The Detroit Model Won’t Work
William Favaro | 11 August, 2009, 5:56 pm
“We like the core of our team and we’ve basically married them. We’ve signed them to long-term deals, are paying them lots of money and they’re the guys that have to drive the bus.”
– Detroit coach Mike Babcock
Management is on a path of another 40 years without a Stanley Cup, and the Detroit Red Wings can’t help us.
We all know the history of the Red Wings. They have been a very successful franchise for well over a decade. Their success comes easy to them in a way that fans of other franchises can only dream. And the competence of their management can be dizzying at times, like when Steve Yzerman retired and management built a seamless bridge to the new era without incurring a post-season drought or even a blip.
That said, the Maple Leafs will never be the Detroit Red Wings. To follow “the Detroit model” is just a buzz phrase coming from people who don’t know what they’re talking about.
What their model actually was can never be duplicated. It was dedication from ownership, two decades of superb management, and a crafty late round draft record that can be attributed to either luck or foresight on the part of management, finding a market that had talent but was untapped. And that option isn’t open to the Maple Leafs now because the Swedish market is now saturated with pro scouts that represent most NHL teams.
Is there a new market full of untapped potential? There will be quite a few. Of course. But other teams are already rooted in these places.
As a good example, we know that San Jose has been building a relationship in China where they funded an affiliate named the China Sharks.
Now that is the problem we face. The Red Wings have offered clues to other teams that building a team today goes beyond drafting. Millions of dollars will have to be spent in R&D to find where to dig, then millions more to grow hockey in that area. Detroit did this in Sweden before anyone else, becoming very well connected and spending a lot of money in their programs also branded the red and white in Sweden.
The Maple Leafs could jump on this bandwagon, they certainly do have the money and the time, and will need to soon. The teams that are doing it now aren’t going to be the ones getting ahead, they’re going to be the ones keeping up with the trend. The Maple Leafs will need to keep up as well just to be competitive in the future. Spending that money abroad is becoming the way to win championships.
That is where my great concern of Brian Burke comes into play. He used to have an experimental streak; his Vancouver Canucks were the first to play in Japan over ten years ago. But lately he has turned himself inward and become very vocal about North American matters. At some point NHL matters (and perhaps another job with them in the not to distant future) seems to have become his official focus. I have not seen him make any strides to serve the Maple Leafs to the global market as other teams are doing; branding themselves in other Countries. The Toronto Maple Leaf is known worldwide, but for how long? When teams like the San Jose Sharks or the New Jersey Devils are spending tens of thousands of dollars in your city and the Maple Leafs aren’t involved, how long can a simple blue and white logo sustain our international image?
The Red Wings were bought by Mike Illitch in 1982. Illitch was the owner that drafted Steve Yzerman, but the GM at the time was NOT Ken Holland. Ken Holland was a scout for the team in the WHL and was eventually made Director of Scouting and Assistant GM, the position he served in from 1990 to 1997. THEN he was made the GM of the team.
The team had losing records from 1970 to 1991 in all but 3 seasons - one of which was a .500 season. Talk about tradition. That’s 21 years of losing, and Leafs fans think we have it bad. Either way, let’s just say that the whole turning around of the team didn’t really happen immediately upon drafting Yzerman.
If we start looking at them in 1991, then they go gangbusters. That also happens to be Niklas Lidstrom’s 1st year in Detroit. They haven’t had a losing season with Lidstrom on the team. Maybe he’s the key cog? I’m wondering what happens when he retires… my bet is they return to some level of normalcy. Lidstrom is probably one of the best 5 D men in the history of the NHL.
They drafted Niklas Lidstrom, Sergei Fedorov, Dallas Drake, and Mike Sillinger in 1989… I don’t know how we can give Holland credit for that draft. In all likelihood we shouldn’t.
From 1981 to 1989 the Red Wings drafted 13 Swedish players. Of those 13 Swedish players, Robert Nordmark (1981), Peter Djoos (1986), Johan Garpenlov (1986), and Niklas Lidstrom were the only ones to actually play in the NHL. Garpenlov and Lidstrom are the only ones to have played over 300 games.
From 1990 to 1999 the Red Wings drafted another 11 Swedes. Of those 11 only Henrik Zetterberg, Tomas Holmstrom, and Anders Eriksson played in the NHL.
From 2000 to 2009 the Red Wings have drafted another 23 Swedes. Obviously they NOW count on that part of the world for their development. Unfortunately for the Red Wings, only Johan Franzen, Niklas Kronwall, Jonathan Ericsson, and Mattias Ritola have made the NHL. Of those 4 players, only Kronwall and Franzen have actually played 100 games. So they’ve increased their dependency on Sweden and had LESS success not more with drafting them.
Over that same stretch I mentioned, the Leafs didn’t draft their first Swede until 1988. From 1988 to 2009 they have drafted 13 Swedes. That’s 13 in comparison to 47 by Detroit.
The strange thing is, the Leafs draft picks have had a FAR higher rate of success in the NHL. Of those 13 draft picks, 8 have played in the NHL, and another 2 are likely to in the next couple of years (Stålberg and Gunnarsson).
That’s 10 out of 13 draft picks or 77% success. Compare that to Detroit who have found 11 players out of 47 draft picks or 23% success. It helps that the 11 players includes Lidstrom, Zetterberg, Franzen and Holmstrom - but the Leafs managed to draft Jonsson, Modin, Tellqvist, and Steen who from a Swedish hockey perspective aren’t really that bad. The potential exists for Stralman, Stålberg, and Gunnarsson to develop into good players also. Not the next Lidstrom obviously, but decent NHLers nonetheless.
Yes the Red Wings have cultivated roots in Sweden, and yes they’ve had some success with players like Lidstrom, Zetterberg, Holmstrom, and Franzen, but that “model” isn’t what has driven their success purely.
You could also make a case that the 19 Russians the Red Wings have drafted over that same stretch had almost as important an impact. Sergei Fedorov, Pavel Datsyuk, Vyacheslav Kozlov, and Vladimir Konstantinov all played a pretty important role in their cup victories over the years.
Either way, I admit they’ve done some good scouting, but it’s not as spectacular as people give them credit for.
Steve, what are you doing with your facts, analysis, and reason? The type of comments appreciated at TML Central are the ones where one contributor fluffs another one’s piece.
‘Hey William another fantastic piece of work. Kudos’
That’s more the speed.
Ummmm the model where you draft an absurd amount of late round gems isn’t going to work? What the hell are you trying to say Favaro?