From Robert Nordmark to Jesper Samuelsson

[LeftWinger 5,152]

Just a little change up from the bickering back and forth with the pens, the UFA/Hossa/What I would do threads. (They are all fun and I am not complaining.) I was looking around the internet to expand my useles knowledge base, and started looking at All of Detroit's drafts. Then I focused on the European, most specifically Detroit's love affair with Sweden...

To start, Detroit's first ever European draft pick was Ladislav Svozil, he was drafted in the 12th round, 194th ovral in 1978 out of the Czecheslovokia Elite League. He played exactly 0 games in the NHL. Bjorn Skaare was a Norweigen born player who played 1 game for Detroit in 1978-79. Did you know that Petr Klima was only the third European ever drafted by Detroit? In between Svozil & Klima came the 1981 draft and in the 10th round Detroit selected their first EVER Swedish born draft pick out of Lulea, Sweden, Robert Nordmark. He also played 0 games for the Wings and re-entered the draft in 1987, where he was re-selected by the St. Louis Blues. He played 236 games in the NHL collecting 13 goals, 70 assists for 83 points playing for the Blues and Canucks. This was not the first Swede that Detroit had though, Thommie "Lars" Bergman played for Detroit from 1972-1975, then again from 1977-1980 and Tord Lundstrom played for Detroit in 1973-74. For a couple of seasons after Nordmark, the Wings stayed out of Europe (besides Klima) but in 1984, 4 out of 12 of their picks were from Sweden:

*Mats Lundstrom - Vastra Frolunda - 0 NHL games

*Stefan Karlsson - Vastra Frolunda - 0 NHL games

*Lars Kalrsson - Farjestads - 0 NHL games

*Urban Nordin - Modo - 0 NHL games

Despite the failure of these 4 to break the NHL, they went to the Swedish hole again in 1985, drafting three Swede's, with unfortunately the same result, 0 NHL games:

*Thomas Bjur, Bo Svanberg & Mikael Lindman. (on a side note the Wings drafted their first ever Finnish player, Erik Hamalainen, in the 10th round this year, with the same result as the Swede's. But he played in Europe up until last season, just nevr had what it takes to crack the NHL.)

The first Swede's that Detroit drafted to make it into the NHL came just a year later in 1986:

*Johan Garpenlov played 10 seasons in the NHL with Detroit, San Jose, FLorida & Atlanta. He was taken 85th overall in the 5th round.

*Per Djoos also played in the NHL, only 3 season though, with Detroit and the Rangers. He was selected 127th overall, in the 7th round.

*They also drafted Peter Ekroth, that year out of Sodertalje, he actually played early in his career in Canada and made an appearance in Adirondack for 12 games, but failed to crack the NHL.

The Wings tried again in 1987 when they used their last pick to draft Tomas Jansson, but again, he stuggled in North America and only got as far as one season in the WHL with the Portland Winter Hawks.

1988 was Swedish free for the Wings, the did draft Czech Petr Hrbek in the 3rd round, but that was the only European taken that season. It seemed maybe the Wings had given up on the Swede's and Euros all together, then 1989 came. You'd have to have been born under a rock to not know the Swedish player selected in 1989, along with a couple of very famous Russian players. (Also Borje Salming played his last season in the NHL for the WIngs in 1989-1990.) The crazy thing is, Lidstrom didn't get selected until the 3rd round, and by the way he turned out, thus started Detroit's ability to uncover diamonds in the ruff. Fedorov was selected in the 4th round and Konstantinov the 11th round. Of course, what Wings fan doesn't know this? It seemed that with the success of Fedorov and Konstantinov, and the Wings ability to steal these players from Red Army, this is what they focued on for a few years, Russian players. It wasn't until the 1993 draft when Detroit decided to roll the dice on a Swedish born player again. This time using their first round pick to select Anders Eriksson #22 overall. Even though he wasn't the player he was projected to be, he was a part of the 1998 Stanley Cup team and has played a total of 552 games in the NHL thus far with Detroit, Chicago, Toronto, Florida, Columbus and most recently Calgary.

