Datsyuk and Zetterberg at the draft and as prospects

SnowblindNYR

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Hi folks,

I've always wondered this but never asked. For some reason got inspiration to ask now. Do you guys know why both of these guys were taken so late? Especially a guy like Datsyuk. You have to think that his sick stickhandling was on display when he was 18. When he was drafted it seems like a time that Russians could be drafted high. 1998 was long after the Soviet Union fell, so there was no reason to worry about players playing in the NHL. It was also before the current "Russian factor". I seem to think I remember reading that Datsyuk played in a lower level league. However, you get guys from High School with far less skill drafted in the middle of the first round. I know American HS and lower league in Russia is a big difference, but is it 6 rounds big?

Also, I realize this was a while back, so the internet wasn't as big then, but does anyone know if these 2 guys were considered really promising prospects after the draft? I mean, right now the Rangers have a promising young Swedish prospect we're following named Jesper Fasth who was taken in the 6th round in I think 2010 (if he turns out half the player these guys are I'd be thrilled). I wonder if there were reports on 2 possible steals playing Europe taken late, in Datsyuk and Zetterberg.
 

WingedWheel1987

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Jan 11, 2011
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The story with Datsyuk is that the Wings were the only team that scouted him before the draft. Supposedly the Blues (could be wrong) were going to scout him too, but bad weather prevented them from seeing him.

IDK the story behind Z.
 

SnowblindNYR

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The story with Datsyuk is that the Wings were the only team that scouted him before the draft. Supposedly the Blues (could be wrong) were going to scout him too, but bad weather prevented them from seeing him.

IDK the story behind Z.

Is it because he was playing in a low league? I mean why else would no one scout him? So you have mother nature to thank for him not going (possibly) to a division rival? :laugh:
 

Garl

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Oct 7, 2006
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From what I remember, Datsyuk had a serious injury and health problems back then, and it wasn't a sure thing he will be playing hockey. That's why he didn't get as much exposure as he should.

As for Z, I believe he was very small and has grown a lot since he was 18. He was a classic late bloomer both physically and gamewise.
 
Aug 6, 2012
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I read an article on Datsyuk pre-draft a while back. If I remember correctly, the Wings sent a scout to Russia to scout a specific player (not Datsyuk) but during his time there the scout was impressed by Datsyuk and obviously noted management about him. Then I believe pretty close to draft day the Blues(?) had sent a scout out to watch Datsyuk and some other Russians, but the weather or something made it so the scout could not fly to Russia. So therefore the only team who knew anything at all about Datsyuk were the Wings. Don't quote me word-for-word on this as I may have some information wrong, but I'm pretty sure that is generally what happened. I'll try to find the article...

Couldn't find the exact article or any others similar other than the one from Wikipedia:

Datsyuk was first noticed by Red Wings Director of European Scouting HÃ¥kan Andersson in the summer of 1997–98 Andersson was in Moscow to scout Dmitri Kalinin, but the one who caught his eye was Datsyuk, "this little guy on the other team." Andersson made another trip to see Datsyuk and would have gone a third time; however his flight was cancelled because of a storm. A scout from the St. Louis Blues was on the plane as well, and as a result of that storm Andersson believes he is the only NHL scout to have seen Datsyuk play prior to the 1998 NHL Entry Draft, when the Red Wings drafted him 171st overall.
 

PullHard

Jul 18, 2007
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I read an article on Datsyuk pre-draft a while back. If I remember correctly, the Wings sent a scout to Russia to scout a specific player (not Datsyuk) but during his time there the scout was impressed by Datsyuk and obviously noted management about him. Then I believe pretty close to draft day the Blues(?) had sent a scout out to watch Datsyuk and some other Russians, but the weather or something made it so the scout could not fly to Russia. So therefore the only team who knew anything at all about Datsyuk were the Wings. Don't quote me word-for-word on this as I may have some information wrong, but I'm pretty sure that is generally what happened. I'll try to find the article...

Couldn't find the exact article or any others similar other than the one from Wikipedia:

Pretty sure Dmitri Kalinin was the guy scouts were going to look at. And yeah if I remember correctly it was St. Louis and Dallas that were going to go see them play, bad weather made it unrealistic to fly over to Russia.

edit: you beat me, and I recalled them as being on the same team. So lucky that Kalinin's team happened to be playing against Datsyuk that night.
 

