How Long to Get There?

How long does it take to get to the NHL? It’s going to be different for the first overall pick to the last pick in the last round. And it is probably a gradual progression along the way.

We also often say that after the first half of the first round, it’s all a crapshoot anyway, it’s only those top 15-16 picks that are locks, right? Is that true?

I decided to look at the data from 2000 to 2024 and see how long it took the player in each first round draft slot to get to the NHL. And by “get to the NHL”, I mean in the season where he played the majority of his games. Getting 5 games in a year isn’t “getting there”. If we look at each draft position, how long does it take? Let’s start with the top 10 picks.

First Overall

This one should really be a lock. The team who chooses first can take any player they want. In some of my other research, I found that the first overall pick turns out to be the best player in the draft only half the time. The other half, some player not taking first overall ends up being better than the guy taken first. This is also the only pick where every player drafted could be evaluated. From the second pick through 10th, it’s not fair to call the 2024 player a “miss”. But the first pick in 2024 is Macklin Celebrini and I’m confident that he’s “made it” in the NHL. The numbers for the first rounders are:

0 Years	21 players
1 Year	3 players
2 Years	0 players
3 Years	1 player
Bust	0 players

The first overall pick makes it to the NHL pretty quickly. 24 out of 25 did it by the year after they were drafted. The only one who took three years was goalie Rick DiPietro, the 2000 first overall pick. And none have been a bust, where a bust is defined as someone who never played the majority of their games in the NHL.

Second Overall

Getting chosen second overall in the NHL draft is still a pretty solid pick and there are no busts here either. The majority play in the NHL in their draft year. A quick look at the numbers.

0 Years	13 players
1 Year	6 players
2 Years	4 players
3 Years	1 player
Bust	0 players

The only player here to take more than two years was again a goalie, Kari Lehtonen. Thirteen players make it in their draft year, 10 others within two years and no busts.

Third Overall

The third overall pick is still looking solid and again, only one player took more than two years to get to the NHL. This time, not a goalie, it’s Dylan Strome. The one player that took two years was 2005 pick Jack Johnson.

0 Years	11 players
1 Year	11 players
2 Years	1 player
3 Years	1 player
Bust	0 players

Fourth Overall

Now it starts to get interesting. We see the first bust and we start to see the majority of players take a little longer, but still doing well. In case you’re wondering, the one player rated as the “bust” is Griffin Reinhart whose longest stint was 29 games with Edmonton in 2015-16.

0 Years	5 players
1 Year	10 players
2 Years	6 players
3 Years	0 players
4 Years	1 player
5 Years	0 players
6 Years	1 player
Bust	1 player

That six year player is Thomas Hickey, drafted in 2007 by the LA Kings.

Fifth Overall

We will gradually see the “bust” numbers increase and the number of players drift downward.

0 Years	4 players
1 Year	5 players
2 Years	5 players
3 Years	5 players
4 Years	1 player
5 Years	2 players
6+ Years	0 players
Bust	1 player

The “bust” is Olli Juolevi, chosen in 2016 by Vancouver.

Sixth Overall

More downward drift.

0 Years	5 players
1 Year	10 players
2 Years	3 players
3 Years	2 players
4 Years	0 players
5 Years	1 player
6+ Years	1 player
Bust	1 player

The bust was Nikita Filatov, selected by Columbus and the 6+ year player was again a goalie, Al Montoya who waited seven years to make it to the NHL.

Seventh Overall

Now we only get one player who made it to the NHL in his draft year, Jeff Skinner, and two bust players, Lars Jonsson (2000) and Lias Anderson (2017).

0 Years	1 player
1 Year	9 players
2 Years	8 players
3 Years	2 players
4 Years	0 players
5 Years	1 player
6+ Years	0 players
Bust	2 players

Eighth Overall

Four players got to the NHL in their draft year, Pierre Marc Bouchard in 2002, Mikkel Bodker in 2008, Alex Burmistrov in 2010 and Sean Couturier in 2011. The busts happened in 2004, 2007 and 2009.

0 Years	4 players
1 Year	6 players
2 Years	4 players
3 Years	3 players
4 Years	1 player
5 Years	2 player
6+ Years	0 players
Bust	3 players

Ninth Overall

The one player to make it to the NHL in his draft year was Josh Bailey, in 2008. The bust years were 2000, 2002 and 2018. Still waiting on the three most recent picks, 2022’s Matt Savoie, 2023’s Nate Danielson and 2024’s Zayne Parekh. They’re not factored in to the data below.

0 Years	1 player
1 Year	6 players
2 Years	8 players
3 Years	4 players
4 Years	0 players
5 Years	0 players
6+ Years	0 players
Bust	3 players

Tenth Overall

The last one that is included for now (the remaining 22 picks will come later), is the 10th overall pick. 2022’s Pavel Mintyukov is included in this data, so the only two not included are 2023’s Dalibor Dvorsky and 2024’s Anton Silayev. That leaves 23 picks, 8 of which are a bust. That’s 35% of the 10th overall picks in the draft who have not made it to the NHL. If 2021’s Tyler Boucher does eventually make it to the NHL, that will drop to 30%, but even that is probably a much higher bust rate than many would have thought. The one player taken 10th overall to make it to the NHL in his draft year is Valeri Nichushkin.

0 Years	1 player
1 Year	4 players
2 Years	5 players
3 Years	2 players
4 Years	2 players
5 Years	0 players
6+ Years	1 player
Bust	8 players

Looking at all of the picks in one table:

Yrs	1st	2nd	3rd	4th	5th	6th	7th	8th	9th	10th
0	21	13	11	5	4	5	1	4	1	1
1	3	6	11	10	5	10	9	6	6	4
2	0	4	1	6	5	3	8	4	8	5
3	1	1	1	0	5	2	2	3	4	2
4	0	0	0	1	1	0	0	1	0	2
5	0	0	0	0	2	1	1	2	0	0
6+	0	0	0	1	0	1	0	0	0	1
Bust	0	0	0	1	1	1	2	3	3	8

Updating the Rankings

The team rankings can change with every NHL game played. The data is based on the “Point Shares” that a player earns in games. If you want more info on the methodology, it’s all here: https://www.draft-analysis.com/

The last time I ran the data was three years ago. A lot has changed and we also now have enough data to analyze a couple more drafts. It takes time for drafted players to get to the NHL, so I previously stopped at 2017. This time, I ran up through 2020. The more recent drafts are a lot more volatile and will likely change a lot more as the players earn Point Shares through their career.

A lot of what is done here is to look at drafts objectively, with data, largely because I’m a Bruins fan and Bruins fans love to say “Don Sweeney is the worst GM for drafting.” I wanted to see if that is correct, using data. I’ll give you the short version here, since 2015 and through the 2020 draft, the Bruins have been the 13th best in the NHL. So like I tell people, definitely not the worst, not the best, but in the top half. There’s also a lot of fluctuations in how they’ve drafted. I did rank each team each year and this is what we got:
2015: 27th best
2016: 6th best
2017: 2nd best
2018: 11th best
2019: 28th best
2020: First overall

And before you guffaw at that 2020, two caveats:
1. It’s about value for their draft position. It’s not about getting just the best player, it’s getting the best player at each of their draft positions, or what I call “avoiding missed value”.
2. It’s the most recent draft that I’ve looked at and the numbers are extremely close through all the teams. The numbers for 2020 will change a lot over the next 10+ years.

The 2015 Draft

Bruins fans love to call out 2015 for the Bruins as it was a huge missed opportunity. The Bruins could have gotten much better players. But for what this looks at, avoiding missed value, the Bruins didn’t do the worst, they even had three teams who did worse. Here’s the 2015 draft rankings. The second column is the total “missed value” and the last column is the average. The Bruins have the most aggregate missed value but they also had more draft picks than other teams.

