yeah, it's easy to hit on your first round picks. Pretty much every Oiler first rounder has been an NHLer to some degree - though Yakupov is doing his best to prove that wrong - but the Oil have gotten nothing from the rest of their drafts, and that's the big reason they've never been able to get out of the cellar.
A team has to find players throughout the draft and they have to make their important, high in the draft order picks count.
Indeed, and given that bar the last 2 or 3 which are still germinating, the wings have drafted at least 1 regular NHL-er (2 or three times for other teams) between the 3rd and last rounds for every year bar 1 since 2001. And our 3rd round pick that year was Igor Grigorenko, who was thought to be a nailed on top six guy with 1st line potential until the near fatal car crash.
While Ericsson and Helm may be dirty words at the moment, for a 9th rounder and a 5th rounder they've done well. We're all losing our heads about AA not being on the roster - 4th round. Marchenko may be a 5-6 d-man but for the 7th round that's good. If Pulky makes an impact thats another 4th rounder, 30 picks BEFORE Mrazek. Nyquist was a 5th. Even Franzen was a 3rd rounder.
Getting on average one roster player every year from rounds 3-7 means that now we are finally keeping our 1st and 2nd round picks, our prospect pool could swell nicely even without tanking. Not to mention taking camp invite hunches like Glendenning, Hicketts and young FAs like DD and Coreau.
Knowing that there are roster rounder-outers coming from later picks and tryouts means those newly kept 1st and 2nds can swing for the fences a little bit more, going for those flawed prospects with great up-sides, which hopefully will provide 1 or 2 of those bona fide 1st line players we crave.
What the organisation HAS TO improve on though, is getting some return for prospects that don't pan out or fringe players leaving in FA. Someone like Patty Eaves should have got us a late pick rather than just being a throw in. Could we not have got a 5th, 6th or 7th for Tommy Mccolum, Marek Tvrdon, Nestrasil or Joakim Andersson? That's chump change to most teams, but for the reasons outlined above, is probably a 1 in 20 chance of a genuine roster player at worst.