More Draft Stuff

When the TV lights go off. Tampa Bay drafted Steven Stamkos #1, then didn’t have another pick until #117 in the fourth round. But they might have had the classiest pick of all – David Carle in the seventh round. Carle, brother of San Jose defenseman Matt Carle and ranked 60^th among North American skaters by Central Scouting, circulated a letter on the eve of the draft to all 30 teams informing them that he was withdrawing from the draft because he had been diagnosed with hypertrophic cardiomyopathy, a heart ailment discovered by doctors during testing for the NHL combine last month. One of the new owners of the Lightning – Oren Koules, who is acquainted with the Carle family – said, "The kid worked his whole life to be drafted in the NHL, and I didn't see a reason he shouldn't be." David and Matt thus become the only brothers from Alaska drafted into the NHL. It was a nice gesture on the part of Koules and the Lightning.

“Mr. Irrelevant.” It is a title that stems, by and large, from the history of the NFL draft and applies to the very last player drafted, who often has very long odds of making the team that drafted him. This weekend, the NHL’s “Mr. Irrelevant” is a forward from Sweden – Jesper Samuelsson. Samuelsson (not ranked by Central Scouting among European skaters) had 62 points and 73 penalty minutes in 40 games. But is he “irrelevant?” Not so fast. He will play for Timra IK in the SEL this coming season. The Wings have another graduate of that club on their roster – Henrik Zetterberg.

Indy Car Racing…or hockey player.

Atlanta had seven picks in this year’s draft, and if you read the roster of picks really fast, you might be left with the impression they selected race driver Danica Patrick with their third round pick. Nope…it was Danick Paquette.

More names… The Carolina Hurricanes dipped into the storied history of the University of North Carolina Tar Heels basketball program for their fourth-round pick…Michal Jordan. OK, Jordan (Michal, not Michael) is a defenseman from Plymouth of the Ontario Hockey League. We don’t know if he can dunk a basketball.

Great names. We don’t think any sport has names as interesting as those in hockey. Some of the examples coming out of this draft…

- Eero Elo…a 5^th round draft pick at left wing out of Lukko Jr., by Minnesota

- Nathan Moon…a 4^th round selection at center from Kingston in the OHL, by Pittsburgh

- Joel Champagne…a center selected by Toronto in the 5^th round from Chicoutimi in the QMJHL

- Prab Rai…selected by Vancouver in the 5^th round, a center out of Seattle in the WHL

- Teighan Zahn…a defenseman from Saskatoon in the WHL, taken in the 5^th round by Chicago

- Geordie Wudrick…taken by Los Angeles in the 3^rd round, a left wing from Swift Current in the WHL

Past as prologue. There are more than a few names with NHL pedigrees coming out of this draft. Anton Gustafsson (son of Bengt) is best known by Caps fans. But there are a lot of draftees with names shared with former hockey personalities. We can’t vouch for whether all are related to their surnamed predecessors, but here are a few…

- Justin Jokinen, LW – a 4^th round pick by Buffalo
- Shawn Lalonde, D – a 3^rd round pick by Chicago
- Adam Comrie, D – a 3^rd round pick by Florida
- Jean-Sebastien Berube, LW – a 7^th round pick by New Jersey
- Kevin Poulin, G – a 5^th round pick by the Islanders
- Viktor Tikhonov, forward – a 1^st round pick taken by Phoenix
- Mathieu Brodeur, D – a 3^rd round pick taken by Phoenix
- Brett Hextall, C – a 6^th round pick taken by Phoenix
- Julien Demers, D – a 5^th round pick taken by San Jose
- Jason Demers, D – a 7^th round pick taken by…San Jose (hmm…)

Just some stuff to think about on a Sunday afternoon…