How Did Blues Get Popular in the Uk Reddit
The NHL Draft is next week in Montreal, and though there's a lot of interest in what the Blues will do with the No. 23 pick, it's hard to match the intrigue heading into the 2007 draft.
The Blues were in the midst of a complete rebuild, and after taking Erik Johnson No. 1 in 2006, they had three first-round selections (Nos. 9, 24 and 26) in 2007. They could have used the three picks to build out the foundation — or packaged them to move back into the No. 1 spot for the second straight summer.
As we know from that night — June 22, 2007, in Columbus, Ohio — the Blues tried to pluck the top pick from Chicago, which had its eyes set on London Knights forward Patrick Kane. Jarmo Kekalainen was the director of amateur scouting at the time and acknowledged those efforts after the draft.
But neither Kekalainen nor former Chicago general manager Dale Tallon has said much publicly about how close the rival Blues and Blackhawks came to making a franchise-altering trade for both organizations that would have changed the course of NHL history. Kane, who has become one of the best American-born players of all time, helped the Blackhawks win the Stanley Cup in 2010, 2013 and 2015 and was the Conn Smythe winner in 2013.
With the draft just around the corner, The Athletic reached out to Kekalainen, who is now the GM of the Columbus Blue Jackets, and Tallon, who recently accepted a position with the Canucks as a senior advisor and pro scout.
Chicago finished with the fifth-fewest points in the 2006-07 regular season, so it was expected to have the No. 5 pick that summer. But the selection order for the draft at that time was a weighted lottery, and despite having just an 8.1 percent chance to receive the No. 1 pick, the Blackhawks were awarded the top pick for the first time in team history. They leaped ahead of the Philadelphia Flyers, Phoenix (now Arizona) Coyotes, Los Angeles Kings and Washington Capitals.
On this day in 2007, the NHL held its annual Entry Draft in Columbus. Patrick Kane and James van Riemsdyk were taken with the first two picks, marking the first time in NHL history that American players were selected with the first two picks #Hockey365 pic.twitter.com/66g0ZIu20u
— Mike Commito (@mikecommito) June 22, 2019
"I'll tell you a good story," Tallon said. "I was on a plane going through Ottawa to Halifax (Nova Scotia, Canada) to watch Jakub Voracek. We had about five guys that we were looking at where we were picking — at No. 5 — and he was on our list.
"So I landed in Ottawa, and my phone blew up when I turned it on. I had all kinds of messages: 'We won the lottery! We won the lottery!' I said: 'What kind of lottery? Can I go live in Hawaii, or what?' They said, 'No, we won the hockey lottery,' so we went from No. 5 to No. 1.
"So when I got to the game, a lot of people came up to me — media, etc. — and asked about it. I'm old-school as far as confidentiality, so I didn't want to let anybody know what our thoughts were. We hadn't even discussed anything with anybody yet anyway. So I said, 'Yeah, (Voracek) is definitely a part of the picture,' and just left it at that."
Chicago, according to Tallon, wasn't certain who it would take until Tallon and assistant general manager Rick Dudley went to watch Kane play for London in the semifinals of the Ontario Hockey League playoffs against the Plymouth (Mich.) Whalers. He had netted 62 goals and 145 points in 58 games in the regular season, but a sequence in the playoff game they attended is what caught their attention.
"Well, he got whacked pretty hard by Jared Boll, a big winger playing for Plymouth (and 2005 fourth-round pick by Columbus)," Tallon said. "We were sitting in the ninth row at one end, 'Duds' and I, and Kaner got hammered pretty hard by Boll. We were like, 'Oh, God!' and didn't think he'd get up from that one, but he brushed himself off like nothing happened.
"I think he got two goals and two assists, and they won the game. I said: 'That's our guy. He's not big, but he's got a big heart and he's got great skills.' We made up our mind in that particular game that he was going to be our first pick. But right up until the draft, we didn't let anybody know."
In the weeks leading up to the draft, the Blackhawks' phone continued to ring with teams asking what it would take for them to cough up the pick. Tallon said it was pretty amusing.