In 1994, the used their 10th round pick to draft Tomas Holmstrom, again finding one of those diamonds that so many other teams passed on, round after round. As a matter of fact, Detroit's 6 picks in between Mathieu Dandenault in the 2nd round and Holmstrom in the 10th, have a grand total of 0 NHL games under their belts.

Sticking with Russians in the higher rounds, Detroit didn't draft their first Swede in 1995 until round 7, when they selected Per Eklund and in the 9th round they selected David Engblom, both of whom have played 0 NHL games...

1996 didn't show anything different from the Wings Swedish parade drafting Johan Forsander in the 4th round and Magnus Nilsson in the 6th round. Again, these two combined have zero NHL experience. Although the success of Lidstrom and Holmstrom had yet to repeat itself, the Wings kept holding on to their belief in Haken Andersson and the Swedish players.

1997 - John Wikstrom - 0 NHL Games; Also aquired at the trade deadline, born in Finland, but is Swedish, Tomas Sandstrom.

1998 - Calle Steen - 0 NHL games

1998 - David Petrasek - 0 NHL games

In 1999, everything seemed the same for the Wings, with their first pick (4th round) the chose Jari Tosla from Goteberg, Sweden, this was supposed to be the best available Swedish player at this point in the draft, but once again he has 0 NHL games played. Then along came the 7th round and a young man name Henrik Zetterberg. No explantaion needed, excpet why this guy lasted this long in the draft... They also aquired at the trade deadline this season (along with trading away Anders Eriksson for Chris Chelios) Ulf Samuelsson from the New York Rangers.

In the 2000 draft, the Wings went full throttle drafting 4 Swedes, Niklas Kronwall, Stefan Liv, Per Backer & Jimmie Svensson. Of which Kronwall has been the only one to see NHL action, although Liv, at one time, was touted as being the next superstar goaltender in Detroit. He has 0 games played.

2001 only saw one Swedish born player drafted, Andreas Jamtin, but he never seen any type of North American hockey. Although the Red Wings did sign Swedish free agent defensman, Frederick Olausson, who was a big part of their 2002 Stanley Cup Championship.

2002 was business as usual for the Wings, drafting 6 Europeans out of 10 total picks, 3 of which were Swedish born players: Johan Berggren, Christian Soderstrom & Jonathon Ericsson, who was selected with the very last draft pick of that year, and just happends to be their #1 prospect and is expected to see full duty in Detroit in 2009-2010. Now thats finding a diamond!

2003 brought four more Swedes to the system, none of which made it and none of which are still considered Wings prospects: Andreas Sundin, Stefan Blom, Tomas Kollar & Mikael Johansson.

2004 brought us Johan Franzen in the 3rd round, followed by Anton Axelsson & Nils Backstrom. Franzen of course needs no explanation, the other two are still in the Detroit prospect system, with Backstrom playing NCAA hockey at Alaska-Anchorage.

2005: Christofer Lofberg, Mattias Ritola & Johan Ryno. Lofberg fell off the map, Ryno went back to Sweden and Ritola played for Grand Rapids last season and is currently sitting in the #9 sot on the prospects list. Detroit also signed free agent defensman Andreas Lilja and free agent forward Mikail Samuelsson this off season.

2006: Dick Axelsson & Daniel Larsson, both of whom are in the system and are rank in the top 12 of prospects. Larsson in pegged to be a NHL goaltender in a few years, if not sooner. He spent all of last season in Grand Rapids.

2007: Joakim Andersson, who currently sits #8 in the prospects rankings.

Which brings us to 2008, and not disappointing, the Wings used two selections this season to draft Gustav Nyquist in the 4th round and Jesper Smuelsson in the 7th round.