VladTheImpaler

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The story with Z goes something along the lines of Jim Nill accompanying Hakan Andersson to a game to scout Mattias Weinhandl and Nill said that he remembers "this little Zetterberg guy who always seemed to have the puck" catching his eye.

The rest is history.
 

RedWinger10

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Feb 11, 2013
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Datsyuk went unnoticed partially because of his size. He's only 5'11". Ever since the mid 90's size has been one of the most important aspects of the players when being scouted. It truly takes something special for smaller players to get noticed. Henrik Zetterberg is no different also coming in at 5'11". It also takes a smart person in the scouting department to notice thes players and look beyond their size and consider their skills and most of all their potential. That smart person is Hakan Andersson. He is responsible for scouting and drafting Henrik Zetterberg, Pavel Datsyuk, Johan Franzen, Tomas Holmstrom, Valtteri Filppula, Niklas Kronwall, and Jiri Hudler and many more. He has done more for this franchise in the last 10-15 years than most. But most don't even know who he is.
 
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RedWingsNow*

Guest
Hi folks,

I've always wondered this but never asked. For some reason got inspiration to ask now. Do you guys know why both of these guys were taken so late? Especially a guy like Datsyuk. You have to think that his sick stickhandling was on display when he was 18. When he was drafted it seems like a time that Russians could be drafted high. 1998 was long after the Soviet Union fell, so there was no reason to worry about players playing in the NHL. It was also before the current "Russian factor". I seem to think I remember reading that Datsyuk played in a lower level league. However, you get guys from High School with far less skill drafted in the middle of the first round. I know American HS and lower league in Russia is a big difference, but is it 6 rounds big?

Also, I realize this was a while back, so the internet wasn't as big then, but does anyone know if these 2 guys were considered really promising prospects after the draft? I mean, right now the Rangers have a promising young Swedish prospect we're following named Jesper Fasth who was taken in the 6th round in I think 2010 (if he turns out half the player these guys are I'd be thrilled). I wonder if there were reports on 2 possible steals playing Europe taken late, in Datsyuk and Zetterberg.

Very, very little was known about European prospects in the late 90s.
A lot of the hockey fan discussion took place over the USENET (most of those early posts can still be found, though it's getting tougher).

Almost nothing was known about Datsyuk until he was on the team.
In fact, even though Zetterberg was drafted a year later, he started getting buzz earlier.
Here's a post about Zetterberg in 2000.

https://groups.google.com/forum/?fromgroups=#!topicsearchin/alt.sports.hockey.nhl.det-redwings/%22Pavel$20datsyuk%22$20AND$20before:2001$2F08$2F06/alt.sports.hockey.nhl.det-redwings/KP2-UsptyR4

For any of you HF vets, good old KL and HockeyinHD go head-to-head in this thread.

Here is KL's description of Zetterberg:
Zetterberg is a fringe prospect at best. A guy his size has to be a better scorer than Zetterberg is, and has to be able to play D. You saw what happened to Steve Kariya. He was a small, one dimensional forward. Now he's a small, one dimensional forward in Syracuse.
 

RedWinger10

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Feb 11, 2013
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And the reason they went late well there are many factors in the draft that determine the order. One of the biggest is, who is on other teams' radar. Teams know what other teams have looked at and scouted who. Lets say its the draft and one of the players you want is player X. You know player X isn't on anyone else's radar because they barely scouted him or havn't at all. Players A-W are on everyone's radar you aren't going to draft player X right away and miss out (give away) your chance on 1 or 2 of those A-W players. then when the time is right you draft player X. Player X turns out to be Pavel Datsyuk. Detroit knew they were the only ones who scouted him hard. When Hakan Andersson went to scout the team Datsyuk's team was playing the plane was grounded due to bad weather. To be on that plane was Andersson and a scout for St.Louis Blues. The Blues scout went and scouted a different game of theirs but Hakan caught the next flight out and saw the game where he noticed "this little guy on the other team." That ."little guy" was Pavel Datsyuk. He knew he was the only NHL scout to see him play prior to the 1998 entry draft. So there was no point in drafting him with the first pick in the draft it would have been a waste. The draft is a strategy and smart franchises know how to play it. THAT is why he was 171st overall.
 

RedWingsNow*

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Also, Russian hockey was in a state of flux in those days.

