[Discussion] *Updated* Is It Really All That Bad?

[Warhippy]

22 minutes ago, theminister said:

Players over 100 GP between 2005-2012:

 

VCR: 5

EDM: 16 ( 6 AFTER the 1st round)

CAL: 8 (Also freaking terrible but still better than us)

 

 

How about good teams... as you said who have traded lots of picks and drafted low?

 

LA: 19

CHI: 15

DET: 14

PIT: 12

SJS: 14

WAS: 14

 

See, WH? If you apply a fair metric... the Canucks get beat by everyone. Everyone. Even a team as pathetically bad as Calgary. They too have a 'black hole' of drafting... just because that one other team does too doesn't mean we don't.

 

Half a decade of basically nothing can't be called anything less.

 

/ Really, all you've done is mislead people in the OP, WH. I'm not suggesting you've done it on purpose but you have because you've counted players for the Canucks that you've not counted for other teams by the same measurement. If anyone actually looks closer at what you included for each team they will see that.

 

Now do me a HUGE favour.  Let's use Edmonton as the example again.

 

How many drafted top 10 or better.  Chicago?  Pittsburgh?  Washington? And for how many years again?   Because didn't they do it multiple times?  And aren't all those highly drafted players in their primes?

 

While we were getting older competing for cups and trading depth and prospects of course 

 

Because it isn't about just the pick or amount if picks.  It's also what the team is doing.  The age of their core.  Where those picks were chosen.  Much of which has not been mentioned 

 

Again.  I'm not trying to say that we didn't do poorly.  I'm trying to allay the myth that EVERYONE did so much better than us when in fact they really didn't when you look at those variables

 

Edit**   if you feel mislead.  Sorry.  But the numbers don't lie.  While we did poorly.  We also didn't squander as much as others no matter how you want to look at things.

 

If people look at it any other way so be it.  But IMO I look at the number of picks quality of picks and see that while we did poorly, we didn't do as poorly as others for where our team was in the standings vs teams drafting quite high and much more frequently over that 11 year period

[groovy]

3 hours ago, Warhippy said:

Man I wish I had time to go through everyone's drafting.  The fact is, this is easily said but hard to prove because the factors include extra picks and draft positioning.  It's kind of one of those situations where you're just looking at the surface without actually doing any research.

 

yesterday we had the worst drafting, today i just showed we don't compared to two teams, weigh that against 27 other teams and I am sure we're about the 20 ish spot give or take for poor drafting.

 

Case in point look at a team like Columbus, ALL of those high picks...who do they really have to show for it?  Arizona?  Toronto?  Boston?  Minnesota? Islanders?

 

Do the research on those teams since 2005 and then come back and tell me out of those teams, and the Albrutal teams.  Who of all of us has the worst drafting.  I can almost assure you when weighed against number of and quality of picks; we're far from being the worst.

Boston clearly hit the motherlode 2006, leading them ultimately to the holy grail. Hopefully JB`s panning leads to a few nuggets.

[theminister]

1 minute ago, Warhippy said:

Now do me a HUGE favour.  Let's use Edmonton as the example again.

 

How many drafted top 10 or better.  Chicago?  Pittsburgh?  Washington? And for how many years again?   Because didn't they do it multiple times?  And aren't all those highly drafted players in their primes?

 

While we were getting older competing for cups and trading depth and prospects of course 

 

Because it isn't about just the pick or amount if picks.  It's also what the team is doing.  The age of their core.  Where those picks were chosen.  Much of which has not been mentioned 

 

Again.  I'm not trying to say that we didn't do poorly.  I'm trying to allay the myth that EVERYONE did so much better than us when in fact they realky didn't when you look at those variables

What favour? They still had more players become NHL players AFTER the 1st round than we did combined. THAT'S EDMONTON! The most notoriously deficient team in the NHL.

 

It's not that EVERYONE did 'SO much better'... some only did marginally better...Calgary, for example... but every single team DID do better than us and we are at the bottom.... there is no way you can spin it any other way. Them's the facts.

