Hockey fans love to handicap the NHL Entry Draft. They really love to go back in time and say, “who should we have taken” with years of hindsight, and in many cases people pretend that they knew that such-and-such was going to be a colossal bust (or such-and-such was going to be a huge success) – often without any kind of paper trail to back it up. It’s why talking about drafts in retrospect often leads to big arguments about who really knows their stuff, and who just straight-up sucks.

Blues fans dealt with this from 2003-2010, when Jarmo Kekalainen was the director of amateur scouting for the Blues. Kekalainen’s draft record while with the Blues runs from “he did a pretty damn good job when you look at the overall body of work” to “Jarmo is overrated, anyone could have made some of those picks, we never got a top-line guy under him, he should have done better with what he had.” So, I’m going to take a look at the Kekalainen draft record while he was in St. Louis from 2003-2010 – both the good and the bad. This should be especially interesting for Columbus Blue Jackets fans, who want to know what to expect of Kekalainen with 3 1st-round picks in this year’s draft.

I thought I’d be able to do this in one article, but quickly realized it needed to be in two parts – and then after writing up 2003 and 2004, thought “this is going to be really, really long … let’s do it in 4 parts.” So, over this week I’ll post all 4 pieces.

First, let’s establish some basic facts about the draft:

1. Not every player drafted makes it to the NHL. This comes as a shock to some hockey fans, but maybe half of all players drafted ever play even one (1) NHL game. The fact that someone doesn’t make it to the NHL doesn’t make the pick “bad” in and of itself, especially when you’re talking about late-round picks.
2. Great players do not always come out of the 6th and 7th round. For every Pavel Datsyuk and Henrik Zetterberg, there’s a slew of guys like Tim Konsorada, Kari Akkanen, and Jimmy Cuddihy who never see the NHL unless they buy a ticket to a game. If your measuring stick of draft success is “but he never found a superstar with a late-round pick” you might want to adjust expectations dramatically.
3. Every team makes mistakes at the draft. Yes, every team. Even teams like Detroit and New Jersey, who have been held up as the gold standard of draft excellence.
4. Draft picks aren’t just guys who are supposed to play on the team in the future, they’re potential pieces in a trade to get guys for the current roster. Logic should show that if every draft pick panned out, there wouldn’t be room in the NHL or AHL to hold all of those guys after a few years. Some of those guys get traded to fill holes you discover you have – and if they can serve that purpose, great.
5. Draft picks are not “bad” if injuries are involved. Jaroslav Svejkovsky was a 1st-round pick for Washington who had game-breaking speed and excellent hands – and whose career was cut short due to repeated knee injuries. That was not a “bad” pick by the Capitals there, it was simply bad luck. If anyone knows of a way to predict when players are going to get hurt ahead of time, let me know – because you’re in line to make more money than you can imagine.
6. You never draft based on immediate need – you always take who you think is the best player available. Remember a few years back, when the Blues allegedly had a glut of goaltending and we were still taking goalies in the draft and everyone wondered why – only to find out that “glut of goaltending” wasn’t nearly as good as we thought? As guys do/don’t pan out, free agents come and go, and guys on the current roster develop or don’t or get hurt, today’s strengths can quickly become tomorrow’s hole that needs to be filled. Take the BPA, trade from a position of strength to fill a weakness if/when necessary.

Also, let's establish a couple of things about how Kekalainen drafts:

1. He always drafts BPA. Period.
2. He doesn't worry about who's got the best numbers now. He's more worried about who's going to have the better career after 10-15 years.
3. He isn't afraid to make risky picks. High risk gives a chance at higher rewards. Sure, that leads to misses at times, but "safe" picks are guys who are serviceable but not difference makers.
4. You look at all players, and don't limit yourself to North America. This is a frequent criticism of Kekalainen, in that he doesn't focus on guys who don't have potential signability issues. For him, talent and skill is more important; if the guy is good enough, then you can worry about getting him under contract.

With that in mind, let’s look at the 2003-2004 drafts.

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2003 - this was the first year Jarmo was with the Blues, having been hired the prior August to run the amateur scouting system.

#30. Shawn Belle, D, Tri-City (WHL) - yes, that was a bust. The Blues would have picked at 17, but courtesy of the Jack Quinn chase after Scott Stevens, the Blues had to flip spots with the Devils. Belle was ranked 33rd among NA skaters by Central Scouting going into the draft, ahead of guys like Corey Perry (35), Brent Burns (39), and Shea Weber (42) so it’s not just Kekalainen who thought a lot of him. Belle’s 20 NHL games are the 2nd worst among all 2003 1st-rounders, ahead of only #12 Hugh Jessiman (NYR) who has two (2) NHL games under his belt. Yes, we missed out on guys like Loui Eriksson (#33), Patrice Bergeron (#45) and Weber (#49). Belle was taken for his size and speed, and the potential upside he might have; at 30, it was a home-run swing and Kekalainen missed.

