Colorado Avalanche Ultimate Franchise Draft

As the NHL Draft approaches next week, I thought it might be interesting to run down how the Avalanche have fared over time by looking at the best draft picks from each round. This isn’t meant to be a serious exercise in analyzing Avalanche draft history but rather a fun look at where the Avs have done well in the past. Some of the results might surprise you, especially given the dark cloud that hung over the organization and their drafting acumen during Pierre Lacroix’s time as General Manager.

The criteria is simple: Which player ended up with the best career from each round. Quebec draft picks don’t count so there won’t be any Adam Foote or Joe Sakic appearances on the list. It doesn’t matter how much the player played for the Avalanche; it’s simply whose career ended up the best.

The interesting thing you’ll see below is that this list will likely look very different in a few years when some of Colorado’s budding young talent has had a chance to get a few more years under their belt to build their statistical cases. Let’s get started!

1st Round

Alex Tanguay – 1998, 12th overall – 1,018 GP, 275 G/553 A/828 Pts (currently 136th all-time in NHL scoring)
Honorable Mention: Robyn Regehr – 1998, 19th overall, Matt Duchene – 2009, 3rd overall

This is one of the easier choices on the list but also one of the ones in the most danger. With Matt Duchene, Gabriel Landeskog, and Nathan MacKinnon all first round picks who are likely going to have long, productive careers this could turn into a real dog fight in ten years. For right now, though, the choice was simple enough. Alex Tanguay has been the most prolific draft pick in Avalanche history and his combination of longevity, production, and clutch moments have cast him as one of the club’s most beloved players over the years.

Regehr, who retired when his LA Kings squad missed this year’s posteason, finished a highly-regarded career that saw him play 1,090 games, no small feat when you play the rugged defensive stopper role he did for so many years.

2nd Round

Paul Stastny – 2005, 44th overall – 612 GP, 176 G/328 A/504 Pts
Honorable Mention: Johnny Boychuk – 2002, 61st overall, Ryan O’Reilly – 2009, 33rd overall

This is another selection that was easy today but could be much more complicated in a few more years thanks to Ryan O’Reilly. Before his, ahem, controversial departure from Colorado, Paul Stastny was the face of the franchise during the team’s transition from the Joe Sakic-era to the current crop of Landeskog and company. A consistently productive player whose stat lines always conflicted with his high salaries, Stastny was nonetheless a fantastic second round selection.

On the flip side, Johnny Boychuk serves as a prime example of the mismanagement that occurred in the later years of Pierre Lacroix’s reign as overlord. Watching Boychuk go on to become a star for Boston and the New York Islanders after the Avalanche gave up on Boychuk after just four NHL games stands as one of the team’s biggest swings and misses of the last 10 years.

3rd Round

Tyson Barrie – 2009, 64th overall – 186 GP, 27 G/77 A/104 pts
Honorable Mention: Mark Parrish – 1996, 79th overall, Kurt Sauer – 2000, 88th overall

This was the round where I had the most debate about which player was most worthy. I ultimately decided to give in to projection and future potential here as I felt Barrie will ultimately far outclass the other two players he was in contention with. Barrie’s first full NHL season saw him merely put up a 53-point season, placing him among the elite offensive defenseman in the NHL. With a future like that, I simply couldn’t deny the kid his place.

Whereas Kurt Sauer would’ve likely been the winner thanks to his outstanding defensive work, injuries unfortunately cut his career short and left him a distant third. Parrish never suited up for the Avalanche, one of many successful players that will appear on this list who was traded by Lacroix in short-sighted moves that ultimately failed, he merits inclusion after a career that saw him play over 700 games and register 6 20-goal seasons as a role player with Florida and the Islanders.

4th Round

Tom Gilbert – 2002, 129th overall – 592 GP, 43 G/173 A/216 pts
Honorable Mention: Brad Malone – 2007, 104th overall

This is a wasteland of talent. The clear-cut best player drafted in the 4th round of Avalanche history is Tom Gilbert, another player who never suited up for the Avalanche because of one of Lacroix’s ill-fated trade deadline deals. Traded in exchange for 5 games of Tommy Salo, Gilbert would go on to enjoy a lengthy career in Edmonton before bouncing around a bit to Minnesota, Florida, and Montreal. A decent depth defenseman, Gilbert represents the only true success from the 4th round.

I picked Brad Malone as honorable mention because he’s the only Avalanche 4th round selection since 1997 to appear in 100 NHL games. Seriously.

