The timelines of the rebuilding NHL teams
Several teams in the NHL are currently, what would be called, a rebuilder. This means they are more interested in acquiring picks and prospects and then developing those players into the NHL, than straightforwardly trying to build a team which would contend from the Stanley Cup right now.
The rebuilding teams are of course in different stages in their respected rebuilds. Some are already turning the corner, some are shoving promise and some can’t get out of the basement at all. In this post I will be looking at the timelines of these rebuilds, how a team has done standings wise in the last six regular seasons, how are they going about their rebuild, what they are doing well and where they have something to improve and what is the outline for the future for the teams in question. The Maple Leafs are up first.
Toronto Maple Leafs
The Maple Leafs rise trough the ranks has been nothing short of meteoropic. After finishing dead last in 2015–2016, they have since landed at 14th and at 6th in the following years, respectively. It is exactly how they wanted to execute the “shanaplan” in the first place. The idea was to rip the band-aid of quickly, finish as low as they can in 2016 and gain respectability soon after that.
The last place finish brought them Auston Matthews, which explains some of the quick rise, but importance must also be placed on the other moves they made. William Nylander and Mitch Marner were mostly kept out of the NHL in the 2014–15 season; they were cooked overripe in a good sense. In 2016–17 they were key difference makers in the league. In the 2016 offseason the Leafs also acquired Frederik Andersen to replace the struggled Jonathan Bernier, which worked out wonderfully for the team.
The Leafs rebuild has been quick and effective. They have put themselves in favorable drafting positions and have hit on their top picks. The visit to the bottom of the league was planned, it was controlled and it was designed to be quick; the Leafs had no intention of spending several years dwelling at the bottom. The Leafs management has been in control throughout the process. How the Leafs have completed their rebuild should become the new formula for rebuild crafting.
Winnipeg Jets
Compared to the Leafs, the Jet’s ‘build has been on the patient side. It could have been said to have started in 2010 when the organisation moved to Winnipeg from Atlanta. Between that date and the current year, the team has mostly been middling between positions of 15 to 25. They have focused on building their prospect pool throughout that time rather than focusing on the success on the ice.
Finally, it seems like the approach is starting to pay of. The Jets, who are loaded on top talents like Mark Scheifele, Blake Wheeler, Patrik Laine, Nik Ehlers, Connor Hellebuyck, Jacob Trouba and Kyle Connor, have risen to the long-awaited position of a Stanley Cup contender. The rise was quick when it happened: an incredible 18 positions from one season to another, the Jets only got beat by the Nashville Predators in the regular season and they then went on to eliminate the preds in the playoffs.
When the GM Kevin Cheveldayoff came on board at the same time as the team moved, his strategy was for a longer term rebuild. In spite of some resistance from the media and the fan base, who started to grow impatient when Cheveldayoff signed an contract extension in 2016 despite having little to show for, he stayed true to his approach and never wavered from it, and now he is reaping in the benefits. The Jets have maybe the most impressive collection of young, talented players and they are set for the next 15 years.
Columbus Blue Jackets
A graph resembling the Leafs, the difference between them and the Blue Jackets is that, for them, the fall 2015–16 was far from controlled. The season was lost essentially after nine games when the team went 0–8–1 and successively replaced Todd Richards with John Tortorella. However, the silver lining in that season was a high pick which was used — with some controversy at the time — to select Pierre-Luc Dubois.
He wasn’t the main cause for the rise that happened in the following season, although he would become a stable in the following season. That honor will go to Zach Werenski, who was the high pick of 2015, and his defense partner Seth Jones, who was brought in by trade. The Blue Jackets couldn’t ultimately sustain their lofty season, but the future is nevertheless bright for this team.
The management group in Columbus has done well in both drafting as well as trades (the Artemi Panarin deal stands alongside the Jones trade) and as a result the organisation has more potential than it ever has during it’s existence. However, it is true to say that the talent level falls short when compared to what Toronto or Winnipeg are boasting with, or that the team still hasn’t won a playoff series in it’s existence, but it has to be kept in mind that with a good number of young studs on board, the foundation for success has never been better for this organisation.
Florida Panthers
The current rebuild for the Panthers effectively started in 2010 when Dale Tallon came on board. Since then the prospects of success have grown, but as of yeat they’ve been in the waiting. Tallon has successfully drafted Aleksander Barkov, Aaron Ekblad and Jonathan Huberdeau, who should one day be the core of this team.
The moment seemed to have been in 2016 when the Panthers set the franchise record for the best regular season in their history. But the judgement was passed too soon and In the following season the Panthers where once again where they started at. The reasons for the tumbling are worthy of a post of their own, but in short it came down to the back-and-forth shifting of the management, some injuries and some BDO-regressing-to-the-mean-stuff. The season was topped off when the management botched the expansion draft losing two top-6 forwards in the process.
Mistakes have been made, but the future should hold a sunrise from the horizon for the wildcats; Barkov, Eklblad and Huberdeau haven’t gone anywhere, they’re burden to carry is just bigger thanks to the moves by the management. The process that started in 2010 is still ongoing, it took a hit in between and then it will hopefully take another upswing in the future as the Panthers are marching on. They would be further in the said process without the mistakes, however.
