I know this has been commented on at S7S's before, but I looked at Ottawa's draft history again today and was amazed at how terrible the drafting was when John Muckler was GM (2002-2007).

It made me wonder - how did we ever have a team strong enough to make the finals and what will it take to get there again?

In 8 drafts and 47 picks, Muckler picked up these NHL regulars:

2002: None

2003: Patrick Eaves (1st #29), Brian Elliott (9th #291)

2004: Andrej Meszaros (1st #23), Peter Regin (3rd #87)

2005: Brian Lee (1st #9), Cody Bass (4th #95 assuming 34 NHL GP counts!) , Colin Greening (7th #204)

2006: Nick Foligno (1st #28), Kaspars Daugavins (3rd #91 hey he's got 43 GP), Erik Condra (7th #211)

2007: None

I guess there's room for the 2007 draft return (all 4 of them!) to improve, but it's fair to say Muckler had no clue at the draft. Basically the guy could have done as good or better by taking a highlighter and copies of the IIS and NCS scouting reports to the bathroom with him on the morning of the draft.

Meanwhile, Brian Murray restocked the prospect cupboards in fewer (4) drafts, cleaned house by way of fire-sale last season, moving most of the NHL "talent" out, and now has a mostly rookie team in the running to make the playoffs. Pretty impressive I would say now (with the benefit of hindsight), even though I was one of the many last season who questioned whether he had run his course in Ottawa.

So if BMurray is truly overachieving here, what's a reasonable timeframe for Ottawa to be back in the position where it was in 06-07 when the Sens made it to the Stanley Cup Finals? I've got a few thoughts based on a superficial analysis of the origins of that 06-07 team, but I'll leave those out and the question hanging so as not to colo(u)r the discussion. I'm sure there are a lot of thoughts out there!