Rank	Team	Total Missed Value	Missed Value Per Pick
1	Edmonton Oilers	-83	-13.83
2	Calgary Flames	-92.8	-18.56
3	Minnesota Wild	-154.7	-22.10
4	Pittsburgh Penguins	-98.1	-24.53
5	Nashville Predators	-186.7	-26.67
6	Vancouver Canucks	-200.7	-28.67
7	Winnipeg Jets	-235.3	-29.41
8	Carolina Hurricanes	-265.9	-29.54
9	St. Louis Blues	-190.4	-31.73
10	Los Angeles Kings	-192.3	-32.05
11	Chicago Blackhawks	-224.8	-32.11
12	New York Islanders	-225.1	-32.16
13	Washington Capitals	-133.3	-33.33
14	Buffalo Sabres	-202.10	-33.68
15	Florida Panthers	-270.4	-33.80
16	Colorado Avalanche	-243	-34.71
17	Columbus Blue Jackets	-313.4	-34.82
18	New Jersey Devils	-183.1	-36.62
19	Detroit Red Wings	-221.3	-36.88
20	Montreal Canadiens	-191.1	-38.22
21	Dallas Stars	-192.5	-38.50
22	Philadelphia Flyers	-347.7	-38.63
23	Ottawa Senators	-309.5	-38.69
24	Anaheim Ducks	-271.6	-38.80
25	San Jose Sharks	-357.8	-39.76
26	Toronto Maple Leafs	-360	-40.00
27	Boston Bruins	-401.4	-40.14
28	Arizona Coyotes	-387.1	-43.01
29	Tampa Bay Lightning	-357.2	-44.65
30	New York Rangers	-314.3	-44.90

Let’s keep going.

2016 Draft

The Bruins were sixth best in 2016, helped by Charlie McAvoy. He is currently the 3rd best player in that draft and the Bruins got him 14th. Minnesota is in the lead currently more by default and bigger misses by other teams. The Wild had four picks and got Kunin and Duhaime to the NHL. What’s also an illustration of this methodology is Toronto had the first overall pick and landed a generational player in Matthews. But that doesn’t get them to the top of this list. They, like many other teams, missed on players like Alex Debrincat, Adam Fox, Brandon Hagel and Jesper Bratt.

1	Minnesota Wild	-85.6	-21.40
2	New York Rangers	-134.5	-22.42
3	Arizona Coyotes	-113.5	-22.70
4	New York Islanders	-142.5	-23.75
5	Calgary Flames	-233.4	-25.93
6	Boston Bruins	-166.5	-27.75
7	Montreal Canadiens	-166.5	-27.75
8	San Jose Sharks	-141.2	-28.24
9	Nashville Predators	-229.1	-28.64
10	Tampa Bay Lightning	-310.5	-31.05
11	Detroit Red Wings	-220.1	-31.44
12	Washington Capitals	-223.2	-31.89
13	Chicago Blackhawks	-288.4	-32.04
14	Philadelphia Flyers	-325.2	-32.52
15	Los Angeles Kings	-132.1	-33.03
16	Buffalo Sabres	-332.8	-33.28
17	St. Louis Blues	-233.9	-33.41
18	Toronto Maple Leafs	-369.7	-33.61
19	Florida Panthers	-237.4	-33.91
20	New Jersey Devils	-311.7	-34.63
21	Vancouver Canucks	-211.5	-35.25
22	Pittsburgh Penguins	-216.8	-36.13
23	Columbus Blue Jackets	-181.5	-36.30
24	Anaheim Ducks	-218.1	-36.35
25	Dallas Stars	-228.6	-38.10
26	Colorado Avalanche	-231.9	-38.65
27	Ottawa Senators	-200.6	-40.12
28	Winnipeg Jets	-241.4	-40.23
29	Carolina Hurricanes	-372.3	-41.37
30	Edmonton Oilers	-381.6	-42.40

2017 Draft

The Bruins had a big jump in the rankings for this draft on the back of Jeremy Swayman, huge value in the 4th round. Dallas easily won this draft as they got the 2nd, 5th and 6th best players using the 3rd, 39th and 26th picks to do that for Miro Heiskenen, Jason Robertson and Jake Oettinger. That’s how you draft value and that’s what this analysis is all about. The current best player from this draft was taken 4th, by Colorado, Cale Makar. The Devils might be happy with their pick, Hischier, but I’m willing to bet that Philadelphia would love a do-over after their pick of Nolan Patrick at 2.

1	Dallas Stars	-69.6	-9.94
2	Boston Bruins	-77.9	-11.13
3	Columbus Blue Jackets	-84	-12.00
4	San Jose Sharks	-82.9	-13.82
5	St. Louis Blues	-83.5	-13.92
6	New York Islanders	-70.7	-14.14
7	Calgary Flames	-70.8	-14.16
8	Pittsburgh Penguins	-85.7	-14.28
9	Edmonton Oilers	-103.5	-14.79
10	New York Rangers	-104.1	-14.87
11	New Jersey Devils	-172.1	-15.65
12	Tampa Bay Lightning	-95.5	-15.92
13	Toronto Maple Leafs	-111.5	-15.93
14	Minnesota Wild	-97.6	-16.27
15	Colorado Avalanche	-114.4	-16.34
16	Winnipeg Jets	-133	-16.63
17	Nashville Predators	-101.9	-16.98
18	Ottawa Senators	-71.6	-17.90
19	Vancouver Canucks	-148.6	-18.58
20	Carolina Hurricanes	-151	-18.88
21	Los Angeles Kings	-135	-19.29
22	Vegas Golden Knights	-236.2	-19.68
23	Florida Panthers	-99.2	-19.84
24	Chicago Blackhawks	-179.7	-19.97
25	Anaheim Ducks	-102	-20.40
26	Washington Capitals	-41.7	-20.40
27	Buffalo Sabres	-128.6	-21.43
28	Detroit Red Wings	-249.6	-22.69
29	Montreal Canadiens	-161	-23.00
30	Arizona Coyotes	-199.4	-24.93
31	Philadelphia Flyers	-236.3	-26.26

2018 Draft

This is the first time looking at this draft and those coming after it. The players have now had six years to reach the NHL and start earning their point shares. We are already starting to get into some really narrow margins in the rankings, a lot can still change in the future. And with the Bruins currently only having Jakub Lauko playing in the NHL, they’ll likely drop in future years. Edmonton leads this draft on the back of having taken Evan Bouchard with the 10th overall pick. Buffalo took Rasmus Dahlin first overall, but the best player taken was Quinn Hughes by Vancouver at 7.

1	Edmonton Oilers	-28.4	-5.68
2	Toronto Maple Leafs	-65.1	-7.23
3	Winnipeg Jets	-48	-8.00
4	Tampa Bay Lightning	-57.4	-8.20
5	New Jersey Devils	-49.6	-8.27
6	Vancouver Canucks	-49.7	-8.28
7	Vegas Golden Knights	-70.9	-8.86
8	St. Louis Blues	-53.9	-8.98
9	Calgary Flames	-46.1	-9.22
10	Nashville Predators	-39.1	-9.78
11	Boston Bruins	-49.1	-9.82
12	Columbus Blue Jackets	-59.5	-9.92
13	Minnesota Wild	-79.5	-9.94
14	Florida Panthers	-60.7	-10.12
15	Philadelphia Flyers	-82.6	-10.33
16	Carolina Hurricanes	-62.2	-10.37
17	Washington Capitals	-74.3	-10.61
18	Ottawa Senators	-85.2	-10.65
19	Anaheim Ducks	-75.9	-10.84
20	Buffalo Sabres	-65.5	-10.92
21	Pittsburgh Penguins	-46.1	-11.53
22	San Jose Sharks	-105.8	-11.76
23	Colorado Avalanche	-95.5	-11.94
24	Los Angeles Kings	-86.3	-12.33
25	Dallas Stars	-105.1	-13.14
26	New York Rangers	-133.9	-13.39
27	New York Islanders	-109.7	-13.71
28	Chicago Blackhawks	-110	-13.75
29	Arizona Coyotes	-126.7	-14.08
30	Montreal Canadiens	-160.7	-14.61
31	Detroit Red Wings	-167.6	-16.76

2019 Draft

Another new addition. Bruins only have Johnny Beecher from this one. Only about half the time does the best player go first overall. This is one of them where Jack Hughes is the best player in the draft. The next best players are Moritz Seider, taken 6th by Detroit, Matt Boldy at 12 by Minnesota, Cole Caufield 15th by Montreal and Bowen Byram, 4th by Colorado.

