“How do you think I’m going to get along without you when you’re gone, you took me for everything I had and kicked me out on my own, are you happy? are you satisfied? how long can you stand the heat? Out of the doorway the bullets rip to the sound of the beat, another one bites the dust, another one bites the dust, and another one gone, and another one gone, another one bites the dust,” are lyrics to Queen‘s classic song from 1980, Another One Bites the Dust. It hasn’t been bullets flying around the St. Paul offices of the Minnesota Wild but rather a few pink slips have been distributed at the close of the team’s 2009-10 season early this April and it makes you wonder who else may get the axe. This song is rather appropriate for the Minnesota Wild’s front office who has been doing a bit of spring cleaning the last few days. First was last week’s termination of the Houston Aeros’ Head Coach Kevin Constantine, a move that was somewhat predictable even though it may have been undeserved. However that was not the case in its next notable firing in less than a week. In a move that was long overdue, the Minnesota Wild chose not to renew the contract of Assistant General Manager Tommy Thompson on Tuesday. Thompson, who originally was the team’s Chief Scout was promoted to Assistant General Manager in the 2002-03 season and has coordinated the team’s scouting efforts ever since in an 11-year career in the State of Hockey. While Thompson did his best to bask in the glow of selections of players like Brent Burns, Cal Clutterbuck, Benoit Pouliot and James Sheppard. That’s right, he was proud of is decision to select James Sheppard and the fact he has been one of Thompson’s more successful draft selections is a big reason why the team decided to let him go.
Wild General Manager Chuck Fletcher gave Thompson the obligatory ‘thanks for all you’ve done, we wish you the best of luck in something else’ type of statement but really it was a move that should’ve happened a long time ago. Let’s take a trip down memory lane shall we? We will look draft by draft at Thompson’s ‘legacy’ to the organization that has hurt this proud franchise for many seasons. This will carry a list of how many of those selected went on to become regular NHL’ers (and their career statistics will be recorded). Players earning just a ‘cup of coffee’ will not be counted.
2003 Draft – 2 out of 9
~ Brent Burns – 373GP 38G 99A = 137pts 227 PIM’s
~ *Patrick O’Sullivan – 280GP 54G 95A = 149pts 110 PIM’s
Patrick O’Sullivan was a great 2nd round pick for the Wild who was traded away to Los Angeles in the Pavol Demitra deal before he ever played a single game for Minnesota. He has easily been the team’s most prolific scorer at the NHL level since it selected Pierre-Marc Bouchard in 2002. Danny Irmen, who was selected in the 3rd round was also selected in this draft class but has only had 2 NHL games and despite his blue collar efforts in Houston his days in the organization seem to be over. He just never was able to replicate the scoring touch he had at the college level. Brent Burns was a near miss after initially being selected as a forward, but luckily for the Wild he was an impressive athlete who could adapt and learn to become an offensively gifted defenseman. He is still honing his craft and learning when to jump into the play and when to focus on his play in Minnesota’s zone but he is still a fairly young player with a lot of upside.
2004 Draft – 1 out of 12
~ *Ryan Jones – 95GP 15G 14A = 29pts 48 PIM’s
While other players such as Peter Olvecky, Kyle Wilson and Anton Khudobin have made brief cameos so far only Ryan Jones has really managed to string together games in multiple NHL seasons. Like O’Sullivan, Ryan Jones was also traded to the Nashville Predators along with a 2nd round pick for Marek Zidlicky. Olvecky had long ‘cup of coffee’ but he’s battling in the Predators’ AHL affiliate in Milwaukee as his NHL career seems to be on standby. Clayton Stoner looks as though he has a reasonable shot to stick with the Wild next season before he sustained a groin injury that required surgery but even he has only played in 8 NHL games. Khudobin has been clawing his way up the system and looked ‘ok’ in his two NHL games earning wins in both. The real story of this draft class was the complete failure of Savage, Minnesota-native A.J. Thelen whose hockey career seemed to just steadily fall apart after the Wild selected him with the 12th Overall pick.
