Best drafting team in the NHL

[Pangu]

If the Devils count Rafalski, then the Sens can basically count Chara, since he was considered to be basically worthless until being a throw-in in the Yashin trade. Sullivan was taken over a decade ago. Outside of that they have a couple semi-big names. Nothing like a Havlat or Hossa. Most of their team was compiled in the late 80s early 90s, like Brodeur, Neids and Steven, and very little of the team is from recent drafting.

Also again Zorin, none of the players should be counted since none of them have proven themselves in the NHL. Rocking minor leugues is not the same as playing in the NHL, so why should they be counted?

 

[John Flyers Fan]

How do they make a drafting thread if they were signed as free agents?

Umberger shouldn't count, but Fedotenko and Andy delmore were bot undrafted free-agents that should IMO count.

 

[John Flyers Fan]

If the Devils count Rafalski, then the Sens can basically count Chara, since he was considered to be basically worthless until being a throw-in in the Yashin trade.

Chara while never expected to be a Norris contender was much more than a throw-in along with Spezza.

 

[Jason MacIsaac]

If the Devils count Rafalski, then the Sens can basically count Chara, since he was considered to be basically worthless until being a throw-in in the Yashin trade. Sullivan was taken over a decade ago. Outside of that they have a couple semi-big names. Nothing like a Havlat or Hossa. Most of their team was compiled in the late 80s early 90s, like Brodeur, Neids and Steven, and very little of the team is from recent drafting.

Also again Zorin, none of the players should be counted since none of them have proven themselves in the NHL. Rocking minor leugues is not the same as playing in the NHL, so why should they be counted?

Not even close, Chara was playing in the NHL when he was traded to Ottawa, Madden was a college player and Rafalski was in europe when they signed, neither was really though of by any team in the NHL but NJ picked them up. Just like David Clarkson was by the Devils again in the offseason.

We didn't pick a Hossa or Havlat....Elias, Sykora, Gionta and Gomez are scrubs I guess....Most of our team was compiled late 80's early 90's?

Madden
Elias
Pandolfo
Gionta
Gomez
Parise
Martin
Hale
White
Rafalski
Clemmensen
Brylin
Janssen
Ahonen

 

[Sens Rule]

Detroit owns this thread.

I'm not sure where people are getting the Senators from.

Lets see picking Hossa 12th and Havlat 26th both arguably the best players in their drafts. Getting a ton of guys late that end up as NHL regulars. Going way back... Getting Alfie in the 5th or 6th round.

Not that they are any better than Detroit at this. Detroit has done pretty much the same thing. Finish in the top 8 teams every year yet still draft some of the best prospects.

But Detroit=Ottawa at drafting well from a late position. Detroit is no better at it nor are they worse.

 

[Sens Rule]

Chara while never expected to be a Norris contender was much more than a throw-in along with Spezza.

Agree, the Sens wanted Chara, the 2nd overall pick was more negotiable than him. They saw something great in Chara though even Ottawa didn't expect him to blossom to this degree.

 

[discostu]

Not even close, Chara was playing in the NHL when he was traded to Ottawa, Madden was a college player and Rafalski was in europe when they signed, neither was really though of by any team in the NHL but NJ picked them up. Just like David Clarkson was by the Devils again in the offseason.

We didn't pick a Hossa or Havlat....Elias, Sykora, Gionta and Gomez are scrubs I guess....Most of our team was compiled late 80's early 90's?

Madden
Elias
Pandolfo
Gionta
Gomez
Parise
Martin
Hale
White
Rafalski
Clemmensen
Brylin
Janssen
Ahonen

New Jersey has had a fantastic record through the 90's. They've been producing about 3 regular NHLers per year during most of that time frame. The one complaint that I would have with their drafting is that I think they've trailed off in the past few years. In the last 5 or 6 drafts, there doesn't seem to be the same returns as they've seen in the past. Zach Parise is of course a great acquisition, but, it's pretty slim for the rest. Paul Martin is a solid pick-up, but, that's going back to 2000. To be fair, I'm not familiar with Jersey's system, so, a lot of the names I'm looking over may be on the verge of making it to the bigs.

