Another Twist In Matvei Michkov’s Draft Journey

Matvei Michkov is the NHL Draft’s great unknown. His skills are known. His availability is not.

The Russian is under contract until 2026 in his home country. His talent is such that he is considered a potential top-5 pick next week. But he also could fall to the Flyers at No. 7.

With the political uncertainty in Russia after its invasion of Ukraine, will Michkov have to honor his contract? Does he want to play in Russia until 2026? Will he be able to play hockey in North America? Teams might be hesitant to draft Michkov as highly as his talent dictates. Teams might seek more clearly defined choices.

In a more stable world, Michkov might have been the No. 2 pick after Connor Bedard. The Red Line Report, a scouting service, ranks Michkov second behind Bedard in this year’s draft class. It says Michkov “would have been #1 overall in 8 of the last 10 drafts.”

Now, there’s a twist.

Hard To Pin Down

On his 32 Thoughts podcast, Elliotte Friedman reported teams haven’t been able to set up meetings with Michkov before the draft, as is customary.

“Teams want to get to know who they’re dealing with here,” Friedman said on the podcast.

“What I’m hearing is that in Russia, the teams that could get there to meet him, it wasn’t easy to get to talk to him.

“You would try to talk to him, set up appointments. He just wasn’t interested.

“Like someone said to me the only way you could really get to talk to him was if you physically got to him right after a game and talked to him for a couple of minutes.”

There is speculation that Michkov is angling to be drafted by a specific team. Jeff Marek, co-host of 32 Thoughts, said he believes Michkov wants to be drafted by Washington. Two of the best Russian players in the league play in Washington — Alex Ovechkin and Evgeny Kuznetsov.

When a team invests in a first-round pick, they want to know everything about the player before the draft.

Say Michkov is available at 7. Would the Flyers draft him without getting to know him and thoroughly interviewing him? I don’t think so — even though his talent is something the Flyers need.

Michkov said he would not attend the NHL Combine earlier this month and he did not. He said he would attend the draft in Nashville on June 28-29.

Maybe it’s simply a communications problem in getting Michkov set up with NHL teams either in Russia or when he arrives in the United States. Maybe it’s more manipulative. You get one chance to make a good first impression.

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