Speculation: NHL Draft History (2008-Present) for Stanley Cup Final Teams

[obey86]

Both Nylander and Marners real rookie season was in the same year as Matthews rookie season. Pretty big difference there opposed to Mantha and AA both already being 24 years old and us still waiting to land a top pick in the future. Rielly is a D and just started hitting full stride over the last 2 seasons, basically the same time Matthews joined.

Personally, the first thing I would do with all of my assets in the scenario of a full rebuild is trade for picks (late 1sts, 2nds, etc) that I would then use to heavily target D with over the first couple seasons. Then I would cross my figures for their development to go well and do anything required to secure top lotto odds and try to land those franchise forwards. I would certainly keep a guy or two around like Kadri or Larkin. Toronto did an excellent job in this window you are referring to.

Again, if we started the rebuild 5 years ago. Mantha and Bertuzzi might have been perfect picks to compliment our team at this point. Since we didn't do that, I would possibly consider moving one of these players or keep them and do a better job of unloading the Greens and Vaneks.

I'm not sure how all of my basses aren't covered here? What more can I explain.

You're innacurately comparing AA and Mantha to Nylander and Marner though. AA and Mantha are more the Kadri, JVR, and Bozak caliber players that the Leafs kept on their roster throughout the rebuild and after the rebuild was complete -- in fact, Kadri JVR, and Bozak were actually even a bit OLDER (25, 26, and 29) in 15-16 (the year prior to getting the #1 pick) than any of Mantha/AA/Bertuzzi are now - and the Leafs didn't just get rid of them.

Players like AA, Mantha, and Bertuzzi are not impactful enough to keep the team out of the basement (and give the Wings little chance at potential top 3 picks), as you've seen proof of this year -- the Wings are a few bounces away from the 2nd worst record in the league. And if they actually were preventing the Wings from staying out of the basement (again, which they aren't), they would be core pieces of their own which one should not want the Wings to get rid of.

I'm not seeing the logic that Mantha, AA, Bertuzzi are preventing the Wings from a legit shot at a top pick and thus should be traded when the Wings are literally 5 points away from the 2nd worst record in the league. That's negligible difference that comes to down bounces, luck, injuries, etc.

The Wings version of Nylander and Marner (higher end prospects that didn't make an impact prior to the #1 pick) should be Zadina and this years ~top 5 pick. Neither has made an NHL impact yet obviously.

 

[Larkin2AA]

All good.

But it is frustrating to see fans wanting us to win these games and claiming it doesn't hurt our chances of success in the draft this year. What is scary is that our core of guys might be to good to lose again like this next year. The only problem is I don't think our current core is good enough to do much damage in the future. I would feel a lot better if atleast got the best player possible while we are this close to it.

I think this is where you are confused, though. Fans don't necessarily WANT the Wings to win right now, more so that its hard to be mad at the games they are winning because of HOW they are winning them. We could all pretty much agree that if we were winning these past 5 games (or whatever it is now) on the backs of Nielsen, Helm, Kronwall, Ericcson, etc. we would all be furious; however, the fact that these games are being won by our future core, then it makes it harder to be mad about it.

As it was posted above, the Wings are literally doing everything in their power to tank right now without actually desperately/noticeably doing so. Our roster is surrounded by 1.5 good lines, one great defenseman, and an ok goalie... I mean how TF are we continuing to win? It doesn't make sense. We all want the top pick, but with the situation we are in now, I think people are not viewing this upcoming draft as a waste if we pick 3-7. I think there is highly regarded value in those picking positions.

 

[haulinbass]

You're innacurately comparing AA and Mantha to Nylander and Marner though. AA and Mantha are more the Kadri, JVR, and Bozak caliber players that the Leafs kept on their roster throughout the rebuild and after the rebuild was complete -- in fact, Kadri JVR, and Bozak were actually even a bit OLDER (25, 26, and 29) in 15-16 (the year prior to getting the #1 pick) than any of Mantha/AA/Bertuzzi are now - and the Leafs didn't just get rid of them.

