Text messages, Snapchats, and Instagram messages start to flood your phone. If you were ranked high enough you attended the draft in person, where you get escorted from your seat down to the draft floor to meet the executives from the team that just drafted you (before the decentralized draft started). Your heart beats at what seems like a million beats per minute, you put on your draft jersey and hat and shake hands with 10-15 scouts and executives, no names which you’ll remember. You soon get swept away by the team’s PR staff up to the team suite, allowing management to return to their draft table to begin discussing their next pick.

Your family soon joins you in the team’s suite. Players and family mingle while the draft continues and then concludes. By the end of the draft, management has joined everyone upstairs. In most cases, the general manager begins his short speech. He welcomes all the players and family to the organization, states how excited the organization is to draft such excellent people and players and how each player will play a role in the future success of the team.

As the night starts to wrap up, you leave with your family to the fancy steakhouse - a reservation that was booked weeks in advanced - to celebrate all your successes. For me, it was the first time in my life I had ever felt truly accomplished. It was almost like a feeling of ecstasy lingered through me. It was the first time in a while that I felt like I was able to truly exhale.

You get drafted, you take the pictures, you put on the hat, you meet management — and then a few days later you walk into a hotel conference room with all the other draft picks and free agents who have been identified as NHL prospects. Everyone sizing each other up, understanding that they are now one step closer to signing an NHL contract. There’s a weird energy around the room - anticipation and excitement, but they both take a back seat to the anxiety that looms overhead. Camp will last anywhere from 4-6 days, where there is always someone watching. Every stride, puck battle, goal, or goal allowed will be under some sort level of criticism. Even sitting in the meal room you start to think to yourself, “Are they judging what I’m eating? Or how much I’m eating?”. You start to question every act because there is always another set of eyes watching what you are doing…

Development camp week comes and goes - exit meetings are now underway. You arrive at the rink with a checklist of staff members to meet with, usually ending with management. There's a strength coach with a tablet full of your testing numbers. A brief conversation outlying what you need to work on - for most guys it’s putting on size and strength at that age. A nutritionist who divulges into a new nutrition plan for you. Then finally you enter the general manager’s office (usually littered with the management staff) at the head of the table, the coach, or sometimes the GM, who smiles the whole time but says very little, because he's already decided what he thinks of you and he's just watching how you handle the room. You sit there nodding, trying to look coachable and confident at the same time. The reality is everything and nothing were said in those exit interviews. It was the first time a lot of these staff members have truly seen you play in person.

In most ‘war rooms’, there are only a couple to a handful of scouts that have watched you play more than once live. These are the people banging the table for the organization to draft you.

After the high of development camp (or more like the raging anxiety for most guys) begins to settle, players return to their home base for the summer and they’re faced with the question: what do I do next?

Some teams will provide each prospect with a personalized workout program that they wish for them to execute to see the best results. However, each player has their own trusted strength coach that they believe in. How could they not? Look at the successes they have had with them thus far. The good strength coaches out there will review the given programs and find ways to tweak their own program to include some of the team’s wishes. The stubborn coaches might review the program and throw it in the trash. After all, look what their workouts have done - their player got drafted for goodness sake! Why change something thats not broken! But, it’s the numbers that gets looked at come the following development camp. And if those don’t improve, management isn’t happy.

These workout programs provided by the team are usually tailored primarily to a player’s weaknesses. If improvements are made, no matter how the player got there, management probably won’t ask too many questions. There are many ways to skin a cat - as long as the program addresses those weaknesses, teams will be happy if they see results by the following year.

And just remember, you’re a part of an NHL organization now. That’s both an honor and a reminder that teams are always watching. You will always have eyes on you from this point forward…

Player development coaches will be monitoring you. The great ones on a weekly/bi-weekly basis, the good ones on a monthly basis, and the others next year at development camp. They check in on your progress throughout the year with your coaches, strength coaches and current/former teammates. Feedback forms are often due weekly to staff from your respective NHL teams. These usually have you listing sleep schedules, stress levels, how many workouts you completed, and then a short list to rank and discuss your games from the past week. These teams collect a massive amount of information on you as a player to develop the best estimate of how you will develop as a professional when you no longer have anyone holding your hand.

You are an investment that every team hopes they strike gold with on their return on investment (even before they every hand you a contract and you get your first check). They pay for your flights, equipment, meals, hotels, guest speakers, etc. every year you show up for development camp. Some players maximize these resources and parlay them into a career to take care of themselves/families. Others are just living in the moment because they think it will last forever. The time is now to make the decision on what each player will do…