Rank	Team	Missed Value	Missed Value Per Pick
1	Columbus Blue Jackets	-13	-4.33
2	Dallas Stars	-18.6	-4.65
3	Washington Capitals	-21.3	-5.33
4	Montreal Canadiens	-59.9	-5.99
5	Vancouver Canucks	-55.4	-6.16
6	St. Louis Blues	-31.7	-6.34
7	Nashville Predators	-52.1	-6.51
8	Toronto Maple Leafs	-39.4	-6.57
9	New York Islanders	-41	-6.83
10	Minnesota Wild	-54.9	-6.86
11	Anaheim Ducks	-48.4	-6.91
12	Calgary Flames	-35	-7.00
13	Carolina Hurricanes	-84	-7.00
14	Vegas Golden Knights	-56	-7.00
15	Chicago Blackhawks	-42.6	-7.10
16	Philadelphia Flyers	-50.9	-7.27
17	Florida Panthers	-65.5	-7.28
18	New Jersey Devils	-73.1	-7.31
19	Colorado Avalanche	-59.4	-7.43
20	Detroit Red Wings	-82.4	-7.49
21	San Jose Sharks	-37.6	-7.52
22	Arizona Coyotes	-68.4	-7.60
23	New York Rangers	-61.2	-7.65
24	Ottawa Senators	-47	-7.83
25	Buffalo Sabres	-47.1	-7.85
26	Pittsburgh Penguins	-40.3	-8.06
27	Winnipeg Jets	-40.3	-8.06
28	Boston Bruins	-40.4	-8.08
29	Tampa Bay Lightning	-57.1	-8.16
30	Los Angeles Kings	-79.8	-8.87
31	Edmonton Oilers	-56.2	-9.37

2020 Draft

The last one to analyze now as it’s only been four years and some players can take up to six years to get to the NHL. Plus there just hasn’t been much time for players to accumulate point shares, there won’t be a lot of variation. The best players taken here were Stutzle by Ottawa at 3, Lucas Raymond at 4 by Detroit, Seth Jarvis at 13 by Carolina, Lafreniere at 1 by the Rangers and Jake Sanderson by Ottawa at 5. Why isn’t Ottawa higher on the list when they have two of the five best players? Because they took those players around where they should have gone. And they’re only 2 points out of the top spot. There will be a lot of movement of these standings in the coming years.

Rank	Team	Missed Value	Missed Value per Pick
1	Boston Bruins	-17	-4.25
2	New York Islanders	-22.5	-4.50
3	Tampa Bay Lightning	-43.3	-4.81
4	New York Rangers	-43.5	-4.83
5	Pittsburgh Penguins	-26.3	-5.26
6	St. Louis Blues	-37	-5.29
7	Philadelphia Flyers	-26.8	-5.36
8	Buffalo Sabres	-27.1	-5.42
9	Florida Panthers	-50	-5.56
10	Arizona Coyotes	-28	-5.60
11	Vancouver Canucks	-28	-5.60
12	Montreal Canadiens	-45.1	-5.64
13	Chicago Blackhawks	-46.1	-5.76
14	Detroit Red Wings	-69.4	-5.78
15	Calgary Flames	-46.6	-5.83
16	Carolina Hurricanes	-46.7	-5.84
17	Toronto Maple Leafs	-70.2	-5.85
18	Vegas Golden Knights	-35.2	-5.87
19	Colorado Avalanche	-29.8	-5.96
20	Columbus Blue Jackets	-30.2	-6.04
21	Ottawa Senators	-63.6	-6.36
22	Edmonton Oilers	-38.2	-6.37
23	New Jersey Devils	-51.5	-6.44
24	Los Angeles Kings	-59.1	-6.57
25	Washington Capitals	-33.1	-6.62
26	Dallas Stars	-35	-7.00
27	Nashville Predators	-50.1	-7.16
28	San Jose Sharks	-65.1	-7.23
29	Winnipeg Jets	-32.9	-8.23
30	Anaheim Ducks	-66.6	-8.33
31	Minnesota Wild	-49.1	-9.82

The Don Sweeney Era

At some point, I’ll tie these to GMs and if I can find the names, to team Scouting Directors. But I think we’re also getting closer to answering questions about whether Don Sweeney is “the worst” at drafting, and over this period, if we average out the rankings, the Bruins are 12.83 or rounded to 13th best in the NHL from 2015 through 2020.

But again, a lot could change over the coming years.

What is a Draft Pick Worth?

Not all draft positions have equal value. I think we can all agree that the first overall pick doesn’t have the same value as the last pick. There would be gradually decreasing value as the draft goes on. Sometimes, teams get criticized for not drafting as well as another team, but this context is often lost. If one team is drafting in the top 10 and another is in the bottom 10, how do you compare those? Which team is drafting better? One way to do it is to look at value for the draft position.

To figure out whether teams are getting value, first we need to know what is the value of each draft position, so I did that. Again, I used the “Point Shares” metric provided by Hockey-Reference. I don’t know that it’s the best metric, but it’s certainly better than something like games played as for one, goalies and skaters won’t have the same value with games played. For another, a 500 game journeyman is not the same as a 500 game star.

I pulled all the Point Shares numbers for every NHL first round pick* from 1979 through 2018. Anything more recent than 2018 is still too soon to have much value. Then I just put all the players together by draft position and figured out the average. So here’s the average Point Shares, by draft position:

1st: 87.32
2nd: 70.75
3rd: 53.22
4th: 53.78
5th: 53.88
6th: 42.33
7th: 39.73
8th: 31.84
9th: 35.59
10th: 24.48

11th: 37.38
12th: 30.83
13th: 29.54
14th: 32.00
15th: 31.23
16th: 24.81
17th: 25.43
18th: 18.63
19th: 26.42
20th: 25.45

21st: 20.11
22nd: 21.89
23rd: 23.67
24th: 24.39
25th: 19.04
26th: 25.77
27th: 22.58
28th: 18.34
29th: 15.77
30th: 13.69
31st: 8.53

How about a pretty graph of these values.

Now that we’ve set a baseline of what a particular draft position is worth, we can start to look at how each team (or General Manager) has done with their drafts. More to come!

* First Round Pick: I extended this to the first 31 picks in the draft for consistency. Some years had fewer than 31 picks, but as of 2018, the first round had 31 picks.

Evaluating the Scouts

Some Bruins fans love to use their 20/20 hindsight and call out all the players the Bruins should have drafted. I’ve also wondered, what if the Bruins had just followed the NHL Central Scouting rankings for each draft, who would they have ended up with? Let’s take a look. Here’s the way it works, each year before the draft, the NHL puts out their own rankings of all the available players. I took that and I crossed names off as they were actually drafted and then when it was the Bruins’ turn to pick, looked at who is the best player available, according to the NHL scouts. Here’s how that went.

2015

We all know 2015 went really badly from the perspective that it was a very deep draft, there were a lot of good players available when the Bruins had three choices. Jake DeBrusk has turned out to be approximately what he was projected to be, around the 19th best player in that draft. Zach Senyshyn has been a huge miss, and then there’s Jakob Zboril. Due to slower development and injuries, the jury is still out. But those are the three guys they took. We always hear about Barzal, Connor, Chabot, Boeser and so many other players, but based on the 2015 NHL Central Scouting rankings, who would the Bruins have gotten? Yes, Matt Barzal and Kyle Connor, but the third one might surprise some people, Jakob Zboril. The best goalies available were Ilya Samsonov and Mackenzie Blackwood.

Let’s take it a little further and look at the second round where the Bruins took Brandon Carlo at 37 and Jakob Forsbacka-Karlsson at 45. The highest ranked players at 37 were Jansen Harkins, Michael Spacek, Blackwood or old friend Daniel Vladar. For the second pick, the same players were still available, but if the Bruins had taken Harkins at 37, then the next man up would be Filip Chlapik. Going as far as the third round, when they took Jeremy Lauzon, the best player in the rankings was Jeremy Roy.

2016

In 2016, the Bruins took Charlie McAvoy at 14, but according to the NHL Central Scouting, the highest rated available was Jakob Chychrun. Chrychrun is a pretty good player, but he’s not as good as Charlie McAvoy. That pick is a win for the Bruins. The Bruins also had a second first round pick at 29 where they took Trent Frederic. The highest ranked player was 21st, Alex Debrincat. He eventually went to Chicago, dropping all the way to 39. In the second round, the Bruins took a guy who is now an NHL defenseman, but was traded to the Rangers in the Rick Nash deal, Ryan Lindgren. He was drafted 49th. The highest ranked players at the time were Kale Clague and Carl Grundstrom. I feel pretty good about the Bruins scouting and drafting on that pick.