Players like AA, Mantha, and Bertuzzi are not impactful enough to keep the team out of the basement (and give the Wings little chance at potential top 3 picks), as you've seen proof of this year -- the Wings are a few bounces away from the 2nd worst record in the league. And if they actually were preventing the Wings from staying out of the basement (again, which they aren't), they would be core pieces of their own which one should not want the Wings to get rid of.

I'm not seeing the logic that Mantha, AA, Bertuzzi are preventing the Wings from a legit shot at a top pick and thus should be traded when the Wings are literally 5 points away from the 2nd worst record in the league. That's negligible difference that comes to down bounces, luck, injuries, etc.

Yeah, you might be right. I was thinking maybe with this teams current pool of young players and upcoming specs we could push for something around 10th worst next year and completely shoot ourselves in the foot. Trading those guys is a conversation I got derailed into. So anyway, we need the best odds of a top 2 pick this year and next year, after that we will evaluate where we are and go from there. Would ya look at that, completely back to where I started!

Anyway, I need to be done in this thread. I went in so many different directions its just getting ridiculous.

 

[obey86]

Yeah, you might be right. I was thinking maybe with this teams current pool of young players and upcoming specs we could push for something around 10th worst next year and completely shoot ourselves in the foot. Trading those guys is a conversation I got derailed into. So anyway, we need the best odds of a top 2 pick this year and next year, after that we will evaluate where we are and go from there. Would ya look at that, completely back to where I started!

Anyway, I need to be done in this thread. I went in so many different directions its just getting ridiculous.

I'm just ready for the lottery slots to be revealed next week so at least we can all stop arguing here about how much this win streak hurt us. lol.

 

[TCNorthstars]

Edmonton has completely failed at drafting D, Edmonton has failed at putting depth around McDavid and Draisitl. Edmonton traded away Taylor Hall. Buffalo isn't that deep into the current rebuild attempt. They have 2 cornerstone pieces they need going forward. They just need depth now.

Nobody ever said there are any sure path to success. Nothing is 100%, especially when you do a horrible job at executing it. The reality is, full rebuilds are the most proven way to success. Is this how you guys evaluate stuff? Because sometimes things don't work out it must not be viable? How does this even make any sense to you people. Look at the chart at the top of this page. It is right there! 1-3rd overall picks leads to championships at a significantly higher rate than anything else.

???? Really

What do you mean by current attempt for Buffalo? It is one continuous attempt.

2013 8OA Ristolainen, 16OA Zadarov
2014 2OA Reinhart
2015 2OA Eichel
2016 8OA Nylander
2017 8OA Middlestadt
2018 1OA Dahlin
2019 Another top 5 pick possibly + a couple more 1st rounders

 

[Hen Kolland]

I'm just ready for the lottery slots to be revealed next week so at least we can all stop arguing here about how much this win streak hurt us. lol.

Until we draw #7 and the page is like a damn war zone for an undisclosed amount of time because Buffalo ends up winning the lottery.

 

[TheOtherOne]

1 more point to add: When you're competing, it doesn't matter when the picks were actually made, it matters how good the players are now. If Larkin is #4 in a redraft, then for all intents and purposes there's our #4. Zadina was a consensus #3 before the draft- I don't know how he's going to pan out but we can realistically hope he turns into a #3 in the long run. What's AA in a redraft? #10ish?
Then you look at the other important column and realize that 8 times (not including Vegas) a team added another team's top 3 pick. So let's use all the money we have coming off the books and add another #3. Plus this year's can still be a 3, but let's say it's a 4 for shits and giggles. And Rasmussen is a #9. That makes our core something like
3, 3, 4, 4, 9, 10
Maybe it's a little lower, maybe it's a little higher.