But interestingly, here's the class of 1998. Not that bad.

5th - Vishnevsky 552 NHL games.
10th Antropov 766 games
18th Kalinin 539 games
31 Chubarov 228 games
54th Zavakhin No games
60th Arkipov 352 games
72 Afinasenkov 227 games
76th Volkov 0 games
87th Ponikarovsky 654 games
101 Schastlivy 129 games
119 Anton But 0 Games
136 Sergei Kuznetsov 0 games
162 Andrei Markov 654 games
171 Datsyuk 750 games
189 Kruchinin 0 Games
223 Vernkin 0 Games
225 Pastukh 0 Games
236 Rostov 0 games
240 Yershov 0 Games
258 Skrobot 0 Games
 

RedWingsNow*

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So there was no point in drafting him with the first pick in the draft it would have been a waste. The draft is a strategy and smart franchises know how to play it. THAT is why he was 171st overall.

Not true.
it sounds awesome. But it's not true.
If Detroit had any real belief that Datsyuk would be as good as he is, they wouldn't have chanced waiting until round 2, let alone round 5.

Detroit thought Barnes, Valtonen, McCracken, Hobday, Steen and Deleeuw were better picks than Datsyuk.. there might have been some gamesmanship in there... but not 5 rounds worth.
 

14ari13

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Oct 19, 2006
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Not true.
it sounds awesome. But it's not true.
If Detroit had any real belief that Datsyuk would be as good as he is, they wouldn't have chanced waiting until round 2, let alone round 5.

Detroit thought Barnes, Valtonen, McCracken, Hobday, Steen and Deleeuw were better picks than Datsyuk.. there might have been some gamesmanship in there... but not 5 rounds worth.

+1...
 

Tomas W

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Oct 23, 2007
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Sweden
Zetterberg was playing in the 2nd tier in Sweden, he played very well there, but at that time swe-2 perhaps wasnt as well scouted as it is today. Todays swe-2 is better than the 90-ies/early 00-ies swe-2.

Zetterberg was still pretty high in regard as a prospect in Sweden. I can clearly remember that as I basicly lived (also saw a couple of games with him) in his home town Sundsvall at that time (Both Njurunda and Timrå is more or less a suburbs/satellites to Sundsvall). There, if nowhere else, he was considered a great prospect. He has played in the nationalteams as an U20, and in the worlds before he started to play in the NHL. If he would have been bigger he would probably been drafted earlier. People say he come from nowhere, and well, if Medelpad is considered nowhere then yes, otherwise no.

Simply a case of underestimation of smalish euros from the north americans. It also took a Swedish scout to get him drafted at all.
 
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wingfan

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Jul 1, 2012
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Zetterberg was playing in the 2nd tier in Sweden, he played very well there, but at that time swe-2 perhaps wasnt as well scouted as it is today. Todays swe-2 is better than the 90-ies/early 00-ies swe-2.

Zetterberg was still pretty high in regard as a prospect in Sweden. I can clearly remember that as I basicly lived (also saw a couple of games with him) in his home town Sundsvall at that time (Both Njurunda and Timrå is more or less a suburbs/satellites to Sundsvall). There, if nowhere else, he was considered a great prospect. He has played in the nationalteams as an U20, and in the worlds before he started to play in the NHL. If he would have been bigger he would probably been drafted earlier. People say he come from nowhere, and well, if Medelpad is considered nowhere then yes, otherwise no.

Simply a case of underestimation of smalish euros from the north americans. It also took a Swedish scout to get him drafted at all.

Hakan Andersson has to be the greatest judge of talent/potential professional hockey has seen. I'm wondering if the Wings have it in plans to move Rasmus Bodin back to d like they did with big E? It's paying dividends now, he's a rock in our zone/on the pk and is moving up the ice with speed/confidence that I didn't know he had.
 

SirKillalot

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Feb 27, 2008
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Not true.
it sounds awesome. But it's not true.
If Detroit had any real belief that Datsyuk would be as good as he is, they wouldn't have chanced waiting until round 2, let alone round 5.

Detroit thought Barnes, Valtonen, McCracken, Hobday, Steen and Deleeuw were better picks than Datsyuk.. there might have been some gamesmanship in there... but not 5 rounds worth.

If Detroit knows that they are the only team to have scouted Datsyuk, of course they will wait to pick him. If no other team know about him, there is no chance for him getting picked by the other teams.
 

