The 19 year-old NHL draft sounds good to me…

To be clear, as a hockey fan, I’ve always preferred the so-called 20 year-old draft.  That is, in general, I like the idea of young players performing with their peers in college or junior hockey for as long as possible, so they are really ready for that next step in their careers into the pro ranks. (Bob Nicholson and Hockey Canada are pushing for a change, to the age of 19, and I, for one, would love to see an adjustment made in how and when players are drafted.)

This is not to suggest that there aren’t (or haven’t been, historically) any number of kids who can play at the NHL level at 18.  Crosby is just one a recent example, Duschene in Colorado, Schenn here in Toronto (though I honestly feel he would have been better served playing another year in junior…) etc.

Through history, we all know the legendary names who joined the NHL “early”: Gordie Howe, Bobby Hull, Bobby Orr and of course Wayne Gretzky are obvious examples of young players who had the size and/or skill and smarts to survive and thrive at the highest level of the game.  Those players not only survived but ultimately thrived, playing with and against players who pushed them to be as good as they could be. (I've included a great old late 1950s picture of Hull, above, scoring a goal at the old Chicago Stadium against Eddie Chadwick and the Maple Leafs.)

I well remember when the “amateur” draft, as I think it was called, was introduced in the late 1960s.  It was the beginning of the end in some ways for the Maple Leafs, who of course lost their  so-called “territorial rights” to all those emerging stars with St. Mike’s juniors and the Marlies.  It was better—and fairer—for all the new expansion teams of course, but not for Toronto.  (For its part, the Montreal franchise adjusted well to the new system, largely because their wise General Manager, Sam Pollock, traded away a number of older players who no longer fit into Montreal’s future plans in return for high draft picks.  The new clubs were so desperate for “name” players from successful teams that they gave away top future picks for players who often did not have much of an impact.  Montreal, on the other hand, benefited from having lots of selections to hit and miss with.  That's how the Habs ended up with Guy Lafleur, despite winning the Stanley Cup just before the 1971 draft.  Toronto, though, did not have the organizational depth to use that kind of strategy...)

What I also remember was that the draft back then was for 20 year-old players only.  That was the end of their time in junior and that’s when they could be drafted.  Full stop.  U.S. college players were barely a consideration back then.  “Red” Berenson was a Canadian who had played in the NCAA and then for the Habs, but players like him were rare.  It was all about Canadian junior players back then, at least in the draft.

Now, when the World Hockey Association jumped on to the scene in the early 1970s, all hell broke loose.  They started grabbing kids as teenagers (e.g. Mark Howe) and the NHL retaliated/responded with an 18-year old draft of their own, as Irecall.  That’s when the Leafs grabbed Jack Valiquette in the first round in about 1974 or so. (Just before that, a player like Denis Potvin in Ottawa, who probably could have played in the NHL a bit earlier, had to play out his time until he was 20 and probably bored playing with younger “kids”.)

I’m trying to remember if the NHL stayed with the 18 year-old draft, but I think they eventually went back to the 20 year-old minimum for a while, after they finally merged with the WHA.  But someone may correct my fuzzy memory on that one.   Leasf fans of the era recall that the Leafs drafted those three kid defensemen, (Benning, Boimustruck and McGill) in 1979 or ‘80 and played them before they were 20.  Later, Mario Lemieux came around (1984-’84?) as an 18 year-old with the Penguins, so I can’t remember what the NHL did, exactly. (If anyone remembers whether the NHL stayed with the 18-year old draft, by all means help me out...)

A quick side-step:  my late father hated the idea of the draft in the late ‘60s, because, as a devout Montreal fan at the time for 50+ years, he loathed the idea of the Canadiens giving up their rights to the best young French players in the province of Quebec.  (If I remember correctly, the last two French-Canadian players who Montreal was able to protect were Rejean Houle and Marc Tardiff in 1969 or thereabouts....)  Dad used to tell me (and I think he was prophetic) that if a kid or their family ever took the NHL to court, that he could win a case to allow himself to sign with any team he wanted after the age of 18 (just like any young person had the freedom and the right to choose where he/she wanted to work).  That hasn’t come to pass, but the 18 year-old draft was here to stay shortly thereafter. (As I write this, I’m trying to remember, wasn’t that precisely the legal road Eric Lindros and his family were heading down, before he was granted a trade from Quebec City to the Flyers?)

In any event, this is my long and winding way of saying:  I’d love to see the NHL (like the NBA) move to a 19 year old draft.

It won’t happen, I realize, because the NHLPA would fight it, though it would be in the best interests of players, and the game, in my view.  I realize there are counter-arguments, but there are reasons why I’d like to see the draft age increased:

It’s crap shoot for scouts to look at 17 year-olds and project what they might be as pros in 5 or 6 years.  It’s so different from the NFL, where you pick someone who is by and large physically and emotionally ready, in their 20s, to become a professional athlete after spending anywhere from two to four years in a college environment and playing against other top athletes.

Education-wise, players could focus, it seems to me, a bit more on school when they are 17-18 rather than worrying about “getting drafted”.  If it couldn’t happen until they were 19, most would have graduated from high school and be on to college or university by then, but at least they could have focused on school as a priority, not the draft.

Also, U.S. collegiate players may be less apt to leave school early and sign pro.

My most important recommendation, and I’m not the first to suggest this, I’m sure, would be that 18 year-olds would only be allowed to be selected in the first round of the NHL draft.  In other words, teams would have to be serious about a player to commit a draft pick to someone that young.  After that only 19 year olds would be eligible.

Right now, too many teams are picking 18 year olds in the 6^th round or whatever.  That makes no sense to me, never has.  Kids don’t want to go back into the draft a second time (does anyone ever get drafted higher the second time around—not because they aren’t further along the development curve, but because they are being punished by the “system” for not signing the first time they were drafted…), so they generally sign a contract- because they are happy just to be picked.

This way, kids could improve their draft position by maturing and showing better in that later year—and get better contracts as a result.

I think we’d see teams making way smarter choices, with fewer mistakes being made.  Scouts would have an extra year to see players develop.

Hey, there will always be the young player who can step in as a teenager—the true “exceptions”.  But for too long we have pushed and prodded too many kids who aren’t exceptional, and I think we end up hurting a lot of kids rather than helping them.

I may be alone, but that’s how I feel.