 

The simple fact is that the majority of teams did vastly better than us and, yes, we did pick low, pick few times, and had few very high picks (though not devoid).

 

However, all that included... we were the worst drafting team in the NHL over that period. Any metric you choose... I'm leaving it up to you, as I said before... I'm betting you can't find one team that we beat. How is that a myth?

[Neko]

Teams like Detroit, Chicago and Tampa has had great draft depth for years, it's not just about getting worthy players in the first round, it's about getting picks outside the first round that can make it into the NHL and excel.  Benning is showing that he's capable of finding players outside the first round which is what the Canucks desperately needs- Edmonton on the other hand are so one dimensional.

[theminister]

12 minutes ago, Warhippy said:

 

 

Edit**   if you feel mislead.  Sorry.  But the numbers don't lie.  While we did poorly.  We also didn't squander as much as others no matter how you want to look at things.

 

If people look at it any other way so be it.  But IMO I look at the number of picks quality of picks and see that while we did poorly, we didn't do as poorly as others for where our team was in the standings vs teams drafting quite high and much more frequently over that 11 year period

No, they don't. The real ones, I mean... not the ones you included in the OP which were improperly applied. We squandered pretty much ALL of them. 

 

Here's the problem with your statement.... try including the 1st round picks for the Canucks and exclude the 1st round picks for every other team. Seem fair then to avoid that issue you raise? We still don't beat a single team.

 

Not one. All other teams don't get 1st and we do... we are still at the bottom. You aren't really look at the 'numbers' at all IMHO.

[Warhippy]

1 minute ago, theminister said:

No, they don't. The real ones, I mean... not the ones you included in the OP which were improperly applied. We squandered pretty much ALL of them. 

 

Here's the problem with your statement.... try including the 1st round picks for the Canucks and exclude the 1st round picks for every other team. Seem fair then to avoid that issue you raise? We still don't beat a single team. Not one.

See here's the thing.  You're applying this to 2005-2011 ignoring everything since.

 

At no point in time am I saying we kicked a55

 

I'm saying quite simply it is FAR from as bad as people make it out to be as 2012 through 2016 have yielded some very solid picks that are just to young to tell while at the same time 2005-2011 have done well by other teams; except we've been able to see how those picks have panned out.

 

It averages out VERY well and leaves us middle of the pack when you factor in more than just a 5 year period.

 

I'm doing this over 11 years.  Not 5

[theminister]

1 hour ago, Warhippy said:

See here's the thing.  You're applying this to 2005-2011 ignoring everything since.

 

At no point in time am I saying we kicked a55

 

I'm saying quite simply it is FAR from as bad as people make it out to be as 2012 through 2016 have yielded some very solid picks that are just to young to tell while at the same time 2005-2011 have done well by other teams; except we've been able to see how those picks have panned out.

 

It averages out VERY well and leaves us middle of the pack when you factor in more than just a 5 year period.

 

I'm doing this over 11 years.  Not 5

I'm ignoring it because of your post at the bottom of the 1st page where you correctly identified removing 2013 on. ... and for two other reasons.. 1) It's too early to tell from the most recent years, and 2) because the recent years are NOT the BLACK HOLE... that's between 2005-2012 as you said.

 

It is THAT bad between those year ranges. Because we don't beat a single team Not one.

 

It does not average out middle of the pack... you aren't even looking at your numbers. I'm using a 8 year period, 2005-2012, where we should have developed players on the roster. That's the Black Hole.

 

Hold on.... I'll do the analysis I stated above, where I don't include other teams' 1st round picks but count ours.... then we can see how bad the Canucks have been.

[groovy]

2 hours ago, WhoseTruckWasIt said:

Someone will have to explain this to me.

 

We won back-to-back President's trophies and nearly won a cup with a team that included 7 of our own draft picks:  Sedins, Edler, Bieksa, Kesler, Raymond, Schnieder.  How is that bad?

