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:
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
