Habs best first rounder from the last 12 years

[Chili]

The sens have done some good drafting. They've mostly had better draft position (less key in later rounds) and more picks (with some major exceptions the last year or two) than the habs as well. Mike Hoffman just falls off that list, too, 2009, they got some of the best scorers outside the first round year after year. There are at least 5-10 teams that mostly draft better than the habs. If the organization can find a person or a group that will improve their drafting to match those teams they should go for it. They should not dump their current group who may not be elite but are not terrible. Think about the decade of drafting before Timmins where all the picks busted. Dumping Timmins and taking on whoever Molson and MB happen to like would not necessarily be a step forward.

Drafting is such a crapshoot, with players developing for years after the pick, that it is hard to tell luck from excellence. Kings, Sens, Canes, a few others have a good enough track record that I'd make the call. Most of those teams do pretty deep analytics and it's something the habs were averse to for a while. I think they hired someone not that many years ago.

One of the reasons it probably would not be a step forward is that unless whoever is hired is absolutely perfect they are going to be flamed by fans and media for their whole tenure. Expecting excellence is good, flaming everyone to the point that locals don't want to be here is counter productive. Look at Toronto, it's not always a good thing for the team but they actually have people who grew up there and want to come back. Toronto media is pretty crazy but nowhere near as bloodthirsty, or as deranged, as the people here (Dave Morissette and the antichambre drive me crazy, though I like Damphousse and Boucher).

If it interests you or anyone, I did a league wide comparison of the third round and beyond right around a year ago (including undrafted free agents). May take the time to update at some point.

Who found the talent on NHL Rosters?

 

[JeffreyLFC]

3rd round or later comparison, last 12 years (players who have played in the NHL in 2021):

Sens:
Marcus Sorenson (106th, 2010)
Mark Stone (178th, 2010)
JG Pageau (96th, 2011)
Frederik Claesson (126th, 2011
Max McCormick (171st, 2011)
Ryan Dzingel (204th, 2011)
Chris Driedger (76th, 2012)
Marcus Hogberg (78th, 2013)
Ben Harpur (108th, 2013)
Christopher Wolanin (107th, 2015)
Joey Daccord (199th, 2015)
Drake Batherson (121st, 2017)

Habs:
Brendan Gallagher (147th, 2010)
Jake Evans (207th, 2014)
Victor Mete (100th, 2016)

True and they have been bad with trades and are dirt cheap.

They should have retained their players like Stone and Pageau. Instead it feel like they are in a interminable rebuild.

 

[The Great Weal]

Serge is no way near Hedman skills and hockey IQ. Just go read what Tampa Bay fans write about Serge. If Serge is the best of this list, that means drafting was poor, very poor.

Francois Beauchemin with the Ducks won the Stanley Cup, pairing with a great D, it's the same story as Serge except nobody blame Gainey to put him on waivers. No it wasn't even a trade while Habs receive a 50 pts winger, he was put on waiver just like Ron Hainsey who had a decent nhl carreer after.

So Serge was a great great pick? Oh boy I'm so impressed !
Timmins next GM, he's a genious, lol.

I shit on Timmins the most out of anyone here, but Sergachev is a damn good player. Don't think he's a top pairing dman yet, and playing on that team certainly helps, but I'd take him back immediately instead of Drouin(who I think has been good).

 

[1909]

I'm not a fan of Timmins, but with this many failed picks, one has to wonder if the problem is not so much the drafting part, but the development part.

Most players drafted by TT become busts or under average NHL players. Especially the first-rounders. The McDonagh-Patches-PK draft is far away... as well as the players themselves.

 

[Chili]

True and they have been bad with trades and are dirt cheap.

They should have retained their players like Stone and Pageau. Instead it feel like they are in a interminable rebuild.

Picked the Sens because they are playing them. If it was the Canucks the list would be less impressive (Adam Gaudette, Ben Hutton, Gustav Forsling and Kevin Connaughton using the same criteria).

Would just be nice to see again someday an impressive list of Habs draft picks.

 

[c3z4r]

Serge is no way near Hedman skills and hockey IQ. Just go read what Tampa Bay fans write about Serge. If Serge is the best of this list, that means drafting was poor, very poor.

Francois Beauchemin with the Ducks won the Stanley Cup, pairing with a great D, it's the same story as Serge except nobody blame Gainey to put him on waivers. No it wasn't even a trade while Habs receive a 50 pts winger, he was put on waiver just like Ron Hainsey who had a decent nhl carreer after.

