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New York Rangers: A look at the importance of first round picks, by the numbers

By Steve Paulus

NEW YORK, NY - NOVEMBER 24: New York Rangers Defenceman Marc Staal (18) blocks a shot by Washington Capitals Left Wing Alex Ovechkin (8) during the National Hockey League game between the Washington Capitals and the New York Rangers on November 24, 2018 at Madison Square Garden in New York, NY. (Photo by Joshua Sarner/Icon Sportswire via Getty Images)
NEW YORK, NY - NOVEMBER 24: New York Rangers Defenceman Marc Staal (18) blocks a shot by Washington Capitals Left Wing Alex Ovechkin (8) during the National Hockey League game between the Washington Capitals and the New York Rangers on November 24, 2018 at Madison Square Garden in New York, NY. (Photo by Joshua Sarner/Icon Sportswire via Getty Images) /
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NEW YORK, NY – NOVEMBER 24: Alex Ovechkin #8 of the Washington Capitals redirects the puck into the net for a goal in the second period against Alexandar Georgiev #40 of the New York Rangers at Madison Square Garden on November 24, 2018 in New York City. (Photo by Jared Silber/NHLI via Getty Images)
NEW YORK, NY – NOVEMBER 24: Alex Ovechkin #8 of the Washington Capitals redirects the puck into the net for a goal in the second period against Alexandar Georgiev #40 of the New York Rangers at Madison Square Garden on November 24, 2018 in New York City. (Photo by Jared Silber/NHLI via Getty Images) /

With two straight blowout losses the Rangers playoff hopes are vanishing.  A few more losses and the only thing Ranger fans can hope for is a top pick in the NHL Draft Lottery in June. How important are first rounders to a speedy rebuild?

The biggest need for the New York Rangers is an elite scorer.  In the day of the salary cap, the successful modern NHL team is a team with a core of elite scorers and defenders, supplemented by inexpensive veterans or young players.

The common belief is that the only guaranteed way to find those elite players is through the NHL Entry Draft and usually in the first round.  To see if that is true, we decided to figure out who the truly elite forwards are in the NHL and  then see where were they drafted.

To qualify, we looked at the last six years in the NHL and picked the forwards who finished in the top 20 in scoring each year and also those who finished in the top five in Selke Trophy voting annually.  By including the Selke, which is the award for best defensive forward, we were able to include elite forwards who weren’t necessarily big scorers.

There are 48 different forwards currently in the NHL who qualify as elite players.  Some of them qualified by making one of these lists once in six years, but there were several repeat players.

Of those 48, there were 17 players who made the lists four times or more. These seventeen are truly the best of the elite forwards in the NHL today.

  1. Seven times:  Anze Kopitar, Patrice Bergeron
  2. Six times:  Sydney Crosby, Tyler Seguin, Claude Giroux
  3. Five times: Alex Ovechkin, Nicklas Backstrom
  4. Four times: Joe Thornton, John Tavares, Evgeni Malkin, Jonathan Toews, Blake Wheeler, Ryan Getzlaf, Vladimir Tarasenko, Jamie Benn, Joe Pavelski, Artemi Panarin

The results

For the most part, the results bore out the NHL Entry Draft first round argument.  Here is what we found (the full list of players will be at the end of this article):

  • 48 different active forwards have finished in the top 20 in scoring or the top five in Selke voting in the last six years.
  • Of those 48 forwards:
    • 17 were among the top three picks in the draft (35%)
    • 38 were picked in the first round (79%)
    • four were picked in the second round (8%)
    • four were picked in the third round or later (8%)
    • 2 were undrafted free agent signings (4%)
  • Those 48 forwards finished in the top 20 in scoring or the top five in Selke voting 131 times in six years. Nineteen other top scorers were defensemen.
  • Of those 131 seasons that qualified them for this list:
    • 48 seasons were by top three picks (36%)
    • 100 season were by first round picks (76%)
    • 31 seasons were for players picked after the first round (24%)
    • five seasons were by undrafted players (4%)
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