5th Round

John-Michael Liles – 2000, 159th overall – 719 GP, 81 G/263 A/344 Pts
Honorable Mention: Brad Richardson – 2003, 163rd overall, Cody McCormick – 2001, 144th overall

Another slam dunk choice here, John-Michael Liles burst onto the scene early in his career and looked like he was going to have a long, prolific career. The best homegrown offensive defenseman in Avalanche history (thus far, anyway), Liles is the measuring stick that Tyson Barrie is currently trying to live up and ultimately surpass. While his defense never developed into much, Liles scored at least 31 points in all seven of his Avalanche seasons, remarkable consistent when you consider he fell out of favor with the coaching staff late in in Avs career.

The other two players drafted from the 5th round who turned out to be useful NHL players were Richardson and McCormick, role players who went on to see greater success elsewhere. If there are alternate universes out there, one of them exists where the Avalanche kept McCormick over current Avs Alternate Captain Cody McLeod when the team felt the need to choose between the two Codys.

6th Round

David Aebischer – 1997, 161st overall – 214 GP, 2.52 GAA, .912 sv %
Honorable Mention: Jonas Holos – 2008, 170th overall

Like the 4th round, there was only one choice for this round as the Avalanche have been unable to mine much quality from this round in the draft. Aebischer took over the starting goaltender job upon Patrick Roy’s somewhat surprising retirement following the 2002-03 season and performed much better than he was ever given credit for, posting a .924 save percentage. He was traded the following season for Jose Theodore, who had won the Hart Trophy as the league’s MVP just two seasons earlier.

I included Holos on this list because he stands out as a player who could have been so much more for the Avalanche organization. After finally breaking through to the NHL in 2010-11, the team and player disagreed on his role moving forward and Holos chose to return to Europe, where he has been a very good player since. Had the Avs gotten out of their own way and allowed Holos to play on the Avs blue line, he likely would have stayed in North America and very well could have been a part of the solution along Colorado’s porous blueline.

7th Round

Radim Vrbata – 1999, 212th overall – 871 GP, 246 G/281 A/527 Pts
Honorable Mention: Dan Hinote – 1996, 167th overall, Samuel Pahlsson – 1996, 176th overall, Marek Svatos – 2001, 227th overall

Showing just how random the draft really can be, the Avs have found more quality players in the 7th round than the 4th and 6th rounds combined. Radim Vrbata gets the nod here both for his longevity and late-career surge (this past season he scored a career-high 63 points) that puts him statistically way over the top of Pahlsson. Traded early on in his tenure before he found his legs (play it again, Pierre!), Vrbata would go on to see great success with Phoenix.

If you say the name Dan Hinote to old school Avs fans, you’ll almost always see a smile spread across their face. Hinote was easy to love, often citing his desire to have a post-playing career of “FBI Agent”, and he was the pest every great team needs to succeed. Scrappy, gritty, hard-working, and easy to love if you were rooting for Colorado, Hinote has a permanent place among the hearts of Avs fans.

Pahlsson never suited up for Colorado but for once, the trade that sent him away was one the team would happily do over again today. He was sent to Boston along with Brian Rolston and other pieces in order to bring Ray Bourque to Denver. Everyone knows how that turned out but what often gets forgotten is that Pahlsson went on to play 798 games in the NHL as a face-off specialist and ace penalty killer.

Svatos is a player, like Sauer earlier, who might have had a long and memorable NHL career had injuries not derailed him. Coming from out of nowhere to score 32 goals in his rookie season in 2005-06, Svatos would struggle to stay on the ice and multiple shoulder and knee injuries sapped Svatos of the explosiveness that made him successful. Like Holos and Sauer, Svatos is one of the great “What if?” stories of recent Avalanche history.

8th Round & Beyond

David Jones – 2003, 288th overall – 387 GP, 93 G/80 A/173 Pts
Honorable Mention: Jeff Finger – 1999, 240th overall

Drafted in the now defunct 9th round, David Jones represents the late-round picks who would have otherwise been undrafted. A big, awkward forward with surprising speed, Jones peaked in his time with Colorado with a 27-goal season in 2010-11 while playing alongside Paul Stastny. Known just as much for his goal-scoring as his penchant for bizarre injuries, such as the knee injury he sustained when he tripped over the blue line, Jones was eventually traded to Calgary in the deal that brought Tanguay back home.

Another player who saw legitimate NHL action but is known for something other than his hockey playing, Jeff Finger was an 8th round draft selection who would go down in Toronto Maple Leafs infamy when he signed a big-money deal after the team apparently had him mixed up with former teammate Kurt Sauer. You can read all about the hilarious episode here (and look at how good Sauer actually was for the Avalanche at the end of his time in Denver).

Unfortunately for Finger, his big payday also likely cost him his NHL career as he was soon buried in the minors when it became clear he wasn’t worth the kind of money Toronto gave him and he never again saw NHL action.