Worst draft year ?

[Redwingsfan]

what about 2001. i'm not saying it's the worst, but it's not very good. besides kovalchuk, spezza, hemsky,ruutu and hamhuis there are a lot off busts in this draft.
like jens karlsson, igor knyazev, jiri novotny, adma munro, adrian foster, jeff woyvitka, alexandr svitov, fredrik sjostrom, dave steckel, (dan blackburn).

 

[Spetzky]

what about 2001. i'm not saying it's the worst, but it's not very good. besides kovalchuk, spezza, hemsky,ruutu and hamhuis there are a lot off busts in this draft.
like jens karlsson, igor knyazev, jiri novotny, adma munro, adrian foster, jeff woyvitka, alexandr svitov, fredrik sjostrom, dave steckel, (dan blackburn).

Munro is not a bust yet, he's a goalie but I guess we should count him out for the team he plays for. Ruutu too because of him being injured so often to the point he misses out on valuable development.

I've got to say 96-99-01-97. Spezza, Kovalchuk, and Hemsky make the 01 draft.

 

[J17 Vs Proclamation]

ah you must have noticed I was talking about 96 the whole time in other post and that was just a miss write there, I ment I would take the 99s over the 96s

Aha, i don't read as much as i should . I thought it was weird, you do know alot about prospects and draft years. 96 was way before my time anyway.

We can't tell how well 04 will turn out. AO and possibly Malkin already make this draft look solid already.

 

[boredmale]

If you go back 30 years, the 1975 draft has to be one of the worst i ever seen, not 1 person worthy of going into th HHOF.

 

[Superfluous U]

what about 2001. i'm not saying it's the worst, but it's not very good. besides kovalchuk, spezza, hemsky,ruutu and hamhuis there are a lot off busts in this draft.
like jens karlsson, igor knyazev, jiri novotny, adma munro, adrian foster, jeff woyvitka, alexandr svitov, fredrik sjostrom, dave steckel, (dan blackburn).

I don't think I'd call Novotny or Sjostrom a bust yet. Even Woywitka still has a shot to be somebody. We're just getting to the right length of time to really gauge how that draft was. One more year seems about right for a lot of these guys.

If you go back 30 years, the 1975 draft has to be one of the worst i ever seen, not 1 person worthy of going into th HHOF.

No hall of famers. A few guys who had themselves nice careers, but you're right, it looks pretty weak. Weak enough that my high school vice principal managed to get himself drafted in the 9th round that year.

 

[Richer]

I did a run down of all the drafts of the 1990 a while ago. I took the top 30 players from the whole draft placed a HF rating on them then averaged out their scores. When it comes to top 30 1999 is the worst with an averge player rating of 6.58, 1996 was a close second with a 6.6. Top 5 1999 was also the worst with a rating of 7.8 while I had 1992 rated at second worst with a rating of 8.1. If anyone wants to see the breakdowns from year to year I will put the excel files up. I think there is an old post with them in it but I forgot what it was called

 

[Redwingsfan]

I don't think I'd call Novotny or Sjostrom a bust yet. Even Woywitka still has a shot to be somebody. We're just getting to the right length of time to really gauge how that draft was. One more year seems about right for a lot of these guys.



i think it's safe to say that neither off those three will ever be somebody. i think a forward that is picked in the first round should be a top 6 forward, if not he is a bust. and i dont see sjostrom or novotny as top 6 in the future. look at manny malhotra everyone knows he is a bust. he plays in the nhl, but he didn't
turn out to be the player he was expected to be.

 

[crashlanding]

1996 has got to be the worst. Chris Phillips as the #1 overall pick. I remember at that time thinking back in '96 that it was weird no one was considered to be better than Phillips. I was thinking to myself how could Phillips (who wasnt an offensive defenseman) be better than Briere who racked up I think it was 167 points. Now 10 years later I guess I'm right. Its shocking that Briere went 17th or somehting like that in '96. That was at a time when the NHL had this boneheaded way of thinking that if you were under 6'0" you were no good.

Phillips < Briere? That's plenty debatable from a drafting standpoint. First of all, it's not like Briere went in the top 10, there were obvious reasons why he dropped to #24. His size was probably the main factor and it can be argued that if the NHL didn't crack down on obstruction he never would have had a breakout (half) season.

Phillips has been a member of the Senators since the year after his draft and has been a solid member of one of the best bluelines in hockey over the last five years or so. Briere bounced back and forth between the Coyotes, not much of a powerhouse so you can't say there wasn't room for him, and the AHL. Plus, the team that drafted him gave up on him like most teams would. So if you're looking at value from your picks there's virtually none for Phoenix when it comes to Briere.

Will Briere have the better career? Probably, but he hasn't done too much damage in his RFA years while Phillips has been pretty solid for Ottawa all this time. If I were to do the 96 draft over again, I would pick Phillips over Briere.

