CrashingTheGoalie

by Ron Spence

A couple of days ago, Scott Cullen  wrote a piece: NUMBERS GAME: FIRST ROUND VALUE.

He was listing the best and worst 3 players at every draft number over the past 30 years.

Some Canucks were named at the top of their pick: Mattias Ohlund at number 13, Ryan Kessler at 23, and Cam Neely at number 9 – soon traded away.

Vancouver has never had a number one pick, three number 2’s (Trevor Linden. Daniel Sedin, and Petr Nedved), and a number 3 (Henrik Sedin). 

For many years, Vancouver was an almost respectable team – not poor enough to get great picks, not good enough to go very far in the playoffs – if they even made it into the playoffs.

Thus, Vancouver’s crappy picks are clustered around the 7 to 10 level.

Now, it should be noted that Vancouver’s scouting was so poor, that they often drafted according to Central Scouting’s rankings.

A case in point is Brad Ference who was ranked  at around 10th overall – if you include the European prospects – and was selected at 10th (I didn’t include goalie rankings as Roberto was the only decent goalie drafted that June.) in 1997.

THE TOP PROSPECTS AS RANKED BY THE NHL’S CENTRAL SCOUTING SERVICE

courtesy of lcshockey.com

The Canucks had heeded the Central Scouting ranking, and still the player that they selected never became an established NHLer.

Fortunately, he was a bust in Florida and afterwards, as he was traded – along with Pavel Bure – for Jovo and others – the key player being Dave Gagner, according to Brian Burke.

It’s also worth noting that most teams followed Central Scouting as well, with the exception of L.A. who took Matt Zultek:

courtesy of hockeydb.com

In the case of Ference, he was a somewhat tough Dman, and Vancouver wanted extra muscle.

My favourite ‘nucks moment – with Ference – was when he went after Mark Messier during training camp. Many believe that’s the reason that he was traded.

Vancouver’s other poor picks were selected in their relative ranking position. Dan Woodley was ranked 6 to 8th by different scouting organizations.

A personal anecdote about Woodley. He came from Victoria – as I did – and my former son-in-law knew him well. One day he arrived home from the beach and told me that Woodley was down their quaffing the cervezas and had gained 10 or 15 pounds, and was thinking about getting into shape. This was in early August.

Also, after Woodley was traded to Montreal, the Habs found that the kid had flat feet. 

Alex Stojanov was ranked higher – 15th – than he should have been for a non-tangible reason. He had had an epic battle with the huge – in those days – Eric Lindros. Based on this, his Major Junior reputation was established and he was referred to as the next Bob Probert. 

“He’s a hockey player who can fight,” said one scout, “not a fighter who plays a little hockey.”

What made it worse, was Stojanov was ranked too high at 15th, and the Canucks picked him even higher at 7th overall.

What was good – in the end – was that Pittsburgh got tired of Markus Naslund and wanted the future Bob Probert.

Jason Herter was picked 8th overall in 1989, and this was a predictable pick at the time.

Every training camp – for a number of years – the media and fans were waiting to see Herter and he literally showed up too late.

I remember talking to Pat Quinn, and he said that Herter had spent too long in college hockey and should have gone to the AHL sooner. 

Herter admits that he wasn’t hungry: 

“It’s hard to explain. I never had to be coached. I was that talented guy, and it was my blessing and my downfall. I just took everything for granted. And when I had to fight for a spot, I didn’t know how to react.

Rob Woodward was selected behind Herter at 29th – and was actually a 2nd round pick in those days. He’s also on Cullen’s list.

Ironically, the Canucks drafted another player – the only Canuck to ever win the Calder Trophy – Pavel Bure at 113th in the 6th round – in 1989.

I personally think that Vancouver’s worse pick was Libor Polasek, who was selected 21st overall:

courtesy of hockeydb.com

Vancouver wanted a big centre, and one scout had seen Polasek play for part of one game in a European tournament. I remember seeing him when Polasek arrived at training camp and he reminded me of a Bulgarian hit man. 

Ironically, Vancouver’s scouting staff did okay with the rest of their picks. They saw Mike Peca as the future Bobby Clarke, and also drafted Adrian Aucion in the 5th round, 117th overall. 

*****

I like good scouting stories – like how they discovered Alex Edler.

It’s almost parallel to the scouting of Brian Leetch.

Rangers’s scout Ray Clearwater used a mechanic whose son played high school hockey.

One day, the mechanic started raving about this freshman from Cheshire named Brian Leetch.

“Even from that first time I ever saw him play, he had total control of the game,” Clearwater remembers. “Back then, you would watch Connecticut high school hockey and it was just a bunch of kids scrambling for the puck. But when Brian Leetch stepped on the ice, it was a different hockey game. All of a sudden everybody on Cheshire’s team looked like a million dollars.”

New York drafted Leetch at 15th, after Vancouver had acquired Woodley at 10th. 

And then, Brian Leetch went on to beat Trevor Linden for the Calder Trophy (1988-89), and was awarded the Conn Smythe Trophy as the Rangers beat the Canucks for the 1994 Stanley Cup.

All because of a mechanic from Hoboken – or someplace nearby.