We know Muckler couldn't draft, so now what?

by Joebo on Jan 24, 2012 4:20 PM EST

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!

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But it's interesting how Greening, Condra, and Foligno have all played top-six roles this year, right?

The answer to your question is that Muckler inherited the core of a Cup contender and added the final piece with Heatley. He also didn’t draft terribly, as just about everyone on that list except for Eaves and Bass has proven to be a legit NHL player. I suppose the best criticism we can lay on him is that his early round picks do not produce at a level justifying their selections.

As for the future, building a Cup contender isn’t an exact science. If it were, everyone would know how to do it. Murray’s drafted a lot of potential for the future, but that’s no guarantee it will pan out. I think we’re two top-six forwards and two top defensemen away from being a true Cup contender, personally. Alfie, Kuba (YES, REALLY) and Gonchar are going to be pretty serious shoes to fill.

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by Mark Parisi on Jan 24, 2012 4:42 PM EST reply actions

How can you say Eaves isn’t a regular NHL player? He’s been with the Wings for the last 3 years playing pretty regularly. He’s only played 10 this year, but he also has a broken jaw and is on IR.

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by modsuperstar on Jan 25, 2012 1:21 PM EST up reply actions

I didn't realize that

I don’t follow the Wings very closely, so I was only going on memory and his waiver claim status.

Mea culpa.

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by Mark Parisi on Jan 25, 2012 1:56 PM EST up reply actions

I was kinda surprised with him sticking with the Wings, but I think he was willing to sign for cheap and play for a winner. I’m surprised more 3rd and 4th line guys don’t take that tact.

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by modsuperstar on Jan 25, 2012 5:13 PM EST up reply actions

If you're a third or fourth line guy, don't you take any contract?

I can’t think of any regular fourth liners that have offers lined up for them on the open market.

Third line guys seem to have to find their niche – e.g. Eaves was thought to have top-6 potential in ottawa and was shipped out when he didn’t fit. So I’d guess if you’re one of those guys, you stick somewhere when they like you to ensure you have continued employment.

by Joebo on Feb 3, 2012 4:46 PM EST up reply actions

Greening and Condra are topsix

by default; great, young, improving and useful players, don’t get me wrong, but Condra is better suited to play with Z. Smith on the 3rd line and Greening may evolve into a power scoring line forward, but on a Stanley Cup contender may be on the 3rd or 4th line at this stage.

Foligno, though, has slowly but surely turned the corner, and with a little more consistency, is a fine addition to our second line.

Condra and Greening helped Muckler’s yield, And Meszaros and Foligno ended up being great value picks, but the Brian Lee and Eaves picks (considering who went afterwards in deep drafts), the trading away of picks/prospects for Tyler Arnason/Bondra/etc, meant that Muckler did a good job of building a team to win in the then-present, but emptied and ignored the cupboard.

The net of 1 legit top 6 forward, one legit top 4 D, and likely bottom 6 guys Eaves, Greening Daugavins and Condra over those years, not a good yield.

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by PekKarlsson on Jan 25, 2012 8:57 PM EST up reply actions

A legit top 6 guy?

If Foligno doesn’t keep it up or even pick it up I don’t think we can say he is a legit top 6 guy.

Perhaps my standards are too high but IF he can get to 50 points this year it would be a huge jump in his production…and we lamented Fisher and his 50ish points each year, hoping he would become a legit 2nd line center.

Mucklers history at the draft is dubious at best – he didn’t do much of anything to help get the Sens over the hump or ensure long terrm success.

by OD99 on Jan 30, 2012 12:20 PM EST up reply actions

I agree Foligno isn't top 6

For a cup winner, you want guys that give a solid 40-50 pts on the 2nd line and show up nightly – not a guy that struggles at times and leaves you wondering if he’ll produce points.

Don’t get me wrong, I think Foligno is a great guy to have on our 3rd line and fills in with spot duty on the top 6th just fine. I think he’s an awesome 3rd liner – tough to play against and dangerous offensively. Too bad he didn’t light it up with Kelly before we shipped him out. In the end I don’t think the Sens would have turned the corner without shipping Kelly out though, so it had to happen.

by Joebo on Feb 3, 2012 5:03 PM EST up reply actions

I guess I should have summarized before and after Muckler as well

Sure he produced about 2 NHL “regulars” per draft, but performance of his predeccessor:

Marshall Johnson (99-02):

1999: Martin Havlat (1st #26), Chris Kelly (3rd #94), Martin Prusek (6th #164), Alexandre Giroux (7th #213 – not sure if this the A. Giroux D who actually played in the NHL or the other one F)

2000: Anton Volchenkov (1st #21), Antoine Vermette (2nd #55)

2001: Jason Spezza (1st #2), Tim Gleason (1st #23), Ray Emery (4th #99), Christoph Schubert (4th #127), Brooks Laich (6th #193), Brandon Bochenski (7th #223)

This looks a hell of a lot better than Muckler. Of course we know Brian Murray’s record is pretty good.

I guess the question I was trying to figure out was whether drafting is going to get us back into the finals faster this time, since it took muckler 5 years to get there with an awesome team (but doing himself no favors at the draft).

by Joebo on Feb 3, 2012 4:57 PM EST up reply actions

Lots of "potential"

This team has alot of potential, and so do alot of other players on other teams. The draft is part of the process, and the team’s ability to develop the players it has drafted is the other part.