"We played along and had a lot of fun with it," he said. "If someone was going to blow our socks off with some stupid offer, we definitely would've entertained it. So we played along with it, and we were trying to play poker as best we could. A lot of calls, a lot of weird flips and people trying to screw you."
But one of the calls that came in wasn't so weird.
Again, the Blues had three first-round picks at the time: No. 9, No. 24 (acquired from Atlanta in a trade for Keith Tkachuk) and No. 26 (acquired from San Jose for Bill Guerin).
There have been varying accounts over the years. One Blues team source said at the time that the Blues offered all three first-rounders to the Blackhawks for No. 1 and the right to select Kane. A source with the Blackhawks said at the time that the pitch was two first-rounders and defenseman Barret Jackman, the 2003 Calder Trophy winner who had just wrapped up his fourth full season in St. Louis.
"I wish I could tell you yes or no, but I don't remember," Tallon said. "I know it was a pretty substantial offer, but I'm not sure exactly what it was. I have a hard time remembering yesterday, but I would say it was pretty substantial, one of the better offers that we received. I can recall that."
Tallon also confirmed Chicago contemplated it.
"What happens is, any offer you get, you run it by your staff," he said. "You have a big, healthy discussion, and you think about it hard."
Larry Pleau was the Blues' GM in 2007 who made the offer, and he has politely declined interviews since stepping down in 2010.
Kekalainen wanted to respect Pleau and Tallon as the GMs in charge of the clubs at the time, so he preferred not to disclose the offer but was well aware of it.
"Yeah, we made a substantial offer to move up to No. 1," Kekalainen said. "Kane was obviously a clear No. 1 that year, and with the three first-round picks, you know, we always do the inquiry of what it would take to move up. I think they probably had to think about it, but at the end of the day, nothing happened."
If the Blues indeed offered all three of their first-rounders, Tallon acknowledged it would have been enticing to the Blackhawks, but a lot more goes into the thought process.
"It depends what your needs are and what kind of team you have," he said. "In our situation, it was a total rebuild. We accumulated a lot of picks, but there aren't many franchise players after No. 5 or No. 10 — it drops off.
"You get good players, but after the first 10 to 15 picks, you're looking at long-term development. Where do they fit in and when do they fit in? You have to have a good plan in place."
Kekalainen agreed that No. 9, No. 24 and No. 26 would have been a stiff price. "But at the same time," he said, "if there's a franchise player like Kane available, you give up a lot to get something like that. You're not going to get a franchise player unless you give up a lot. They're usually never available."
With no trade on the table, the Blues proceeded to use their three first-round picks.
"We were all excited with the opportunity in front of us, so it was an exciting time," Kekalainen said.
After Kane went No. 1 to Chicago, the selection order leading up to the Blues' scheduled first pick looked like this: No. 2 James van Riemsdyk (Philadelphia), No. 3 Kyle Turris (Phoenix), No. 4 Thomas Hickey (Los Angeles), No. 5 Karl Alzner (Washington), No. 6 Sam Gagner (Edmonton), No. 7 Voracek (Columbus) and No. 8 Zach Hamill (Boston).
The Blues were on the board at No. 9 but traded down with San Jose. In exchange, they received picks Nos. 13 and 44 in that draft and a third-round pick, No. 87, in 2008.
"We always had a group of guys that we felt are the must-haves in the draft," Kekalainen said. "Once we were running out of those guys — if I remember correctly, they were all gone — we decided to move back."
With the Blues' pick, the Sharks took forward Logan Couture, who has had a terrific career in San Jose and is the Sharks' captain. He has 296 goals and 633 points in 845 regular-season games, along with 48 goals and 101 points in 116 playoff games.
When the Blues chose at No. 13, they selected forward Lars Eller. He played just seven games in St. Louis before being traded to Montreal in the deal for goaltender Jaroslav Halak in 2010. Eller was later traded from Montreal to Washington, where he won a Stanley Cup in 2018. In 870 NHL games, he has 153 goals and 348 points, along with 15 goals and 49 points in 96 playoff games.