Look, I acknowledge that this is all very hand-wavey. I'm just trying to establish that ACTUAL draft position doesn't matter as much as the quality these guys turn out to be. We should understand that more than most fans after watching D and Z dominate for a decade. And if you look at it that way and squint a little, our newly rebuilt core doesn't look THAT much different than this list of Cup winners and runner-ups.

 

[Flowah]

Look, I acknowledge that this is all very hand-wavey. I'm just trying to establish that ACTUAL draft position doesn't matter as much as the quality these guys turn out to be. We should understand that more than most fans after watching D and Z dominate for a decade.

Sure....

But if it were possible to find those guys outside the top3 with any degree of regularity or predictability, teams would do it.

 

[odin1981]

Using the wings as why we can is very disingenuous. Back in the late 80's early 90's we bucked the trend of the NHL by actually scouting outside of N America.

That doesn't happen any longer. We were the only team looking. Dats, Z, Lids won't be recreated again. Because the entire league now looks worldwide.

 

[obey86]

Sure....

But if it were possible to find those guys outside the top3 with any degree of regularity or predictability, teams would do it.

But we already found our “lottery pick” in Larkin. Isn’t the whole premise that you need at least one lottery pick to have a successful team?

 

[The Zetterberg Era]

We need some luck in a rebuild, that is true of almost every franchise. What Keith and Kucherov are second rounders?

We are going to have to find a couple guys outside of the top of the draft in order for this to work.

I am encouraged by a lot of the development this year, it would be great if that luck smiled on us with Jack Hughes. If being the worst team in the league ensures you 4th, there is no way to plan on this. We need to hit a homerun with our pick where it is. I get that half the top 10 scorers in this league were picked #1. But, there is no way to ensure that and while I understand the crowd saying finish as low as possible, Larkin flat out drug us away from there on some nights this year. I cannot kill the guy for that, all I can hope is that the other young players work out with him this summer and take the next step.

You can only play the cards that are dealt and just folding endlessly until we are dealt the flush straight isn't likely to happen either.

 

[ZDH]

Why do I have this sickening feeling that next year is going to play itself out identically to this year where we have a poor start b/c we are a young/learning team, proceed to get mathematically eliminated from the playoffs, and then get red hot.

Did we go on a tear last year at the end? I don't remember.

 

[JustJokinenAround]

I'd be more interested if you were able to refine the year over year to top 3 picks, instead of top 10 (even though I can comb through it on my own), just because it reflects the debate that we have been making. Maybe like categories of TOP 3 and 4-10 side by side, just to isolate what the lottery has contributed vs what the other 7 top 10 picks have contributed.

just top 3 but a good look at the top 3 plus other notable players high in the draft

 

[TheOtherOne]

Sure....

But if it were possible to find those guys outside the top3 with any degree of regularity or predictability, teams would do it.

I don't see your point. I'm not talking about regularity, I'm talking about what we already have.

The premise of this thread is that, to be successful, your team composition has to look similar to the teams listed.

Right now, without any caveats or hypotheticals, we have a #6 and a #9. We'll probably add something like a #4 (could still be #1 but I'm being conservative). So in the real world we look like 4, 6, 9. Decent.

To make it sound better I'm doing 3 sketchy but in my opinion justified things:

1) if Zadina had been picked at #3 it wouldn't have surprised anyone, so I'm calling him a #3. Making it 3, 4, 9.

2) in the 10 years listed, a top 3 pick was acquired outside the draft 8 times by the listed teams. We have plenty of money to do this. So I conservatively add another #3, and we're at 3, 3, 4, 9.

3) what matters isn't the draft itself, but top 10 quality players. So I add Larkin and AA who are currently accepted to be as good as top 10 picks. I think Larkin could be as good as 1 or 2 in a Cup run but conservatively I'm leaving him at #4 for now where he's currently at.

So after my fuzzy math our "top 10 draft pick" composition looks like the equivalent of 3, 3, 4, 4, 9, 10, conservatively.

