Edmonton Oilers 2007 HRDR - By Round

Edmonton Oilers

2007 Version

Historical Review of Draft Results

Results by Round when Player was Drafted

Please reserve comment for a future post wherein I will request commentary on the review as a whole.


Two factors are important when evaluating a teams drafting history in terms of the Draft Round in which the draftee was picked. Those factors are: 1) the quality of player and 2) which round they were drafted in. Players drafted in the 1st round should become 'stars' while players drafted in the 9th round are true longshots.

i.e. a 'star' player drafted in the 5th round is worth more than if that same 'star' player was drafted in the 1st round.

This also affects the negative scores of unranked players drafted early; let's face it - screwing up a 2nd round pick, on which the organization has spent considerable scouting resources, is worse than screwing up a 12th round throw-away pick.

Ex: An additional modifier of -60 was added to all unranked players (total is -90 in the 1st round) and then added back at 10/round until the total modifier was +/- 0 (the 10th round).

The modifiers allowed for the actual results of each draft round to be measured against the reasonable expectation of each round. Thus, drafting Kelly Buchberger in the 9th round, and getting a solid NHL'er out of a draft pick so late, results in the 9th round being a positive grade for the organization. The following table assigns a grade to each draft round:


The 2nd and 3rd rounds remain a damning indictment of the teams draft policies and scouts.

Pre-2003, of the 63 picks made from those rounds, only 14 serviceable players made the NHL and well over half of those are from the 'journeyman' category. Of the 4 players rated 'solid' or better, one was drafted in 1979 (Messier) and another (Maltby) was a longevity upgrade. That is not acceptable for draft rounds that are so important to an organization.

One could surmise that the team would have been further ahead if they had traded away every 2nd round pick the organization has ever had (and every 3rd round pick after Messier). No other draft round even comes close to the disaster that the 2nd and 3rd rounds are. From 2003 onward it does appear that the results are getting better and hopefully Chorney and/or Petry can make the grade.

Question: Why so down on the 2nd and 3rd rounds? That 5th round score is pretty bad too. Answer: Because draft picks made in the 5th round aren't supposed to mean anything.

I almost mean that too. Sure, you want that 5th round pick to turn out. You want EVERY pick to turn into a bonafide player. However, I am sure that teams are delighted when a pick after the 4th round makes their AHL roster. By comparison, 2nd and 3rd round picks SHOULD come close to making the NHL.

The way teams work through their draft lists a high 2nd round pick is, probably, still in the top-20 on that teams list. Think about that for a second. The team didn't screw up by picking that prospect with the #42 draft pick... they screwed up by having that prospect listed as their #18 (for example).

Question: Should the Oilers be stocking up on 4th round picks? Answer: I guess so.

The 4th round has been a bonanza for the Oilers. While the 2 'Hall of Fame' player grades combine with the low number of picks overall (24 picks made pre-2003) to help inflate the grading score, the simple fact is that the team has drafted well out of that spot. If I knew more I would tell you.

Question: I'll ask again - is there any hope? Answer: Yeah.

Remember, the Prospect section (above) covers the last 4-5 years (2003 - 2007). If you look you will notice that there are a lot of promising 1st and 2nd round prospects coming out of those years. Prendergast's scouting team may have, and I say that cautiously, may have turned it around.

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Edmonton Oilers 2007 HRDR - Introduction
Edmonton Oilers 2007 HRDR - Draft Results Summation

Edmonton Oilers 2007 HRDR - Yrs 1979 to 1983
Edmonton Oilers 2007 HRDR - Yrs 1984 to 1988
Edmonton Oilers 2007 HRDR - Yrs 1989 to 1993
Edmonton Oilers 2007 HRDR - Yrs 1994 to 1998
Edmonton Oilers 2007 HRDR - Yrs 1999 to 2003
Edmonton Oilers 2007 HRDR - Yrs 2004 to 2007

Edmonton Oilers 2007 HRDR - Draft Results By Year
Edmonton Oilers 2007 HRDR - Draft Results By Pick
Edmonton Oilers 2007 HRDR - Draft Results By Round
Edmonton Oilers 2007 HRDR - Draft Results By Age
Edmonton Oilers 2007 HRDR - Draft Results By Position
Edmonton Oilers 2007 HRDR - Draft Results By League
Edmonton Oilers 2007 HRDR - Draft Results By Country of Birth

Edmonton Oilers 2007 HRDR - Player Grading System
Edmonton Oilers 2007 HRDR - Graded Players Summary
Edmonton Oilers 2007 HRDR - Data Set Changes

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Have a great evening everyone.

