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Kekalainen at the Draft: 2005-2006 |
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A quick note: I'll have the preview of tonight's Kings game up later this evening.
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Having looked yesterday at the 2003-2004 draft period, I’ll turn to the next 2 years of Blues drafts under former director of amateur scouting Jarmo Kekalainen – and it contains a few of the most hotly debated (among Blues fans) picks in his record.
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2005 Draft - the Crosby draft, where "the #1 pick was rigged for Pittsburgh," the draft order snaked around, and criticism ramped up from Blues fans.
24. T.J. Oshie, LW, Warroad (MN-High). Ranked #43 among NA skaters by Central Scouting, this pick sent Blues Nation into a frenzy and brought all kinds of jeering from people who thought Kekalainen had really screwed the pooch with this pick by taking him way too early. (If he hadn’t taken Oshie at 24, Edmonton would have at 25.) Even now, mention the name “Oshie” on a Blues message board and you get a wildly divergent set of opinions among Blues fans. He’s a Blue for life, he’s a great guy for the team, he’s heart-and-soul, he’s a slacker, he’s overrated, trade him now, … Oshie was a long-argued pick from the moment his selection was announced and continues to be today.
No, ideally Oshie probably isn’t a first-line player – but he’s capable of playing there if needed. (Of course, of the 10 forwards taken ahead of him, only 3 are 1st-line guys. Only in the draft is everyone a top-3 forward / top-2 defenseman / legitimate #1 goalie, no matter where selected in the draft.) Yes, he was immature at college and in his first few years in St. Louis and did some dumb stuff. No, he’s probably not going to score 40 goals and 80 points in a season. But for all the complaints about how he underachieves, he’s currently 11th in goals, 9th in points, and 6th in points-per-game among 2005 draftees – and he’s a guy who lays it on the line night in and night out and gives the opposition fits. The guys ahead of him in points-per-game? Some guy named Crosby, Anze Kopitar, Paul Stastny (#44, Colorado – who we’ll discuss shortly), Bobby Ryan, and James Neal (#33, Dallas, who plays with that Crosby guy and another fellow, last name Malkin). If that’s underachieving from the #24 spot, there’s a ton of teams that will gladly take that – and there’s a lot of fans who’d love to have Oshie on their team.
37. Scott Jackson, D, Seattle (WHL). Mention this name, and a slew of Blues fans will inevitably melt down about how we should have known to take Paul Stastny instead – and how the Blues should have known all about Stastny because he grew up in the St. Louis area. Considering one of these guys was ranked #21 among NA skaters by Central Scouting (and #29 overall by Bob McKenzie), and the other was ranked #74 among NA skaters by Central Scouting, … well, let’s just say this notion that everyone knew Stastny was the better player wasn’t universally adopted – including by the Colorado Avalanche, who scooped up Ryan Stoa with their first pick at 34.
Who else passed on Stastny? Boston did twice. Detroit (that “gold standard” franchise for drafting) did twice. New Jersey (that other “gold standard” franchise for drafting) did twice. Washington passed twice. A few other teams passed on him twice. Let’s not pretend the Blues somehow missed this sure-fire, golden nugget waiting to be plucked; a lot of teams that have good draft records overlooked Stastny as well.
Back to Jackson, though. Projected as a stay-at-home defenseman with a little offense, he was a “successful” pick because he’s played one (and exactly one) game in the NHL – but he certainly didn’t pan out like we expected at 37. Maybe that’s because he was overrated by everyone (including people who follow prospects for a living) … or, maybe that’s because of two knee injuries he suffered during the 2005-06 season (and tried to play through). I’ll let everyone else argue over which was the case.
85. Ben Bishop, G, Texas (NAHL). The 6’7” Bishop has gone from “he’s never going to make it” to “he’s the future Blues #1” to “he’ll be lucky if he’s a backup in the NHL” to “we should have never traded him away” since being drafted by the Blues – which goes to show just how fickle fans can be and how his long-term future has varied since being drafted. The #6 goalie in NA according to Central Scouting, Bishop finally had a breakthrough season in the AHL in 2011-12 (his 4th full season there), being named an AHL All-Star and posting a 24-14-0 record with a 2.26 GAA and .928 SV% before being dealt to Ottawa for a 2nd round pick in 2013. Whether the Blues should have traded him or not is a different story – what’s important here is “did he make it?”
Well, yes … and not yet. While he’s made it to the NHL and has signaled he can play there, he’s still only logged 30 NHL games so far. That’s 5th among all goalies drafted in 2005 – but only 10 of the 23 goalies taken in ’05 have made it to the NHL for even 1 game, and the 4 guys ahead of him in GP have at least 117 or more. However, there’s still time for this to look even better than it currently does. At a minimum, this was a “good” pick by Kekalainen.