2005 Draft – 1 out of 7
~ *Benoit Pouliot – 104GP 24G 18A = 42pts 61 PIM’s
Minnesota had to have felt it lucked out big time by beating the odds in the NHL draft lottery and earned the 4th Overall pick. Yet the Wild’s selection , Benoit Pouliot, the second highest selection in franchise history was dangerously close to being an enigmatic bust until Minnesota managed to trade the unhappy and at times disinterested forward to Montreal for Guillaume Latendresse about a quarter of the way through the 2009-10 season. If it wasn’t for that trade that ended up working out rather well for both players involved allowed Minnesota to escape as Pouliot’s value had fallen considerably and he wasn’t even close to showing the modest scoring touch he had in the Ontario Hockey League. A 4th Overall pick should be a franchise cornerstone and it nearly became another ugly anecdote for Minnesota’s drafting ineptitude. Making matters worse the Wild have had little to no return with the other 6 six selections from that draft. Big enforcer Matt Kassian selected in the 2nd round, 57th Overall was a huge mistake (no pun intended) as the role of such players have been greatly reduced in the ‘new’ NHL.
2006 – 2 out of 7
~ James Sheppard – 224GP 11G 38A = 49pts 108 PIM’s
~ Cal Clutterbuck – 154GP 24G 15A = 39pts 128 PIM’s
The same year the Wild first chose to really take a dive into free agency to become a perennial playoff team, it traded its most promising forward Patrick O’Sullivan to Los Angeles along with a 1st round pick it had acquired the season before from Edmonton (for Dwayne Roloson) Pavol Demitra. Minnesota’s other 1st round pick that draft was James Sheppard, the alleged solid two-way forward with size 15 skates. Even Wild Head Coach Jacques Lemaire gave a ‘thumbs up’ to the selection at the time but what a difference a few seasons makes as Sheppard finished this season with just 2 goals and 5 points in almost 50 games played. Hardly good value for a player selected 9th Overall. Luckily the Wild managed to pick the hard charging Cal Clutterbuck in the 3rd round otherwise this could’ve been another complete draft class disaster. Clutterbuck is the hitting machine this organization always missed and has provided a level of agitation to a team normally known for its more calm and collected attitude. The rest of the draft class was dismal, especially tough was the failure of Ondrej Fiala who was not even awarded with a pro contract and is back playing in his native Czech Republic. No doubt Wild fans would give a collective ‘thumbs down’ to both Sheppard’s selection as well as most of this draft class.
2007 – 1 out of 5
~ Colton Gillies
I really debated as to whether I should count Colton Gillies as a success for his limited stint in the NHL last season. The player whom the Wild traded a 2nd round pick in order to select him 16th Overall has not morphed into the swift and rangy power forward but instead looks as though he’ll turn out to be a serviceable player on the 3rd or 4th line. Not exactly a good value for what Minnesota gave up to move up a few spots in the draft. Cody Almond and Justin Falk along with Gillies may turn this into the most successful Wild draft by the proportion of its serviceable NHL selections since both Almond and Falk got brief looks this season. Yet neither established themselves as being completely NHL-ready. Almond projects as another checking forward with some possible scoring ability and Falk looks to be a big, mobile stay at home blueliner. Neither will be true diamonds in the rough but they may someday be able to fill out the team’s depth over time which makes this draft look relatively successful compared to some of the other Wild’s debacles on draft day.
2008 – Too early to tell (4 selections)
It may seem unfair to pick on this draft but there are some concerns looming about the progress of 1st round selection (23rd Overall) Tyler Cuma, another draft where Minnesota moved up to make its pick as this time it surrendered a 3rd round pick to move up just one spot. Cuma would hurt his knee at the Team Canada (who went on to win a gold medal in his hometown) tryout camp and it has been rough going ever since. This season Cuma was passed over by Team Canada for this year’s U-20 squad and then had another mundane season with the Ottawa 67’s. If there is a saving grace it will likely be the 2nd round pick Marco Scandella who has been pegged by many to be the Wild’s top prospect not playing with the big club. Big, poised with great two way ability and he helped anchor Team Canada’s top defensive pair looks to be a solid selection (55th Overall) and perhaps a future Top 4 defenseman for Minnesota. Yet its not quite as shining for picks Sean Lorenz who has been a 3rd pair defenseman on a struggling Notre Dame (CCHA) squad and Eero Elo doesn’t look to be interested in coming to North America anytime soon.