Edmonton Oilers 2007 HRDR - By Age

Edmonton Oilers

2007 Version

Historical Review of Draft Results

Results by Age of Player when Drafted

Please reserve comment for a future post wherein I will request commentary on the review as a whole.


At issue here is the ability to isolate 'age' as a factor in evaluating the ability of an organization to draft players. To do that it is important to: 1) modify the player-grade scores such that a single 'Hall of Fame' player does not skew the results of a single age category entirely, and 2) modify the calculation to recognize that projecting the capability of an 18 year old player is harder than projecting the capability of a 22 year old player.

There is no issue with the fact that trying to gauge the long-term ability of an 18 year old kid is a difficult task. A 30 year old man, however, should be more of a known quantity and a player like that should only be drafted if the team has a reasonable assurance that the player in question can fill the role required. After all, anyone over the age of 24 that gets drafted by an NHL team is already playing pro-level hockey.

I will not go into detail on the math. Suffice to say that first the player-grade scores were flattened out and then, as a second step, a modifier was put in that added to the global score for each category of players younger than 23 and subtracted from the global score for each category of players older than 23. The modifier increases the further away from 23 you go. The grades are organized and summarized below:


Please note the percentile score in the second column on the left side of the main chart. It is derived from the sum of all players who have a player-grade D or higher AND all prospects that are ranked (star / solid / borderline).

i.e there are (1 + 2 + 3 + 9 + 3 =) 18 ranked players and (2 + 3 + 8 =) 15 ranked prospects in the 18 yr. old age category. 33 / 142 = ~ 22%.

The analysis and summary by age category remains interesting. Note where the 18 year old category has a low grade score in contrast to its decent percentile score. Two factors at work here: 1) the quality has been less than optimal - of the ones who made the show, most were journeyman players at best and 2) there are 8 borderline prospects included in the percentile scoring - take them out and the score drops to 16%.

To be fair we can't really know what all of this means; without a context (how do the other teams rate?) we are left without conclusions.

Question: Does one year (from 18 to 19) make THAT big a difference? Answer: Probably.

The 19 year olds outclass the 18 year olds both in terms of career quality (the grading score) and in success rate (the percentile score). As mentioned, with out a larger data set it is hard to suss this out in definitive manner but right now the 19's are more than holding their own.

Question: So what is the deal with the 20 year bracket? Why so much better? Answer: You kidding me?

Drafting an awesome 20 yr old prospect IS better than drafting an awesome 18 yr old. Those three years of physical, mental and emotional growth are defining to a career imo. The problem is getting the chance to draft that 20 yr old. Odds are good that your typical 'awesome' 20 yr old prospect was drafted at the age of 18.

It would be interesting to figure out how many of those 20 year olds were drafted early and how many of them played college hockey. That would be a different study though - feel free.

Question: How has the team done when drafting overagers? Answer: Meh.

Semenov, Pouzar, Markannen. Personally I think the success rate should be higher (the known quantity thing) but, on the other hand, they haven't drafted that many (29 older than 20 / 18 older than 23) and most of those were later round picks so it isn't like it hurts much

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Edmonton Oilers 2007 HRDR - Introduction
Edmonton Oilers 2007 HRDR - Draft Results Summation

Edmonton Oilers 2007 HRDR - Yrs 1979 to 1983
Edmonton Oilers 2007 HRDR - Yrs 1984 to 1988
Edmonton Oilers 2007 HRDR - Yrs 1989 to 1993
Edmonton Oilers 2007 HRDR - Yrs 1994 to 1998
Edmonton Oilers 2007 HRDR - Yrs 1999 to 2003
Edmonton Oilers 2007 HRDR - Yrs 2004 to 2007

Edmonton Oilers 2007 HRDR - Draft Results By Year
Edmonton Oilers 2007 HRDR - Draft Results By Pick
Edmonton Oilers 2007 HRDR - Draft Results By Round
Edmonton Oilers 2007 HRDR - Draft Results By Age
Edmonton Oilers 2007 HRDR - Draft Results By Position
Edmonton Oilers 2007 HRDR - Draft Results By League
Edmonton Oilers 2007 HRDR - Draft Results By Country of Birth

Edmonton Oilers 2007 HRDR - Player Grading System
Edmonton Oilers 2007 HRDR - Graded Players Summary
Edmonton Oilers 2007 HRDR - Data Set Changes

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Have a great evening everyone.