62. David Backes, C, Lincoln (USHL) - folks, that’s a screaming home run. Backes was ranked #38 among NA skaters, and he’s outperformed several guys ranked ahead of him. The only guys taken after him who have more points are Lee Stempniak (who we’ll get to shortly) and Joe Pavelski (S.J) – and Backes has only 3 fewer points than Stempniak in 70 fewer games. The big criticism of Backes (and virtually every other Blues pick in this era) is “well, he’s not a top-3 forward.” The 2003 draft was exceptionally deep, and even in that 1st round you can find at least 9 guys (Jessiman, Nilsson, Bernier, Fehr, Pouliot, Stewart, Boyle, Tambellini, Eaves) who aren’t 1st-line guys. Even outside the 1st round, non-Blues who are 1st-liners are limited to Eriksson and Bergeron. A guy taken #62 overall who ranks 17th in points, 16th in goals, and 15th in goals per game? If that’s a bad pick in your book, your standards are artificially high.

#84. Konstantin Barulin, G, Tjumen (RUS). The #1 ranked European goalie in the draft, Barulin has become one of the better goalies in the KHL over time. Unfortunately, his “I’ll come over if you guarantee me a roster spot” stance killed any chances of him donning the ‘Note. Still, Kekalainen saw the potential there and it wasn’t a bad pick at the time; it just would have been nice to know that a year and change later, Barulin would flip-flop on making the jump before making that pick.

#88. Zach Fitzgerald, D, Seattle (WHL). Ranked 81st among NA skaters, Fitzgerland has played one (1) game in the NHL, so that was a “successful” pick – but in terms of defensemen we could have had, there’s Jan Hejda or Kyle Quincey or (going way down) Dustin Byfuglien or Tobias Enstrom - but before you jump on that wagon, there’s 29 other teams that passed on all of those guys more than a few times. Fitzgerald was never projected to be more than a 3rd pairing like who played physical hockey, and he’s become that … in the AHL.

101. Konstantin Zakharov, LW, Yunost Minsk (BEL). Ranked #19 among European skaters, Zakharov was the classic example of Russian players who were drafted by the Blues, went to Peoria for a little while, then bailed when not instantly promoted to the NHL or given premier minutes with the Rivermen. In his case, it was a midnight bailout back to Belarus and Yunost Minsk, the team his father coached. In retrospect, he clearly didn’t have his head screwed on. How badly did Central Scouting mess this up, though? They had Eriksson ranked 9 spots later.

127. Alexandre Bolduc, C, Royun Noranda (QMJHL). #46 among NA skaters, Bolduc was a “let’s take a flyer on him” pick, a guy who was ranked in the 1st round early on but fell as the season passed. As it turns out, he was playing through mono the back half of the season and that explained his poor performance. That said, he’s carved out a 4th-line niche in both Vancouver and Phoenix, logging 55 games to date. Probably a decent example of a pick that missed as intended, but was still serviceable – just not for us.

148. Lee Stempniak, RW, Dartmouth (NCAA). As noted above, Stempniak is the biggest steal among forwards in the back half of this draft other than Pavelski. His 135 goals puts him 15th among all 2003 draftees, and his 290 points currently puts him 16th. Getting a guy who averages 20.6 goals and 44.3 points with a 5th-round pick? That’s pretty damn good. Being able to flip him for Alex Steen and Carlo Colaiacovo? That’s even better. Not bad for a guy who was ranked #158 among NA skaters – which, when combined with the other lists, puts him closer to the 7th round.

159. Chris Beckford-Tseu, G, Oshawa (OHL). Ranked #14 among NA goalies, Beckford-Tseu is another example of goalies who Blues fans saw put up good numbers in the minors (in this case, the ECHL) and got excited about – which goes to show that taking stats from outside the NHL and projecting to the NHL can lead to some really bad conclusions. However, CBT did log one (1) NHL game to his credit (a 27-minute appearance in the 2007-08 season with the Blues) before he fell back to the ECHL and then out of pro hockey after the 2010-11 season. Of course, if you really didn’t like this pick, we could have drafted either current Blues goalie Jaroslav Halak with this pick (he went 271st to Montreal) or current Blues goalie / whipping boy Brian Elliott, (he went 291st to Ottawa).

The rest of the Blues picks from here on out (Jonathan Lehun, Evgeny Skachkov, Andrei Pervyshin, Juhamatti Aaltonen) all never got close to the NHL and are incredibly unlikely to do so now – and for guys taken in the 6th round and later, that’s more the norm.