2017

This is the last year to look at as not enough players have had time to develop yet from 2018 on. But this year, the Bruins took Urho Vaakanainen at 18. The highest ranked players available according to the NHL Central Scouting were either Eeli Tolvanen or Klim Kostin. Meh. I’m not too excited about any of those players and I wouldn’t get too excited about “missing” on any of those. Looking into the second round, the Bruins took Jack Studnicka at 53 and the highest ranked players available for that pick were Rickard Hugg and Alexei Lipanov. To which I can just say “Who?” as neither of them have NHL experience and I don’t think either will ever get any.

There you have it, the answer to “What if the Bruins fired all their scouts and just used the NHL’s own rankings?” The thing to keep in mind though is for every Debrincat, all the other teams missed on him too. Each team has their own hits and misses including the Flyers, Stars and Capitals 2016 first round picks who have played a combined 15 NHL games.

Setting a Low Bar For Draft “Success”

All of the draft analysis so far has been about whether teams took the best player available at their draft position and if they did not, how much did they miss by. That is the main point of a draft, to get the best players available to you. However, some people like to criticize teams for only having a certain number of players reach the NHL. I see criticisms that include “Barely any of your draft picks make it to the NHL!” However, let’s look at this another way.

So one night, your favorite team plays the game and later that night, someone asks “How’d they do?” and you answer “They scored 3 goals.” Is that good? Virtually anyone would ask “But what was the score?” or “How many did the other team score?” because how many goals a team scores is relative to the other team’s goals scored in determining who wins. If you score 1 goal and shut out the other team, you win. If you score 6 goals but give up 7, you lose. So just having information about one team doesn’t tell you much. You need to compare it to the other team. Same with draft results. Knowing how one team has fared means nothing unless you know how that compares to other teams. If you want to know which team is best at drafting by the Best Player Available method, I have that for you here: Which Team is Best at Drafting: Answered

But if you care more about whether a team’s draft picks reach the NHL, I have that for you here too. It’s a ridiculously low bar to use “to reach the NHL”, but it’s a standard many people use in evaluating a General Manager or a team’s drafting ability, so here we go.

How it Works

I took the draft results (data taken from hockey-reference.com) from every NHL draft, 2000 to 2017 and added up how many players for each team have reached the NHL. There have been 4212 players drafted in that timeframe and 1963 of those have reached the NHL for a league average of 46.6%.

From 2000 to 2004, the NHL went 9 rounds for their draft, selecting around 290 players per year. The league averages those years were:

2000	40.27%
2001	43.94%
2002	35.75%
2003	44.52%
2004	44.33%

Yep 2002, a year led off with Rick Nash and Kari Lehtonen was a tough one. Once the league dropped two rounds, the percentage improved.

2005	48.26%
2006	42.72%
2007	45.97%
2008	49.54%
2009	55.02%
2010	50.24%
2011	59.81%
2012	51.42%
2013	50.71%
2014	46.67%
2015	48.57%
2016	45.50%
2017	42.40%

Some people ask why I stop at 2017 and you can see the answer here. Players just haven’t developed yet to give an accurate and fair picture. The percentage drops off. Maybe no more players from the 2017 draft will ever play in the NHL, but the numbers indicate otherwise. If we look at 2018, it’d likely be even lower, so it’s not worth including yet. (Update: Ok, I did check 2018. 217 players were selected and as of July 2022, 67 players have reached the NHL for a 30.8%. In 2018, there were also 217 selections and 56 have reached the NHL for a 25.8%. In short, it’s too early to judge teams on these drafts.)

Some years for individual teams were particularly interesting like in 2008, the Canadiens had 5 picks and zero have played in the NHL. Vancouver had 7 picks in 2007 and none have played even a single NHL game. The Penguins and Capitals matched that in 2017. Pittsburgh missing on six picks and the Capitals missed on all four. The opposite has also happened in a number of years. All five of the Devils picks in 2015 have played an NHL game. In 2011, the deepest draft statistically, four teams graduated all players to the NHL. All seven of Anaheim’s picks, all five of Calgary’s, all five of Pittsburgh’s and all six of Tampa’s. The highest graduation total was the 2008 Islanders, 9 out of their 13 picks played at least one NHL game.

The Best and Worst

Who are the best teams using this metric? This is the total percentage for all drafts from 2000 to 2017 for the teams. Atlanta and Winnipeg have been combined.

Boston	60.63%
Columbus	52.94%
Los Angeles	52.35%
Anaheim	52.34%
Toronto	51.45%
Ottawa	50.37%
Philadelphia	50.36%
New Jersey	50.00%
Pittsburgh	48.09%
San Jose	47.69%
St. Louis	46.90%
Carolina	46.88%
Buffalo	45.89%
Nashville	45.70%
Calgary	45.59%
Edmonton	45.45%
Colorado	45.39%
Florida	45.21%
Minnesota	45.11%
Montreal	45.04%
NY Islanders	45.00%
NY Rangers	44.44%
Dallas	43.88%
Washington	43.80%
Tampa Bay	42.48%
Atlanta/Winnipeg	41.89%
Phoenix/Arizona	41.73%
Chicago	41.57%
Vancouver	40.65%
Detroit	36.69%

So there you have it, the Boston Bruins and their General Managers from Mike O’Connell to Jeff Gorton to Peter Chiarelli to even the current Don Sweeney, lead the NHL with drafting players who play at least one game in the NHL. Again, a ridiculously low bar, but it’s one that people choose for some reason, when they want to evaluate a team’s drafting ability and the front office.

If you have any questions about the data, let me know on twitter at @plaverty24 and I’ll do my best to answer.

2017 Draft: Five Years Later

The quality of a draft is constantly changing, as the players’ value, or their “Point Shares (PS)” number changes when they play. The result of a draft isn’t really finalized until all the players have retired. On the other end of the spectrum, players can’t earn PS until they’re playing in the NHL. Evaluate these too soon, and it’ll be a very top-heavy draft as those players generally get to the NHL the fastest. For this reason, I waited until the end of the ’21-’22 season to put together the results of the 2017 draft. Here’s what we got so far.

A reminder of the methodology for this is here: “How This Works.”

First, here’s the 2017 first round:

1	New Jersey Devils	Nico Hischier
2	Philadelphia Flyers	Nolan Patrick
3	Dallas Stars	Miro Heiskanen
4	Colorado Avalanche	Cale Makar
5	Vancouver Canucks	Elias Pettersson
6	Vegas Golden Knights	Cody Glass
7	New York Rangers	Lias Andersson
8	Buffalo Sabres	Casey Mittelstadt
9	Detroit Red Wings	Michael Rasmussen
10	Florida Panthers	Owen Tippett
11	Los Angeles Kings	Gabriel Vilardi
12	Carolina Hurricanes	Martin Necas
13	Vegas Golden Knights	Nick Suzuki
14	Tampa Bay Lightning	Callan Foote
15	Vegas Golden Knights	Erik Brannstrom
16	Calgary Flames	Juuso Valimaki
17	Toronto Maple Leafs	Timothy Liljegren
18	Boston Bruins	Urho Vaakanainen
19	San Jose Sharks	Joshua Norris
20	St. Louis Blues	Robert Thomas
21	New York Rangers	Filip Chytil
22	Edmonton Oilers	Kailer Yamamoto
23	Arizona Coyotes	Pierre-Olivier Joseph
24	Winnipeg Jets	Kristian Vesalainen
25	Montreal Canadiens	Ryan Poehling
26	Dallas Stars	Jake Oettinger
27	Philadelphia Flyers	Morgan Frost
28	Ottawa Senators	Shane Bowers
29	Chicago Blackhawks	Henri Jokiharju
30	Nashville Predators	Eeli Tolvanen
31	St. Louis Blues	Klim Kostin

Next, here are the top 31 players, based on their NHL “Point Shares”:

