The San Jose Sharks need a rebuild. The team’s near future looks bleak. But, three to five seasons from now, this team can get a lot of help from the draft if they hit on their early round draft selections. And for that, they’ll need general manager Doug Wilson and his team to be at their drafting best.
With that being said, is Wilson good at drafting early on? We’ll look at his picks in the first and second round and subject them to the following criterion: did he draft the best player available?
In the NHL, the ideal approach is to draft the best player available. Each position requires multiple players, and since teams are drafting 18-year-olds, players usually make their way to the NHL a few seasons after their draft. ‘Best’ will have different meanings to different general managers, but it’s proven that consistently drafting top talent will help a team enormously.
Doug Wilson Draft History
The Criterion
For my evaluation, I took a look at the player selected and judged if he was the best available in that slot compared to the following 30 selections – essentially one round of the draft. Selecting the best player is the ideal result. The second-best player available is generally good as well. The third result can be okay within certain circumstances. But if four or more players turned out better, it was a bad selection. In terms of making the best player available designation, I won’t attempt to split hairs. If players have delivered comparable careers, Wilson’s selection gets the benefit of the doubt.
Since Doug Wilson began his draft responsibilities for the Sharks with the 2003 draft, this is where we’ll begin our evaluation.
2003 (4 selections)
Milan Michalek (6th overall), Steve Bernier (16), Josh Hennessy (43), Matt Carle (47)
Michalek tore up his knee in his second NHL game and we’ll never know what sort of player he might have become. Despite this, he did have a respectable career. Bernier, however, turned in a more limited career.
A long list of players selected after Michalek had far better careers. Subsequent players include Ryan Suter, who was drafted next, Jeff Carter, and Brent Seabrook. Three of the next four picks after Bernier posted far better numbers; among them are Zach Parise, Ryan Getzlaf and Brent Burns. Several others did as well, not much further down the board, including Corey Perry, Ryan Kesler, and Loui Eriksson. In short, no, Doug Wilson wasn’t close on those picks.
The Hennessy selection doesn’t fare well either, as he barely had an NHL career. Four-time Selke Trophy-winner Patrice Bergeron was taken two spots later. Carle was taken two spots after Bergeron. While Carle had a respectable career, three, perhaps four players were better in the next 30 selections: Shea Weber, Corey Crawford, David Backes, and, arguably, goaltender Jimmy Howard.
It is safe to say in Wilson’s 2003 draft, he didn’t come close to the best player available with any of his first or second-round picks. Fortunately, Wilson’s seventh-round selection was Joe Pavelski, who was arguably a top five pick in this very deep draft class.
2004 (1 selection)
Lukas Kaspar (22)
Kaspar was a bust, managing just 16 NHL games. To put it lightly, he was not close to best player available. That said, this draft was not particularly strong and the best player among the next 30 picks is Mike Green followed by Blake Comeau. Unlike the 2003 draft, where lots of superb players went between 23rd and 52nd overall, 2004 fell in the opposite direction.
2005 (2 selections)
Devin Setoguchi (8), Marc-Edouard Vlasic (35)
Once again, Doug Wilson struck out in round one. There were a number of players who had meaningfully better careers than Setoguchi in the next 30 selections, including Tuukka Rask, T.J. Oshie, Andrew Cogliano, Matt Niskanen, and James Neal. But the draft choice just three picks after Setoguchi hurt the hardest. Anze Kopitar, a potential Hall of Famer, was and has been key to some of the worst moments in Sharks history. Vlasic is the first hit for Wilson as the best player available. The only players selected among the following 30 even in consideration are Kris Letang and Paul Stastny.
2006 (2 selections)
Ty Wishart (16), Jamie McGinn (36)
Wishart played just 26 NHL games. Wishart was not the best player available. That said, like 2004, the draft wasn’t a particularly strong one either. Several players drafted in the next 30 selections after Wishart had respectable careers, though only Claude Giroux wound up becoming an elite player. Semyon Varlamov and Nick Foligno are the next best.
McGinn was closer than Wishart, but still wound up short of expectations. Four players among the selections between 37 and 66 are better; Nikolai Kulemin, Jeff Petry, Milan Lucic, and Artem Anisimov. McGinn wasn’t the best player available, though none of the next 30 went on to achieve greatness, either.
2007 (2 selections)
Logan Couture (9), Nicholas Petrecki (28)
Couture was the best player available. Only Max Pacioretty and Ryan McDonagh are in the vicinity among those drafted in the 30 slots after Couture. And while cases could be made for either being better, it isn’t enough to overtake Couture’s career. Petrecki, on the other hand, is an interesting case. Having played just one NHL game, he clearly wasn’t the best player available. But in draft spots 29-58, only P.K. Subban has turned in a respectable career. The next best bet is probably Nick Spaling, followed by T.J. Galiardi. So, while Petrecki was a bust, the pickings were already quite slim.
2008 (0 selections)
(none)
Without any picks in 2008, the Sharks did not draft a player this season.
2009 (2 selections)
William Wrenn (43), Taylor Doherty (57)
Neither Wrenn nor Doherty ever played an NHL game. Plenty of good players were there for the taking in what proved to be a deep draft. About a dozen players taken within 30 draft spots of the two busts have turned in respectable or better careers. Among them are Reilly Smith, Tyson Barrie, and Tomas Tatar. Dmitry Orlov and Robin Lehner were selected between Wrenn and Doherty.
2010 (1 selection)
Charlie Coyle (28)
One can make a decent case for Coyle as the best player available. He never played for the Sharks, departing in the trade which landed star defenceman Brent Burns. Brock Nelson, Justin Faulk, and Tyler Toffoli are the best among the 30 draft selections following the Coyle pick. All, including Coyle, have carved out solid careers. It is hard to say any are meaningfully better than Coyle, who is perhaps the best two-way player of the group. With this in mind, Coyle has earned a best player available designation.
