Quote:
Originally Posted by GreenLantern2814
The top-3 pick stat illustrates a couple things.
1. All champions bottomed out long enough to draft that high at least once. The only exceptions are the best-run franchise in the league and a team that paid $600M for a seat at the table and hoodwinked a bunch of teams out of talent with a new expansion process.
2. Those teams hit on their picks when they had the opportunity to draft that high. It’s not just limited to top-3. When you draft top-5, you can’t have those picks be role players or complimentary skill guys.
Florida No Bennett, or Reinhart or Gudbranson. They have to be MacKinnon, Draisaitl, Barkov, Makar level players
The Florida Panthers once drafted Stephen Weiss, Jay Bouwmeester and Nathan Horton top-4 in successive years.
It wasn’t until they drafted Huberdeau, Barkov and Ekblad, they started to matter, and even that wasn’t enough.
You need hits all throughout a rebuild - Andersson is a perfect example of the sort of pick every rebuilding team needs if it’s gonna happen for them. Same with Wolf. You can’t just rely on top picks to carry you.
But it’s basically impossible to do anything substantial without elite players found at the top of the draft, and we have 20 years of evidence saying as much.
|
Yep, well said.
Those opposed to rebuilds seem to believe that those who are pro-rebuild see it as some sort of guaranteed Stanley Cup route. We (pro-rebuild folk) know that it isn't, but we do think it's the only real sure-fire non-expansion, non-lighting in a bottle way to put your team in a position to have a consistent shot at things.
To win a Stanley Cup, I've long said you need to do two
simple things:
1. Bottom out and build the foundation of your team through the top of the draft. Yes, this means timing the year of the bottoming out is incredibly important, and does include a significant luck factor (like everything in hockey).
2. You have to be one of the best run teams in the entire league AFTER (and at the same time?) you bottom out and build the foundation of your team through the top of the draft. You need to find hits all through the draft, and you need to manage your salary cap almost perfectly.
I think the Flames, for a brief stretch, under Treliving hit point #2. There were mistakes on the salary cap side that ended up being near fatal - but no matter how good things went, they could not overcome the fact that they did not do #1. They absolutely CRUSHED it in drafting Tkachuk and Monahan both at the 6th overall spots. Bennett at 4 isn't that bad, but it wasn't a home run...but Monahan was never Mackinnon or Barkov (1 and 2 that year) and Bennett was no Ekblad or Draisaitl (1 and 3 that year). We never got our Hedman or Mackinnon, not even an Eichel or a Drasaitl. The Flames didn't accomplish #1.
Imagine if we had snagged Barkov and Bennett? Or Monahan and Draisaitl? Then all of a sudden you look at Andersson, Dube, Kylington, and Mangiapane being found later in the drafts and that's when you start to look like a Stanley Cup team. I think the Flames did plenty good at the spots they got to draft in, they just didn't get the spots they needed.
Looking back at the Flames over the last decade, I find it hard not to think that it's irresponsible for teams who are in bubble spots to not sell at the trade deadline. Even if it's for a less than stellar return at the deadline, because subtracting from your roster to create death march for the remainder of the season increases the value of your 1st round pick significantly.