Carlzner

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Oct 31, 2011
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To add onto the OPs question, how and how long after they were drafted did people realize these guys were good prospects, and then that they were potentially going to be great?
 

RedWingsNow*

Guest
If Detroit knows that they are the only team to have scouted Datsyuk, of course they will wait to pick him. If no other team know about him, there is no chance for him getting picked by the other teams.

Did Ken Holland call all 30 NHL Gms and 300 scouts to ask if they saw Datsyuk?
Come on.

If you think you're drafting a guy who can successfully take the torch from a Fedorov or Yzerman... you don't risk waiting until round 5.
 

RedWingsNow*

Guest
To add onto the OPs question, how and how long after they were drafted did people realize these guys were good prospects, and then that they were potentially going to be great?

Zetterberg started generating by the December of his draft.
But the hype picked up after Datsyuik joined the Red Wings in 2001.
Wings fans were so excited to have their first offensively talented player since--Kozlov, perhaps... so the story was, "And there's more than Datsyuk, young Henrik Zetterberg is tearing up Sweden.

Zetterberg really started getting attention in 2001 when they began talking about him for the Swedish Olympic team.

Datsyuk was basically out of leftfield
I remember the first time watching a game and thinking, who is this guy they call Duck Soup.
I think he played on Russia's World Championship team. In today's world, he would have generated some buzz.
But back then, there wasn't much of it.
 

SirKillalot

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Feb 27, 2008
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Did Ken Holland call all 30 NHL Gms and 300 scouts to ask if they saw Datsyuk?
Come on.

If you think you're drafting a guy who can successfully take the torch from a Fedorov or Yzerman... you don't risk waiting until round 5.

Were talking about a couple dozen scouts max. You know, scouts from different teams do chat, and sometimes travel together.
 

Jussha

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Jan 15, 2006
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0
Were talking about a couple dozen scouts max. You know, scouts from different teams do chat, and sometimes travel together.

to add to this though, I'm pretty certain Hakan first saw Pavel in 98 (I could be wrong on this though), his first draft eligible year, Datsyuk I'm pretty sure got passed entirely in the draft once or maybe two straight years until finally getting selected by Detroit as a 20 year old.

Even if that was the wings strategy to wait until round 7 to get him, if they truly believed he was going to be as good as he was you don't let him go undrafted for 2 straight years if you think that and have seen him already and you take him with your last pick in the 98 draft. The fact that they did pass him I would think means they saw potential but still didn't think it was worth wasting a late round pick on at the time.

Wikipedia (I know it's not a great source but whatever lol) says Hakan first saw him in 1997. If this is true, at the same time even if you think no one has seen him, by waiting 2-3 years later to draft him you risk other teams seeing him, so I don't think their strategy was lets pass on him until the later rounds, more likely in their eyes he was a calculated gamble at the pick they chose to take him at
 
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RedWingsNow*

Guest
Were talking about a couple dozen scouts max. You know, scouts from different teams do chat, and sometimes travel together.

And if you scouted the next russian superstar that you thought nobody else knew about, would you be talking to other scouts about him?
Nope. Not if you're any good
 

RedWingsNow*

Guest
to add to this though, I'm pretty certain Hakan first saw Pavel in 98 (I could be wrong on this though), his first draft eligible year, Datsyuk I'm pretty sure got passed entirely in the draft once or maybe two straight years until finally getting selected by Detroit as a 20 year old.

Even if that was the wings strategy to wait until round 7 to get him, if they truly believed he was going to be as good as he was you don't let him go undrafted for 2 straight years if you think that and have seen him already and you take him with your last pick in the 98 draft. The fact that they did pass him I would think means they saw potential but still didn't think it was worth wasting a late round pick on at the time.

Wikipedia (I know it's not a great source but whatever lol) says Hakan first saw him in 1997. If this is true, at the same time even if you think no one has seen him, by waiting 2-3 years later to draft him you risk other teams seeing him, so I don't think their strategy was lets pass on him until the later rounds, more likely in their eyes he was a calculated gamble at the pick they chose to take him at

By all means, give credit to Andersson and Holland for taking the chance on Datsyuk. They were the ones who drafted him.
But there's a lot of luck involved. I think Andersson just was quoted as saying scouting is 60 percent luck or something
 

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