Something to cheer us all up!

by Cmen on Aug 19, 2010 6:15 PM EDT

Okay so we all know how amazing the NHL 2003 Entry Draft was. Infact it is arguably the best draft of all time, but without a doubt top three. It featured many of the superstars we see and cheer for today, incuding our pride and joy Mr. Devil, Zach Parise. Other names only in the first round mind you include: Eric Stall at #2, Thomas Vanek at #5, Getzalf at #19, Mike Richards at #24, and well... you get the point. Infact 29 out of the 30 players picked from that first round have gone on to at least make the NHL at some point, i dont know about you but that is just a completely insane number to fathom. 29/30 just never happens, its a good draft if more than a third of the players go on to long careers in the NHL.

So i did a little digging to find out a little more about that 1 person who still has yet to crack an NHL line up, and thanks to ol' reliable WIKI i was able to do that. His name is Hugh Jessiman, drafted in the first round, 12th overall, by the New York Rangers and is currently the only first round pick from 2003 to not play in an NHL game. The ONLY one to not play, how crazy is that, by the NYRangers mind you!!!

As soon as i found that out i was almost crying of laughter, i had to text my younger brother immediately and this was his response.

"Lmao...damn hahahahahahahahahahaha"

"Rangers suck hahahahaha"

Oh and come to think about it we were celebrating our last stanley cup that year also, talk about pouring salt in the wounds. But okay the fun is over........lets sign kovy, and make the moves necessary to get under the cap this year so we can win #4 in style baby. Looking forward to seeing you guys at the rock.

Poll

On a side note i was just wondering which player not named Zach Parise from 2003 would you guys have drafted, NOW that we know these names a lot better and know what they can do.

Eric Staal

44 votes

Thomas Vanek

6 votes

Jeff Carter

14 votes

Ryan Getzlaf

49 votes

Mike Richards

21 votes

Brent Seabrook

10 votes

Hugh Jessiman

6 votes

150 votes | Poll has closed

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Comments

No offense, but you do realize that this is common knowledge to us all (that we know Jessiman’s a failure)?

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by Kevin Sellathamby on Aug 19, 2010 7:15 PM EDT reply actions

But it’s always fun knocking the Rags.

Go Devils
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by FrankG929 on Aug 19, 2010 10:45 PM EDT up reply actions

no offense taken, but like FrankG929 said…..its always fun knocking on the Rags. This post was really meant for the casual fans, and this is only like my second fan post so ill leave the real talk for the big boys i guess.

by Cmen on Aug 20, 2010 3:36 AM EDT up reply actions

FWIW, there’s still a chance the number becomes 30 of 30 this year. Jessiman signed a deal with the ’Hawks.

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by George E. Ays on Aug 20, 2010 3:00 PM EDT up reply actions

Guys warming up to Mcilrath yet? To bad Fowler or Gormely wasn’t available… Oh wait.

Mathew Barnaby to Lyle Odelein: "Cornelius, as we like to call him, gets under your skin. Planet of the Apes. Look at him. Seriously. He looks like Cornelious."

Odelein to Barnaby: "He should take a look at his wife. She's God-awful to look at."

by RolliePollieKovy on Aug 20, 2010 3:49 PM EDT up reply actions

McIlrath’s allegedly got a 90+ slapshot and spent the 2nd half of last year learning how to use it on the PP. I think the fan base is generally excited for the kid.

For whatever reason, fans want guys that hit stuff, and lots of them if possible. So I’m going to guess that McIllrath will be quite endearing to the Rangers’ fanbase. And FWIW, Fowler/Gormley haven’t done a thing yet either, so it’s hard to go too nuts about who they passed on now. It’s entirely possible one of them becomes the version of “how the heck did Tyler Myers fall to 12th?” scenarios, but it’s also possible they both fizzle out quickly.

Beauty of the draft, you don’t know until you know.

Camp Tortorella - Where Vomit is a Mainstay
Blueshirt Banter - "ARISTH"-Assuming Redden is sent to Hartford
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by George E. Ays on Aug 20, 2010 6:51 PM EDT up reply actions

I see

But Fowler I think will be much better then Dylan. I know that he hits hard and stuff but I just like Fowler’s game. Hey you never know. He could turn out to be another Chara.

Mathew Barnaby to Lyle Odelein: "Cornelius, as we like to call him, gets under your skin. Planet of the Apes. Look at him. Seriously. He looks like Cornelious."