Draft Position	Draft Team	Player	Point Share
4	Colorado Avalanche	Cale Makar	30.2
3	Dallas Stars	Miro Heiskanen	25.5
5	Vancouver Canucks	Elias Pettersson	25.4
1	New Jersey Devils	Nico Hischier	19.8
39	Dallas Stars	Jason Robertson	15.7
20	St. Louis Blues	Robert Thomas	14.9
26	Dallas Stars	Jake Oettinger	12.7
12	Carolina Hurricanes	Martin Necas	12.1
13	Vegas Golden Knights	Nick Suzuki	11.3
19	San Jose Sharks	Joshua Norris	10.3
111	Boston Bruins	Jeremy Swayman	9.5
121	Ottawa Senators	Drake Batherson	9
22	Edmonton Oilers	Kailer Yamamoto	8.7
34	Vegas Golden Knights	Nicolas Hague	8.6
29	Chicago Blackhawks	Henri Jokiharju	8.2
49	San Jose Sharks	Mario Ferraro	7.7
21	New York Rangers	Filip Chytil	6.7
50	Anaheim Ducks	Maxime Comtois	6.2
103	Los Angeles Kings	Michael Anderson	6.2
8	Buffalo Sabres	Casey Mittelstadt	5.5
2	Philadelphia Flyers	Nolan Patrick	4.1
99	Buffalo Sabres	Jacob Bryson	4.1
17	Toronto Maple Leafs	Timothy Liljegren	4
45	Columbus Blue Jackets	Alexandre Texier	4
15	Vegas Golden Knights	Erik Brannstrom	3.8
30	Nashville Predators	Eeli Tolvanen	3.7
14	Tampa Bay Lightning	Callan Foote	3.6
47	Ottawa Senators	Alex Formenton	3.5
11	Los Angeles Kings	Gabriel Vilardi	3.4
117	Columbus Blue Jackets	Emil Bemstrom	3.1
9	Detroit Red Wings	Michael Rasmussen	2.8

Next, we look at which teams had the best draft. As explained in the methodology, for the table below, a team wants fewer points. If the team drafted the best player available in their draft position, that earns a 0. If the best player is not taken, the team gets points added for the difference in PS between the player taken and the best player available. So fewer points are better.

Team	Total PS	# Picks
Washington Capitals	11.2	4
San Jose Sharks	17.4	6
New York Islanders	19.5	5
Dallas Stars	20.1	7
Pittsburgh Penguins	22.3	6
Ottawa Senators	22.8	4
Columbus Blue Jackets	23.1	7
Calgary Flames	23.4	5
Anaheim Ducks	25.7	5
Boston Bruins	26.2	6
St. Louis Blues	28.7	6
Minnesota Wild	30.3	6
New York Rangers	30.7	7
Tampa Bay Lightning	32.1	6
Nashville Predators	32.9	6
Edmonton Oilers	35	7
Toronto Maple Leafs	35.2	7
Florida Panthers	35.5	5
Colorado Avalanche	37.4	7
Los Angeles Kings	47.7	7
Winnipeg Jets	48.2	8
Buffalo Sabres	48.8	6
Vancouver Canucks	48.9	8
Carolina Hurricanes	50	8
Montreal Canadiens	53.5	7
Chicago Blackhawks	55.2	9
New Jersey Devils	57.3	11
Arizona Coyotes	67.7	9
Vegas Golden Knights	72.6	12
Detroit Red Wings	79.5	11
Philadelphia Flyers	87.2	9

A team can get a better score in the table above, simply by having fewer picks. To adjust for that, here’s the average points per draft pick.

Team	Average PS	# Picks
Washington Capitals	2.80	4
Dallas Stars	2.87	7
San Jose Sharks	2.90	6
Columbus Blue Jackets	3.30	7
Pittsburgh Penguins	3.72	6
New York Islanders	3.90	5
Boston Bruins	4.37	6
New York Rangers	4.39	7
Calgary Flames	4.68	5
St. Louis Blues	4.78	6
Edmonton Oilers	5.00	7
Toronto Maple Leafs	5.03	7
Minnesota Wild	5.05	6
Anaheim Ducks	5.14	5
New Jersey Devils	5.21	11
Colorado Avalanche	5.34	7
Tampa Bay Lightning	5.35	6
Nashville Predators	5.48	6
Ottawa Senators	5.70	4
Winnipeg Jets	6.03	8
Vegas Golden Knights	6.05	12
Vancouver Canucks	6.11	8
Chicago Blackhawks	6.13	9
Carolina Hurricanes	6.25	8
Los Angeles Kings	6.81	7
Florida Panthers	7.10	5
Detroit Red Wings	7.23	11
Arizona Coyotes	7.52	9
Montreal Canadiens	7.64	7
Buffalo Sabres	8.13	6
Philadelphia Flyers	9.69	9

The numbers are a little misleading and we need to look into details. Both tables indicate the Capitals had the best draft, when actually, they’ve had zero players make it to the NHL. That is in part due to the fact that they only had four picks and their first pick was 120th overall. The remainder of their picks were 151, 182 and 213. Not many teams will hit on those.

Dallas on the other hand, had an outstanding draft. They drafted three of the top seven players getting the second-best player, Miro Heiskenen at 3 (25.5 PS), the fifth best player, Jason Robertson at 39 (15.7 PS) and the seventh best player, Jake Oettinger at 27 (12.7 PS). The Sharks grabbed 10th best Josh Norris at 19 and he’s at 10.3 PS and 16th best Mario Ferraro at 49 and 7.7 PS.

The Don Sweeney haters will be disappointed to see the Bruins had the 7th best draft, which was on the strength of the current 11th best player, Jeremy Swayman taken at 111, and his 9.5 PS. First rounder, Urho Vaakanainen was the 43rd best player in the draft so far, with his 1.3 PS score.

First Line Centers

How does a team get a top line center? I last looked at this in the summer of 2022, so let’s do a little update in January of 2025. Previously I used the depth charts at CapFriendly, but this time I’ll use average TOI for each team’s centers.

Team	Player	Obtained	Draft Position	Draft Year	Main Trade Piece
Anaheim	Trevor Zegras	Draft	9	2019
Boston	Pavel Zacha	Trade	6	2015	Eric Haula
Buffalo	Tage Thompson	Trade	26	2016	Ryan O’Reilly
Calgary	Mikael Backlund	Draft	24	2007
Carolina	Seth Jarvis	Draft	13	2020
Chicago	Connor Bedard	Draft	1	2023
Colorado	Nathan MacKinnon	Draft	1	2013
Columbus	Sean Monahan	UFA Signing	6	2013
Dallas	Wyatt Johnson	Draft	23	2021
Detroit	Dylan Larkin	Draft	15	2014
Edmonton	Connor McDavid	Draft	1	2015
Florida	Alexander Barkov	Draft	2	2013
LA	Anze Kopitar	Draft	11	2005
Minnesota	Joel Eriksson Ek	Trade	20	2015
Montreal	Nick Suzuki	Trade	13	2017	Max Pacioretty
Nashville	Filip Forsberg	Trade	11	2012	Martin Erat, Michael Latta
New Jersey	Jack Hughes	Draft	1	2019
NYI	Mat Barzal	Draft	16	2015
NYR	Vincent Trochek	UFA Signing	64	2011
Ottawa	Joshua Norris	Trade	19	2017	Erik Karlsson
Philadelphia	Travis Konechny	Draft	24	2015
Pittsburgh	Sidney Crosby	Draft	1	2005
San Jose	Mikael Granlund	Draft	9	2010
Seattle	Chandler Stephenson	Trade	77	2012	5th Round Pick
St. Louis	Robert Thomas	Draft	20	2017
Tampa Bay	Jake Guentzel	Trade	77	2013	3rd Round Pick
Toronto	Auston Matthews	Draft	1	2016
Utah	Clayton Keller	Draft	7	2016
Vancouver	Elias Pettersson	Draft	5	2017
Las Vegas	Jack Eichel	Trade	2	2015	Tuch, Krebs, picks
Washington	Dylan Strome	UFA Signing	3	2015
Winnipeg	Mark Scheifele	Draft	7	2011

We can sort the data by how they were obtained and then which draft pick each one was, to get a better view of how the players are obtained. 20 of the 32 were obtained in the draft and 15 of those 20 were in the first 15 picks. Barzal just misses as the 16th pick, but Bruins fans will certainly scream that he should have been a top 15 pick. We also see three first line centers were signed as unrestricted free agents and the remaining nine were obtained via trade. As I noted in 2022, getting the most minutes doesn’t necessarily make a guy a “first line center”, but that’s the context of what we’re looking for here. How do teams get a true first line center for their team. I’ll let the reader look through the list and decide for themselves who is a “true 1C” and look how teams get them.

