Friday night, the New Jersey Devils selected 18-year-old Swedish center Alexander Command with the 12th overall pick in the 2026 NHL Entry Draft. Command, who played the past season in the U20 Nationell, logged 17 goals and 27 assists for 44 total points in 30 games. He "appeared" in six SHL games, only actually playing in two of them in limited minutes.
With Wyatt Cullen and Tynan Lawrence both off the board and Ethan Belchetz as a somewhat unappealing option for a few reasons, the Devils were either going to have to buck the consensus or trade down to get their guy, and buck the consensus they did. Command was typically mocked in the late teens of the first round, though some late noise predicted that he was a potential top-10 pick.
The name of the game for Command is motor, motor, and more motor. He's one of the hardest workers in the entire draft, taking offense when the other team has the puck and doing anything and everything he can to retrieve it for his team. He's incredibly strong, especially for his size, and is one of the most defensively mature players in the class. On top of it all, he's a pest who frequents getting in the face and under the skin of his opponents.
It's also a pick that makes sense for the Devils for a number of reasons. One, though I generally oppose picking for need, he comes at a position New Jersey can certainly use more of. Secondly, though his production and subsequently his NHLe is subpar relative to his draft slot, his underlying metrics are stellar. According to Gabriel Foley, who uses InStat to measure a variety of metrics, Command ranked first in practically all offensive metric and second in the ones he did not lead.
That's ignoring the defensive side of things, too, which is where professional scouts seem to believe Command shines more than anywhere else. His comparables have ranged anywhere from Christian Dvorak to Jared McCann to Anton Lundell.
At this point in time, it should also be noted that his game is likely underrated by public analytics models. Two-way forwards are typically undervalued in this regard, and Sunny Mehta's analytical approach should be trusted significantly more than the Devils' previous regime at this point in time. After all, he had Bratt as a top-five pick back in 2016 and progressively slammed his hands on the table for him more and more as the draft went on.
Command won't be ready to contribute to the Devils' lineup in 2026-27 in all likelihood, but he's a high-floor, moderately high-ceiling center who will contribute sooner rather than later. He may not be a Cullen or Lawrence, but this is not a player who is a complete bust of a pick. In fact, there is certainly reason to believe he will be a significant contributor for the Devils for a long, long time.
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