Jack Eichel: Great at hockey, terrified of snakes
Jack Eichel has impressed scouts and NHL fans all year thanks to his stellar freshman season at Boston University and his outstanding performance at the NHL Combine. The 18-year-old is such an elite player that NBC Sports even made an argument for Eichel as a generational American talent.
So it's clearly difficult to find any glaring deficiencies in Eichel's game, but a day out in Florida finally revealed one weakness for the potential No. 2 draft pick: Eichel has a paralyzing fear of snakes and alligators.
The hilarity ensued when Eichel and a group of top draft picks took a trip to the Florida Everglades on Thursday. There was a snake petting area and a boat tour of the Everglades, but Eichel was having none of it.
"Eichs told us he hates snakes," Mitchell Marner, a center from the London Knights, told Puck Daddy. "As soon as he got there of course there’s a big snake sitting there to our right."
"So I said, 'Eichs, get over here,'" Lawson Crouse, a left wing for the Kingston Frontenacs, said to Puck Daddy. “And he ran in the opposite direction. He was nowhere to be found."
Luckily, the NHL had video of the entire visit. The cameras showed a brave Mitchell Marner draping a snake around his neck while Eichel was MIA. But the cameras eventually tracked down Eichel, who was hiding out on a porch away from the petting area.
"I don't want anything to do with being over there or looking at that snake, touching it," Eichel told the cameras. "I don't know what those guys are doing. That thing, it's a wild animal.
"You don't understand my fear for this stuff. It's crazy."
A skittish Eichel grudgingly participates in the boat tour (despite his wish for a two-level boat where he could hide in a top corner), but some of the other potential draft picks were a bit more brave. Crouse both impressed and disgusted his fellow prospects when he ate a worm on a dare from expected top pick Connor McDavid.
It seems that it's a good thing Buffalo has the second overall pick and is therefore the most likely team to select Eichel, as the young star shouldn't encounter too many snakes or alligators in Western New York.
(h/t Puck Daddy)
Photo credit: Maddie Meyer/Getty Images
