The Red Wings hosted three Russian players at their Summer Development Camp this past week at the BELFOR Training Center underneath Little Caesars Arena. Detroit Hockey Now’s Bob Duff took note of their presence, as well as Red Wings director of player development Dan Cleary’s take on the trio’s performance in a learning environment:
Detroit, a team known for rostering some of the best Russian hockey players in NHL history, hosted three young KHL players over the past week, including free agent invites Yegor Vinagradov and Yaroslav Busygin, alongside 2025 sixth-round pick Nikita Tyurin
“It was good to finally see him [Tyurin.] You know, three of them together are like thick as thieves, these guys. They had a great time. Got to watch and do some baseball, they got to go shopping… I hope they enjoyed it,” Director of prospect development Dan Cleary said.
The Red Wings probably have little to no shot of signing Vinagradov or Busygin, but the Wings afford all their development camp invitees with the same level of instruction.
As such, Duff reports that the Russian players did run into a language barrier from time to time, but the Wings’ skill development coaches made sure that everything worked out for the best:
“Fish (Detroit scout Jiri Fischer) was a great help in that, and having our Russian scout (Nikolai Vakurov) here to translate because I didn’t understand them much and they certainly didn’t understand me,” Cleary joked.
Of course, for Red Wings fans, they might have been more interested in what center Vinagradov, who had 54 points in 67 KHL games last year for Torpedo Novgorod, has to offer in the short term. Unfortunately, the 23-year-old is still under contract with his Russian club, but establishing a relationship with him was important for the team.
“Fish threw those two guys at me [Busygin and Vinagradov], and you know, Vinagradov had a really good season in the KHL. It’s his first time over here. Certainly, it’s great to see these guys,” Cleary said, “All these kids are sponges, you know, which is great. These kids are much more prepared and better than I was at that age.”
Continued; again, Vinagradov’s presence was definitely more about relationship-building than an expectation that the young man might buy out his own contract to come over from Torpedo Nizhny Novgorod to the NHL..
But that’s the kind of thing that the Summer Development Camp is for, especially in terms of college free agents. You just never know when one might end up signing in Detroit, which would benefit the organization greatly. So you push the time and resources into creating that relationship, and sustaining it over time.
