Best NHL Draft of All Time?

[periplanar]

1979: 7 HHOFers - Messier, Bourque, Gartner, Goulet, Anderson, Carbonneau, Lowe
1984: one of the best players of all time in Lemieux, one of the best goalies of all time in Roy, 2 other HOFers in Hull and Robitaille
2003: considered one of the deepest drafts of all time - Bergeron, Getzlaf, Perry, Kesler, MAF, Pavelski, E Staal, Burns, Suter, Phaneuf, Carter, Brown, Backes, Seabrook, Byfuglien, Halak, Crawfrod, Howard, etc
2015: jury's still out due to recency, but already a lot of top end talent - McDavid, Eichel, Marner, Rantanen, Barzal, Boeser, Chabot, Aho, Werenski, Meier, Connor, Hintz, Provorov etc

Click to read more...

 

[BLNY]

03

 

[FrozenJagrt]

03 was deep for sure. But it's hard to beat 7 Hall of Fame players. I voted 1979.

 

[Albatros]

1979:
#1 Rob Ramage
#2 Perry Turnbull
#3 Mike Foligno

 

[Ivo]

Hard to beat 1979, since it was basically two drafts rolled into one due to draft age being lowered. Could have been even better, if the draft ran longer (only 6 rounds and 126 total players selected). Players like Cicarelli and Kerr were eligible, but undrafted.

 

[High five Tom]

03 was deep for sure. But it's hard to beat 7 Hall of Fame players. I voted 1979.

I think 03' will have just as much hall of famers

 

[FrozenJagrt]

I think 03' will have just as much hall of famers

Really? I can't see it. Who are you thinking?

 

[SwedishFire]

Really? I can't see it. Who are you thinking?

Fleury, Staal, Bergeon, Getzlaf, Perry, Crawford ...pavelski? Considering he was a 7th rounder, weak case for Weber - probably not,

1979 had Lowe as a HoF, thats tomtoo weak.

2015 has the chance to be no1.

 

[SwedishFire]

1989 was deep as well, mostly because the iron curtain fell.

 

[norrisnick]

1979: 7 HHOFers - Messier, Bourque, Gartner, Goulet, Anderson, Carbonneau, Lowe
1984: one of the best players of all time in Lemieux, one of the best goalies of all time in Roy, 2 other HOFers in Hull and Robitaille
2003: considered one of the deepest drafts of all time - Bergeron, Getzlaf, Perry, Kesler, MAF, Pavelski, E Staal, Burns, Suter, Phaneuf, Carter, Brown, Backes, Seabrook, Byfuglien, Halak, Crawfrod, Howard, etc
2015: jury's still out due to recency, but already a lot of top end talent - McDavid, Eichel, Marner, Rantanen, Barzal, Boeser, Chabot, Aho, Werenski, Meier, Connor, Hintz, Provorov etc

You missed a HOFer for '84.

 

[wetcoast]

03 was deep for sure. But it's hard to beat 7 Hall of Fame players. I voted 1979.

Except that Anderson is a real fringe HHOFer and Carbs/Lowe even moreso.

03 was just soooooo deep.

 

[BigBadBruins7708]

Really? I can't see it. Who are you thinking?

If the Anderson, Lowe, Carbonneau standards are applied there's 7 from '03

Bergeron, Burns, Getz, Perry, MAF, Staal, Weber

 

[KirkAlbuquerque]

1996 AINEC

 

[TheRumble]

2015 is shaping up to be a legendary draft.

McDavid, Eichel, Marner, Hanifin, Rantanen, Provorov, Werenski, Meier all went in the top 10. Strome and Zacha didn't quite live up to their potential but are still solid NHL players.

Then the rest of the first round: DeBrusk, Barzal, Chabot, Eriksson Ek, Roslovic, Boeser, Konecny, Beauvillier, Samsonov

Rest of the draft: Carlo, Aho, Cirelli, Garland, Mangiapane, Marino, Siegenthaler, Hintz, Kaprizov, Cernak

 

[Wry n Ginger]

1990 has to be in this discussion. Insanely deep draft.

Owen Nolan, Petr Nedved, Keith Primeau, Jaromir Jagr, Keith Tkachuk, Martin Brodeur, Doug Weight, Sergei Zubov, Peter Bondra...and that is not including guys like Nedved, Derian Hatcher, Darryl Sidor and Geoff Sanderson.

 

[dire wolf]

I voted '03. Elite top end plus depth.

It will be interesting to see how 2016 shakes out: F: Matthews, M. Tkachuk, Tage, Laine, PLD, DeBrincat, Bratt, Keller, Kyrou;
Elite D: Fox, McAvoy, Sergachev, and Chychrun (plus guys like Girard and Hronek)

No love for 1983?
F: LaFontaine, Yzerman, Neely, Claude Lemieux, Tocchet, MacLean, Stevens, Courtnall, S.Turgeon, Tikkanen
D: Beukeboom, Galley, Bergevin
G: Hasek, Barrasso, Puppa
Goons: Probert, Kocur, Grimson

 

[goonybird]

Hard to beat 1979, since it was basically two drafts rolled into one due to draft age being lowered. Could have been even better, if the draft ran longer (only 6 rounds and 126 total players selected). Players like Cicarelli and Kerr were eligible, but undrafted.

1979 was the best * required though

 

[MessierII]

It’s 1979. Under the todays rules Gretzky would have been eligible too.

 

[lawrence]

wheres 1993 option? sure the order of the 1st 5 can be altered that by that a deep as hell draft Ive ever seen.

 

[Petey But Really Jim]

2016.

 

[HFpapi]

The 2003 draft is actually going to look less impressive in retrospect than it really was because not enough players sustained their levels but for a time, the NHL was basically fully dominated by the 2003 draft + the big 3 (Crosby, Ovi, Malkin).

Guys like Mike Richards, Zach Parise, Thomas Vanek, Jeff Carter, Ryan Kesler, Brent Seabrook, David Backes, Loui Eriksson, Dion Phaneuf, Dustin Brown on their best days were much better than they will be remembered as being in posterity due to lack of numbers/hardware.

Even some gems of the draft like Staal, Perry, Weber, and Burns might fall short of the HOF after being well on track at one point.

Getzlaf and Bergeron are probably the only two HOF'ers from 03 (maybe Fleury too but I hope not, Pavelski is a no for me), but that doesn't really do 2003 justice.

 

[Aaaarrgghh]

1991 was pretty good too. Lindros, Niedermayer, Forsberg, Kovalev, Näslund, Whitney, Rucinsky, Palffy, Ozolinsh, Osgood to name a few.

 

[biturbo19]

I mean, look at the length of the list of names from 2003.