 

I saw that National Post article headlined, "Drafting: Toronto gets a pass, Canucks fail".  They cherry-picked the period that is always discussed here; you know, that period where we had a great team that didn't have room for raw rookies?  So that's fair, considering that we added a bunch of players from the period before that.  And then of course, the article concluded that the best measure of success is the number of players that have played a small number of games with your team, or another team I guess.  So, having five guys that can't cut it in the bigs for more than 100 games is considered to be "more successful" drafting than adding a guy like Hansen that plays for a decade plus on dominant teams.

 

I cannot stand the discussions around this - quoting percentages and what-not.  The number of guys that make it has more to do with the number of NHL spots available than the abilities of the draftees.  You can't compare draft success across teams by comparing the number of guys that play.  Perhaps you could by comparing the quality of the drafted players, but maybe that says more about development than drafting.  Besides which, it depends a lot on how competitive the NHL club is.  Some dominant teams are drafting role players to fill out the roster, whereas weaker teams might be looking for core players.  One team may have a garbage budget and rely on ELC's; for example, I'm sure that Carolina has great "draft success" if you merely count the players, but if you measure the quality, it's hard to justify that evaluation.  But, even still, it was easy for them to add players, good or not, because the team is no good.  So if a team is generally unsuccessful at being a team, does it really matter that they played a lot of their own draft picks?  A good team may add one prospect in a year, even though 6 of their prospects could have made a crap team.  Maybe there's a team with so many bad contracts that their own well-drafted prospects never get an opportunity.  Then you have pick-trading on so on.  Maybe a team would have drafted that great player, but got a better one by trading the pick.  That won't show up in the draft record.  The draft record itself does not provide a reliable measure of drafting ability. 

My very thoughts.... Stop.

[Warhippy]

5 minutes ago, theminister said:

I'm ignoring it because of your post at the bottom of the 1st page where you correctly identified removing 2013 on. ... and for two other reasons.. 1) It's too early to tell from the most recent years, and 2) because the recent years are NOT there BLACK HOLE... that's between 2005-2012 as you said.

 

It is THAT bad between those year ranges. Because we don't beat a single team Not one.

 

It does not average out middle of the pack... you aren't even looking at your numbers. I'm using a 8 year period, 2005-2012, where we should have developed players on the roster. That's the Black Hole.

 

Hold on.... I'll do the analysis I stated above, where I don't include other teams' 1st round picks but count ours.... then we can see how bad the Canucks have been.

Agree to disagree bud.

 

You're looking at numbers from one perspective I'm seeing them from another.

 

We can go about this all day but I'd rather not.

 

IMO from 2005 to 2016 our drafting has been bad good bad good abd had a number of shoddy years while we were thd top team in the league.

 

Now it's averaging out over the last 4 years.

 

Go ahead tell me how im wrong now because I'm just going to ignore it.  Telling someone their opinion is wrong because they're looking at somethjng differently than you is perfectly fine. 

 

But doing it over and over gets old

[theminister]

WH... using your format from the OP...

 

So here is the list of players drafted by teams who have 100 GP (a couple who are just outside) but excluding 1st round picks for other teams while I include 1st round picks for the Canucks over an 8 year period. This should negate the question of draft position or amount of picks.

 

 

Vancouver:

 

2005:  Raymond (51)

2006:  Grabner (14)

2007:  0

2008:  Hodgson (10)

2009:  Schroeder (22), Connauton (83)

2010:  0

2011:  0

2012:  0

 

5 players from 2005-2012 including players taken in the 1st round from 47 picks. 10.6%

 

Edmonton:

2005:  Chorney (36), Vandevelde (97)

2006:  Petry (45) Peckham (75)

2007:  0

2008:  0

2009:  Lander (40)

2010:  Marincin (46)

2011:  Rieder (114)

 

 

7 players from 2005-2012 from 48 picks. 14.6%

 

Calgary:

2005:  0

2006:  0

2007:  Aulie (116)

2008:  Bouma (78)  Brodie (114) 

2009:  0

2010:  Ferland (133)

2011:  Granlund (45)  Gaudreau (104)

 

6 players from 2005-2012 from 46 picks. 13.0%

 

