OT: Should We Fire Gordie Clark

[ColonialsHockey10]

If this were true, we would be able to sign an overwhelming majority of UDFA/grads. Which we do not. We lose out all the time. And how do you know this to be true? Did you poll a bunch of guys about to hit free agency after graduating? Or did someone appoint you the spokesperson for this class of players?

MAJOR, sweepstakes guys we've landed in the past fifteen years? Who--Gilroy, Hayes? How many have signed elsewhere? Do I need to prepare a list of guys we were linked to that didn't sign here?

You're presenting an opinion without any facts to support it. Which is fine. But let's acknowledge that it is an opinion.

Why are you mentioning guys like Erixon and Fox? We're not talking about trade acquisitions. At least, I wasn't and I'm not.

You talk about Zuccarello and Vesey, and the fact that there were many teams after them, as if there's somehow no scouting involved. Really? Just like first round draft picks, these guys can fail. You still have to do your due diligence and scout them. We're not in on every player that is coveted by a lot of other teams, and it's for a reason. Just because a guy is a big name, doesn't mean he'll be good, and your amateur scouts have to make that determination. I mean I'm using Vesey as a success story, whereas a lot of people here think he's a huge failure and the worst guy they ever seen. What does that tell you? Everything is relative and you still have to scout these guys. Being a Hobey Baker finalist means nothing. Having ten other teams in on a guy means nothing.

And why credit our GM, then? Because it's all about NYC and the Original Six, right? And our offers that are better than the rest. So no one deserves the credit.

Yes, you did post a bunch of numbers earlier. I have my own issues with those numbers, but I literally said nothing about our drafting. I did not come in here to defend our draft record. I literally quoted ONE thing in ONE post which was that we generally do a good job with UDFA signings. And--hilariously!--I didn't even say it in defense of Gordie Clark. I merely pointed out that it's not an area where we struggle, for whatever reason, to whoever's credit.

Finally, no--it is absolutely not a stretch to mention the solid organizational pieces the team has added over the years. Those guys are instrumental in building a winning AHL team. Look no further than Vinni Lettieri, one of the few guys on our first good Hartford team in years who can actually put the puck in the net. Those guys are very important, and if you want to gloss over them, you're ignoring a big part of player development.

Anyway. I was here to talk about how we were not struggling to sign undrafted free agents or guys who graduated college and became free agents. I don't know why you're talking about all this other stuff like trading for Fox and Erixon and who deserves credit for making heroes of guys signing in New York or whatever, but I think I've made my points and am done.

You’re very fired up for very little reason.

I agree with your first point as well actually (Gordie is not solely responsible), but I find the argument that our scouting department deserves credit for players like Hayes and Vesey very very flawed.

Sure, scouting is responsible for doing due diligence on players. You’re ignoring the fact that these were free assets however. Nobody is going to evaluate Vesey as a player and say “nope, he’s not going to pan out. We shouldn’t sign him”. You take a flyer on those guys 10 times out of 10, because they’re free to acquire. Are you seriously going to disagree with this? And those guys do in fact sign with the NYR because we’re an organization with a reputation for treating its players well, in a city that is often romanticized as the best in the world. Whether or not you believe that (I for one don’t - I live here), it is true for most people. It’s very very desperate to argue that’s not the case.

I brought up Erixon and Fox because those were players that were continuously linked to the Rangers prior to holding out on their original teams. The reason was because they wanted to become Rangers. Adam Fox wanted to play in NY because he’s from here and is a fan. We can drop them from the discussion, sure, but they fit like a glove when it comes to the thematic topic of players wanting to simply play hockey for the New York Rangers.

Also, I’d love to see that sweepstakes list. I guarantee the Rangers come out on top more than any other single team in the league. I’d do it myself, but I don’t think there’s any way to do it at a macro level - we’d have to manually go case by case. The major guy that sticks out to me is Panarin, I’m sure there are a few others I am missing. But in the past 10 years we got the top dog 4 times in their respective year - Gilroy, Vesey, Zucc, Hayes.

 

[Kendo]

Quite frankly the NHL draft is a joke.

The MLB draft has 1,235 rounds, and every player is as much "voodoo" as picking goalies.

The NBA draft is largely a 1-round draft.

The NFL draft at least has more developed players, but there are 30 positions to fill.

If the NHL draft is a joke, then major league professional drafts are a joke across the board.

12 years?

You should remove Chytil and call it 9 years. In a few years, you could look at your 12 year list and have some all-stars included...just to be fair.

 

[Kendo]

2005 - Staal and Sauer were good picks. Whiffed on some picks, but got a decent plumber in Pyatt.

2006 - Sanguinetti was a pretty big whiff, but there were even worse selections earlier in the round. The Flyers literally "guessed" on Giroux. They almost said his name wrong at the podium. Anisimov was a win at his spot.