In a week or so the Wings are going to go to the 2009 draft with no doubt a couple of Swedish prospects on their minds. They'd love to be able to get a hold of Victor Hedman, but unless they pull off a blockbuster trade to secure the #1 or #2 pick, they will have to rely on their European scouting to find the next diamond from Sweden, and given their history I think we have plenty to look forward to!

Sorry this was so long, but I hope it kept your mind off the trolls for a while and the Salary Cap too!

Edited June 20, 2009 by LeftWinger

[zetterbergfan 23]

This thread almost slipped off of page 1 with no comments. I think it was a good distraction from all of the other topics. And I also appreciate the research.

[FireCaptain 563]

Nice work on the research - this had to have taken some time.

[LeftWinger 5,152]

Thanks! Yeah, I started looking around at about 11 pm and finished sometime after 4 am. I noticed that there was a lot of views coming, but no replies. I guess something like this doesn't really warrent any replies, just a read to get away from the pens and "if I ould have a UFA" toipics. It was fun, but yeah it was a lot of research... glad you enjoyed it.

[P. Marlowe 748]

Nice work finding all this info. I remember the 1985 pick Erik Hämäläinen. He used to play in Jokerit (Filppula's and Leino's team) when I was a big fan of them in the 90's. He was in the world championship team of Finland the only time they won the gold (1995).

[Greatness=PavelDatsyuk 65]

good work and great job, thanks for taking the time to track that down, it was a good distraction

[Booster313 138]

Nice work it was a good read, the only thing that could make this thread better is if we start talking about Hossa!

[BlakKy 58]

Excellent research.

[PROBIE4PREZ 58]

Great read .. thanks for posting

[Wingfan24 0]

Great to see a topic like this nice work.

[egroen 384]

Nice writeup! -- it's amazing going over draft lists and seeing the amount of outright busts.

Detroit is a great scouting and drafting team, but have entire years where they draft nothing but sludge.

The 1989 draft is probably the greatest of all time, but I just got a laugh looking at the 1983 draft:

1983 Entry 4 1 Steve Yzerman C Peterborough Petes [OHL] 1514 692 1063 1755 924

1983 Entry 25 2 Lane Lambert C Saskatoon Blades [WHL] 283 58 65 123 521

1983 Entry 46 3 Bob Probert L Brantford Alexanders [OHL] 935 163 221 384 3300

1983 Entry 68 4 Dave Korol D Winnipeg Warriors [WHL]

1983 Entry 86 5 Petr Klima L Czech National Team [intl] 786 313 260 573 671

1983 Entry 88 5 Joey Kocur D Saskatoon Blades [WHL] 821 80 82 162 2519

1983 Entry 106 6 Chris Pusey G Brantford Alexanders [OHL] 1 0 0 0 0

1983 Entry 126 7 Bob Pierson L London Knights [OHL]

1983 Entry 146 8 Craig Butz Kelowna Wings [WHL]

1983 Entry 166 9 Dave Sikorski D Cornwall Royals [OHL]

1983 Entry 186 10 Stu Grimson L Regina Pats [WHL] 729 17 22 39 2113

1983 Entry 206 11 Jeff Frank Regina Pats [WHL]

1983 Entry 226 12 Chuck Chiatto Cranbrook H.S. (Mich.)

This class amassed 10,048 Penalty Minutes in the NHL!!!

... And to top it off, they drafted a Pusey.

Edited June 22, 2009 by egroen

[LeftWinger 5,152]

Nice writeup! -- it's amazing going over draft lists and seeing the amount of outright busts.

Detroit is a great scouting and drafting team, but have entire years where they draft nothing but sludge.