Not everyone will pan out, and some will take more time to pan out. Although we are miles ahead of where we were last year, we are not nearly there yet.

Offensively it looks like we are doing an incredible job drafting and developing. We are scoring enough goals to win games and we have several top six potential players knocking at the door or busting the door down. This is the really exciting part of our development.

Defensively, we are developing slowly, and we are currently mediocre, and Bingo is terrible, so there is a Hell of alot of of work to do in that area. The offensive risk-taking is not tempered by enough good defensive play, and traditionally all out offence doesn’t work very well come playoff time.

Do we really have the proper mix of dmen to play this kind of a high risk system. Good teams can switch to shutdown mode… we don’t show much ability to do that. In the playoffs, teams that can’t play shutdown mode end up being the first round exits.

With Karlsson on the ice so much the team is as good defensively as he is. He is improving in leaps and bounds defensively, and when he has a even a mediocre night defensively, we generally lose.

We also need alot more depth in the nets. One goalie and one prospect does not make for depth in nets. There are no guarantees with Lehner and we should have other strong options. Trying to fill that need with undrafted goalies has not produced much.

If we make the playofffs, the first round pick somewhere in the 20’s or thereabouts will not help us this year.

IMO, some of our offensive prospects will have to be packaged to fill in what we are missing. This is risky business, and I hope we come out of that better than we go in. I’d love to see us with another stud shutdown physical defenceman going into the playoffs or at worst next season. These kinds of guys are hard to find, and generally need to be drafted… but who knows? Sometimes the development trail of defencemen can be painfully slow.

Turris, so far looks like a real find, and there are no guarantees that he won’t be asking for big time money like he was in Phoenix. The cap space will get filled in in a hurry.

Z’jad appears to be way more defensive-minded than his high draft status warrants… and he has the potential… again that word that carries no guarantees. He may still need a year in Bingo. Butler may be playing his way out of town.

All in all, I am optimistic that enough of the prospects will pan out to make us a team to be reconned with.

by Marvellous on Jan 25, 2012 9:08 AM EST reply actions

Turris

I think that Turris asked for that money to force a trade. I would also imagine that he felt forced to do this, because his development wasn’t progressing and he wanted to do something before it was too late. I do not know of the training facilities for the Coyotes, but if this is the case i do not hold it against him. + he is playing very well for us.

Sidebar: Strickly looking at potential, i love our future Spezza-Turris-Zbad center depth, and to think last year they traded Fisher(2) and Kelly(3).

by Bikini Cowboy on Jan 26, 2012 8:53 AM EST up reply actions

Spezza, Turris, Zbad, Zmith, Foligno

Those guys are all natural centres. And Winchester too IIRC. And Konopka if he gets resigned.

by The Tif on Jan 26, 2012 5:11 PM EST up reply actions

Senators 2002 Draft

1 16 Jakub Klepis Czech Republic Portland Winter Hawks (WHL)
2 47 Alexei Kaigorodov Russia Metallurg Magnitogorsk (Russia)
3 75 Arttu Luttinen Finland HIFK (Helsinki) (Finland)
4 113 Scott Dobben Canada Erie Otters (OHL)
4 125 Johan Bjork Sweden Malmö Redhawks (Sweden)
5 150 Brock Hooton Canada Quesnel Millionaires (BCHL)
8 246 Josef Vavra Czech Republic Vsetin HC (Czech.)
9 276 Vitaly Atyushov Russia Molot-Prikamye Perm (Russia)

….Arguably the worst single draft result of any team in the history of the league.

Just saying…

by 80 on Jan 28, 2012 1:28 PM EST reply actions

Oui...

and i think that not one of these players played for the Sens, ever.

by Bikini Cowboy on Jan 31, 2012 2:14 PM EST up reply actions

Skimming over the names, there aren't many I recognize from that year

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2002_NHL_Entry_Draft

Seems like a fairly lean year.

by The Tif on Jan 31, 2012 3:10 PM EST up reply actions

Addition

http://www.hockeysfuture.com/articles/9713/leaguewide2002_draft_evaluation/

From this, things look pretty lean. The numbers are super skewed by that one guy who plays a lot, so use caution when reading. Otherwise, that looks like a pretty lean draft year to me.

by The Tif on Jan 31, 2012 3:12 PM EST up reply actions

Bon... d'accord.

Okay, two thought looking at your link.

First: Quirky, Mike McKenna and Curtis McElhinney were both drafted in 2006 during round 6. 172 & 176.

Second: Holy crap! THE LAST PLAYER SELECTED: Jonathan Ericsson for (you guessed it) Detroit is now a NHL regular being paid 9.75 millions for 3 years. 290 players were selected before him in one of the worst draft in history (exagération). Played in the Stanley Cup finals and scored the only goal in a 1-2 game 7 loss to Pittsburgh. The Senators selected 8 guys before him and he’s Swedish. SAINTE MARDE !!!

by Bikini Cowboy on Feb 1, 2012 8:53 AM EST up reply actions

“how did we ever have a team strong enough to make the finals and what will it take to get there again?”

There’s a relationship here: Part of the reason we were a strong team at the time was trading away draft picks—picks which would otherwise have increased Muckler’s odds of drafting regular NHLers.

As for your second question…