2007 - Cherepanov should have been an NHL player. We found a great depth gem in Hagelin. I'm still upset with the Lafleur pick. Literally no point...

2008 - Del Zotto and Stepan were good picks. Weise was a decent depth piece.

2009 - Kreider was a great pick. We did not have a good rest of the draft, at all.

2010 - We had a terrible draft, with a great, late, depth piece.

2011 - Miller was a good pick. We struck out 3-6.

2012 - Skjei was a good pick. Boo was a decent pick, I guess.

2013 - With no 1st or 2nd round picks, we somehow had a good draft. Crazy.

2014 - We had a bad draft, with one bright spot that has yet to prove whether or not he is an NHL fixture. Speaking of goalies...Lafleur, Halverson, and now possibly Lindbom look like burning a lotto ticket before the draw...just discarding a 2nd rounder.

2015 - We had a bad draft. The value placed on Gropp was especially heinous.

2016 - With not even a 2nd rounder, whatever comes to fruition out of this draft is a win.

2017 - It was a 6-player draft where we picked 7th. Chytil salvages the 1st round...but it's pointless to even analyse this draft since the roulette wheel is still turning on this one.

So our drafting in 2005-2016 was a mixed bag like all teams, but largely positive. We did fine early in 05, 07 (I choose to believe in the pick), 08, 09, 11, 12. We did poorly in 06 & 10. We didn't have early picks in 13, 14, 15, or 16, yet still made good picks in 13.

McIlrath and the wasted 2nd rounders are pretty big bugaboos. Those are the topics in discussing Clark's tenure. We could denounce him for Andersson today, and watch Lias be a 3rd line fixture on another team in 2022. We need some new blood in our scouting department, but it's not rotten from the top down per se.

 

[RangersFan1994]

2005 - Staal and Sauer were good picks. Whiffed on some picks, but got a decent plumber in Pyatt.

2006 - Sanguinetti was a pretty big whiff, but there were even worse selections earlier in the round. The Flyers literally "guessed" on Giroux. They almost said his name wrong at the podium. Anisimov was a win at his spot.

2007 - Cherepanov should have been an NHL player. We found a great depth gem in Hagelin. I'm still upset with the Lafleur pick. Literally no point...

2008 - Del Zotto and Stepan were good picks. Weise was a decent depth piece.

2009 - Kreider was a great pick. We did not have a good rest of the draft, at all.

2010 - We had a terrible draft, with a great, late, depth piece.

2011 - Miller was a good pick. We struck out 3-6.

2012 - Skjei was a good pick. Boo was a decent pick, I guess.

2013 - With no 1st or 2nd round picks, we somehow had a good draft. Crazy.

2014 - We had a bad draft, with one bright spot that has yet to prove whether or not he is an NHL fixture. Speaking of goalies...Lafleur, Halverson, and now possibly Lindbom look like burning a lotto ticket before the draw...just discarding a 2nd rounder.

2015 - We had a bad draft. The value placed on Gropp was especially heinous.

2016 - With not even a 2nd rounder, whatever comes to fruition out of this draft is a win.

2017 - It was a 6-player draft where we picked 7th. Chytil salvages the 1st round...but it's pointless to even analyse this draft since the roulette wheel is still turning on this one.

So our drafting in 2005-2016 was a mixed bag like all teams, but largely positive. We did fine early in 05, 07 (I choose to believe in the pick), 08, 09, 11, 12. We did poorly in 06 & 10. We didn't have early picks in 13, 14, 15, or 16, yet still made good picks in 13.

McIlrath and the wasted 2nd rounders are pretty big bugaboos. Those are the topics in discussing Clark's tenure. We could denounce him for Andersson today, and watch Lias be a 3rd line fixture on another team in 2022. We need some new blood in our scouting department, but it's not rotten from the top down per se.

Boo was an awful pick in my opinion considering other prospects drafted after him were better prospects and are all better NHL players than Boo will ever be. 2ed round pick turned into a minor league scrub. great draft, same for Ryan Gropp. awful picks


Forwards: all better players than Nieves

Cedric Paquette

Josh Anderson

Andreas Athanasiou


Defense:

Shayne Gostisbehere


Colton Parayko

Damon Severson

Adam Pelech

Esa Lindell

imagine if NYR have drafted some of these defenseman, especially Parayko.



Ryan Gropp


Jordan Greenway

Roope Hintz

Anthony Cirelli

all better NHL players than Ryan Gropp. Rangers really need to hire new scouts and fire some of these clowns that can't scout young talent.

 

[egelband]

I was surprised to see nobody had actually pulled data on this, to see how NYR has fared against other teams in the draft. Instead we get these completely subjective arguments where people go through the drafts and say “well the only players that are better than the NYR draft pick are X, Y and Z”.