Team	Player	Obtained	Draft Position	Draft Year	Main Trade Piece
Chicago	Connor Bedard	Draft	1	2023
Colorado	Nathan MacKinnon	Draft	1	2013
Edmonton	Connor McDavid	Draft	1	2015
New Jersey	Jack Hughes	Draft	1	2019
Pittsburgh	Sidney Crosby	Draft	1	2005
Toronto	Auston Matthews	Draft	1	2016
Florida	Alexander Barkov	Draft	2	2013
Vancouver	Elias Pettersson	Draft	5	2017
Utah	Clayton Keller	Draft	7	2016
Winnipeg	Mark Scheifele	Draft	7	2011	Package of assets
Anaheim	Trevor Zegras	Draft	9	2019
San Jose	Mikael Granlund	Draft	9	2010
LA	Anze Kopitar	Draft	11	2005
Carolina	Seth Jarvis	Draft	13	2020
Detroit	Dylan Larkin	Draft	15	2014
NYI	Mat Barzal	Draft	16	2015
St. Louis	Robert Thomas	Draft	20	2017
Dallas	Wyatt Johnson	Draft	23	2021
Calgary	Mikael Backlund	Draft	24	2007
Philadelphia	Travis Konechny	Draft	24	2015
Las Vegas	Jack Eichel	Trade	2	2015	Tuch, Krebs, picks
Boston	Pavel Zacha	Trade	6	2015	Eric Haula
Nashville	Filip Forsberg	Trade	11	2012	Martin Erat, Michael Latta
Montreal	Nick Suzuki	Trade	13	2017	Max Pacioretty
Ottawa	Joshua Norris	Trade	19	2017	Erik Karlsson
Minnesota	Joel Eriksson Ek	Trade	20	2015
Buffalo	Tage Thompson	Trade	26	2016	Ryan O’Reilly
Seattle	Chandler Stephenson	Trade	77	2012	5th Round Pick
Tampa Bay	Jake Guentzel	Trade	77	2013	3rd Round Pick
Washington	Dylan Strome	UFA Signing	3	2015
Columbus	Sean Monahan	UFA Signing	6	2013
NYR	Vincent Trochek	UFA Signing	64	2011

(The following data was first published here in July 2022 and it out of date now. It’s being kept just for historical purposes and comparison to current data.)

Let’s look at each team’s guy, using the depth charts from CapFriendly.com. Feel free to disagree on who the 1C is on each team, but that’s the data I’m using.

Team	Player	Obtained	Draft Position	Draft Year	Main Trade Piece
Anaheim	Trevor Zegras	Draft	9	2019
Arizona	Barrett Hayton	Draft	5	2018
Boston	Patrice Bergeron	Draft	45	2003
Buffalo	Tage Thompson	Trade	26	2016	Ryan O’Reilly
Calgary	Elias Lindholm	Trade	5	2013	Dougie Hamilton
Carolina	Sebastian Aho	Draft	35	2015
Chicago	Jonathan Toews	Draft	3	2006
Colorado	Nathan MacKinnon	Draft	1	2013
Columbus	Jack Roslovic	Draft	25	2015
Dallas	Roope Hintz	Draft	49	2015
Detroit	Dylan Larkin	Draft	15	2014
Edmonton	Connor McDavid	Draft	1	2015
Florida	Alexander Barkov	Draft	2	2013
LA	Anze Kopitar	Draft	11	2005
Minnesota	Ryan Hartman	Trade	30	2013	Draft picks
Montreal	Nick Suzuki	Trade	13	2017	Max Pacioretty
Nashville	Mikael Granlund	Trade	9	2010	Kevin Fiala
New Jersey	Jack Hughes	Draft	1	2019
NYI	Brock Nelson	Draft	20	2010
NYR	Mika Zibanejad	Trade	6	2011	Derick Brassard
Ottawa	Joshua Norris	Trade	19	2017	Erik Karlsson
Philadelphia	Sean Couturier	Draft	8	2011
Pittsburgh	Sidney Crosby	Draft	1	2005
San Jose	Tomas Hertl	Draft	17	2012
Seattle	Matty Beniers	Draft	2	2021
St. Louis	Ryan O’Reilly	Trade	33	2009	Package of assets
Tampa Bay	Steven Stamkos	Draft	1	2008
Toronto	Auston Matthews	Draft	1	2016
Vancouver	JT Miller	Trade	15	2011	Draft picks
Las Vegas	Jack Eichel	Trade	2	2015	Tuch, Krebs, picks
Washington	Nicklas Backstrom	Draft	4	2006
Winnipeg	Mark Scheifele	Draft	7	2011

First, consider that these are just the first line center on each of the teams, then think about whether certain guys would be the 1C or even 2C on your own favorite team. Some might not.

So how do you get your first line center? It looks like for the most part, you draft him. 18 out of the 32 players are Top-10 picks and 22 out of 32 are from the top half of the draft. If you’re drafting in the bottom half, your choices become pretty slim.

10 of the players were obtained by trades, and most of those were for a big name going the other way (Karlsson, O’Reilly, Hamilton, Pacioretty).

Here’s the same table, sorted by the round the players were drafted. This view emphasizes the fact that teams generally get their top center from the first ten picks in the draft.

Team	Player	Obtained	Draft Position	Draft Year	Main Trade Piece
Colorado	Nathan MacKinnon	Draft	1	2013
Edmonton	Connor McDavid	Draft	1	2015
New Jersey	Jack Hughes	Draft	1	2019
Pittsburgh	Sidney Crosby	Draft	1	2005
Tampa Bay	Steven Stamkos	Draft	1	2008
Toronto	Auston Matthews	Draft	1	2016
Florida	Alexander Barkov	Draft	2	2013
Seattle	Matty Beniers	Draft	2	2021
Las Vegas	Jack Eichel	Trade	2	2015	Tuch, Krebs, picks
Chicago	Jonathan Toews	Draft	3	2006
Washington	Nicklas Backstrom	Draft	4	2006
Arizona	Barrett Hayton	Draft	5	2018
Calgary	Elias Lindholm	Trade	5	2013	Dougie Hamilton
NYR	Mika Zibanejad	Trade	6	2011	Derrik Brassard
Winnipeg	Mark Scheifele	Draft	7	2011
Philadelphia	Sean Couturier	Draft	8	2011
Anaheim	Trevor Zegras	Draft	9	2019
Nashville	Mikael Granlund	Trade	9	2010	Kevin Fiala
LA	Anze Kopitar	Draft	11	2005
Montreal	Nick Suzuki	Trade	13	2017	Max Pacioretty
Detroit	Dylan Larkin	Draft	15	2014
Vancouver	JT Miller	Trade	15	2011	Draft picks
San Jose	Tomas Hertl	Draft	17	2012
Ottawa	Joshua Norris	Trade	19	2017	Erik Karlsson
NYI	Brock Nelson	Draft	20	2010
Columbus	Jack Roslovic	Draft	25	2015
Buffalo	Tage Thompson	Trade	26	2016	Ryan O’Reilly
Minnesota	Ryan Hartman	Trade	30	2013	Draft picks
St. Louis	Ryan O’Reilly	Trade	33	2009	Package of assets
Carolina	Sebastian Aho	Draft	35	2015
Boston	Patrice Bergeron	Draft	45	2003
Dallas	Roope Hintz	Draft	49	2015

In the end, it looks like the best way to get a top center, is to miss the playoffs, endure a bad season and hope a guy is available at your spot and he develops.

Consistency of Success

The opinions of some Bruins fans are often what lead me to dig into data. For example, most Bruins fans hate the 2015 draft and claim Bruins GM Don Sweeney is terrible at drafting, so I looked into data to see if that’s true. But another claim is that the team doesn’t win enough. They’re not consistent enough and they need to do more. Yes, I’d love for the Bruins to win the Stanley Cup more often, but how do the Bruins results compare to other teams? Do other teams win more? Are they consistently better than the Bruins? That leads to a question for fans of any organization. Would you prefer that your team is consistently good or would you prefer a team is that cycles between great and terrible?

In my head, I believed that the Bruins “hold on” after highly successful years more than other organizations. In 2011, the Bruins played Vancouver for the Cup and Vancouver has not been consistently good since then. In 2013, the Bruins played Chicago for the Cup and Chicago has not been consistently good since then. Even after 2019, the Blues have not continued on as a juggernaut of a team. But let’s look at how all teams do after they go to the Stanley Cup Final, both the Cup winner and the team they beat, since 2000, and look at what they did after. “How they do” is defined by regular season point totals and what overall place they come in. Also note, 2004-05 was the lockout year, so no standings and no Cup awarded.