If you look at the 90's as a whole, I don't think you can find a better record. Ottawa is definitely competitive with it. We also have been producing about 3 NHLers per year. We've drafted 7 top-end talents (Yashin, Demitra, Alfredsson, Spezza, Redden*, Havlat, Hossa). Three of those players came from high picks, so, reduce the number to 4, if you'd like. New Jersey has produced three top-end talents (Brodeur, Nieds and Elias).

As for saying which team is better, honestly, why bother. Both teams have done an incredible job during that time frame, that, I don't think the fans of either team could ask for anything more from management. The only complaint is that perhaps New Jersey's record may be faltering a bit, without matching their previous success.

As an Ottawa fan, I've been highly encouraged by what I've seen from Meszaros, Eaves, Emery, Schubert and Bochenski, all recent picks, and, there's still big expectations from Kaygordov, once his Russian contract expires. That's what I've liked the most about Ottawa's drafting, it has survived transition. We've gone through countless GMs, different heads of scouting, etc., yet, our drafting record has remained impeccable. I was really worried once we lost Jarmo Kekailenen as our head scout, but, the organization marched on, and has succeeded without him. Meanwhile, St. Louis (where he went to) hasn't done anything remarkable on the drafting front. I guess he never played a big a role as we thought.



*Since Redden was acquired with a swap of the first and second picks, I see that as the organization just doing a do-over of their draft pick.

 

[Danny__K]

As team that went from one of the best in the past to one of the worst in the present i would like to nominate the flames. Between 80-85 they got

39 D Steve Konroyd
181 F Hakan Loob
15 D Al MacInnis
56 G Mike Vernon
13 C Dan Quinn
51 C Brian Bradley
231 R Sergei Makarov
12 L Gary Roberts
38 L Paul Ranheim
117 R Brett Hull
159 C Jiri Hrdina
180 D Gary Suter
27 C Joe Nieuwendyk
122 L Tim Sweeney
143 L Stu Grimson

Now if the flames could only turn out that many regular NHLers every 6 years i would be one happy happy flames fan.

 

[Colorado Avalanche]

Ottawa,New Jersey and Detroit.

 

[NyQuil]

Chara while never expected to be a Norris contender was much more than a throw-in along with Spezza.

There was a four-page article on the "Steal" in the Ottawa Citizen, in which they talked about the entire affair involving then-GM Marshall Johnston.

In a nutshell, it was a high-stakes poker game where Ottawa HAD to dump Yashin but didn't want anyone to know how desperate they were to unload him.

What is interesting to note, is that Marshall Johnston was scouting for the Islanders when they drafted up Chara, and it was Zdeno who was the main target in the trade.

They were hoping to get the first-round pick, but they probably would have made the deal for something else had Milbury not agreed to it.

 

[Pothier]

http://www.hockeysfuture.com/article.php?sid=8039

Read.

 

[budscweizer16]

kinda small to read.

Jersey
Ottawa

in a few years I think Nashville will be among the top

 

[AlienWorkShop]

A little off topic, but this is a different Keith Carney.

What's sick though is that they're both from Rhode Island. What are the freakin' chances of that? Plus they were born only a year and four days apart and taken in consecutive drafts. Man that's strange.

Kind of like when the Leafs and Blue Jays each had a top prospect named Jeff Ware at the same time. And they were both busts.

Agh, I've made that mistake before

 

[Maithz]

Brendan Shanahan
Bill Guerin
Martin Brodeur
Mike Dunham
Jaroslav Modry
Scott Niedermayer
Brian Rolston
Jason Smith
Sergei Brylin
Cale Hulse
Stephane Yelle
Jay Pandolfo
Brendan Morrison
Krzysztof Oliwa
Patrik Elias
Sheldon Souray
Steve Sullivan
Petr Sykora
Alyn McCauley
Pierre Dagenais
Colin White
Scott Parker
Josef Boumedienne
Willie Mitchell
Scott Clemmensen
Mike Van Ryn
Scott Gomez
Brian Gionta
David Hale
Paul Martin
Michael Rupp
Mike Danton
Alexander Suglobov
Zach Parise
Travis Zajac
Nicklas Bergfors

NJ own this thread

Nj , Ottawa , Detroit , Colorado and Los Angeles are the best . Montreal in the top 10 for the last 5 years . With Plekanec , Komisarek , Perezhogin , Higgins , Latendresse , Price , Kostitsyn brothers , Locke .

