Talent entering the league in the 80s vs. the 90s

[MHO]

I had this thought remembering how exciting hockey is now compared to what it was in the early 2000s and the current rules have a lot to do with that. But I also remember thinking at the time that there were a lack of stars then. So I did some quick unscientific research and saw that there were 37 Hall of Famers drafted in the 1980s vs 14 drafted in the 1990s.

Now that only includes drafted players so guys like Martin St Louis don't count and also guys like Jagr, Chara, Zetterberg, Thornton, and Marleau (Maybe HOF?) aren't included but isn't it still something that one decade had double the hall of famers enter the league than the next?

I think it's still too early to judge how many came from the draft decades following but I'm betting it will be way more than 20 for each. The 90's talent just really sucked

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[Brodeur]

Maybe more a thread for the History board, but some of the 90s drafts were horrid. Definitely an unfortunate time to expand from 21 teams to 30 by the end of the decade. The fall of the USSR in 1991 set back their hockey program, presumably similar things happened with Czechoslovakia splitting. I wish I could attribute where I read it, but I recall somebody saying that the Swedes had a lot of their top youth athletes opt for soccer over hockey in the 80s; The Swedes winning Olympic Gold in 1994 sparked a renaissance and we that caused a resurgence of top tier Swedes born in the early-mid 90's that are still in the NHL today.

Sometimes a bad sign when a defenseman goes #1 in 3 straight drafts (1994-96), at least in terms of the draft class lacking a high end forward talent.

I forget if USA Hockey got a Miracle on Ice bump, but those early 80's kids wouldn't have been draft eligible until very late in the 90's to early 00's. Now it's not unusual to see California, Texas, Florida produce a decent prospect or two. But back in the 90's the rinks and competition level weren't what they are today; I'm still a bit bitter that they built a nice facility in my suburb of LA around 1999-2000 right after I left.



This ESPN segment from the early 90's always stuck with me, namely how bad the Russian facilities had gotten.

 

[Brodeur]

Out of curiosity I looked at American top 30 picks from the 90's to 00's. Definitely unscientific but:

1990: 4 (Hatcher-Tkachuk-Smolinski-Gotziaman)
1991: 5 (Lachance-Rolston-Peake-Bilodeau-Campbell)
1992: 4 (Hulbig-Wilkie-Ferraro-O'Sullivan)
1993: 2 (Wilson-Adams)
1994: 3 (Bonsignore-Kealty-Quint)
1995: 2 (Berard-Boucher)
1996: 4 (Rasmussen-Reasoner-Ratchuk-LaCouture)
1997: 5 (Mara-Jones-Tselios-Clymer-DeFauw)

-- hypothetical 1980 Miracle on Ice bump

1998: 3 (Legwand-Rupp-Gomez)
1999: 4 (Connolly-Jillson-Tanabe-Heisten)
2000: 5 (DiPietro-Hainsey-Orpik-Hale-Taffe)
2001: 5 (Komisarek-Umberger-Gleason-Bacashihua-Steckel)
2002: 6 (Whitney-Nystrom-Ballard-Higgins-Morris-Slater)
2003: 7 (Suter-Jessiman-Brown-Parise-Stuart-Kesler-Boyle)
2004: 6 (Wheeler-Montoya-Thelen-Stafford-Schremp-Schneider)
2005: 8 (Ryan-Johnson-Skille-Lee-Lashoff-Oshie-Finley-Niskanen)
2006: 10 (Johnson-Kessel-Okposo-Mueller-Lewis-Mitera-Fischer-Sanguinetti-Foligno-Summers)
2007: 10 (Kane-van Riemsdyk-McDonagh-Shattenkirk-Cole-Pacioretty-Blum-White-Petrecki-O'Brien)
2008: 5 (Bogosian-Wilson-Gardiner-Carlson-McCollum)
2009: 5 (Leddy-Kreider-Moore-Schroeder-Palmieri)
2010: 10 (Campbell-Fowler-Forbort-Watson-Bjugstad-Bennett-Tinordi-Hayes-Coyle-Etem-Nelson)

Also mix in the USNTDP starting in 1996 and perhaps doing a better job at developing prospects as a group rather than guys having to fend for themselves.

 

[JackSlater]

Hockey Canada had a summit focusing on development in part because of how bad the talent that came through many of the 1990s drafts was. Also because of losing two best on best tournaments.

Intuitively it is obvious that the talent of the 90s players, most of whom came around in the 1980s drafts, was better than that of the 2000s players, but that is skewed because a lot of stars who should have been top players in the 2000s were injured and shells of what they should have been. It also doesn't totally break down along clear decade lines though. The poor drafts continued into the 2000s and there are some strong early 1990s drafts.

 

[carjackmalone]

3of the greatest players

Gretzky,Lemieux,Bourque

But what stands out in the 80’s is the rise of American born players

Prior to this teams had 1 token American on each roster to have a qualified and college educated NHLPA team Rep.

 

[Michael Farkas]

The 90's talent just really sucked

Without going back and really diving in, we don't know this for sure. One thing I'll say quickly is that: people automatically think that because a draft pick fails or whatever that it was a bad job of scouting talent or whatever. But player development is such a big deal. Teams that really have/had it together in that regard like LA, Pittsburgh has overcome their bad drafting to get more games played out of undrafted players than drafted players over the last decade, etc. can make up for bad scouting.

Where as teams that don't invest in that nearly as much and don't have a development plan for each of their players, tend to fail no matter how many high picks they have.

So, the 1990's you have a situation too where Lindros broke the mold. Teams spent through 2003 trying to draft the next Lindros. So they over-drafted linebacker types even if they weren't skilled, couldn't skate and/or didn't have hockey sense. ALSO, teams that didn't have Lindros needed to be prepared with guys that could stop a Lindros. So, enter 6'5" piano movers that were tasked with stopping that guy...so those guys were going to top 10 in the draft too.

And then it becomes a little self-fulfilling because the investment was made, the draft capital is there, so these guys have to get into the league...and so they did. And it all sort of grinded to a near-halt. I'm not convinced that one full stride was taken in the 2003 Western Conference Final. I think everyone's laces were tied together.

So the hypothesis may be true...it may not be. The result may be indicative of the hypothesis...it also may not be. This kind of question is mostly about process. And that's going to be really difficult to process after the fact...

 

[MHO]

So the hypothesis may be true...it may not be. The result may be indicative of the hypothesis...it also may not be. This kind of question is mostly about process. And that's going to be really difficult to process after the fact...

I get all that. But for a decade of drafts (over 2000 players in each decade) to have double the hall of famers drafted than the one after it and a likely larger talent pool getting drafted in the 90s, I think the elite talent would come out no matter how much teams got in their own way.

Now if you took the decade of 1992 - 2002. then you're looking at a decade of total futility entering the league.