The Top 5 Worst Toronto Maple Leafs Draft Picks of All-Time
The Toronto Maple Leafs have not been known as a team that generally makes good draft picks.
The Toronto Maple Leafs of today are built primarily through the draft, but that wasn’t always the case.
The Leafs of the past were famous for trading their picks (Tyler Seguin, Dougie Hamilton, Scott Niedermayer) or for just making terrible selections.
The NHL draft has often been a crapshoot during the 56 years that it has been in existence. For every sure fire number-one pick that becomes a superstar such as Auston Matthews or Connor McDavid, there are flops such as Alexandre Daigle and Doug Wickenheiser.
No team is ever guaranteed that their first-round pick is going to achieve stardom or even see regular duty.
The Toronto Maple Leafs have seen their fair share of draft day highlights and low lights over the years and this article will showcase some of the lowest of the lows.
Every Leafs fan is well aware of the team’s awful draft history. We’ve combed through it all to bring you the top five worst draft picks in team history.
Keep in mind that this list was not designed criticize the players taken (they didn’t choose when they were taken), but buds’ management and scouts for not using their picks better.
#5 Tyler Biggs
One of Toronto Maple Leafs GM Brian Burke’s professional low lights was selecting the big physical American right-winger at 22nd overall, but no one would have guessed it at the time.
Biggs was coming off a year that had seen him score five goals and ten points at the in the 2010 World U-17 Hockey Challenge, spearheading the American squad to a gold medal.
The winger was expected to become a premier power forward for the Toronto Maple Leafs and earn his keep by flattening opponents and scoring key goals.
Like many top Leafs prospects of more recent years who paid their dues with the Marlies in the American Hockey League for a year or two before being called up to the buds, Biggs served his time with the Marlies, but his lack of production keep him down there.
Biggs spent a promising year as an Oshawa General in the OHL before he turned pro with the Marlies in 2013, but only managed 14 points in 104 games. Biggs never made it to the show, but he hasn’t given up on hockey and at still just 26 years old plays for the Kalamazoo Wings of the ECHL.
Players taken after Biggs include Richard Rakell and John Gibson of the Anaheim Mighty Ducks, William Karlsson of the Vegas Golden Knights, and Art Ross Trophy winner, Nikita Kucherov of the Tampa Bay Lightning.
Here’s to hoping that Biggs can find his way to the bigs in the future.
# 4 Luke Schenn
Luke Schenn was a one-man wrecking crew of a defenceman in the WHL with the Kelowna Rockets, and the Toronto Maple Leafs drafted him eighth overall, in 2008.
The Leafs had expectations that Schenn would continue to dominate in the NHL like he did the WHL. This was sadly not to be the case, and he has settled in to the role of a relatively inconspicuous journeyman,.
Schenn joined the Toronto Maple Leafs in 2008 and had a promising rookie campaign that saw him named to the NHL all-rookie team. On the heels of this auspicious start, it seemed that NHL stardom was sure to follow.
However, Schenn’s development wasn’t up to expectations as was reflected in his stats. His point totals never exceeded 22 which he recorded in both the 2011 and 2012 seasons.
Toronto Maple Leafs GM Brian Burke was tired of waiting and traded Schenn to the Philadelphia Flyers in exchange for winger James van Riemsdyk, and in doing so acquired a star winger in exchange for his slumping defenseman.
Shenn has bounced around the league since then and has seen stops in Philadelphia, Los Angeles, Anaheim, Arizona, and Vancouver. In recent years Shenn has also spent time in the AHL
Schenn is currently a member of the Tampa Bay Lightning.
Players taken after Schenn in the 2008 draft include Norris Trophy winner, Erik Karlsson, New York Islanders Josh Bailey and Jordan Eberle, former Leaf and current Hurricane, Jake Gardiner, and this year’s probably Norris Trophy candidate (if the season ever starts again), John Carlson of the Washington Capitals.
# 3 Jeff Ware
Arriving from the OHL’s Oshawa Generals in the 1995 draft, Jeff Ware was another big, hard-hitting defenceman with a can’t miss reputation.
As a member of the Generals Ware played on an OHL championship winning squad and also a gold medal-winning World Junior Champion Team Canada. The Toronto Maple Leafs chose the hulking defender at number 15 overall.
Ware only managed to get into 15 games with the buds during the years, 1997-98 and never saw time in the show again except for a very brief six game stint with the Florida Panthers during the 1998-99 season.
