OrrNumber4
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- Jul 25, 2002
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What are expectations of a draft pick?
- Thread starter OrrNumber4
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Mizral
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How I see it:
1 - 5: Franchise players at forward and defense, 1st line forward, #1 or 2 defensemen
6 - 10: 1/2nd line forwards, top 4 defensemen
11 - 20: 2nd/3rd line forwards, top 4 defensemen
21 - 30: 3rd line forwards, top 5 defensemen
31 - 45: 3rd/4th line forwards, top 6 defensemen
45+: It's all gravy
1 - 5: Franchise players at forward and defense, 1st line forward, #1 or 2 defensemen
6 - 10: 1/2nd line forwards, top 4 defensemen
11 - 20: 2nd/3rd line forwards, top 4 defensemen
21 - 30: 3rd line forwards, top 5 defensemen
31 - 45: 3rd/4th line forwards, top 6 defensemen
45+: It's all gravy
Depends entirely on the draft year.
A 1993 or 1997/98 draft year, I'd expect a top talent with a top 10 draft pick.
I like Mizral's outline for 1-10, but 11-20 should still expect good strong talent. Drafting a third/fourth liner with a 21-45 pick shouldn't be the objective or expectation IMO, unless we're talking about spectacular checking line forwards such as Peca, Holik, Madden, etcetera.
Take a look at any draft and you'll find just as many good to elite talent in the latter half as you would in the top half (save the top 4 picks).
1998 for example, you see after the top five are: Rico Fata, Manny Malhotra, Mark Bell, Mike Rupp and Nikolai Antropov to round out the top 10.
Later in the first round are: Simon Gagne, Robyn Regehr, Alex Tanguay, Jiri Fischer, Scott Gomez, and Mike Van Ryn; all of which are equal to better talents than the 5-10 group.
Granted 1998 was one of the stronger draft years in recent memory. So take 1996 instead, probably the weakest draft in the past few decades:
Top ten of the 1st round includes: Phillips, Zyuzin, Dumont, Volchkov, Rasmussen, Devereaux, Lance Ward, Salei, and Aitken
After the top ten: Derek Morris, Marty Reasoner, Zubrus, Sturm, Marcus Nilson, and Daniel Briere.
I'd take the 'after top ten' list before that 'top ten' any day. You can run down the list of drafts, and find a general trend: after the first 4 picks, the talent will be scattered in the first round.
In answer to the original question, I don't think there can be expectations based on a draft number. Not entirely, at least. The top 4 should always be expected to be a top player, but after that the talent can be so scattered among the first round. In the second round, sometimes you have years such as 2003 and 1998 where you can find a boatload of mature players that become impact NHLers, but most years you've got around a 30-35% chance of landing a future NHLer in the second round. Very rarely will that be an elite talent.
In the third round, you've got around a 25-30% chance of netting yourself a future NHLer. Same goes for the fourth round.
After the fourth, it turns into a complete crapshoot. Teams select players with some great potential but some huge flaws, or select players that the team has interviewed and thinks highly of (character-wise), but only in a depth/role player capacity, etcetera. That's why you can see talents like Kim Johnsson, Theo Fleury, Tomas Kaberle and Andrei Markov come out of late rounds; they have the potential, but chance of attaining that potential and overcoming deficiencies is unlikely.
Since teams are drafting very raw 18-year old talents, and the depth of the draft pool varies from year to year, I don't think it's possible to set expectations outside the top four picks.
A 1993 or 1997/98 draft year, I'd expect a top talent with a top 10 draft pick.
I like Mizral's outline for 1-10, but 11-20 should still expect good strong talent. Drafting a third/fourth liner with a 21-45 pick shouldn't be the objective or expectation IMO, unless we're talking about spectacular checking line forwards such as Peca, Holik, Madden, etcetera.
Take a look at any draft and you'll find just as many good to elite talent in the latter half as you would in the top half (save the top 4 picks).
1998 for example, you see after the top five are: Rico Fata, Manny Malhotra, Mark Bell, Mike Rupp and Nikolai Antropov to round out the top 10.
Later in the first round are: Simon Gagne, Robyn Regehr, Alex Tanguay, Jiri Fischer, Scott Gomez, and Mike Van Ryn; all of which are equal to better talents than the 5-10 group.
Granted 1998 was one of the stronger draft years in recent memory. So take 1996 instead, probably the weakest draft in the past few decades:
Top ten of the 1st round includes: Phillips, Zyuzin, Dumont, Volchkov, Rasmussen, Devereaux, Lance Ward, Salei, and Aitken
After the top ten: Derek Morris, Marty Reasoner, Zubrus, Sturm, Marcus Nilson, and Daniel Briere.
I'd take the 'after top ten' list before that 'top ten' any day. You can run down the list of drafts, and find a general trend: after the first 4 picks, the talent will be scattered in the first round.
In answer to the original question, I don't think there can be expectations based on a draft number. Not entirely, at least. The top 4 should always be expected to be a top player, but after that the talent can be so scattered among the first round. In the second round, sometimes you have years such as 2003 and 1998 where you can find a boatload of mature players that become impact NHLers, but most years you've got around a 30-35% chance of landing a future NHLer in the second round. Very rarely will that be an elite talent.
In the third round, you've got around a 25-30% chance of netting yourself a future NHLer. Same goes for the fourth round.
After the fourth, it turns into a complete crapshoot. Teams select players with some great potential but some huge flaws, or select players that the team has interviewed and thinks highly of (character-wise), but only in a depth/role player capacity, etcetera. That's why you can see talents like Kim Johnsson, Theo Fleury, Tomas Kaberle and Andrei Markov come out of late rounds; they have the potential, but chance of attaining that potential and overcoming deficiencies is unlikely.
Since teams are drafting very raw 18-year old talents, and the depth of the draft pool varies from year to year, I don't think it's possible to set expectations outside the top four picks.
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