156. Ryan Reaves, RW, Brandon (WHL). Ranked #228 among NA skaters by Central Scouting, Reaves wasn’t expected to be taken at all – but Kekalainen used a 5th on him, passing up other higher-ranked guys in the process. Reaves has transitioned into a fighter in the pros, something he really didn’t do in juniors (his high in juniors was 91 PIM) but was still never expected to be more than a 4th line guy. He’s not going to score many goals, and sure you can point to people we could have had instead – but at 107 games played and counting, Reaves is good enough that he’ll probably have a decent career in the NHL – and certainly better than anyone expected going into the draft.
169. Mike Gauthier, D, Prince Albert (WHL). Ranked #86 among NA skaters by Central Scouting, Gauthier was always going to be a project, and in a best-case scenario was still going to be a physical defenseman who could occasionally fill-in as a 6/7 guy. He simply never could get the skating part of his game good enough to play outside of juniors.
171. Nicholas Drazenovic, C, Prince George (WHL). Drazenovic was ranked 29th among NA skaters by Central Scouting, but plummeted down the draft board until the Blues used a 6th-round pick on him. Drazenovic has done well in the AHL, averaging about .63 points per game, but has only seen 7 games in the NHL and has yet to record a point. This is one of those few cases where team scouts and Central Scouting rankings don’t align – and in this case, it appears CS was the one that was off. Still, if you can get a guy at this point of the draft to even make the NHL that’s pretty good – and it’s likely Drazenovic will record a few more games and maybe even a point in the NHL before he’s done.
219. Nikolai Lemtyugov, RW, CSKA Moscow (RUS). Yet another example of why Blues fans got incredibly leery of drafting Russian players. Lemtyugov rooted for the Blues as a youngster, hated the Red Wings, said he was willing to gut it out in Peoria to play in the NHL, and then stormed off when he didn’t get a call-up after a season and change that saw him post 27-29-56 in 96 games in the AHL. Since returning to the KHL, he’s bounced across 6 teams and has never scored more than 10 goals in a season there. Had he stuck around and made it to the NHL, he would have been a surprising hit; instead, he’s just another expected miss.
Grade: B+. 5 of the 7 picks hit the NHL, 2 of them have played 100+ games, and a 3rd (Bishop) still has time to get there. Only 3 teams (Colorado was 6/9, Dallas was 6/7, NY Rangers was 6/9) hit with more guys, Thus far, those 5 picks have amassed 73-126-199 in 428 games, with Oshie responsible for a chunk of that as noted above. That’s still good enough for Blues picks to rank 17th in GP but 13th in goals, 11th in assists, 12th in points, and 5th in points-per-game; throw out the guys taken ahead of him and all goalies (which I should have done for prior drafts to better compare all skaters), and the Blues picks rank 11th in GP, 7th in goals, 7th in assists, 8th in points, and 3rd in points-per-game. After not picking until 24, that’s not too bad.
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2006 - the end of the Bill Laurie Reign of Terror, and the Blues first #1 overall pick – which, like the 2005 draft picks, generated (and still generates) all kinds of controversy.
1. Erik Johnson, D, USNTDP. As controversial as the Oshie pick was in 2005, this one still sets some Blues fans off and is used as the #1 example of “why Jarmo sucks” to some. It’s also the pick that generates the most misrepresentation of facts.
As much as people like to think “Johnson wasn’t the consensus #1 pick” he was. Period. McKeen’s, ISS, Central Scouting, … all your favorite draft places, they all had him #1 going into the draft – and many of them had him there after the WJC’s when he put up a strong performance. Staal was young and had upside as a future 2-way player, Toews was pegged as a future captain and a great leader with top-line talent, Backstrom was pegged as a future #1 center in the league who could be a premier set-up guy, Kessel was pegged as a guy who could score goals, … and yet, EJ was flat-out the #1 guy going into the draft – and it wasn’t up for debate. The question was who the #2 guy was, and opinions varied there. Even in the preliminary CS rankings, Toews was #2 among NCAA skaters behind Kessel, and at the mid-term EJ was #1 among NA skaters with Kessel #2, Toews #3 and Staal #4.
So … what happened? The problem with EJ wasn’t that he went to Minnesota in 2006-07 (which some Blues fans howled over). It also wasn’t that first year in the NHL. It started that 2nd year, when he tore an ACL in a team outing on the golf course in the preseason. (Stories vary about how it happened; that’s kind of irrelevant, it’s the fact that it happened.) That was the start of things. While he came back with a strong 2009-10, he struggled the following year and was ultimately traded to Colorado for Kevin Shattenkirk (#14, 2007) and Chris Stewart (#18, 2006). Lack of actual talent, failure to develop, poor coaching, … pick any (or all) of those reasons why Johnson hasn’t become the franchise defenseman many expected him to be – but a slew of people covering the ’06 draft thought Johnson was the best defensemen to come through the draft since Chris Pronger. Sure, the Blues could have done better – and the 29 other teams would have chomped at the bit to take him at #1 overall given the chance.