I pulled all of the data from hockeydb (let me know if there’s an easier way of doing this) and ran the numbers since 2007, when Clark was promoted to run our team’s scouting. I wanted to see how reasonable it is to say Clark has done a garbage job:

Games played by NHL drafted players since 2007:

25. Toronto
26. NY Rangers
27. NJ Devils
28. Pittsburgh

Points by NHL drafted players since 2007:

21. Arizona
22. NY Rangers
23. Detroit
23. Toronto

“But wait, CH10, the Rangers traded away all of their draft picks during their cup run years”

Games played per pick by NHL drafted players since 2007:

20. Chicago
21. NY Rangers
22. Pittsburgh
23. Philadelphia

Points per pick by NHL drafted players since 2007:

21. Montreal
22. NY Rangers
23. Arizona
24. Philadelphia

The Rangers are one of 5 teams that finishes in the bottom third for each of these categories, along with Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, Vancouver, New Jersey and Toronto.

“But wait, CH10, the Rangers traded away all of their high draft picks during the cup runs”.

Ranking of cumulative draft position since 2007:

21. Edmonton
22. NY Rangers
23. NY Islanders
24. Columbus

There are other factors at play here, of course. The Rangers were without a first round pick a few years. There have also been situations like the Cherepanov incident that have hurt them in these rankings. Additionally, we have a strong prospect pool, which could change things in the long run.

Ultimately though, it looks like Clark has done an objectively bad job since he was promoted to run our scouting department. He has failed, time and time again, to draft a star caliber player - a drought no other team surpasses the Rangers on. Coupled with some of the more high profile failures recently, like McIlrath and Andersson, his resume looks like trash. Some of you may disagree with that (and many posters here operate under the assumption that because these people are paid they always know what they’re doing - which is hilariously false), but it’s completely reasonable to argue that Gordie Clark deserves to be fired.

Well done on this. Thank you. Very interesting and quite damning. It’s amazing the Rangers have been so successful despite the draft handicap. The Draft-i-cap?

 

[Amazing Kreiderman]

Boo was an awful pick in my opinion considering other prospects drafted after him were better prospects and are all better NHL players than Boo will ever be. 2ed round pick turned into a minor league scrub. great draft, same for Ryan Gropp. awful picks


Forwards: all better players than Nieves

Cedric Paquette

Josh Anderson

Andreas Athanasiou


Defense:

Shayne Gostisbehere


Colton Parayko

Damon Severson

Adam Pelech

Esa Lindell

imagine if NYR have drafted some of these defenseman, especially Parayko.



Ryan Gropp


Jordan Greenway

Roope Hintz

Anthony Cirelli

all better NHL players than Ryan Gropp. Rangers really need to hire new scouts and fire some of these clowns that can't scout young talent.

Unless you can honestly say these were the players you wanted on draft day, it's meaningless to bring them up now. With the power of hindsight, everyone is a HOF GM

 

[effen]

St. Louis was such a visionary on Parayko they passed on him three times before they took him. zzzzzzzzz

 

[romba]

Unless you can honestly say these were the players you wanted on draft day, it's meaningless to bring them up now. With the power of hindsight, everyone is a HOF GM

You're right, but NYR prestige and funding should have HOF caliber GM, not an average one.

 

[Amazing Kreiderman]

You're right, but NYR prestige and funding should have HOF caliber GM, not an average one.

You talk as if every GM is dying to work for the Rangers. I am sure we are probably top-10 in terms of appeal, but I have a hard time believing we are no 1 or even top-3

 

[SA16]

You talk as if every GM is dying to work for the Rangers. I am sure we are probably top-10 in terms of appeal, but I have a hard time believing we are no 1 or even top-3

That is true but being the team with the most (or among the most resources) and given there’s no salary cap on executives we should be able to just pay for the best.

 

[Amazing Kreiderman]

That is true but being the team with the most (or among the most resources) and given there’s no salary cap on executives we should be able to just pay for the best.

But what if "the best" rather work for the Bruins? Or the Wild? Or the Leafs?

 

[nyr2k2]

That is true but being the team with the most (or among the most resources) and given there’s no salary cap on executives we should be able to just pay for the best.

Why should we assume the best want to work here? I mean we always hear in all sports about assistant coaches, assistant GMs, whatever, turning down steps up to other organizations because they have other plans for themselves. Gord Chinook might be the best damn scout around, but maybe he cares more about working for the Leafs than the extra $500K he'd get from us. Seamus McCarthy might be the hottest up-and-coming executive, but he may want to hold out for a job in Boston.

This reminds me of when Yankees fans gradually came to the realization that other teams also had money and resources and attractive things about them, and that being the Yankees didn't automatically mean they could just have the best things.