 

Bruins:

2005:  Sobotka (106)

2006:  Lucic (50) Marchand (71) 

2007:  0

2008:  Hutchinson (71)

2009:  0

2010:  Spooner (45)

2011:  0

2012:  0

 

5 players from 2005-2012 from 43 picks. 11.6%

 

Blackhawks:

2005:  Blunden (43) Hjalmarsson (108)

2006:  0

2007:  0

2008:  Smith (169)

2009:  Pirri (59), Kruger (149)

2010:  Nordstrom (90)

2011:  Clendenning (36) Saad (43) Dahlbeck (79 - 94 GP), Shaw (139)

2012:  0

 

10 players from 2005-2012 from 63 picks. 15.9%

 

Kings:

2005:  Quick (72)

2006:  0

2007:  Simmonds (61), Martinez (95), King (109)

2008:  Voynov (32), Loktionov (123)

2009:  Clifford (35), Deslauriers (84), Vey (96), Nolan (186)

2010:  Toffoli (47)  

2011:  Shore (82)

2012:  0

 

12 players from 2005-2012 from 55 picks. 21.8%

 

Islanders:

2005:  0

2006:  MacDonald (160)

2007:  0

2008:  Hamonic (53), Martin (148), Spurgeon (156)

2009:  Czikas (92), Lee (152)

2010:  0

2011:  0

2012:  0

 

6 players from 2005-2012 from 57 picks. 10.5%

 

Blue Jackets:

2005:  McQuaid (55) Russel (67) Boll (101) 

2006:  Mason (69) Sestito (85), Dorsett (189)

2007:  0

2008:  Golubef (37 - 96 GP), Calvert (127) Atkinson (157) 

2009:  Savard (94)

2010:  Prout (154)

2011:  Jenner (37)

2012:  0

 

12 players from 2005-2012 from 53 picks. 22.6%

 

Quote

So again, I ask.  Is it REALLY that bad??

 

Shall I go on? I can do more teams, if you'd like.

 

We can't even beat a single team when we get 1sts and they don't over that time period.

 

Black Hole confirmed.

[theminister]

31 minutes ago, Warhippy said:

Agree to disagree bud.

 

You're looking at numbers from one perspective I'm seeing them from another.

 

We can go about this all day but I'd rather not.

 

IMO from 2005 to 2016 our drafting has been bad good bad good abd had a number of shoddy years while we were thd top team in the league.

 

Now it's averaging out over the last 4 years.

 

Go ahead tell me how im wrong now because I'm just going to ignore it.  Telling someone their opinion is wrong because they're looking at somethjng differently than you is perfectly fine. 

 

But doing it over and over gets old

Your opinion can be different than mine... that's fine....

 

But you have misrepresented the numbers, even by your own standards, when you include players like Gaunce and Corrado for the Canucks and exclude half a dozen players from the Oilers who have played more games in the NHL.

 

Listen... I think  our drafting has markedly improved since 2012... so some MG and some JB... but by trying to deny that we are worse than every other team over a LONG period is flat out unsupportable, if you are being objective.  

 

I understand your opinion that we traded a lot of picks.. and that we picked low... and that our context for getting young players into the line-up was different because we were competing for many of those years, a full 8 consecutive seasons... but it doesn't change the math. The only thing that does is you counting players from a threshold for the Canucks but not for other teams by the same measurement.

 

You chose the numbers that you state in the OP... if you want an honest discussion then you should portray the numbers fairly and evenly. Because right now you, if you are aware of the inconsistencies in your argument, you are being disingenuous. 

 

Like any problem... it's most important to identify and admit you have one first... we have had a MASSIVE problem.

[Nuxfanabroad]

To paint with a broad brush, historically...

 

-Our drafting has been brutal

 

-Last 25 yrs, trading has saved our A$$

[Squeak]

METRICS!

 

[BI3KSA-]

You're including our recent great draft years under Benning, and Gillis' last one or two. No one complains about that, what people complain about is our drafting from 2005 to 2011 or so, where we drafted a singular impact player that fell down a lot, and rightfully so. 