All I'm saying is if you just look at those numbers it doesn't look all that out of place when compared to the teams discussed in the OP.

 

[DatsyukToZetterberg]

But we already found our “lottery pick” in Larkin. Isn’t the whole premise that you need at least one lottery pick to have a successful team?

I'm not so inclined to think that going forward this would be the norm for Larkin. He's playing the 3rd most minutes of any forward at ES and he doesn't grade out well in P/60. I know good players play a lot of minutes so it's kind of a catch 22, but I wonder if his numbers aren't just a tad inflated this season. He's a 1C but he kind of falls into the Ryan O'Reilly tier of centers for me; if I'm being total honest I'm not confident in our chances of our rebuild being successful if he is our #1C.

We're still missing at least 1 or 2 other top line forwards to compare to past Stanley Cup winners. Maybe we get them via trades or FA, but the most likely way is through the draft. I do like the analysis that was done, but I'd like to see what the teams in the conference finals looked like. So much of the playoffs comes down to luck, I think looking at the teams in the final four would provide a better picture of how a contending team developed.

 

[Winger98]

We need some luck in a rebuild, that is true of almost every franchise. What Keith and Kucherov are second rounders?

We are going to have to find a couple guys outside of the top of the draft in order for this to work.

I am encouraged by a lot of the development this year, it would be great if that luck smiled on us with Jack Hughes. If being the worst team in the league ensures you 4th, there is no way to plan on this. We need to hit a homerun with our pick where it is. I get that half the top 10 scorers in this league were picked #1. But, there is no way to ensure that and while I understand the crowd saying finish as low as possible, Larkin flat out drug us away from there on some nights this year. I cannot kill the guy for that, all I can hope is that the other young players work out with him this summer and take the next step.

You can only play the cards that are dealt and just folding endlessly until we are dealt the flush straight isn't likely to happen either.

Also, I'm not sure how much we can gleam from how past cup winners were built. Pretty much gone will be the teams with multiple 1st overalls within a short timespan. It's probably unlikely we'll see a team with multiple top3 picks within four or five years. since the lotto was revamped in 2015 we haven't had any repeat teams in the top 3. In the four drafts prior to that Edmonton and Florida were in the top3 three times, and Colorado was in it twice.

As teams like Chicago and Pittsburgh age, and we start seeing teams built from the draft lotto era, focus might be forced to shift on how well teams pick in the top 10 in general, rather than how much top talent they can pull from a handful of top3-5 picks. Outside of laine, we've seen Winnipeg built with those sort of picks and some astute trades. same with nashville. same with Boston. the only holdover from that previous era might be Tampa, pulling Stamkos and Hedman from back to back drafts at 1 and 2 overall.

And of course this goes along with hitting on some second and third rounders to fill out the rest of the team.

edit: and Washington, of course. With Ovi and Backstrom.
edit edit: this also isn't taking anything away from the original post by @Larkin2AA It's a great post and conversation starter. We talk about having to get guys from the rest of the draft outside of our first selections but to actually see how many guys top teams pull from the second and third rounds (and deals, hint Kenny) should be a bit of an eye opener.

 

[MeLoveRedWings]

The two positions I believe we need to draft well to become a competitor are defense and center. Not that Howard is a Stanley Cup caliber goalie, but I think that position is harder to draft and easier to pick up later. I think we are alright on the wing if we have elite centers (not that adding Kakko to Zadina wouldn't be nice), but even if we are not, again I think it is easier to pick up later for cheaper.