As for worst draft, I have to go with 96 as well. As a Devils fan, Lance Ward has to go down as one of our worst picks ever. Our only top 10 pick in the last 10+ drafts and it has to be in '96...sigh.

 

[Redwingsfan]

 

[stardog]

Last year, with the exception of Crosby didnt really have too many standout prospects, although it is still way too soon to tell if it was a horrible draft year. The worst draft year in my opinion has to be 1989 (dont really remember too much about 96) but if you look at all the players drafted that year, about a third of them I look at and just say to myself "who?"

Good one dude! Whatcha got planned for an encore?

 

[stardog]

I don't think I'd call Novotny or Sjostrom a bust yet. Even Woywitka still has a shot to be somebody. We're just getting to the right length of time to really gauge how that draft was. One more year seems about right for a lot of these guys.



i think it's safe to say that neither off those three will ever be somebody. i think a forward that is picked in the first round should be a top 6 forward, if not he is a bust. and i dont see sjostrom or novotny as top 6 in the future. look at manny malhotra everyone knows he is a bust. he plays in the nhl, but he didn't
turn out to be the player he was expected to be.

I dont agree with that at all. Not even remotely. Both statements are incredibly far fetched.

 

[JonathanK]

Funny thing with the 1996 draft is that you could pretty much reverse the order of the players drafted and there would be less 1st round "busts".

 

[Redwingsfan]

I dont agree with that at all. Not even remotely. Both statements are incredibly far fetched.

so you would say that a player like manny malhotra is as good as he was expected to be. he is playing on the fourth line. and is patrik stefan not a bust he is pending between the third and fourth line.

 

[TONY42OMONTANA]

not the worst, but it's up there.

 

[Jason MacIsaac]

Johnson
Brule
Ryan
Bourdon
Staal
Pouliot
Kopitar
Skille

What are you smoking?

Yea, all those players are tearing apart the NHL... You must realize that player hype will allways be strong after a recent draft and every prospect has qualities that make them destine for the NHL. Wait 5 years and see how the draft stands.

 

[stardog]

so you would say that a player like manny malhotra is as good as he was expected to be. he is playing on the fourth line. and is patrik stefan not a bust he is pending between the third and fourth line.

We could do this all night long. Would you say that Mike Peca is a bust? Mike Ricci?
So you pick out two guys to back up your statement, and one of them is an obvious bust considering what was projected.
Your statement was that any forward drafted in the first roundshould be on he top two lines, and if they arent on the top two lines, then they are busts. I think that statement is just wrong. Im sorry if you dont agree but I just named 2 first round guys who completely disprove the theory. There are going to be exceptions and making an absolute, blanket statement (especially one as short sighted as that) is probably not the most well thought out theory IMO.

ANd BTW, it is an interesting observation considering the question of Malhotra being considered a bust or not is being discussed in anoter thread on the prospects board (the top 50 from 1998). I gave my thoughts there on him, but I basically said he isnt a bust in the traditional sense, but considering what his projection was and he fell far below them, you could consider him a bust. A useful player, but nowhere near what was expected. So define your definition of a bust.

 

[Redwingsfan]

We could do this all night long. Would you say that Mike Peca is a bust? Mike Ricci?
So you pick out two guys to back up your statement, and one of them is an obvious bust considering what was projected.
Your statement was that any forward drafted in the first roundshould be on he top two lines, and if they arent on the top two lines, then they are busts. I think that statement is just wrong. Im sorry if you dont agree but I just named 2 first round guys who completely disprove the theory. There are going to be exceptions and making an absolute, blanket statement (especially one as short sighted as that) is probably not the most well thought out theory IMO.

ANd BTW, it is an interesting observation considering the question of Malhotra being considered a bust or not is being discussed in anoter thread on the prospects board (the top 50 from 1998). I gave my thoughts there on him, but I basically said he isnt a bust in the traditional sense, but considering what his projection was and he fell far below them, you could consider him a bust. A useful player, but nowhere near what was expected. So define your definition of a bust.

as for peca and ricci. there is allways exeptions, but peca is getting time on the powerplay and he had 23.3 toi average last season and i dont think that was on the third line. he is a grinder but he is a top 6 forward. and ricci was dealt after two seasons with the team that drafted him fourth overall. i wonder why

a bust to me is a player that is far away from reaching he's expectations and potential. and i dont think the flyers drafted ricci so that another team could use him on the third or fourth line. i'm not calling him a bust but he is pretty close. every draft we have players that will never make it. look at the 99 draft players like beech, pyatt and lundmark is considered busts. they can still be third or fourth liners. pyatt and lundmark allready are and beech will probably be one, but they are still considered as busts. so i feel that what i said was pretty correct, but you i dont think we will ever agree with each other on this one

 

[Nobak]

Yea, all those players are tearing apart the NHL... You must realize that player hype will allways be strong after a recent draft and every prospect has qualities that make them destine for the NHL. Wait 5 years and see how the draft stands.