[Sean Avery]

Nobody was really saying that our drafting nowadays is bad... they were mostly talking about our drafting in the past and us "overrating" our prospects.

[theminister]

Continuing the above....and again... no 1st round picks.

 

San Jose:

 

2005: Vlasic (35), Joslin (149)

2006:  McGinn (36)

2007:  Bonino (173), Braun (201), McLaren (203)

2008:  Wingels (177), Demers (186)

2009:  0

2010:  0

2011:  Nieto (47)

2012:  Tierney (55)

 

10 players from 2005-2012 from 48 picks. 20.8%

 

 

Nashville:

 

2005: Franson (79), O'Reilly(150), Hornqvist (230)

2006:  0

2007:  Spaling (58)

2008:  Josi (38), Lindback (207)

2009:  Latta (72), Smith (98), Ekhlom (102), Bourque (192)

2010:  0

2011:  0

2012:  0

 

10 players from 2005-2012 from 54 picks. 18.5%

 

 

Anaheim:

 

2005: Mikkelson (31)

2006:  Belesky (112)

2007:  Tangradi (42), Kampfer (93)

2008:  Schultz (43), MacMillan (85)

2009:  Vatanen (106)

2010:  Smith-Pelly (42)

2011:  Gibson (39), Karlsson (53), Manson (160)

2012:  Andersen (87)

 

12 players from 2005-2012 from 50 picks. 24.0%

 

 

Dallas:

 

2005: Neal (33), Clune (71), Wandell (146)

2006:  0

2007:  Scievour (112), Benn (129), Gazdic (172)

2008:  Larsen (149)

2009:  Chiasson (38), Smith (69)

2010:  Klingberg (131)

2011:  Jokipakka (195)

2012:  0

 

11 players from 2005-2012 from 44 picks. 25.0%

[theminister]

Colorado:

 

2005: Statsny (44), Hensick (88), Cumiskey (222)

2006:  0

2007:  Galiardi (55), Malone (105)

2008:  O'Reilly (33), Barrie (64), 

2009:  

2010:  

2011:  

2012:  

 

7 players from 2005-2012 from 51 picks. 13.7%

 

 

Minnesota:

 

2005: 0

2006:  Clutterbuck (72)

2007:  Falk (110)

2008:  Scandella (55)

2009:  Keumper (161), Haula (182)

2010:  Larsson (56), Zucker (159)

2011:  0

2012:  0

 

7 players from 2005-2012 from 41 picks. 17.1%

 

 

 

[theminister]

So... basically...when every team can find a greater amount of NHL players, and at a higher success rate to boot, without 1st round picks than the Canucks did WITH 1st round picks over an 8 year period...

 

Yes... it's a real problem. Sorry, WH... you're just wrong because you used faulty numbers. Use good data and you'll come around.

 

Fortunately, JB identified it early and set out to correct it, with help from the last couple of MG drafts... it's too bad that some people don't recognize how big of a problem this has been for us. If the Eastern media, for example or apparently a lot of our fans, could come to grips with this reality then they might accept the plan of the organization better, and why we made the trades we did.

 

Context is everything...and the context is we got walked over at the draft by every team in the league except for a couple who were right at the bottom with us... even though we beat them to the bottom.

[Honky Cat]

1 hour ago, SID.IS.SID.ME.IS.ME said:

I tend to agree that our drafting was pretty average during those Gillis years, especially when you account for draft position and pick volume.

 

And I think some of our worst drafting probably happened during the 90s. Other than the top-3 picks of the twins and Nedved, the 1994 Ohlund pick, and Peca in the 2nd round in 1992 (maybe throw in Cooke and Schaefer as "hits" during that decade at least relative to draft position), I think we were quite poor relative to volume and position through that decade.

 

We actually had some very good results during the 1970s and 1980s and had quite a few hits. It helped that we enjoyed decent position and a generally high volume in picks (mostly due to the team being bad for much of that period).