#NHLTopPlayers: Top 20 Defensemen

Preseason rankings of top 20 defense in the league. Two drafted inside the top 3 picks. Some of the others on the list drafted as late as the 8th round and even one undrafted player. Drafting in the top 2 is not a necessity at this position, but probably most of you already knew that. Looking at the list of players drafted by teams playing in the finals, even when there is a defensemen that was taken in the top ten, some of them were non-factors (Adam Larsson was a frequent healthy scratch in that run). We do need to get better at finding these players later and especially at developing them. This is a position that I don't feel we have any current player or prospect that will ever end up on a list like this, so we need to draft or trade for a couple. We need to find a couple, but I don't think our problems in this area are solved by simply drafting higher. I have a feeling if we identify and develop the talent in the same way we have been, we will end up with Cam Barker or at best Adam Larsson out of the deal. I love Hronek and Cholowski as prospects, and could even see one or both of them developing into solid top 4 or even top pairing guys, but not into Norris trophy contenders.

#NHLTopPlayers: Top 20 Centers

Preseason rankings of the top 20 centers in the league. 11 drafted inside the top 2 picks. Only 5 outside of the top 10. Right now Larkin doesn't doesn't belong on this list, but he may end up there one day. I would want two top 20 centers to feel like we were ready for another cup. That leaves one more if we are lucky. Unless Veleno outperforms all expectations, we probably don't have anything near that in the system (sorry to any Athanasiou as center or Rasmussen boosters). Looking at this years draft Hughes and Kakko are the obvious one and two. Will either even play center at the NHL level? I have my doubts, but will give Hughes the benefit of the doubt that he will. Kakko isn't a center now, so despite reading speculation that he could play center in the NHL, I don't give him that same benefit of the doubt. Hughes will likely go #1. Second and third best players in this draft are both on the wing. Either we get lucky (and every team has bad odds of winning the lottery so luck is all anyone has here) or we don't get a center that deserves to go in the top two or even three spots in the draft. If we don't win the lottery, we just need to try our best to identify one of those 9 guys that weren't top 2 picks. Cozens, Turcotte, Zegras, Dach, Krebs, or whoever. Which one could be a superstar center in the league. With Larkin a potential future top guy, we only have to find that guy once and we have two star centers.

I think centers are more easily identified and that makes the top 2 pick very valuable for finding these guys. Much more likely to have a can't miss long-term solution in the top 2 at center than defense. I think defense is tougher to identify (and that we happen to be extra bad at it), so having a top 2 pick probably wouldn't help us as much there.

 

[obey86]

I'm not so inclined to think that going forward this would be the norm for Larkin. He's playing the 3rd most minutes of any forward at ES and he doesn't grade out well in P/60. I know good players play a lot of minutes so it's kind of a catch 22, but I wonder if his numbers aren't just a tad inflated this season. He's a 1C but he kind of falls into the Ryan O'Reilly tier of centers for me; if I'm being total honest I'm not confident in our chances of our rebuild being successful if he is our #1C.

We're still missing at least 1 or 2 other top line forwards to compare to past Stanley Cup winners. Maybe we get them via trades or FA, but the most likely way is through the draft. I do like the analysis that was done, but I'd like to see what the teams in the conference finals looked like. So much of the playoffs comes down to luck, I think looking at the teams in the final four would provide a better picture of how a contending team developed.

Meh, no one is ever going to confuse Larkin with Crosby or Kucherov offensively...but that doesn't mean he can't be a #1 center in the mold of a Toews, Kopitar, Bergeron, etc. And let's be real, Larkin is driving the offense of basically this entire team. Outside of Athanasiou doing his thing on another line, there really isn't too much more to be worried about offensively if you're the other team. Once he gets more offensive support (better linemates, better puckmoving/offensive defensemen, better overall power play, etc) i'm sure his TOI will go down and his P/60 will increase.

 

[TheOtherOne]

I hope you have a cup of coffee and something to snack on while digesting all of this lol, but I want to use this as something of use for us to compare to see where we are at during our rebuild. Fans have been up and down these last few weeks about the Wings winning and how it is damaging our ability to get the best draft pick as possible, some are even saying that it will keep us stuck in limbo for many years ahead.