 

[norrisnick]

Wings owned 1989.

Sillinger - still in the NHL
Boughner - still in the NHL (barely, but still there)
Lidstrom - best defenseman of his generation
Fedorov - best two-way forward of his generation
Drake - still in the NHL
Konstantinov - should still be in the NHL with some hardware on his mantle.

That is all.

 

[pit]

Not a chance in hell that the Sens drafting is better then colorados. If memory serves me currectly the Sens were the laugh stock of the league a couple years ago no wonder they got good younge players.

If we're talking about laughing stocks "a few years ago", allow me to introduce you to the Avalanche's alter ego: The Quebec Nordiques.

Before moving to Colorado, Quebec had:
1987 - #15 - Joe Sakic
1989 - #1 - Mats Sundin
#22 - Adam Foote
1990 - #1 - Owen Nolan
1991 - #1 - Eric Lindros
1993 - #10 - Jocelyn Thibault
- #14 - Adam Deadmarsh
1994 - #12 - WADE BELAK (Ok, maybe not the best pick!)
#72 - Chris Drury
#87 - Milan Hejduk

All the sucking the Avs did as the Nordiques is what formed their Stanley Cup core of later years. #1 picks in three consecutive years. I'm not saying the Avs haven't made some good later round decisions recently, but there's no room to laugh at other teams for sucking and getting to draft high for it when the Avs organization was the poster child for that.

 

[Attica]

Anyone saying Colorado has the best drafting in the NHL is completely off their rocker, If you said that, you are not only wrong, but a massive feeble homer.


Come on.... You're gonna take Stoa And Stastny over Datsyuk and Zetterberg?

Use your head.


What a joke.

 

[Slats432]

Oilers have had 20 years of suckitude.....hopefully some of the present hotshots turn out.

 

[Hasbro]

Anyone saying Colorado has the best drafting in the NHL is completely off their rocker, If you said that, you are not only wrong, but a massive feeble homer.

Some of the praise has come from Canucks and Wings fans

Come on.... You're gonna take Stoa And Stastny over Datsyuk and Zetterberg?

Use your head.


What a joke.

It is a joke considering they were drafted 6 and 7 years before Stoa and Stastny. Liles and Svatos, not too bad.

 

[MAF]

I disagree, the Pens' drafting has got to be one of the worst in the NHL.

I absolutely agree. Sure, you can't do much wrong when selecting Crosby with the 1st pick...

Some of their 1st and 2nd rounders from the 90s were (absolute) busts. I've never heard anything or much from Alexander Zevakhin, Robert Dome, Brian Gaffaney, Pavel Skrbek, Craig Hillier, Richard Park, Domenic Pittis, Stefan Bergkvist, Rusty Fitzgerald ...

4 of 10 1st rounders of the 90's have played less than 55 games for the Penguins and none of these 4 guys has reached 200 games in total...

Sure, it has gotton better over the last years, but the 90s were awful considering the draft. If they had drafted better, then they wouldn't have missed the playoffs for 3 years in a row. On the other hand no Crosby, Malkin & Fleury ...

 

[Fish on The Sand]

Ottawa continually has it thrown in their face that they amassed all its talent from its top 10 picks, but I would take their 5 drafts after their top 10s over their first 5.

yashin
daigle
Berard
phillips
bonk

hossa
chouinard
havlat
volchenkov
gleason


That doesnt even take into consideration their late round work, which has been exceptional

if you would take the 2nd set you must not be very smart or really dislike winning.

