An investigation into Steve Yzerman's history, going back to his days in Tampa Bay
As we sit on the precipice of the 2023 NHL Draft, a draft in which the Detroit Red Wings are slated to pick twice in the first two rounds, it feels like an appropriate time to take a look back at Steve Yzerman's history in the draft.
Yzerman was the Vice President and General Manager of the Tampa Bay Lightning from 2010 through the '18-19 season, at which point he returned to Detroit. To get a sense of what to expect Wednesday night, let's start by taking a look at every first round pick Yzerman made across his two stops managing NHL rosters.
Steve Yzerman's First Rounders: 2010-Present
2010: Brett Connolly, sixth overall, Prince George Cougars (WHL)
2011: Vladislav Namestnikov, 27th overall, London Knights (OHL)
2012: Slater Koekkoek, 10th overall, Peterborough Petes (OHL); Andrei Vasilevskiy, 19th overall, Tolpar Ufa (MHL)
2013: Jonathan Drouin, 3rd overall, Halifax Mooseheads (QMJHL)
2014: Tony DeAngelo, 19th overall, Sarnia Sting (OHL)
2015: No first rounder (used in trade that brought Braydon Coburn to Tampa)
2016: Brett Howden, 27th overall, Moose Jaw Warriors (WHL)
2017: Cal Foote, 14th overall, Kelowna Rockets (WHL)
2018: No first rounder (used in trade that brought Ryan McDonagh and J.T. Miller to Tampa)
2019: Moritz Seider, 6th overall, Adler Mannheim (DHL)
2020: Lucas Raymond, 4th overall, Frolunda HC (SHL)
2021: Simon Edvinsson, 6th overall, Frolunda HC (SHL); Sebastian Cossa, 15th overall, Edmonton Oil Kings (WHL)
2022: Marco Kasper, 8th overall, Rogle BK (SHL)
Trends and Takeaways
Across these thirteen drafts split between two organizations, we can Yzerman operating from all over the first round. We see him picking as high as pick number three in 2013, and we see him selecting at the tail end of the first. We can see him deep in a rebuild, and we can see him tinkering with a Cup contender.
From a positional standpoint, I don't see any obvious trends. He's used a first on a goaltender once at each stop, and then we have six forwards and five defensemen. Yzerman downplayed the significance of position as a draft criteria at his pre-draft availability, and what we see here reflects that stance.
Perhaps it's more of a curiosity than anything else, but I'm drawn to the fact that in his time in Tampa, every skater that he drafted was from the CHL (i.e. the QMJHL, OHL, or WHL), but the lone goaltender played in Europe, while in Detroit he has picked all European-trained skaters and a Canadian netminder. In Namesnikov, Yzerman did select a European-born player but one who played Canaidan major junior. Meanwhile, Yzerman has yet to use a first rounder on an NCAA player.
I'm sure Yzerman would tell you that each selection was based on that player's scouting report, not what league they played in (or at least not entirely), but the trend is still intriguing.
When you look at his selections from Tampa, it's far from overwhelming. I don't think it's crazy to argue that Lucas Raymond and Moritz Seider are already the two best skaters Yzerman has drafted in the first round. In fact, I'm not sure it's close.
Bretts Connolly and Howden have both been useful pieces on Cup-winning teams (Connolly in Washington in '18, Howden this year in Vegas), but neither are top-of-the-lineup play-drivers. Raymond and Seider are just that at 21 and 22, respectively; you don't even have to project growth to put them to the top of that heap. Vasilevskiy is of course ahead of both, but I think it's fair to keep goalies in their own category.
It's also important to remember what we aren't seeing here. Looking at Yzerman's first rounders from those days in Tampa it becomes obvious that the vast majority of those eventual Cup winners didn't come from the first round.
Yzerman picked Nikita Kucherov in the second round of the 2011 Draft. He took Ondrej Palat in the seventh the same year. Yzerman snagged Brayden Point and Anthony Cirelli in the third round in 2014 and '15, respectively. Yanni Gourde was signed as an undrafted free agent in 2014.
To bring in three vital pieces of what would become a championship blue line, Yzerman made trades for Erik Cernak, Mikhail Sergachev, and McDonagh.
Crucially, Yzerman also inherited two players taken at the very top of the first round in the two seasons before he arrived. Steven Stamkos came to Tampa as the 2008 first overall pick, and Victor Hedman arrived the next year, having been taken second overall.
In the two years before Yzerman took the reins in Detroit, Ken Holland selected Filip Zadina (at number six) and Michael Rasmussen (at number nine). Granted, Holland wasn't working at the very top of the draft, but there is an obvious gulf between those two sets of players.
Still, I think it's encouraging for Red Wings fans to see just how important everything other than the first round was for Yzerman and Tampa. You can't hand wave away the significance of Hedman and Stamkos, two players with credible Hall of Fame cases if they retired tomorrow, but it's undeniable that those championship Lightning teams were assembled in the later rounds of the draft or via trade. That bodes well for a Red Wing team that has had dreadful luck in the lottery for years.
Thus far in Detroit, Elmer Soderblom (a 2019 sixth rounder) is the only non-first round draft pick of Yzerman's to appear at the NHL level. You'd expect later selections to take longer to get to the top level, so it's no huge surprise that we haven't seen more emerge yet. Some players who appear close to that leap William Wallinder, whom Yzerman took with a 2020 second, and Carter Mazur, a 2021 third. For Detroit to keep pressing up the Atlantic standings, that list will need to grow.
This exercise isn't going to get us to a place where we can confidently say what Yzerman will do with his two first rounders this evening. Another goalie wouldn't make sense, but beyond that, just about anything is on the table.
What it does tell us is that there is hope for the Red Wings despite their lottery woes and that, if we want a look at the players who will play key roles on the next Cup contending team in Detroit, we should pay close attention to rounds two through seven.