Odelein to Barnaby: "He should take a look at his wife. She's God-awful to look at."

by RolliePollieKovy on Aug 20, 2010 7:09 PM EDT up reply actions

Another quality draft by the Rags :P I still remember how shocked I was when Parise was still available when it got to the Devils’ pick. We lucked out, thanks to the Isles passing on him XD

If I had to pick another player other than Parise I would have taken Getzlaf. Big guy with great hands and the brain to learn any system. Definitely would have helped our powerplay, but so does Parise so I still think we won out on that whole year’s draft.

by njdss4 on Aug 19, 2010 11:21 PM EDT reply actions

With one pick, yeah. But ANA got two guys in Perry and Getzlaf, Philly got Richards and Carter, and I think NSH got Suter and Weber but not sure.

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by red army line on Aug 20, 2010 5:06 AM EDT up reply actions

We got Parise and ????. Well now I’m kind of sad.

Mathew Barnaby to Lyle Odelein: "Cornelius, as we like to call him, gets under your skin. Planet of the Apes. Look at him. Seriously. He looks like Cornelious."

Odelein to Barnaby: "He should take a look at his wife. She's God-awful to look at."

by RolliePollieKovy on Aug 20, 2010 7:44 AM EDT up reply actions

and ????

The Devils 2003 draft.

The less said about the group after Zach Parise, the better. Considering we won the Cup that year, we ought to be happy with what we had. We also need to give a word of thanks to St. Louis, whose foibles (the Scott Stevens/FedEx/tampering thing) allowed us to maneuver to get Parise. If I recall correctly, we had swapped first-rounders (up to #22) as part of the tampering settlement, and then Lou jumped up from 22 to 17 when Parise was still on the board.

by acasser on Aug 20, 2010 8:45 AM EDT up reply actions

Thanks to Edmonton too.

Mathew Barnaby to Lyle Odelein: "Cornelius, as we like to call him, gets under your skin. Planet of the Apes. Look at him. Seriously. He looks like Cornelious."

Odelein to Barnaby: "He should take a look at his wife. She's God-awful to look at."

by RolliePollieKovy on Aug 20, 2010 1:31 PM EDT up reply actions

But thanks most of all to the NY Islanders, who allowed Parise to still be available. They were reportedly interested in him, but wound up taking Robert Nilsson, oh the stud he turned out to be.

Yankees in baseball, Giants in football and Devils in hockey. It's that simple. I have no off-season.

by DownGoesAvery on Aug 22, 2010 9:45 AM EDT up reply actions

Not all Sunshine and Daffodils

Pittsburgh went with Marc-Andre Fleury at #1. Not a bad pick, but perhaps they would have gotten more out of some of the other guys available.

Los Angeles drafted Brian Boyle (26) and Jeff Tambellini (27). The jury is still out on both of them, but early returns are not encouraging, especially when you consider that Corey Perry was the 28th pick.

I don’t recall how Philadelphia got their second first-round pick that year. Anyone have some enlightenment as to what they gave up to nab it?

by acasser on Aug 20, 2010 8:43 AM EDT up reply actions

From SI.com

Philadelphia traded C Daymond Langkow to Phoenix for Phoenix’s second-round pick in the 2002 Entry Draft (pick later traded by Philadelphia) and first-round pick in the 2003 Entry Draft (July 2, 2001).

Turned out to be the 11th pick, which they used to draft Carter.

Playing Devils' advocate since 1982.

by elesias on Aug 20, 2010 8:58 AM EDT up reply actions

Wow. Philly really worked that out.

Mathew Barnaby to Lyle Odelein: "Cornelius, as we like to call him, gets under your skin. Planet of the Apes. Look at him. Seriously. He looks like Cornelious."

Odelein to Barnaby: "He should take a look at his wife. She's God-awful to look at."

by RolliePollieKovy on Aug 20, 2010 1:32 PM EDT up reply actions

Caps got Eric Fehr, who’s a solid player but ain’t no stud like some of the others.

by red army line on Aug 20, 2010 9:23 AM EDT up reply actions

When your signature becomes an advertisement that is longer than your post, you might want to rethink it.

Playing Devils' advocate since 1982.

by elesias on Aug 20, 2010 9:29 AM EDT up reply actions

As soon as the season gets underway, I should have something new. I used to have parodies of Milbury’s Crosby is Ovechkin’s daddy now, but those are kind of outdated now.

by red army line on Aug 20, 2010 1:30 PM EDT up reply actions

I wonder if ILWT could take some ad space up there…

In Lou We Trust: Continuing a saga no one really cares about
"Pfft, Wii’s where it’s at. *Swings toy plastic racquet, separates shoulder"- RudyKelly

by Kevin Sellathamby on Aug 22, 2010 8:48 PM EDT up reply actions

Doubtful, he’s got everything covered: content, numbers, craziness, humor, discussion, bravery and a catch-all, even if a few of them are mislabeled. What’s left?