Lars Eller (Scott Taetsch / Getty Images)
"We probably under-evaluated (Couture)," Kekalainen said. "Obviously, he has scored a lot more in his career, but Lars is a Stanley Cup champion and has had a very good career. So, you know, hindsight is easy in this business."
The Blues' next pick in the opening round was No. 24, but they decided to trade up with Calgary to No. 18 and take defenseman Ian Cole. The Blues sent the Flames a third-round pick (No. 70) to move up the six spots.
"We liked (Cole's) physical tools, puck-moving ability and competitiveness," Kekalainen said. "We moved up on him because we didn't think he would last."
Cole played 167 games in a five-year career with the Blues before being traded to Pittsburgh for Robert Bortuzzo in 2015. He won two Stanley Cup titles in Pittsburgh and has gone on to play 670 regular-season games and 110 postseason games with six teams, including Colorado, Columbus, Carolina and Minnesota.
With the No. 26 pick — the last of the Blues' three first-rounders — they took David Perron, who had been undrafted in his first year of eligibility.
"I think people probably overlooked him a little bit (in 2007) because of that," Kekalainen said. "We really liked him, (former Blues scout) Bill Armstrong and myself in particular, and we thought we could get him later in the first round. He really looked like a late bloomer that we thought had a big upside. His skill and his hockey sense was pretty evident, and his competitiveness as well."
Perron has had a memorable career with the Blues that has included three stints. He was traded to Edmonton in 2013 in a deal that gave the Blues a second-round pick in 2014, which they used on Ivan Barbashev. He came back and was then exposed in the 2017 NHL expansion draft, where he was taken by Vegas. He came back a third time in 2018 and won a Stanley Cup with the Blues in 2019.
Perron has 196 goals and 465 points in 673 regular-season games with the Blues and 22 goals and 48 assists in 77 postseason games.
Q&A with David Perron: Wearing the Blue Note, being exposed in the expansion draft and the All-Star snub https://t.co/kfE5Z2hGSC #stlblues
— Jeremy Rutherford (@jprutherford) January 9, 2020
"It shows the appreciation the organization has had for him, because otherwise you're not going to do it three times," Kekalainen said. "He's been a pretty good St Louis Blue, that's for sure."
While Perron has been the biggest contributor to the Blues of those first-rounders, you can't overlook the production of the players they received in the trades that were made. Halak provided some stability in net, winning a Jennings Trophy in 2012 alongside Brian Elliott, and Bortuzzo has been a model teammate for the past eight seasons, a stretch that included the Stanley Cup in 2019.
"You either grow with that player and he stays on your core or you trade the player for a need in other areas of your roster," Kekalainen said. "That's part of having good assets. There's going to be a demand from other teams. But if it's not a good player or not a good prospect, it's not going to happen."
So the Blues didn't end up with Kane, who has played 1,107 regular-season games with Chicago, netting 430 goals and 1,180 points. In 136 playoff games, he has 52 goals and 132 points.
As an aside, if Jackman had been involved in the Blues' offer for the No. 1 pick in 2007, could you imagine the rugged defenseman in the Blackhawks sweater taking whacks at Kane in a Blues sweater for all those years?
"Yeah, it would be odd," Tallon said. "You never know, right? You just never know."
Taking it one step further, what if the Blues had drafted Blackhawks captain Jonathan Toews No. 1 in 2006 instead of Erik Johnson? Could you imagine Kane and Toews on the Blues?
What happened in the 2007 draft wasn't the only deal like that not to materialize. But for some, it's still fun to think about.
"Yeah, there's been a lot of those," Kekalainen said. "For sure, it would have changed the landscape a lot in the whole league."
(Top photo: Jeff Curry / USA Today)
Source: https://theathletic.com/3378566/2022/07/01/patrick-kane-blues/
0 Response to "How Did Blues Get Popular in the Uk Reddit"
Post a Comment