FUTURE STARS: Top 50 Bantam Players Ranked

Over this past National Championship weekend, MexicoHockey.com “ranked” all the players participating in the tournament.  All Bantam games were watched and rated.  Then, we compiled the results and came up with our Top 50 players in Mexico!

First, you should know that ranking the players in the Federation will be an annual event.  This year, MexicoHockey.com has ranked only the Bantams. Next year, we will add the Midgets and Juniors.

As an independent news service to the Federation, our aim is to challenge everyone and spark some competition.  We think competition is great for ice hockey and will contribute to it's growth. 

In addition, it is our hope that, with these rankings, the Federation will be able to increase their awareness of all the players the country so that our National Teams can recruit from these pool of players.  So ready, steady, let's go......

Just a quick note - to rank the players, we put together a 4 person committee of coaches, referees, and other hockey leaders to rank each player.  Each ranking official  observed the games at the Nationals.  Then, each official rated each player on 4 distinct categories - (1) Skating (2) Shooting (3) Passing and (4) Game Play.

# 1 Manolo Escandon - 93.75
Manolo plays for the Lomas Verdes Falcons.  He is 6’2” tall and weights 175 lbs.  He’s is 14 years old.  Manolo has many years of hockey experience. He is also playing on the U20 and U18 National team and is the only player ranked that is already on the national team.  Manolo plays defense.  He is a excellent puck handler and skater.  His size and skating speed intimidates opponents.  He is a super duper player.

# 2 Alejandro Escalante - 88.75
Alejandro plays for the Lomas Verdes Falcons.  He is 14 years old and stands 5’6’ tall and weighs 125 lbs.  He plays defense for the club.  He is the captain of his team and has solid leadership credentials.  He is an offensive defensemen who frequently takes the puck into the net and puts the defense on it's heals.  He is an all-around skater, puck handler, shooter, and smart leader.

# 3 Jose Antonio Diez - 86.25
Jose plays a physical style of defense for the San Jeronimo Bears club.  Jose stands at 5’9’ 155lbs. He is the Captain of this years National Champions.  He has a wicked slap shot that can break the glass and knock out a goalie.  It's so strong that it's just sick!  In addition, Diez has strong leadership qualities that make him one to watch for the future.

# 4  Hector Carrero - 85.63
Hector plays center for the Lomas Verdes Falcons. He stands at 5’3 and weighs 110lbs.  Hector is a natural goal scorer and frequently puts in hat tricks during games.  Hector is all about scoring.  He is the kind of player that each defense has to key on because he can light up the net quick and turn a game around.

# 5 Oscar Flores - 84.38
Oscar plays center for the Bears of San Jeronimo.  Oscar stands at 5’5’ and weighs 135 lbs. He is an all around player that skates low and drives hard.  His work ethic, determination, and mental toughness is what sets him apart from the rest and makes this player a future National Team star.

# 6 Charles “Chucky” Bivona - 83.38
Charles plays defensive the San Jeronimo Bears. He stands at 5’0’ and weighs 85 lbs.  Voted the smartest player by coaches, Chucky is a player who just plays big in big games.  A great passer and controller of the game tempo, Chucky also skates extremely well and loves the checking game.  He has already started practicing with the U18 team as coaches prepare this future star for a role on the team for 2006-07.

# 6 Alan Smithers - 83.38
Alan is a strongman on the offense using both his physical attributes and his skating abilities to out dual opponents.  His physical style of play is dominating and his drives to the net are unstoppable.  Alan is a future star to watch!

# 8  Adrian Baz Baz - 82.50
Adrian is a well rounded all around player.  He plays both offense and defense and just makes plays.  Not too big and not too small, Adrian slithers his way to net and is a play maker for the Lomas Verdes Falcons.

# 9  Carlos “Pato” Gomez - 81.25
Carlos, an experienced player, has been playing with Bears of San Jeronimo.  He can skate and shoot extremely well and is a natural goal scorer.  Unfortunately, he broke his wrist in his first game at the Nationals and did not have a chance to show his stuff.  He is out for 2 months but upon his return, we expect this future star to excel. 

# 9  Guillermo Lastra - 81.25
Guillermo is a new star coming on the scene.  He plays center for Villahermosa and made a huge impression at the National Championships leading this team to success.  He can skate, shoot, pass, and play smart.  This player has a future in hockey and might be on the National Team roster by this time next year.

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HOW THE RANKINGS ARE SCORED

Each category was given a score from 0-100, where 100 is perfect. Each ranking official added up his 4 scores and then divided by 4 to get their average score. Then, MexicoHockey.com added up each Ranking Official's average score and divided the scores by 4 to get the composite average. The scores you see published is this composite score. Here's an example;

Complete Top 50 List                  Top Prospect Desktop

EXAMPLE Say Official # 1 ranks Player A as follows; Skating: 75 Shooting: 65 Passing: 71 Game Play: 55  75+65+71+55=266 Official # 1 would add up the total.  In this case, the total equals 266.  Then, the Official would divide the 266 by 4, to ge the average score for Player A. 266/4=66.50  Now let’s say, the other 3 Officials go through the same process and their scores are as follows; Official # 1:  66.50 Official # 2:  71.00 Official # 3:  61.25 Official # 4:  85.00 66.50+71.00+61.25+85.00=283.75 So by adding up the 4 officials scores, MexicoHockey.com has a composite score of 283.75.  We then, divide by 4 to get the composite total score for the player that is 70.94. 283.75/4=70.94=Composite Total Score for Player A