If you want exposure, just tweak your signature to be even more of an advertisement and post at every SBN site you can find on every thread that is in any way at all even tangentially related to the Devils with something that may or may not actually add to the thread but is sure to mention the team or one of its players and, boom, instant commercial.

Playing Devils' advocate since 1982.

by elesias on Aug 23, 2010 8:26 AM EDT up reply actions

The Rangers never draft well. They don’t have to. They sign free agents, they make trades, that’s how they roll. They play in NYC, they NEED to ice superstars.

Although Callahan, Dubinsky, etc. have been drafted in later rounds by the Rangers, take a look at their first round picks since 2000:

2000: no first round pick
2001: 10th overall – goaltender Dan Blackburn (played 63 NHL games…all with NYR), PASSED UP ON: Dan Hamhuis, Colby Armstrong, Dave Steckel, Derek Roy, Mike Cammalleri
2002: no first round pick
2003: 12th overall – Hugh Jessiman, PASSED UP: Dustin Brown, Brent Seabrook, Zach Parise, Ryan Getzlaf, Ryan Kesler, Mike Richards, Corey Perry
2004: 6th overall – Al Montoya, 19th overall – Lauri Korprikovski PASSED UP: Travis Zajac, Wojtek Wolski, Andrej Meszaros, Mike Green
2005: 12th overall – Marc Staal (not a bad pick) PASSED UP: Martin Hanzal, T.J. Oshie, Steve Downie
2006: 21st overall – Bobby Sanguinetti (still developing, looks promising) but they passed up Claude Giroux and other NHLers
2007: 17th overall – Alexei Cherepanov (we know the tragedy of this guy)
2008: 20th overall – Michael Del Zotto (not a bad pick, but they could have had John Carlson or Jordan Eberle, who appear to be stars in the making)

Yankees in baseball, Giants in football and Devils in hockey. It's that simple. I have no off-season.

by DownGoesAvery on Aug 20, 2010 4:17 PM EDT reply actions

2006: 21st overall – Bobby Sanguinetti (still developing, looks promising)

Now a proud member of the Carolina Hurricanes, in return for a 2nd-round pick (2011) and a 6th-round pick (2010). Unless those picks turn into something good, this is another wasted pick.

by acasser on Aug 20, 2010 4:57 PM EDT up reply actions

But do you really think the Rangers knew they would have drafted that bad? I mean there has to be a reason why they took Jessiman. And back then you didn’t know who would turn out well. And I would rather have Del Zotto then Carlson . Eberle is tough though. Cherepanov was supposedly really good. To bad he passed but I would have enjoyed watching him play. The Rangers have had good first rounds the past few years. Blackburn was the next starter in NY but he had a bad injury and was forced to retire. They turned that into Lundqvist. I never thought Sangy was good. He was in the NHL a few times and never saw him turn out to be what Ranger fans were talking about. But do you think the Devils knew Parise would be an all-star and a 40 goal scorer and the best American born player since Modano? I don’t think so.

Mathew Barnaby to Lyle Odelein: "Cornelius, as we like to call him, gets under your skin. Planet of the Apes. Look at him. Seriously. He looks like Cornelious."

Odelein to Barnaby: "He should take a look at his wife. She's God-awful to look at."

by RolliePollieKovy on Aug 20, 2010 5:10 PM EDT up reply actions

In our defense.

The Devs track record isn’t exactly sparkling. Parise obviously is a monster win, and I happen to love Zajac (as much as one can love someone from your franchise at least). Bergfors looks like a stud too..but what do the Devs have to show for 9 years of drafting besides those 3 guys? Mark Fraser and Vlad Zharkov?

I know you have Josefson and Tedenby from recent drafts (plus undoubtedly other prospects your giddy about I don’t know of), but we have a veritable army of guys from the last 3 drafts who are going to force Sather to stop spending money (we hope) so that they have roster spots waiting.

Also while our firsts have been sketchy (at least pre-Gordie Clark in 2007), we’ve at least pulled some NHLers out of the later rounds.

2002: Prucha (8th round, 30 goal rookie at least, and still servicable NHLer)
2003: Dawes (5th, decent 3rd liner)
2004: Dubinsky (2nd), Callahan (4th)
2006: Anisimov (2nd)

The list also leaves out 2009: Chris Kreider, who might be the best of the list. Yeah, the Cherepanov untimely death was unfortunate, else the last 4 drafts would’ve been good, at least right now. I mean, it’s also a bit unfair to say Marc Staal: passed up TJ Oshie. Please. Staal’s one of the best shutdown d-men in the league at 23, I don’t care who we passed up, that’s a win. I would under no circumstance trade Staal for Oshie, nor do I think many people would, not only Rangers fans.