Edmonton Oilers
For the Edmonton Oilers the route to success is fairly straightforward. there are only two obstacles that stand in their way. Firstly, they’re ability to develop players needs to be improved as it has been sub-par for the last 15 or so years. When your only notable findings besides the first round in the 21st century are Jeff Petry and Oscar Klefbom you know you could have done better. Things aren’t much better in the first round. The Oilers have had the questionable honor being a beneficiary of the draft lottery, but they also had the reputation for not developing those picks properly. Out of these top picks Nail Yakupov flopped completely, Ryan Hugent-Hopkings and Jordan Eberle turned out to be good players, but neither reached the expectations of the first pick. Only Taylor Hall and Connor McDavid (who would have develop into a hockey player even in Western Sahara) have arguably been worthy of the hype that surrounded them. Out of these players Yakupov, Eberle and Hall no longer play for the Oilers, which gets us to the second problem: Peter Schiarelli.
Looking his moves from an outsiders perspective, they seem, not baffling, but as an outright attempt to ruin the organisation from within. He traded Hall, a 30 goal scorer on a average year, to a second pairing defenseman, and he traded Eberle, a 25-goal scorer on an average year, to a third line forward. The justification for the Hall trade was that the Oilers needed defense, which is fair, but making that trade is like cutting of your legs in order to pick a dime from the ground. It works for sure, there’s no denying that, but there might be a further usage for those legs, you know. The justification for the Eberle trade was that he isn’t worth 6 million per season. Again, that may be the case, but neither is Milan Lucic and that deal goes on for some time.
Combining these two issues it is hard for me to say that the future is bright, but there is the Connor McDavid effect fueling the hopes up. I don’t think the Stanley Cup will grace the northern cold of Edmonton as long as Chiarelli is the GM and the player growth is this disastrous, but McDavid’s presence will necessitate some level of success for this franchise. So here’s to another decade of darkness, this one filled with optimism.
Carolina Hurricanes
The Carolina Hurricanes have been in the process of rebuilding for a while, but they haven’t been able to reap the benefits as of yeat. They are the first team featured that hasn’t made the playoffs in the covered period. Last time they made the playoffs was in 2009 when the team was lead by Eric Staal, Ray Whitney and Joni Pitkänen.
Since their lineup has gotten considerably different and considerably younger. Players like Sebastian Aho, Teuvo Teräväinen, Noah Hanifin and Jacob Slavin have been (mostly) drafted and developed by the Hurricanes. Besides them they have a bunch of other promising players in the pipelines.
The drafting and developing has been solid, but where the organisation has failed is finding players with true top tier potential. This separates them from teams like Toronto and Winnipeg who can rely on Auston Matthews and Patrik Laine to fill that slot for them. Carolina has a good number of good players, but until they can find a difference maker of Matthews’ or Laine’s caliber, they will be behind teams who have that need filled.
The Hurricanes have showed patience in their rebuild, but that might be changing with the new owner in Tom Dundon stepping on and with the announcement that everyone on the roster, apart from Sebastian Aho, is available. Personally, I think the timing’s off. Growing prospects into competent NHL players takes time and patience; selling those good young players for a quick 20 is hardly what they need. There is now shortcut to becoming a Stanley Cup champion. It may not be what the Hurricanes fans and their management want to hear, but the patient approach must continue. As of right now the future for the Hurricanes is unsure from both the upstairs as well as the ice surface.
Arizona Coyotes
For a team that is supposed to start turning things around, things aren’t moving in the right direction for the Arizona Coyotes. After miraculous run to the conference finals in 2011, the Coyotes have been on a downhill ever since. In 2013–14 they were still putting up respectable numbers, but in the next season they found themselves back at the bottom and the fan base has been waiting for something to grab onto ever since.
The ‘Yotes ownership got tired of waiting around and brought in a new GM John Chayka in 2016. He was heralded as a progressive thinker, someone who could turn the ship around in Arizona. Indeed, Chayka has made some savvy moves like acquiring Antti Raanta and Niklas Hjalmarsson, but the takeoff hasn’t happened as of yeat.
The problem may run deeper in the organisation. For the longest of time the prospect core has been considered as one of the better in the NHL, but the results haven’t followed. Many old prospects have had trouble either inserting themselves into the NHL lineup or producing in an NHL role. In a similar situation with the Oilers, making it out bottom is next to impossible when you can’t make your draft picks into producers. If there is one thing that the Arizona coyotes graph seems to suggest is that the longer you spent dwelling at the bottom the harder it is to climb back up again. The problems in the organisation seem to become more stickier by every losing season.
Buffalo Sabres
You can tell the same of the Buffalo Sabres. Arguably the most unsuccessful organisation in the last few seasons, they have more than enough experience of finishing low. In a league where parity is at an all-time high, finishing last in 3 out of the last 5 seasons, which the Sabres achieved, is generally hard to do. When your highest finish in the last 6 years in 22nd, you start to slowly create the culture of losing.
It is starting to show: reports of misbehaving players, players losing their passion to the game and and angry GMs are coming out of the city of Buffalo.
Besides these problems they also suffer from the bad player development disease; many a player who where expected to become greats became either complete flops (Mikhail Grigorenko) or are seriously underachieving (Sam Reinhart, Joel Armia).
If success breeds success and losing breeds losing then the Sabres are in for a long haul. If the new GM Jason Botterill turns it around it will equal any magic tricks that Criss Angel can pull off. In any case, success seems to be far away for this organisation.