UNCOMMON KNOWLEDGE
We know two things are true about the NHL entry draft, the first is that there will be surprises that come out of every round, some good, some bad. The second one is that it is the way to build teams, with no draft position being more important than defense. Even teams that fail miserably at drafting and developing impact forwards can at least be respectable year in and year out if they have built a solid blueline. The Los Angeles Kings won the Stanley Cup with a really good goalie, an inadequate forward group and one of the two or three best defensive units of the past two decades.
The Kings opposite number, the Edmonton Oilers over the past decade and a half have failed miserably to draft and develop defense. This has led to three straight years with the first overall pick, where they selected highly touted “can’t miss” forwards. How bad is their draft record on the blueline? Between 2000 and 2010 they drafted twenty-eight defensemen. 14 of those defenseman have played zero NHL games. 2008 pick Johan Motin has played one NHL game, that was back in the 2009-10 season, 2007 first round pick Alex Plante has racked up 10 NHL games, 3 two years ago, 3 the year before that, and four back in 2009-10. Brian Young of the 2004 draft, appears to already be retired having racked up seventeen NHL games. The 2003 draft which produced so many great players gave the Oilers Mathieu Roy, who has chalked up 64 NHL games, most of them not with the Oilers.
Taylor Chorney and Danny Syvret both from the 2005 draft have done slightly better with 61 and 59 games respectively, which would be great if either still had their rights retained by the Oilers. Of their three biggest hits in the past decade of drafting defense, two came out of the 2006 draft Jeff Petry who has 156 NHL games to his credit, and Theo Peckham taken 30 picks later who has 160 games on his record. Peckham is unsigned for next season, and has played less than sixty games in the last two season. Petry is showing signs of promise having played 22 minutes a night and all 48 games of the past season. But the biggest success off their draft board is Matt Greene who is now a veteran of 466 regular season NHL games. Unfortunately the Oilers only got him for the first 151 of those (plus 18 playoff games). In the seven game series against the eventual Stanley Cup champion Carolina Hurricanes as a rookie he didn’t have a single minus game, and only had one in the 18 games. Yet he was traded in 2008 for a defenseman who would play just 107 games in an Oilers uniform over the following two seasons.
The Edmonton Oilers are hardly the only team to draft poorly at defense over that same ten year span, but they are clearly the worst not just at recognizing talent, but at retaining it as well. It doesn’t take a spectacular memory, or long study of the final seasons standings for the last twelve years to wonder what the Oilers might have done had they hit on even two more defensive picks.
PuckSage is an unrepentant fan of hard working physical, and honest hockey. He’d rather watch a preseason game between the two worst teams in the NHL than finals game in baseball or basketball. If you can’t find him on Twitter @PuckSage his website PuckSage.com or Google+ and Facebook, you just aren’t trying hard enough. ◉
DEFENSE
DRAFT WELL OR DRAFT HIGH
BY PUCKSAGE