So Serge was a great great pick? Oh boy I'm so impressed !
Timmins next GM, he's a genious, lol.

Hedman at the same age Sergachev is at right now was nowhere near as good. You can't just compare players in their prime with young players on the rise and go "See, he's just so much worse", because that's to be expected.

 

[dcyhabs]

Hedman at the same age Sergachev is at right now was nowhere near as good. You can't just compare players in their prime with young players on the rise and go "See, he's just so much worse", because that's to be expected.

Hedman is also a second overall pick so comparing him to a ninth pick, at different ages, with different teams around them (Lightning were bad when Hedman came in) and considering it a criticism does not make a lot of sense. Sergachev has put up more points than Hedman did at this point in his career but he's doing it on a much better team. He's looking good this year, and if he starts outscoring Drouin the trade will look bad... I don't think Sergachev will end up worse defensively than Drouin.

 

[salbutera]

Hedman at the same age Sergachev is at right now was nowhere near as good. You can't just compare players in their prime with young players on the rise and go "See, he's just so much worse", because that's to be expected.

And the TBay “team” was nowhere near as good, nor was it as he was developing from his rookie season on. Sergachev has only played with a top tier team.

 

[TonyTinglebone]

Not like it gets better going back to the end of the Sam Pollock era. Some decent talent but not a lot of first round talent picked up. Bolded are players that reached 1000 games, underlined are players with the potential to reach there and * is 0 NHL games (several others with single digits or low double digits). Even worse is of the players to play 1000 games the only ones with the bulk of their games with the Habs are Koivu and Corson.

Dan Geoffrion & Dave Hunter
Doug Wickenheiser
Mark Hunter, Gilbert Delorme & Jan Ingman*
Alain Heroux*
Alfie Turcotte
Petr Svoboda & Shayne Corson
Jose Charbonneau & Tom Chorske
Mark Pederson
Andrew Cassels
Eric Charron
Lindsay Vallis
Turner Stevenson
Brent Bilodeau*
David Wilkie
Saku Koivu
Brad Brown
Terry Ryan
Matt Higgins
Jason Ward
Eric Chouinard
Ron Hainsey & Marcel Hossa
Mike Komisarek & Alexander Perezhogin
Chris Higgina
Andrei Kostitsyn
Kyle Chipchura
Carey Price
David Fischer*
Ryan McDonagh & Mac Pacioretty

 

[abo9]

Not like it gets better going back to the end of the Sam Pollock era. Some decent talent but not a lot of first round talent picked up. Bolded are players that reached 1000 games, underlined are players with the potential to reach there and * is 0 NHL games (several others with single digits or low double digits). Even worse is of the players to play 1000 games the only ones with the bulk of their games with the Habs are Koivu and Corson.

Dan Geoffrion & Dave Hunter
Doug Wickenheiser
Mark Hunter, Gilbert Delorme & Jan Ingman*
Alain Heroux*
Alfie Turcotte
Petr Svoboda & Shayne Corson
Jose Charbonneau & Tom Chorske
Mark Pederson
Andrew Cassels
Eric Charron
Lindsay Vallis
Turner Stevenson
Brent Bilodeau*
David Wilkie
Saku Koivu
Brad Brown
Terry Ryan
Matt Higgins
Jason Ward
Eric Chouinard
Ron Hainsey & Marcel Hossa
Mike Komisarek & Alexander Perezhogin
Chris Higgina
Andrei Kostitsyn
Kyle Chipchura
Carey Price
David Fischer*
Ryan McDonagh & Mac Pacioretty

And here I thought I was born in the wrong Habs era. I got to grow with Price and Patch, and those guys are probably the best Habs on this list besides Koivu (who I also got to see a bit!)

Funnily enough when we traded Hainsey I just assumed he was out of the league 2-3 years after. I was so surprised to hear that he was still playing well in his 30s lol

 

[dcyhabs]

They thought Wilkie, Brown, Bilodeau and Rivet would be their top 4, with Rivet maybe not making it. Rivet was the only one to have a long career, though Wilkie was never the same after destroying his knee.

Habs drafting could be much worse and used to be much worse.

Forgot Rory Fitzpatrick, he was a joke all star candidate but when he was drafted the habs expected him to be top 4.

That was during the time the habs traded really good players for journeymen and then the journeymen for busts. Stanley cup winner to pathetic in a bunch of really dumb decisions. No first round picks that worked out. Overvaluing size and toughness.

I doubt any of these guys would be as badly misjudged in recent years. The worst drafting teams today have more knowledge and information than the best did 25 years ago.