It’s like saying 2006: Pittsburgh takes Jordan Staal: Passed on Jonathan Toews, Nicklas Backstrom. Big deal, they didn’t whiff. Would Pittsburgh be disgusting with Crosby-Toews-Malkin? Sure…but I don’t think they regret taking Staal, who is cheaper and highly underrated.

Lastly, I love MDZ, but Carlson might be ridiculous in the league. It’s too early to make that call. It’s still the same argument though, the Rangers didn’t whiff on MDZ. You can play woulda coulda shoulda all day, as long as you don’t get Jessiman’s, you can’t regret things like that.

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by George E. Ays on Aug 20, 2010 6:43 PM EDT up reply actions

We’ll see when everyone retires and come back and laugh. Only 25 more years!

Mathew Barnaby to Lyle Odelein: "Cornelius, as we like to call him, gets under your skin. Planet of the Apes. Look at him. Seriously. He looks like Cornelious."

Odelein to Barnaby: "He should take a look at his wife. She's God-awful to look at."

by RolliePollieKovy on Aug 20, 2010 6:51 PM EDT up reply actions

Ha…basically what I just wrote above. Nobody knows. Zajac could forget how to play tomorrow, Nick Palmieri could wake up one morning and set the world on fire.

I understand the novelty of the Rangers’ epic fail in 2003, it is rare to have something that awesome, I’m not trying to begrudge anyone from taking part in that fun. Heck, we make fun of it as much as anything (even part of our draft week slogan at the Banter). When you look at how many 1st round fails exist though, you get over it fairly quickly, if you’re rational.

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by George E. Ays on Aug 20, 2010 7:00 PM EDT up reply actions

You just can’t afford to throw away so many first round picks. I know the Devils haven’t always been spectacular in the first round, but the Devils are the team making the playoffs regularly. The Rangers have missed the playoffs seven times – including last year – since the last time the Devils missed them.

Yankees in baseball, Giants in football and Devils in hockey. It's that simple. I have no off-season.

by DownGoesAvery on Aug 20, 2010 7:42 PM EDT up reply actions

13 years ago

Woo!

Mathew Barnaby to Lyle Odelein: "Cornelius, as we like to call him, gets under your skin. Planet of the Apes. Look at him. Seriously. He looks like Cornelious."

Odelein to Barnaby: "He should take a look at his wife. She's God-awful to look at."

by RolliePollieKovy on Aug 20, 2010 7:50 PM EDT up reply actions

8 times actually.

And yes, I certainly am not pleased with the draft results pre-Clark, the Rangers would be a much better team with Brown, Wolski, and Hemsky (though I can’t kill Blackburn too much, he made the NHL as an 18 y.o. goaltender and then his shoulder failed him, while it is still a fail, it’s unlucky)

Just saying that 1st round picks are not the only thing that matters when evaluating a draft. We have some kids here with Dubinsky (24), Anisimov (22), Stepan (20), Werek (19), that were all 2nd rounders. Plus, I can’t emphasize the “Pre-Gordie Clark” thing enough, since he took over the Rangers drafting in 2007, he so far seems to have not only hit his 1st rounders, but his 2nds and 3rds as well (final results pending).

So to say we “never draft well” would seem to me to be wrong, as we’ve gotten an NHL player out of every draft since 1997, just zero superstars to date. (mostly 3rd liners and 2nd pair defenseman). Though we could just be arguing over what “drafting well” really means, in which case it’s a matter of opinion that neither of us will likely budge on.

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by George E. Ays on Aug 20, 2010 8:42 PM EDT up reply actions

The jury is still out

The rule of thumb I see from a lot of sports writers and commentators (all sports, all stripes) is that you need five years before you can really judge a trade or a draft…. and in sports like the NHL and MLB where draftees often need a few years in the Minors before they get to the league, the timeframe on judging a draft ought to be even longer.

I wouldn’t go overboard talking about how wonderful Gordie Clark’s drafts have been…. yet. For example…. if you look at the 1st round of the 2007 draft, we haven’t seen a whole lot out of that group yet and can’t really judge them. Sure, Patrick Kane is a star in this league, while both James van Riemsdyk and Brandon Sutter both look like the real deal…. but how many of those guys haven’t made the NHL yet, and how many never will? Same goes for the lower rounds. Come back to this discussion with fresh eyes in three or four years, and we’ll all have different perspectives.

by acasser on Aug 20, 2010 9:38 PM EDT up reply actions

Fair enough.

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by George E. Ays on Aug 20, 2010 10:00 PM EDT up reply actions

2007 was weak for defensemen. I think Karl Alzner has played more games than the rest of that group combined and Alzner hasn’t even played a full season yet.