep the puck moving in the right direction, and force the defender to make a move beforehand. Together, these traits make him a difficult player to play against; even on a Silvertips team that prides itself on being hard to play against, and the fact that his effort is considered a major plus seems to consistently stand out because of what it means for the rest of the draft; a lot of these kids sometimes get dinged for inconsistencies in their game that tends to be described as a lack of effort or taking a shift off.
Nobody will ever accuse Carter Bear of taking a shift off, and it’s made him a formidable player among his peers.
If there is a negative to his game, it’s how his physicality could impact his game sense.
Here’s sort of what I mean; Carter Bear can and most likely will muscle his way out of coverage. That’s something that he can do at his size and weight in the WHL where he’s playing teenagers who are incomplete products who sometimes take shifts off or assume their positioning is good enough. As a matter of fact, he tends to default to muscling his way out of trouble when he’s getting defended, and you know what? Most of the time, it works! He is used to pulling himself away from his opponent and keeping his balance to keep possession under pressure…from teenagers.
The issue is that in the professional game, all of that is gonna be coming at him a lot harder and faster than anything he’s seen in the WHL, and there’s a worry that if he can’t find a seam to muscle his way through, he’s just gonna get into board battles and lose possession as seasoned pros make him pay for trying to muscle his way through them. He either needs to add muscle to allow him to both survive that and continue finding the speed necessary to fight through pro-style players, or he needs to lean more into the skill side of his game to give him further tools to evade backcheckers. A gloriously unsubtle gameplan can be ruined by planning around it, after all.
Drafting Bear means that you will have a player that embodies a lot of the things you would like in a player, while also supporting that he has the capacity to be more if you properly nurture those traits. He’s not exactly the high skill-ceiling pick, but he’s definitely the highest possible effort.
Personally? I think Bear would make a great Bruin.
While yes, the number of headlines trying to shoehorn his name into it would result in the most unbearable day at your local sports website, Bear also embodies a lot of the qualities that Bruins fans tend to like in their players (or at least they think they do), while having the talent necessary to translate all of that into a successful, dangerous player. Will he be a top six player? Sure, but I think it would be clear that he is a 2nd line player at absolute best, and while the Bruins do need to get a couple of those, they also need 1st liners as well.
This is a draft that sets up the next few years for Boston. A feel-good pick may not be the best for the team.
Rankings
Ranked 10th by NHL Central Scouting among North American Skaters
Ranked 8th by EliteProspects.com
Ranked 15th by TSN’s Bob McKenzie
Ranked 22nd by TSN’s Cragi Button
Ranked 7th by The Hockey News’ Tony Ferrari
Ranked 20th by McKeens Hockey
Ranked 20th by FC Hockey
Ranked 16th by DailyFaceoff.com
Ranked 13th by Dobber Prospects
Ranked 9th by Smaht Scouting