Quote:
Originally Posted by Ashasx
Well, the 2nd round pick Toronto traded with their own 1st (from Boston) to move up became John Gibson, the top goalie prospect in the NHL...
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Sure, that happens. However, do you really expect it? Is it fair to actually expect it?
Start at about 5 years ago (in order to give as much time for prospects to develop and make the show, and get a 'read' as to how they contribute in the NHL), and stop as far back as you wish.
Now, count how many 1st line talent (blue-chip) forwards there are selected after the 15th spot in the draft. There DEFINITELY ARE some, but they are scarce. Count them up.
Now count up all the players selected in the first round after the same 15th position, and count how many were busts. Less than 50 games in the NHL sound fair? 100? Zero? Doesn't matter. You will start to see how difficult it is to find these blue-chip players in the bottom half of the 1st round, much less in the outlying rounds.
Sure, most drafts produce a few notable players in the latter rounds. You have your goalies especially, whose future success seems to be dependent on anything but draft positioning, and you have your late blooming defencemen who are harder to scout apparently.
However, do you really believe yourself when you think that Gaunce and Gauthier are terrible picks? At that point, a team is looking for warm bodies.
I have no idea where Moon got his info on Gauthier from, but from everything I read and saw, Toronto drafted him to become their future 3rd line shutdown center. That is what they are hoping for, and that is (as far as I know) what the fans expect with him. Nobody in Van is saying that Gaunce is going to be a fixture in the top 6 either. Are you implying these are terrible picks?
Go back and look at the draft. You will see that some drafts barely produce a strong start 6 lineup (3 forwards, 2 defence and 1 goalie). That is what makes the 2003 draft so special, was the amount of talent still being drafted into the 2nd. Compare that with the year prior (2002) and see how many great players you can hope to find. Sure, there have been decent ones from the 2002 draft picked after #15, but few. Many (like Alexander Steen) are just making a name for themselves. Jiri Hudler was one of the best picks at less than .5ppg or so over his NHL career (though he is also exploding now with a new team).
Heck, 6 of the top 12 picks in '04 have either never played in the NHL, or no longer play in the NHL. That is 50% in that draft in the first top 12 picks.
If you are suggesting that the Flames should be drafting a blue-chippers past the top 15 picks, you need to really familiarize yourself with the last 20 drafts and see how difficult and unrealistic those expectations are.
You might as well just say "Datsyuk was selected in the 7th round. I don't see why the Flames aren't selecting future HHOFs in the late rounds.!".
There has been many goalies with much better records in their draft years than Gibson. The consensus was that Kidd was better than Brodeur too, but we know how that was played out. Point is, you can't point to a blue-chip prospect you unearth in the 2nd rounds and later, or point at prospects who are almost a sure thing to make it into the NHL (Gaunce and Gauthier) and say they are terrible picks.
Organizationally, you almost need to find a few of those later picks and have them as 'home runs', but you can't expect a team to do so with any regularity in the slightest.