The 1989 draft is probably the greatest of all time, but I just got a laugh looking at the 1983 draft:

1983 Entry 4 1 Steve Yzerman C Peterborough Petes [OHL] 1514 692 1063 1755 924

1983 Entry 25 2 Lane Lambert C Saskatoon Blades [WHL] 283 58 65 123 521

1983 Entry 46 3 Bob Probert L Brantford Alexanders [OHL] 935 163 221 384 3300

1983 Entry 68 4 Dave Korol D Winnipeg Warriors [WHL]

1983 Entry 86 5 Petr Klima L Czech National Team [intl] 786 313 260 573 671

1983 Entry 88 5 Joey Kocur D Saskatoon Blades [WHL] 821 80 82 162 2519

1983 Entry 106 6 Chris Pusey G Brantford Alexanders [OHL] 1 0 0 0 0

1983 Entry 126 7 Bob Pierson L London Knights [OHL]

1983 Entry 146 8 Craig Butz Kelowna Wings [WHL]

1983 Entry 166 9 Dave Sikorski D Cornwall Royals [OHL]

1983 Entry 186 10 Stu Grimson L Regina Pats [WHL] 729 17 22 39 2113

1983 Entry 206 11 Jeff Frank Regina Pats [WHL]

1983 Entry 226 12 Chuck Chiatto Cranbrook H.S. (Mich.)

This class amassed 10,048 Penalty Minutes in the NHL!!!

... And to top it off, they drafted a Pusey.

Look at this bust of a draft for the Wings, 1988!

1988 NHL Entry 1 17 Kory Kocur Saskatoon

1988 NHL Entry 2 38 Serge Anglehart Drummondville

1988 NHL Entry 3 47 Guy Dupuis Hull

1988 NHL Entry 3 59 Petr Hrbek Sparta Praha, TCH

1988 NHL Entry 4 80 Sheldon Kennedy Swift Current 310 49 58 107 -15 233

1988 NHL Entry 7 143 Kelly Hurd Michigan Tech

1988 NHL Entry 8 164 Brian McCormack St. Paul's (High-NH)

1988 NHL Entry 9 185 Jody Praznik Colorado College

1988 NHL Entry 10 206 Glen Goodall Seattle

1988 NHL Entry 11 227 Darren Colbourne Cornwall

1988 NHL Entry 12 248 Donald Stone Michigan

Yikes! Followed up this dandy of a draft, 1996!

1996 NHL Entry 1 26 Jesse Wallin Red Deer 49 0 2 2 -5 34

1996 NHL Entry 2 52 Aren Miller Spokane

1996 NHL Entry 4 108 Johan Forsander HV-71 Jonkoping, SWE

1996 NHL Entry 5 135 Michal Podolka Sault Ste. Marie

1996 NHL Entry 6 144 Magnus Nilsson Vita Hasten, SWE

1996 NHL Entry 6 162 Alexandre Jacques Shawinigan

1996 NHL Entry 7 189 Colin Beardsmore North Bay

1996 NHL Entry 8 215 Craig Stahl Tri-City

1996 NHL Entry 9 241 Eugeny Afanasiev Detroit L.C. Midgets

20 players drafted, 2 players to make the NHL with a total of 359 games played. 49 goals 60 assists for 109 points with a -20 rating!

1997 wasn't that amazing either!

1997 NHL Entry 2 49 Yuri Butsayev Lada Togliatti, RUS 99 10 4 14 -13 28

1997 NHL Entry 3 76 Petr Sykora HC Pojistovna IB Pardubice, CZE 12 2 2 4 -1 6

1997 NHL Entry 4 102 Quintin Laing Kelowna 43 1 6 7 6 10

1997 NHL Entry 5 129 John Wikstrom Lulea, SWE

1997 NHL Entry 6 157 B.J. Young Red Deer 1 0 0 0 0 0

1997 NHL Entry 7 186 Mike Laceby Kingston

1997 NHL Entry 8 213 Steve Willejto Prince Albert

1997 NHL Entry 9 239 Greg Willers Kingston

...the draft is fun to watch, I remember being so pissed for the 2005 lottery (fixed) draft with the players they skipped over and selected. Kindl has yet to break in, but I am fairly happy with Helm and Abdelkader!

Edited June 23, 2009 by LeftWinger

[VM1138 1,921]

Yuri Butsayev! I forgot about him. Always liked his name for some reason.