Grade: A. Having to start at 30 meant a lot of talent was long gone by the time the Blues were finally able to pick - and even considering the miss on Belle, the Blues picks still have gone on to produce 266-317-583 in 1081 games. The GP ranks 14th among all 30 teams, goals ranks 5th, assists 9th, and points 7th. Throw out the first 29 guys drafted (thus looking at the guys the Blues actually had available to them when they started picking), and Kekalainen's picks rank 1st in GP, goals, and points, and 2nd in assists. The Backes and Stempniak picks were home runs and the latter brought us a current core piece of the team; if Barulin had made the jump and panned out here like he has in Russia, this would have been an even better draft.

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2004 - the first draft where Kekalainen had his procedure in place from the very start of the year.

17. Marek Schwartz, G, Sparta Praha (CZE). In retrospect, yes – this was a miss. However, in 2004 Schwartz was touted as a potential top-10 pick and was the #2 ranked goalie behind Al Montoya; on draft day, as he slid down the board TSN’s Bob McKenzie (who had Schwartz ranked #6) was shocked when team after team passed on Schwartz, and at 17 he said the Blues got a steal. Well, even McKenzie is wrong on occasion. In retrospect, the goalie to take was Cory Schneider (who went to Vancouver at 26) ... or, the Blues could have taken Travis Zajac, who went to New Jersey at 20. Hindsight – it’s always 20/20.

49. Carl Soderberg, C, Malmo (SWE-2). While Soderberg hasn’t come over to the NHL (and is unlikely to do so), he’s been a great player in Sweden. That doesn’t help the Blues or the Bruins (who currently retain his rights), but it gives you insight into the kind of talent the guy has and why Kekalainen took him here. Soderberg’s problem was his undying loyalty to his hometown Malmo team, who he wanted to see get in (and stay in) the Elitseiren – which is why he bailed on the Rivermen in the 2005-06 season. (Malmo was relegated that year, and has never come close to getting promoted back up – which forced Soderberg to go to another team if he wanted to play in the top tier.) On the other hand, he did bring us Hannu Toivonen, whose terrible play in net would push the Blues toward the basement in 2007-08 and put us in position to draft one of the four highly-touted blueliners that year … but we’ll get to 2008 later – and I’m not sure it’s complete atonement for Soderberg never sticking it out in North America, either.

83. Viktor Alexandrov, LW, Novokuznetsk (RUS). Alexandrov has had a decent career in Russia, and has shown why he caught the attention of scouts in ’04. However, he would never make the jump – making this another busted pick. 14 spots later, the Red Wings would hit with Johan Franzen - the only pick the Red Wings would have from that draft make the NHL.

116. Michal Birner, LW, Praha Slava Jr. (CZE). Birner was never going to be more than a 3rd/4th line guy, so him busting here isn’t a shock. At best, he was going to be a poor man's Michal Hanzdus. On the other hand, he did go in a package that brought us Andy McDonald – but we arguably could have used a guy like Ryan Callahan (taken at 127 by the Rangers) even more.

136. Nikita Nikitin, D, Avangard Omsk (RUS). Nikitin didn’t make the jump to North America until 2010, after most Blues fans had given up on him … but he has the potential to go down as the best Blues pick of this draft. Dealing him to Columbus just 70 games into his North American pro career for Kris Russell may end up being a pretty short-sighted move before all is said and done.

180. Roman Polak, D, Viktovice Jr. (CZE). Polak has become a very solid 5/6 guy with the Blues. In the late 5th round, this was a great pick; the only picks after this that were arguably better were Pekka Rinne (#258, Nashville), Mark Streit (#262, Montreal) and maybe Troy Brouwer (#214, Chicago).

The other 2 picks (David Fredriksson, John Michel Boutin) didn’t get close to the NHL – and again, at that point of the draft it’s largely luck.

Grade: C. I could even go C- here as things stand. The Blues picks have contributed for 452 GP to date (22nd of the 30 teams), contributing 18-89-107 (21st in points). Throw out the first 16 picks (the ones above the Blues first), and they rank 19th in GP and 18th in points. Had Nikitin not made the jump, it would have graded out as a D at best – but if Nikitin continues to improve, this draft will look better. If Soderberg had not flipped out and run back to Sweden, this might be a B+ draft or better and Blues fans are talking about that steal we got at 49.

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To recap: Kekalainen's first two drafts gave us 5 pieces of the current roster (Backes and Polak via draft; Steen, McDonald, and Russell via trade). The 2003 draft looks strong when you consider where the Blues started picking, even considering the miss on Belle. Sure, 2004 wasn't as good, and it would have been nice to hit on a few guys in there - but does it get better? Check back later on when I post a recap of the 2005 and 2006 drafts.

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