2011 (1 selection)
Matt Nieto (47)
Nieto has delivered a respectable career; his 500 NHL games are a testament to this. Still, this draft proved deep and three players which followed in the next 30 selections have been big-time successes; Vincent Trocheck, William Karlsson and Nikita Kucherov. A few others also exceeded Nieto’s level. Despite his solid career, he has not lived up to the names of the three players that came after him.
2012 (2 selections)
Tomas Hertl (17), Chris Tierney (55)
Hertl is close to the best. He comes in second. The selections between 17-19 have all had strong careers. Teuvo Teravainen is comparable to Hertl, but it’s hard to argue that he’s been better. The one who is better was taken 19th, Andrei Vasilevskiy, the Vezina winning netminder. Hertl comes in second. Tierney makes a strong case in his designation. He is first in games played and second in points in his draft class behind only the offensively gifted and defensively questionable Shayne Gostisbehere. Additionally, there are cases to be made for late-blooming defencemen Esa Lindell and Adam Pelech. Still, there is no strong argument that any are outright better than Tierney. Tierney was the best player available in his position.
2013 (2 selections)
Mirco Muller (18), Gabryel Boudreau (49)
No and no. That said, this was another draft class that turned pretty modest after the first 15 selections. Even so, plenty of players selected outdid Mueller in spots 19-48. Among them include, Shea Theodore, Andre Burakovsky and Jason Dickinson. Boudreau never played in the NHL, among the better players selected in the 30 draft spots after Boudreau are Jake Guentzel, Brett Pesce and Pavel Buchnevich. Wilson traded up two spots to grab Mueller. The original draft spot, 20th overall, was used to select Anthony Mantha, another player who has had a far better career than Mueller’s.
2014 (3 selections)
Nikolay Goldobin (27), Julius Bergman (46), Noah Rod (53)
Another bust class for Doug Wilson in rounds one and two, though, again, this was a draft class where genuinely good players were hard to find at the point the Sharks began drafting. Though this was not where the Sharks could have begun drafting. Kevin Labanc sits 12th in the class in points. Nine of the 11 in front of Labanc were gone by the time Goldobin was selected. Players which followed Goldobin in the draft like Adrian Kempe and Brandon Montour easily surpassed the Sharks selection. Rod and Bergman, neither of whom made it to the NHL, weren’t the best players available. One star was taken 26 slots after Rod, Brayden Point.
For the second straight draft, Wilson held the draft’s 20th overall pick. This time he traded down to the 27th spot. From the 20th to the 27th spot, five solid NHL players were selected, including a major star in David Pastrnak. So calling the early rounds of this draft a bust is fair. Calling it a self-inflicted disaster is also fair.
2015 (2 selections)
Timo Meier (9), Jeremy Roy (31)
It is hard to call Meier a bust, but other players that followed have turned out significantly better. Two players taken shortly after Meier have exploded into stars; Mikko Rantanen and Matthew Barzal. Kyle Connor, Brock Boeser, Travis Konecny, and Sebastian Aho have also outscored Meier. Defenceman Thomas Chabot is also having a fine early career. Meanwhile, Roy hasn’t made it to the NHL and likely never will. Aho, Roope Hintz, Brandon Carlo, and Vince Dunn are among those drafted within 30 spots after Roy who are having good careers.
2016 (1 selection)
Dylan Gambrell (60)
As odd as it is to say, Gambrell actually makes the cut. Only newly-crowned Norris Trophy winner Adam Fox has done more among players selected between 61 and 90. This is more a case of the bar being low than Gambrell doing much, but he is the second-best player taken in slots 60-90. Still, what most might consider a bust, actually shows up as a positive for Doug Wilson in this draft class.
2017 (2 selections)
Joshua Norris (19), Mario Ferraro (49)
It gets trickier to evaluate players here, as they are near the beginning of their careers. Norris is off to a good start, having just completed his rookie season. While others taken behind him have better numbers, it is too early to make a call. If nothing else, Norris appears among the better players available at his draft spot.
Ferraro, meanwhile, is the clear-cut best player available so far. Again, it is early and there is a chance others pass him by as time progresses. But, for now, he’s earned his best player available designation and, given his improving play, he will likely remain the best or very close to it for years to come.
2018 and Beyond
It is difficult to grade as players with few NHL seasons. Even using 2016 and 2017 was a bit of a stretch. The draft classes from 2018 and later are too early along in their careers to evaluate at this point. For the record, Ryan Merkley (2018, 21st) is the one high Sharks selection who’ll likely make his NHL debut in 2021-22. While many from his draft class have made their NHL debut, few have played consistently.
Doug Wilson Draft Summary
In all, we took a closer look at 27 first and second-round selections from 2003-2017 Best player available designations went to Vlasic, Couture, Tierney, Ferraro, and Coyle. Hertl earned a second-best player designation along with Dylan Gambrell, while Joshua Norris gets a “too soon to tell”, but he has made a strong case for himself.
Five of Wilson’s picks were the best player available and two others were pretty close to it and one is too early to tell. This means 19 failed to live up to their draft position Among the 19 who weren’t, most had at least 4-5 players who improved over time. The draft is, by nature, hit and miss. Still, getting the best player available less than 20% of the time and one of the three best players just 27% of the time is something that needs improving for the Sharks to return to success in the years ahead.
One final note: readers might notice Doug Wilson had four selections between sixth and ninth overall. The Sharks hold the seventh spot in the upcoming draft. So how did Wilson do with these selections between six and nine? He selected the best player available once (Couture), none of the other three were close.
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