 

The 2000s had some hit and miss years and probably are pretty average on a whole, especially given that we didn't have many high picks in the first round. 2004 was a very good draft  (getting Schneider, Edler, and Hansen). And in 2005, Bourdon (RIP) would likely have been a great player. Most of the other years were big misses (EDIT: Kesler in 2003 was a great pick).

 

Gillis's drafts are actually looking better with age. There are still players drafted during his regime that might yet pan out (like Rödin) and some later gems (like Hutton). Hodgson was an unlucky result for a pick that was universally praised at the time. Taken all together, those years have already reached average "hit" status in terms of return on the volume/position of the picks made. And Gillis's attempts to revamp the scouting department seemed to be paying dividents by the final year of his tenure.

 

Benning started where the Gillis regime left off and has had what appear to be above average results (for hit rate relative to volume/position). And the early indications seem good for the transition (in scouting leadership) from Eric Crawford to Brackett/Weisbrod.

 

Overall, drafting is a cycle. You have periods of good luck and bad luck. You have years when you're competing so you have low pick volume (from "win now" trades) and poor draft position (due to good records). And when you're in the cellar, you have high picks and better volume (from selling). In the long term view, we've been average and have ridden the highs and lows the same as most teams.

 

Currently, we're in the rebuilding phase so we should be able to draft better players with our higher first round picks. And while pick volume hasn't been great, we've mainly spent our picks on long terms core pieces who are on the younger side, so we're still doing fine with our hit rate, all things considered.

 

And the scouting department seems to be in good shape now. The changes implemented by Gillis and continued by Benning seem to be paying off, at least based on early returns (we won't really know which picks "hit" for a few years yet). By definitely reasons for optimism.

 

Overall, unless you're drafting early first round, you are really just throwing darts. And even great scouts miss (and can miss often and repeatedly) at those percentages. But it's a cycle and things always come around again and you start to get some lucky hits, sometime even from the same scouts who missed for years. That's just how things go at the draft table.

 

But I actually like our chances to occasionally outperform pick volume/position with the current scouting and management. And I also feel like the wheel of luck is due to come around again for this team, so we might enjoy a very healthy hit rate for our current and future picks/prospects, and possibly draft among the better teams in the league for the next while.

Canucks drafting was actually pretty decent in the 90's..a lot of players had good NHL careers,and the Canucks picked up a lot of gems with their later picks ( Peca,Cooke,Walker,Chubarov,Ruutu,Schaefer and more),not to mention 1991 pick Stojanov,who parlayed into Marcus Naslund..The era culminated with the drafting of the twins in '99.....Every year of the 90's draft yielded 2-3 bonafide NHL's,except for 1996.

 

The 2000's have been well below average (a good year in 2004)...Gillis' drafting was abysmal,(Nonis and Burke get an honouable mention as well)..

 

 

[Standing_Tall#37]

2 hours ago, theminister said:

Players over 100 GP between 2005-2012:

 

VCR: 5

EDM: 16 ( 6 AFTER the 1st round)

CAL: 8 (Also freaking terrible but still better than us)

 

 

How about good teams... as you said who have traded lots of picks and drafted low?

 

LA: 19

CHI: 15

DET: 14

PIT: 12

SJS: 14

WAS: 14

 

See, WH? If you apply a fair metric... the Canucks get beat by everyone. Everyone. Even a team as pathetically bad as Calgary. They too have a 'black hole' of drafting... just because that one other team does too doesn't mean we don't.

 

Half a decade of basically nothing can't be called anything less.

 

/ Really, all you've done is mislead people in the OP, WH. I'm not suggesting you've done it on purpose but you have because you've counted players for the Canucks that you've not counted for other teams by the same measurement. If anyone actually looks closer at what you included for each team they will see that.

 

Yea, you're right, I wouldn't consider guys that have been eligible for 7+ years to play in the NHL and have less than 100 games of experience, NHL players. Anyone can cherry pick any stats they want based upon opinion. I don't know how guys like Schroeder, Hodgson, Corrado and such could be considered anything more than fringe NHLers at best.