2009 – Too early to tell (8 selections)
In a bit of a transition from the previous two drafts where Minnesota traded up to get a specific player. This time the Wild traded down once, taking a 3rd round pick to move back to 16th where many felt they may trade down again. Minnesota decided their targeted player may be taken, 2009 ‘Mr. Hockey’ Eden Prairie’s Nick Leddy. The Wild would add some intrigue to this draft class by the fact Minnesota would deal away two of its picks, 4th round pick (116th Overall) Alexander Fallstrom and Nick Leddy to Boston and Chicago respectively. Was Leddy’s quick departure from the club the result of his milquetoast play with the University of Minnesota. No one is saying anything publically so far but it was hard not to notice how much he struggled this season for being such a highly touted player. Luckily for Minnesota the Wild may have gotten a steal in 3rd round selection (77th Overall) Matthew Hackett who looks to be a blue chip goaltending prospect after another solid season for Plymouth. The rest of the picks don’t give you a lot of hope, other than the team’s 7th round pick Erik Haula who has been tremendous for Omaha of the USHL.
So there is your trip through the past and the results would not impress anyone. 7 out of 40 picks not counting the 2008 and 2009 draft. That is a 17.5% success rate. However this may shock you to learn that Tommy Thompson is not packing his bags just yet, he’s actually scouting a tournament in Russia right now for the Wild. At the very least you have to hand it to his professionalism since most people would hardly stick around after someone told them their services are no longer needed. In what I think is a must read for any Wild fan, Thompson gives very candid and honest answers about what transpired that led to him not really wishing to come back even as the team planned not to renew his contract. Read it for yourself and I have to admit it has changed my mind about him.
http://www.startribune.com/blogs/57299562.html
For the first time it was revealed that the disintigration of Minnesota’s 2nd round pick from 2004 (42nd Overall) Roman Voloshenko from a guy who looked to be on the cusp of something great before abruptly falling off the Wild’s radar was due to substance abuse perhaps encouraged by a member of the Houston Aeros during the 2005-06 season. Who that was Thompson did not say but you could speculate based on his production that season; perhaps fellow Russian Andrei Nazarov who was a very expensive healthy scratch sine Minnesota foolishy signed the 6’6″ goonish winger to a $1,000,000 one way contract. Nazarov certainly would’ve seemed like a cultural island for Voloshenko who had made his first prolonged stint in North America and since neither the Wild or the Aeros were very interested in playing him as they both played him in just one game each. When you consider it was Nazarov who later made the accusation that 90% of the league was using performance enhancing drugs it is hardly out of question to make the leap that Nazarov may have been wishing to cover up his own drug use and considering the cultural and language connection perhaps influenced Voloshenko to take a dark path that ultimately destroyed his potential NHL career. Thompson stated that he felt that everyone should’ve stepped in to stop that but for whatever reason they did not and the skilled sniper self destructed.
In a less disturbing story was Thompson’s recollections about another failed 2nd round pick in Ondrej Fiala (40th Overall) who suffered 3 terrible knee injuries that basically forced him out of North America as his game was just never the same. So while Thompson certainly deserves some criticism, especially when you hear how he mentions his lack of homework on A.J. Thelen he also suffered a degree of bad luck as well. He certainly owed up to his failures in the interview but I still feel he showed too much loyalty to James Sheppard who by all accounts has been a complete bust.
Perhaps the biggest surprise was the fact Thompson said he was looking to leave Minnesota as he felt the change of “culture” in the organization was such that he didn’t want to be a part of it anymore. What those changes could be would again be speculation as he did not identify what those changes were. The Wild now will move on without Thompson as it readies itself for the 2010 Entry Draft, one where it hopes to take full advantage of having four selections in the first 70 players taken. While I must now tip my cap to Thompson and wish him the best of luck, I hope his departure brings some good luck to Minnesota’s drafting ability!
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