 

[Jason MacIsaac]

New Jersey has had a fantastic record through the 90's. They've been producing about 3 regular NHLers per year during most of that time frame. The one complaint that I would have with their drafting is that I think they've trailed off in the past few years. In the last 5 or 6 drafts, there doesn't seem to be the same returns as they've seen in the past. Zach Parise is of course a great acquisition, but, it's pretty slim for the rest. Paul Martin is a solid pick-up, but, that's going back to 2000. To be fair, I'm not familiar with Jersey's system, so, a lot of the names I'm looking over may be on the verge of making it to the bigs.

If you look at the 90's as a whole, I don't think you can find a better record. Ottawa is definitely competitive with it. We also have been producing about 3 NHLers per year. We've drafted 7 top-end talents (Yashin, Demitra, Alfredsson, Spezza, Redden*, Havlat, Hossa). Three of those players came from high picks, so, reduce the number to 4, if you'd like. New Jersey has produced three top-end talents (Brodeur, Nieds and Elias).

As for saying which team is better, honestly, why bother. Both teams have done an incredible job during that time frame, that, I don't think the fans of either team could ask for anything more from management. The only complaint is that perhaps New Jersey's record may be faltering a bit, without matching their previous success.

As an Ottawa fan, I've been highly encouraged by what I've seen from Meszaros, Eaves, Emery, Schubert and Bochenski, all recent picks, and, there's still big expectations from Kaygordov, once his Russian contract expires. That's what I've liked the most about Ottawa's drafting, it has survived transition. We've gone through countless GMs, different heads of scouting, etc., yet, our drafting record has remained impeccable. I was really worried once we lost Jarmo Kekailenen as our head scout, but, the organization marched on, and has succeeded without him. Meanwhile, St. Louis (where he went to) hasn't done anything remarkable on the drafting front. I guess he never played a big a role as we thought.



*Since Redden was acquired with a swap of the first and second picks, I see that as the organization just doing a do-over of their draft pick.

You are right, we traded alot of picks to win those two cups and it has caught up a little but just when you think they are dried out there sign a FA defensmen out of college like Miller who ends up being the real deal. Same with Ryan Murphy, there is noway this guy won't be in the NHL on a PK and shutdown unit.

 

[ukyo]

In terms of drafting goaltenders San Jose should be mentioned. Not so much their forwards or defensemen though...

 

[Debrincat93]

Your dreaming.

Ottawas picks:

Kaigorodov: 47th 2002
Vermette: 55th 2000
Eaves: 29th 2003
Fisher:44th 1998
Havlat:26th 1999
Alfredsson: 133rd 1994
Boshenski: 223rd 2001
Volchenkov:21st 2000
Mezsaros:23rd 2004
Emery: 99th 2001
Hossa: 12th 1997

Detroit:

Datsyuk: 171st 1998
Hudler: 58th 2002
Holmstrom: 257th 1994
Grigorenko: 62nd 2001
Fischer: 25th 1998
Kronwall: 29th 2000
Lidstom: 53rd 1989
Howard: 64th 2003

By the looks of things Ottawa had done much better drafting then detroit. Considering I did not mention the really good prospects Ottawa has over in Russia or the talented blueliner in Lee, or Glass who won a gold medal last year in the world juniors as the teams number 1 goalie. Ottawa is not only in Detroits league when it comes to drafting but the sens set the bar.

yea great points, but where is: fedorov, konstantinov, sillinger, boughner, drake, kozlov, primeau, lapointe, york, osgood, knuble?

yea thought so, dont make a argument and add everyone from ottawa if your not gonna do it from detroit

im not saying detorit has a better draft team, but im just stating this for the sake of the conversation

 

[The Fuhr*]

yea great points, but where is: fedorov, konstantinov, sillinger, boughner, drake, kozlov, primeau, lapointe, york, osgood, knuble?

yea thought so, dont make a argument and add everyone from ottawa if your not gonna do it from detroit

im not saying detorit has a better draft team, but im just stating this for the sake of the conversation

Ya, did not think it would be fair to Ottawa to talk about a teams drafting record before the Sens enterd the league. Compare the teams when Ottawa became a team in 1992, Its not Ottawas fault they wont around before then to compare drafting records.

Also I guess Edmonton is an outstanding drafting team because they drafted Anderson,Coffey,Fuhr,Lowe,Messier and Tikkanen