April 22, 2010

Oilers' Problems: Scouting or player development?

I'm sure this has been talked about elsewhere, but I'd like to put it in a nice succinct form for all to gawk at in wonder. I've been thinking lately about the patheticness of the Oilers and why through so many years of failure the Oilers have still not managed to put together a good team through the draft. At first I thought it was just poor drafting. Looking at the Oilers drafting history leaves a lot to be desired. I've listed below the Oilers first draft pick of every season since 1993 and one other player who was available at the time.

Now I can't expect every draft pick to turn out, but when only 1-2 top picks from the last 17 years end up becoming NHL players (let alone superstars), I can't help but be mighty frustrated. But all this failure begs the question: "
Is the bigger problem in the Oilers organisation poor drafting/scouting or poor player development?". I don't know much about the personnel that are involved in each of these aspects, and I'd like to think that someone in the Oilers organisation is looking very closely at it... but I can't. They've proven time and again that they are incompetently unaware of how to be a successful franchise. Sigh.

So hopefully they read this here blog, become enlightened, hire me as the new VP of hockey operations and get this franchise rolling. :)


OILERS DRAFT HISTORY


1993

Oilers: Jason Arnott (7th)

Available: Saku Koivu (21st-MTL)

NOTE- this was actually a decent year. The Oil also drafted Satan 111th.


1994

Oilers: Ryan Smyth (6th)

Available: Patrick Elias (51st-NJD)


1995

Oilers: Steve Kelly (6th)

Available: Jarome Iginla (11th-DAL)


1996

Oilers: Boyd Devereaux (6th)

Available: Daniel Briere (24th-PHO)


1997

Oilers: Michel Riesen (14th)

Available: Brendan Morrow (25th-DAL)


1998

Oilers: Michael Henrich (13th)

Available: Brad Richards (64th-TBL) (besides Datsyuk -171st by DET)


1999

Oilers: Jani Rita (13th)

Available: Martin Havlat (26th-OTT) (besides Zetterberg -210th by DET)


2000

Oilers: Alexei Mikhnov (17th)

Available: Niklas Kronwall (29th-DET)


2001

Oilers: Ales Hemsky (13th)

Available: Derek Roy (32nd-BUF)


2002

Oilers: Jesse Niinimaki (15th)

Available: Cam Ward (25th-CAR)


2003

Oilers: Marc Pouliot (22nd)

Available: Mike Richards (24th-PHI)


2004

Oilers: Devan Dubnyk (14th)

Available: Mike Green (29th-WAS)


2005

Oilers: Andrew Cogliano (25th)

Available: Paul Stastny (44th-COL)


2006

Oilers: Jeff Petry (45th)

Available: Milan Lucic (50th-BOS)


2007

Oilers: Sam Gagner (6th)

Available: Wayne Simmonds (61st-LAK)


2008

Oilers: Jordan Eberle (22nd)

Available: ???

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!

1 comment:

  1. Ugh, and you're not even listing all the missed picks. I randomly looked at 2003 and really shouldn't have:

    2003
    Oilers: Marc Pouliot (22nd)
    Available: Mike Richards (24th-PHI),
    Corey Perry (28th-ANA)
    Loui Eriksson (33rd-DAL)
    Patrice Bergeron (45th-BOS)
    Shea Weber (49th-NAS)
    David Backes (62nd-STL)

    Now obviously other teams were picking clunkers too, but the Oilers have consistently combined questionable picks followed by poor development. Many other teams seem more capable of turning their lower picks into NHL-caliber players or even all-stars. For the Oilers, not a chance... and the draft history makes it glaringly obvious.

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