My full data sheet is here: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1yNsrjg6hmTHkGFEry9fDUMB7ep2kYTpGbAybhwnqpbE/edit?usp=sharing

I’ll pluck out a few to make graphs with and release the data from all the teams. Let’s look at the first team in my timeframe, the 2000 (and 2003) Stanley Cup champions, the New Jersey Devils.

They won the Cup twice and then kept pushing for another six years before eventually the bottom fell out and the rebuild became necessary, starting in 2011. Over the last 11 seasons, the Devils have struggled to do much.

How about a team who won the Cup, had to take some steps back, rebuild and is back at the top. The Colorado Avalanche:

The Avs won the Cup in 2001, then drifted downward in the standings, finishing 4th, 6th, 10th, 13th and eventually the bottom fell out and the rebuild happened to get them the Cup in 2022. I see some Bruins fans lamenting that the Bruins front office can’t be more like Colorado’s and in looking at the 2010 to 2020 years, that’s a lot of suffering for a fanbase, and suffering that I’m not sure those Bruins fans would tolerate.

Here’s a look at Tampa’s path as well. They won the Cup in 2004 and then went the rebuild route to get back to where they are today. Here’s a look at their annual finishes:

As Bruins fans know, the last time they won the Cup was 2011. We’ve seen that in at least two examples here, it’s typical for a team to win the Cup, be decent for years and five to seven years, then the bottom falls out. As it’s now been eleven years since the Bruins won the Cup, there’s been enough of a sample for them to follow that pattern. Here’s their graph:

The worst the Bruins did was to drop to 17 which was in 2015 and that was the cap jail the team got into via Chiarelli and the attempted Cup run with Iginla. Since then, it’s looked pretty good. But also notice what’s missing. A bottoming out that requires a rebuild.

One other team has been similar. The Pittsburgh Penguins also have not needed a rebuild, but that’s probably what happens when you get Crosby and Malkin in back to back drafts:

The Penguins have a similar line to the Bruins, their worst finish was also in 2015 when they finished 15th. There’s no big drop-off and no rebuild that was necessary. The Bruins and the Penguins are generally the outlier among teams.

Here is the average, high and low finish for each Cup winner since 2000. The longer ago the Cup win was, the more data there is, as the data starts the year after the team won the Cup between 2000 and 2021:

Cup Winner	Year	Average	High	Low
New Jersey	2000	15.76	3	29
Colorado	2001	14.50	1	30
Detroit	2002	13.21	1	31
New Jersey	2003	17.44	5	29
Tampa Bay	2004	14.06	1	30
Carolina	2006	17.25	3	26
Anaheim	2007	13.80	2	30
Detroit	2008	16.64	3	28
Pittsburgh	2009	6.69	2	15
Chicago	2010	13.50	1	27
Boston	2011	7.91	1	17
Los Angeles	2012	17.40	7	30
Chicago	2013	15.33	3	27
Los Angeles	2014	19.63	8	30
Chicago	2015	17.71	3	27
Pittsburgh	2016	7.50	2	12
Pittsburgh	2017	8.60	5	12
Washington	2018	7.25	4	13
St. Louis	2019	8.67	2	15
Tampa Bay	2020	7.50	7	8
Tampa Bay	2021	7.00	7	7

IN the case of New Jersey, we see a team who won, hung on for a few years and is still struggling with their rebuild. With Colorado, we see a team that won, did the rebuild and is back at the top. With the Bruins and the Penguins, we see two teams who haven’t bottomed out after winning the Cup and by looking at the chart, we can see that most teams do bottom out.

Cup Finalists

The data above only includes teams that have won the Cup since 2000. But what if we look at the same data for the teams who lost in the Cup Final. Some of these will also include Cup winning teams, but the main thing here is the same patterns emerge. Teams win, teams take some time to drop off, then the bottom falls out and the rebuild needs to begin.

Starting with the Cup finalist in 2000 and 2020, the Dallas Stars, here’s the path they’ve taken. Definitely some ups and downs in there.

Here is the Cup finalist in 2002 and a team that Bruins fans are all too aware that has finally made their resurgence, The Carolina Hurricanes. But it definitely was not quick, taking about 15 years to get to where they are now.

We’ve already seen how the Bruins have fared since 2011, so how has their opponent, the Vancouver Canucks done since then. Have they had as much continued success as the Bruins have?

It’s safe to say that no, Vancouver has not been nearly as competitive as the Bruins have since they met for the Cup in 2011.

Like with the Cup winners, here’s a table with each Cup finalist and their average finish after they went to the final, plus the highest and the lowest they’ve finished. The same patterns emerge, the same teams stand out.

Cup Finalist	Year	Average	High	Low
Dallas	2000	13.67	2	24
New Jersey	2001	16.40	4	29
Carolina	2002	17.53	3	30
Anaheim	2003	13.61	2	30
Calgary	2004	15.76	2	27
Edmonton	2006	21.88	8	30
Ottawa	2007	20.47	12	31
Pittsburgh	2008	6.79	2	15
Detroit	2009	18.46	6	31
Philadelphia	2010	15.67	4	29
Vancouver	2011	19.09	1	29
New Jersey	2012	24.10	14	29
Boston	2013	8.33	1	17
NY Rangers	2014	15.50	1	26
Tampa Bay	2015	7.57	1	18
San Jose	2016	17.50	6	29
Nashville	2017	11.40	1	19
Vegas	2018	10.75	2	17
Boston	2019	7.00	1	10
Dallas	2020	16.00	15	17
Montreal	2021	32.00	32	32

Most teams who have made it to the Cup final eventually really bottom out and end up at the very bottom of the standings. Even old friend Vancouver hit 29 one season, in 2017. But again, Pittsburgh has done well, never finishing below 15 and the Bruins never finishing below 17. Those two, along with Tampa Bay have enough of a sample size and still finish in single digits for average. While one number doesn’t tell a whole story, it does give an indication of the consistency of success for these organizations.

Just Take the Best Player: 2008 – 2011

If you have the first overall pick in the draft, it should be easy to choose the best player available, right? Same for the top five or so. In this mini-series, I look at how teams did in the first five picks of the draft and whether they took the best player available. This is the third post on the topic, as I have posts that include 2000 to 2003 and 2004 to 2007.

2008

In the first post, I explained that the best player available has only been drafted first overall in nine of the seventeen draft years I analyzed. Roughly half. If teams struggle to take the best player available with the first overall pick, it becomes a little more understandable if a team misses on a later pick. In this year’s draft, teams nailed the top two picks. The only previous year when that happened was 2004. Tampa Bay had the first overall pick and selected Steven Stamkos. The Kings had the number two pick and landed Drew Doughty. A pretty good start for this draft. With the third pick, the Thrashers took Zach Bogosian, but the third best player available was Erik Karlsson, who was taken 15th overall by Ottawa. The Blues had the fourth pick and got the fourth best player available, selecting Alex Pietrangelo. The Maple Leafs had the fifth pick and took Luke Schenn while the Capitals got the fifth best player available taking John Carlson with the 27th pick in the draft.

Pick	Player	Team	Pick	Player	Team
1	Steven Stamkos	Lightning	1	Steven Stamkos	Lightning
2	Drew Doughty	Kings	2	Drew Doughty	Kings
3	Zach Bogosian	Thrashers	15	Erik Karlsson	Senators
4	Alex Pietrangelo	Blues	4	Alex Pietrangelo	Blues
5	Luke Schenn	Maple Leafs	27	John Carlson	Capitals

2009

This makes back to back years that teams nailed the top two picks, taking the best player available. Even the subsequent picks weren’t too far off the mark, compared to other years. The Islanders had the top pick and took John Tavares and the Lightning had the second pick, selecting Victor Hedman. Both were the best player available for their draft spot. At three, the Avalanche took Matt Duchene but the third best player available was Oliver Ekman-Larsson, selected by the Coyotes at 6. Fourth was the Thrashers taking Evander Kane but the fourth best player available was the biggest jump into the top five, the Senators selecting Robin Lehner with the 46th pick. The fifth pick went to the Kings who took Brayden Schenn while Duchene has been the fifth best available.