But that year was projected as a pretty deep draft year. I don't see how we can, 14 months after the draft, claim it to be among the worst.

 

[God Bless Canada]

*1989 looks like a good year on the surface. But in terms of players who were draft eligible for the first time, it isn't. Lidstrom was passed over in 1988. If not for the collapse of the USSR, this draft is a stinker. Fedorov had been draft eligible before. Konstantinov had been draft eligible since the mid 1980s. Lidstrom was a result of astute drafting. Fedorov and Konstantinov were essentially, lucky picks, taking chances on highly thought of players who may or may not eventually come to North America. As far as the first round, it's one of the worst ever.
*1996 is my pick. An out-and-out pile of crap. Chara's the best player from that draft. There were two types of players who proliferated in that draft: tall but lanky defensive defencemen, and small but smart centres, most of whom had skating deficiencies. Not exactly the type of players I want to choose from. Very, very few top line forwards or top pairing defencemen. Not much to choose from among the goalies, either.
*1999 sucked, too, especially the first round, although some players who were written off are coming around. The later rounds weren't bad, but not enough to save the draft.
*1992 is another terrible draft. It's claim to fame: the first draft in which half of the first round was European. Some good players came out of the first round (Stillman, Straka, Gonchar, an in his prime Yashin). But a lot of busts and disappointments.
*MS is right in mentioning 1997. The top end is great, as good of top end as any draft since those great drafts from 1979 to 1984. But this was supposed to be the best draft since 1979. Imagine if most of the top prospects from the 2003 Draft wind up as busts or disappointments. Then you'd have 1997. Forget guys like Tkachuk, Cleary (a big-time disappointment, but not a total flop) and Dome. It's the later rounds that are even better. Jarrett Smith. Adam Coliagacomo. Jay Legault. Maxim Balmochnyk. I won't hold Stefan Cherneski's career against him, he suffered one of the most horrifying knee injuries that I've heard of. This draft will likely have a similar number of NHL-calibre players, or players who qualify for a pension (400 NHL games) as the 1996 and 1999 drafts. And for a draft with that much talent, it's a disappointment. Half of the players in the first round probably won't qualify for the pension - usually a measuring stick for careers.

 

[More 2004]

please dont remind me of svitov, at least we got the aging sydor for him..

 

[Jimmi McJenkins]

1999 sticks out of recent, a high number of 1st round busts that year...Brendl, Lundmark, Beech, etc.

http://www.hockeydb.com/ihdb/draft/nhl1999e.html

How does everyone miss on Havlat, 26th, yikes. That's a pretty bad year, it gets my vote.

 

[Blades 0f Steel]

and ricci was dealt after two seasons with the team that drafted him fourth overall. i wonder why

Wasn't he included in the Lindros deal?

 

[Mogo]

Well IMO 96 is the worst draft I can remember Phillips, Dumont, Briere, and Morris stand out from the 1st round, but MANY MANY bust (haha Volchenkov, Zyuzin), Craig Hillier the top goalie in the draft haha, at least.

I would rather the 99 1st rounders over the 96 ones, the Sedins came on strong last year with that, Connolly was ok, Havlat is the star of the 1st round, Boynton plays solid out there, Jillson isn't bad either, Stefan though never living up to expectations isn't lost on the ice though.

and one last thing, for the guy that posted this, how can you think this, OMG this is one of the strongest drafts ever IMO.


89 be a bad year?????
Pavel Bure, Mats Sundin, Niclas Lidstrom, Sergei Fedorov, Bill Gurien, Bobby Holik, Vladimir Konstantinov, Adam Foote, Mike Sillinger, Robert Reichel, Olaf Kolzig, Kevin Haller, Travis Green, Patrice Brisebois, Scott Thornton, Greg Johnson, Byron Dafoe, Rob Zamneur, Stu Barnes, Scott Pellerin, Wes Walz, Kris Draper, Jason Woolley, Joseph Beranek, Trent Klatt, Dallas Drake, Donald Audette, Vladimir Malakhov

this 89 draft to me looked like it turned out pretty good, not too many drafts you can get those type of players especially Bure, Sundian, LIdstrom and Fedorov in one draft...WOW...I don't see how this can be a bad draft.

Mogilny be there too

 

[Jori]

Wasn't he included in the Lindros deal?

Yes

 

[monster_bertuzzi]

Yea, all those players are tearing apart the NHL... You must realize that player hype will allways be strong after a recent draft and every prospect has qualities that make them destine for the NHL. Wait 5 years and see how the draft stands.

The guy said ''other than Crosby this draft isn't strong'' and he would be wrong.