How to grade this? Two ways – one is to judge him against who we could have had (everyone else) and the other is to judge him by who we were able to get for him. In the former, clearly we could have done better; in the latter, getting Shattenkirk and Stewart was a pretty solid return. As I noted yesterday, sometimes it’s not what the guy does for you that’s important – it’s what he brings you in a trade. In this case, EJ (along with Jay McClement and a 1st) brought us two key pieces of the current roster (and a 2nd that became Ty Rattie). If that was a bad pick, the Blues did a really nice job of salvaging something for him.
25. Patrik Berglund, C, Vasteras (SWE). Berglund was ranked #8 among European skaters by Central Scouting, but Kekalainen swung a deal with the New Jersey Devils to move up from 30 to nab Patrik, who the Detroit Red Wings had targeted. Despite currently sitting 8th in GP among 2006 draftees, 9th in goals, 9th in points, and 8th in points-per-game, some Blues fans inexplicably continue to think Berglund is a bust – primarily because they claim Berglund was hyped into the next coming of Mats Sundin.
Does Berglund have the potential to be a #1 center? I think he does – and so do some around the league. Will he hit it? Maybe not (the longer he goes, the more “no” becomes the answer) – but considering that the only guy taken after him who’s outproduced him is Milan Lucic (#50, Boston) and he’s clearly outperforming guys taken ahead of him, it’s hard to figure out if Berglund can ever do anything to appease that faction of Blues Nation who think he royally sucks. (Probably not.) Does that mean in any way this was a bad pick? Nope – at 25, Berglund has done pretty damn good so far. He’s averaging .526 points per game, and that’s even after a couple of slow seasons. At 24, he still probably has his best year ahead of him – and he’s likely to continue producing for several more seasons. There’s a lot of teams that would gladly take that.
31. Tomas Kana, C, Viktovice (CZE). The #5 European skater according to Central Scouting, Kana was seen as another Michal Handzus – but never really developed the passion to want to play in the NHL. Eventually traded away to Columbus in a minor-league deal, he would play 6 games for the Blue Jackets and register a pair of assists before languishing in the minors some more and eventually going back to Viktovice.
61. Jonas Junland, D, Linkoping (SWE). Ranked #36 among European skaters by Central Scouting, Junland played a couple seasons at Peoria, getting named to the AHL All-Star Game in each season. He also got a call-up twice, the first time in 2008-09 (where he looked out of place) and the other in the 2009-10 season (where he didn’t). However, Junland demanded a 1-way contract and a guaranteed NHL roster spot after the ’09-10 season; the Blues were willing to do the former but not the latter, and Junland returned back to Sweden.
The rest of the Blues picks (Ryan Turek, Andy Sackrison, Matthew McCollem, Alexander Hellstrom) didn’t make the NHL and won’t going forward. Turek and Hellstrom at least spent a little time at Peoria, but neither was really close – and neither one was projected to be more than a fringe NHL’er who got a call-up for a game or two.
Grade: B. All in all, the 2006 draft was considered to be generally weak with a big drop-off in talent after the middle of the 2nd round; even Kekalainen figured getting 3 players to the NHL would be great. The Blues got 4 of 9 picks there; the only teams to do better were Toronto (5 of 7), Washington (5 of 10) and NY Islanders (5 of 13). Including EJ, the Blues rank top-5 in terms of GP, goals, assists and points; throwing out EJ, the Blues are around 12-13 … but, that then ignores the fact that EJ returned a pair of players via trade. Not sticking that #1 pick hurt, but there would be more reason to be upset about it if EJ wasn’t the consensus #1 guy there. It's not higher because EJ didn't become that cornerstone defenseman, but it's not lower because of who we were able to get back via trade.
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Summary so far: If you only looked at the raw data from 2003-2006, Kekalainen’s record isn’t terrible – but it’s not jaw-dropping, either. Despite not nailing that #1 overall pick and a couple misses with the early picks, of the 36 picks Kekalainen has made 18 have hit the NHL (50%, putting him 6th) and they’ve combined for 468-727-1195 in 2611 combined games (12th in GP, 11th in points, 9th in points-per game). Not bad, but not "damn, that's really good." Throw out the guys he couldn’t choose from, though, and it paints a different picture: his hit-ratio moves to 4th (behind only Boston, Montreal and Dallas, and tied with Pittsburgh) and his picks rank 4th in games played, 3rd in goals, 2nd in assists, 3rd in points, and 3rd in points-per-game. The only team clearly better is Boston (Kessel, Lucic, Bergeron, Krejci, Versteeg, Marchant) and the only team arguably as good is Colorado (Stastny, Stewart, Wolski, Jones).
Given where he had to start picking from, and the relative and perceived misses he had, Kekalainen did a solid job of getting players who would produce in the first 4 years with the Blues - and he'd have another 4 years to stock the system with players. Tomorrow, a look at 2007 and 2008 - the last 2 years we can really draw decent conclusions from.
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