This table can give us an idea of all the teams who have been in the Stanley Cup finals since 2008 and the notable players on their rosters that helped them get there. Most teams only have 1-2 players that they drafted on their team from the top 10, while others have more (i.e. most noticeably Pittsburgh). You will notice that a lot of other teams acquired talent from other teams who were also drafted in the top 10, or you'll find that a majority of the players that were of great help/leaders of the SCF teams were those players drafted outside the top 10.

So my question to everyone here is, do we think that we are on the right path with the players in our system now, that we could afford a pick outside the top 2 in this upcoming draft and still continue to build a solid Playoff/Stanley Cup contender in the next 3-5 years? Discuss.

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If you get a chance, I'd love to see 06 and 07 filled in for completeness. That would give us everything in the cap era.

 

[Larkin2AA]

If you get a chance, I'd love to see 06 and 07 filled in for completeness. That would give us everything in the cap era.

I got you tomorrow!

 

[Larkin2AA]

If you get a chance, I'd love to see 06 and 07 filled in for completeness. That would give us everything in the cap era.

 

[TheOtherOne]

View attachment 211255

I missed this. Thanks for completing!

So when all is said and done, if we look at ALL Stanley Cup Finals teams in the cap era with no cherrypicking (ok I'm excluding Vegas for obvious reasons, nobody has the option of building a team like they did):

A grand total of 30% (7/23 teams) made it to the Finals with ZERO top-3 draft picks of their own.

 

[Winger98]

I missed this. Thanks for completing!

So when all is said and done, if we look at ALL Stanley Cup Finals teams in the cap era with no cherrypicking (ok I'm excluding Vegas for obvious reasons, nobody has the option of building a team like they did):

A grand total of 30% (7/23 teams) made it to the Finals with ZERO top-3 draft picks of their own.

The caveat is that all of those teams had those picks before the draft was reworked in 2013. Pittsburgh, for instance, had four top2 picks in a row. I can't imagine any team pulling that off in the current system. Chicago had a run of three top3 picks in four years. As those teams age out of contention, it wouldn't surprise me if we see teams built more from the top10 rather than the top3 being the contending teams. and outside of a team just getting stupidly lucky and getting a few top picks at just the right time, I wouldn't be surprised if we don't see a truly dominant, multiple cup winning team in awhile.

 

[Frk It]

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I think it's very disingenious to only include top 10 picks if they were still on the roster of the team that got there.

Example - Anaheim drafted Lupul #7 overall in 2002 and Ladislav Smid at #9 in 2004. They then traded these top 10 picks for Pronger, who was absolutely huge to them winning the Cup in 07. The top 10 picks are assets at the end of the day, so you have to look at these a little bit in more detail. You could very easily argue without the top 10 picks they never get Pronger and never get the Cup.

A grand total of 30% (7/23 teams) made it to the Finals with ZERO top-3 draft picks of their own.

Where are you getting 7 teams from?

 

[izlez]

I think it's very disingenious to only include top 10 picks if they were still on the roster of the team that won.

Example - Anaheim drafted Lupul #7 overall in 2002 and Ladislav Smid at #9 in 2004. They then traded these top 10 picks for Pronger, who was absolutely huge to them winning the Cup in 07. The top 10 picks are assets at the end of the day, so you have to look at these a little bit in more detail. You could very easily argue without the top 10 picks they never get Pronger and never get the Cup.



Where are you getting 7 teams from?

I think when you start including high picks that were traded away, high picks that had minimal impact, high draft picks from other teams, etc., you could easily argue that 99% of teams in NHL history are included in "teams that had high draft picks" and therefore every team that played in the Stanley Cup had high draft picks, but so did every other team that didn't reach the Stanley Cup. And then you just wasted a lot of your time.


And the 7 teams comes from 5 in the original post + the 06 and 07 cups that were added later on. Keep in mind the first column is "drafted in top 10" and the comment is about "drafted in top 3"