Pick	Player	Team	Pick	Player	Team
1	John Tavares	Islanders	1	John Tavares	Islanders
2	Victor Hedman	Lightning	2	Victor Hedman	Lightning
3	Matt Duchene	Avalanche	6	Oliver Ekman-Larsson	Coyotes
4	Evander Kane	Thrashers	46	Robin Lehner	Senators
5	Brayden Schenn	Kings	5	Matt Duchene	Avalanche

2010

This draft had a little bit of both, teams hitting on their picks and a wild miss. This was the year of Taylor/Tyler as Edmonton took Taylor Hall with the top pick, but should have instead took Tyler Seguin, as he has been the best player available. The Bruins did snag Seguin with the second overall pick but the second best player available was taken 187th overall by the Hurricanes, Frederik Andersen. The Panthers had the third pick and took Erik Gudbranson while Taylor Hall has been the third best available. At four, the Blue Jackets took Ryan Johansen but the fourth best available was Vladimir Tarasenko, selected 16th by the Blues. The fifth pick went to the Islanders who took Nino Niderreiter but the fifth best player available was Jeff Skinner, taken 7th by the Hurricanes.

Pick	Player	Team	Pick	Player	Team
1	Taylor Hall	Oilers	2	Tyler Seguin	Bruins
2	Tyler Seguin	Bruins	187	Frederik Andersen	Hurricanes
3	Erik Gudbranson	Panthers	1	Taylor Hall	Oilers
4	Ryan Johansen	Blue Jackets	16	Vladimir Tarasenko	Blues
5	Nino Niederreiter	Islanders	7	Jeff Skinner	Hurricanes

2011

This draft saw one of the biggest jumps into the top spot for the best player available. The Oilers had the first overall pick and took Ryan Nugent-Hopkins while the Lightning got the best player at 58, Nikita Kucherov. The Avalanche used the second pick on Gabriel Landeskog but the Bruins got the second best player available in Dougie Hamilton with the 9th pick. The Panthers took Jonathan Huberdeau at three and the Ducks got the third best available with the 39th pick, John Gibson. At four, the Devils took Adam Larsson while the fourth best player available was Landeskog. One thing to note is the margin of difference in the top picks for this draft is very small and point shares updates every game. Any of these players can easily move up or down a couple slots. At five, the Islanders took Ryan Strome but the fifth best player available was Mark Scheifele, selected 7th overall by Winnipeg.

Pick	Player	Team	Pick	Player	Team
1	Ryan Nugent-Hopkins	Oilers	58	Nikita Kucherov	Lightning
2	Gabriel Landeskog	Avalanche	9	Dougie Hamilton	Bruins
3	Jonathan Huberdeau	Panthers	39	John Gibson	Ducks
4	Adam Larsson	Devils	2	Gabriel Landeskog	Avalanche
5	Ryan Strome	Islanders	7	Mark Scheifele	Jets

And the 2012 to 2016 draft updates are soon to come!

Just Take the Best Player: 2004 – 2007

How easy is it to draft the best player available? Should be pretty easy, but let’s see how successful teams have been. The first post about this covers 2000 to 2003, so let’s keep going with it.

2004

This draft seems to be a bit of a rarity as the teams nailed it on the first two picks but after that, a huge failure by every team, many times. With the first overall pick, the Washington Capitals selected the best player available, Alex Ovechkin. With the number two selection in this draft, the Penguins selected fellow Russian Evgeni Malkin. Great, so far the teams are two for two in nailing the best player available. But Chicago had the third pick and went with Cam Barker. Using Point Shares, the difference between Barker and Malkin is more than 108 points. Huge. Who was the third best player available? That would be the player who was chosen 258th, by the Nashville Predators, Pekka Rinne. With the fourth selection in the draft, the Carolina Hurricanes took Andrew Ladd, but the fourth best player was Devan Dubnyk, taken 14th overall by Edmonton. And to fill out our top five, the Phoenix Coyotes actually did take the fifth best player available, Blake Wheeler.

Pick	Player	Team	Pick	Player	Team
1	Alex Ovechkin	Capitals	1	Alex Ovechkin	Capitals
2	Evgeni Malkin	Penguins	2	Evgeni Malkin	Penguins
3	Cam Barker	Blackhawks	258	Pekka Rinne	Predators
4	Andrew Ladd	Hurricanes	14	Devan Dubnyk	Oilers
5	Blake Wheeler	Coyotes	5	Blake Wheeler	Coyotes

2005

Just like in 2004, the best player available was selected first overall. After that pick, teams weren’t terrible but also didn’t exactly nail it either. The first overall pick went to the Pittsburgh Penguins and they took Sidney Crosby. Crosby has about a 100 point lead in Point Shares over the actual second selection in the draft. The Ducks took Bobby Ryan second overall. The second best player overall was taken fifth, by the Montreal Canadiens, Carey Price. The third pick went to the Hurricanes and they took Jack Johnson. Imagine if the Hurricanes had instead taken the third best player available, Anze Kopitar. Kopitar was actually taken 11th overall by the Kings. The fourth pick in the draft went to the Minnesota Wild and they took Benoit Pouliot instead of a goalie, the fourth best player selected, Jonathan Quick. Quick was taken 72nd overall by the Kings. So yes, the Kings got the 3rd and 4th best players in the draft with the 11th and 72nd picks. And as noted earlier, the fifth pick in the draft was Montreal taking Carey Price. Some segments of the Bruins fan population might not like to hear who was the fifth best player available, goalie Tuukka Rask, selected 21st overall by Toronto and later traded to Boston for Andrew Raycroft.

Pick	Player	Team	Pick	Player	Team
1	Sidney Crosby	Penguins	1	Sidney Crosby	Penguins
2	Bobby Ryan	Ducks	5	Carey Price	Canadiens
3	Jack Johnson	Hurricanes	11	Anze Kopitar	Kings
4	Benoit Pouliot	Wild	72	Jonathan Quick	Kings
5	Carey Price	Canadiens	21	Tuukka Rask	Maple Leafs

2006

In this draft, two top five best available were taken in the top five, but it wasn’t the top two picks. The Blues had the first overall pick and chose Erik Johnson. The Capitals were the fortunate ones, getting the best player available with the fourth overall pick, Nicklas Backstrom. The Penguins chose next and after hitting a home run the previous year with Crosby, took Jordan Staal. The Capitals got the second best player available in Semyon Varlamov with the 23rd overall pick. In spite of getting the top two best players in the draft, Varlamov wasn’t a part of the Caps’ Cup win. The Blackhawks chose third and took their current captain, Jonathan Toews. Toews has only been the fifth best player in that draft. The best available to the Blackhawks was Phil Kessel, taken fifth by the Bruins. Backstrom was next, taken 4th by the Caps, but the fourth overall best player in the draft was taken 71st, by the Bruins, Brad Marchand. Fifth overall was Kessel and fifth best was Toews.

Pick	Player	Team	Pick	Player	Team
1	Erik Johnson	Blues	4	Nicklas Backstrom	Capitals
2	Jordan Staal	Penguins	23	Semyon Varlamov	Capitals
3	Jonathan Toews	Blackhawks	5	Phil Kessel	Bruins
4	Nicklas Backstrom	Capitals	71	Brad Marchand	Bruins
5	Phil Kessel	Bruins	3	Jonathan Toews	Blackhawks

2007

In this draft, the first overall pick did nab the best overall player and then the rest of the top five is a bit of a mess. First overall was the Chicago Blackhawks and they did get the best available in Patrick Kane. Second was the Flyers who selected James van Riemsdyk. Definitely not a bad player but Jamie Benn has a higher PS score and was taken by Dallas with the 129th overall pick. Third was the Coyotes taking Kyle Turris instead of the third best player available, PK Subban, taken 43rd by the Canadiens. Next was the Kings, taking Thomas Hickey but the Canadiens did get the fourth best player available when they took Max Pacioretty at 22. Finishing out the top five was the Capitals taking Karl Alzner instead of the best available at this slot, Jakub Voracek, taken by the Blue Jackets with the 7th pick in the draft.

Pick	Player	Team	Pick	Player	Team
1	Patrick Kane	Blackhawks	1	Patrick Kane	Blackhawks
2	James van Riemsdyk	Flyers	129	Jamie Benn	Stars
3	Kyle Turris	Coyotes	43	PK Subban	Canadiens
4	Thomas Hickey	Kings	22	Max Pacioretty	Canadiens
5	Karl Alzner	Capitals	7	Jakub Voracek	Blue Jackets

More coming soon!

NHL Draft Analysis

Using Data to Analyze NHL Drafts