 

[ColonialsHockey10]

Well done on this. Thank you. Very interesting and quite damning. It’s amazing the Rangers have been so successful despite the draft handicap. The Draft-i-cap?

Thank you. As I mentioned, there are caveats, but it’s a stronger argument than manually going through the draft and just listing players you think are better than the Rangers pick.

We’ve had a HOF goaltender, signed the prized free agent on multiple occasions and made a few wonderful trades (funny how the same people who defend Gorton would never throw Sather a bone because of his early moves). Every other competitive team out there is built primarily through the draft. The 06 Canes were the outlier.

 

[ColonialsHockey10]

Why should we assume the best want to work here? I mean we always hear in all sports about assistant coaches, assistant GMs, whatever, turning down steps up to other organizations because they have other plans for themselves. Gord Chinook might be the best damn scout around, but maybe he cares more about working for the Leafs than the extra $500K he'd get from us. Seamus McCarthy might be the hottest up-and-coming executive, but he may want to hold out for a job in Boston.

This reminds me of when Yankees fans gradually came to the realization that other teams also had money and resources and attractive things about them, and that being the Yankees didn't automatically mean they could just have the best things.

I’ll agree that the allure of being the GM of the Rangers isn’t the same as playing for them.

Doesn’t help when your boss’ boss is an imbecile that inherited all of his dad’s money.

 

[SA16]

But what if "the best" rather work for the Bruins? Or the Wild? Or the Leafs?

Well of course it comes down to their preference. There is just no excuse for being cheap given we have more resources than most teams.

 

[Amazing Kreiderman]

Well of course it comes down to their preference. There is just no excuse for being cheap given we have more resources than most teams.

Who says we are being cheap? We literally overpaid for a college coach to convince him to leave Boston

 

[SA16]

Who says we are being cheap? We literally overpaid for a college coach to convince him to leave Boston

I don't know. Who did? I didn't say that. They did what I said they should do with Quinn. If they like someone and think he's their guy they have the money to make it happen provided the other party can be convinced by money.

 

[nyr2k2]

@ColonialsHockey10 I deleted my previous post despite the fact I wrote it on my phone and it took me a long f***ing time and I didn't want to delete it. LOL. Almost none of what I wrote is relevant to this topic.

This started when someone posted about how Gordie sucks, something something draft, something something UDFAs. All I did was respond that we do fine with UDFAs. It was in no way meant as a defense of Gordie, who I'm generally ambivalent towards. I just wanted to point out that UDFA signings are actually something we're good at.

Then we got sucked down this rabbit hole and I ended up boxing myself into something that sure sounds like a defense of Clark. I assure you it is not that, and that I really don't have anything invested in this specific topic; when this started, I was at work, with only one member of my team, and I was bored. Sooo...my bad for taking us here.

 

[Crease]

There's enough elite talent around the league to be convinced that Gordie Clark is not good at identifying elite talent. And it's not all draft position. I'm ready to move on.

 

[ColonialsHockey10]

@ColonialsHockey10 I deleted my previous post despite the fact I wrote it on my phone and it took me a long ****ing time and I didn't want to delete it. LOL. Almost none of what I wrote is relevant to this topic.

This started when someone posted about how Gordie sucks, something something draft, something something UDFAs. All I did was respond that we do fine with UDFAs. It was in no way meant as a defense of Gordie, who I'm generally ambivalent towards. I just wanted to point out that UDFA signings are actually something we're good at.

Then we got sucked down this rabbit hole and I ended up boxing myself into something that sure sounds like a defense of Clark. I assure you it is not that, and that I really don't have anything invested in this specific topic; when this started, I was at work, with only one member of my team, and I was bored. Sooo...my bad for taking us here.

No worries!

It’s an interesting topic, and it was a good discussion. I too had a little too much time on my hands at work today. That’s why I had time to build a spreadsheet lol.

 

[BBKers]

Clarke needs to go. It is time. In a world now full of sensitivity, accountability, fancy stats and result orientation, he is done. Finito. That old Buffalo mummy Ruff on the D bench too

 

[wafflepadsave]

You’d never guess this was widely hailed as the top farm system in the NHL about 10 weeks ago.

Personally, I love how Kakko apparently doesn’t count because he was gimme. Never mind that he’ll count if he busts, but that’s another story.

Personally, I would like to know who they were targeting before the lottery win was determined?

 

[wafflepadsave]

It’s moments like these where I wish I was a fly on the wall in those war rooms..

We need someone in the nsa to help us out now!

 

[Edge]

Personally, I would like to know who they were targeting before the lottery win was determined?

I suspect the pick would’ve been Zegras.

 

[BKGooner]

Just playing devil's advocate - who has drafted the pants off the rest of the league if most teams and especially the Rangers are incompetent? The only one that really pops into my head is Boston. Maybe St. Louis as well.