Ware’s NHL statistics were unimpressive with only one point, an assist, recorded in 21 games played while accumulating 12 penalty minutes.
Ware settled into a career as a minor league journeyman D-man for various AHL teams, but suffered from knee injuries during his pro career and following five knee surgeries, he finally hung up his skates in 2002 as a member of the Syracuse Crunch.
Had the Leafs passed on Ware, they could have had a pick from among a number of future NHL regulars instead such as Buffalo Sabres’ goalie Martin Biron, New Jersey Devil’s centre, Peter Sykora, Philadelphia Flyers’ goalie Brian Boucher, Alexei Morozov of the Pittsburgh Penguins, and perhaps most regrettably Marc Savard, who would become a star for the Boston Bruins before having his career ended by devastating hits from Matt Cooke in 2010 and Matt Hunwick in 2011.
# 2 Brandon Convery
Brandon Convery was expected to become a top-flight NHL pivot when he was drafted by the Toronto Maple Leafs with the eighth overall pick in the 1992 NHL draft.
The high expectations were based on Convery’s high-scoring junior career as a member of the Sudbury Wolves of the OHL.
Convery showed flashes of scoring prowess in the few NHL game he played for the buds, and then later, the Vancouver Canucks, but was never able to get a foothold in the show and spent most of his pro career as a member of the St. John’s Maple Leafs.
As a junior in Sudbury, Convery scored at nearly a goal a game clip through a season and a half with the Wolves and garnered the attention of NHL scouts. Convery spent two more seasons in the OHL with initially, the Niagara Falls Thunder and then the Belleville Bulls before turning pro with the Leafs AHL farm team, the St.John’s Maple Leafs.
During the 1994-95 season, Convery scored at nearly a point per game for St.John’s and appeared set for the next step, promotion to the big club.
Convery made his Toronto Maple Leafs debut the following season and recorded 10 points in 39 games. Apparently, this offensive output was far below the expectations of Toronto Maple Leafs brass and Convery was shipped to the Vancouver Canucks for the 1997-98 season.
He played in only seven games for the Canucks, went back down to the AHL, and was claimed on waivers by the Los Angeles Kings before giving up on the NHL and heading to Europe where he finished his hockey career.
By drafting Convery at number eight, the buds passed up on future solid NHL pros such as Kirk Maltby, Sergei Gonchar, Jason Smith, Mike Peca, and Darren McCarty.
#1 Scott Thornton
San Jose Shark Joe Thornton’s first cousin and former teammate, Scott Thornton, had a long career as an NHL journeyman tough guy and right-winger, but one would expect much more from a number three overall pick than that.
Well, in this case, maybe not, when you realize that, in 1989, the team that picked him, the Toronto Maple Leafs, were nearing the end of their worst decade ever and team management was in shambles.
At the 1989 Draft, the Leafs used all of their three first round picks on Belleville Bulls players from the OHL.
This strange occurrence might be understandable if the Belleville Bulls were a junior hockey dynasty loaded with superstars, but this was not the case. The Bulls were a mediocre team at best, and like the Toronto Maple Leafs, won nothing during the entire decade of the 1980s.
Regardless, the buds drafted three Bulls in the first round-forwards Thornton and Pearson at numbers three and 12, and defenceman Steve Bancroft at number 26. None of these players had ever produced impressive numbers in junior save Pearson for just one season.
Did the 89’ Toronto Maple Leafs even have a scouting staff? Did the lone scout run out of gas on the 401 just outside Belleville? Why else would the Leafs choose three Belleville Bulls with their first three picks in the 89’ draft? Force of habit? It seems that something was rotten in the Province of Ontario….
The 1989 draft did feature a plethora of future NHL star power among its offerings, and this was the draft that saw future Toronto Maple Leafs legend Mat Sundin get picked at number one overall by the Quebec Nordiques.
By acquiring their three Bulls, the Leafs missed out on Stu Barnes, Bobby Holik, Bill Guerin, Olaz Kolzig, Adam Foote, Patrice Brisebois, Robert Reichel and most regrettably, Sergei Fedorov and Niklas Lidstrom, who, together (with a little help from Stevie Y), turned Detroit into “Hockey Town” with Stanley Cups galore, thereafter.
Additional Disappointing Picks: Landon Wilson, Luca Cereda, Justin Pogge, Steve Bancroft, Rob Pearson, Eric Fichaud.
Next. Who Would Have Thought?: Nylander Among Best in NHL. dark
As you can see, the Toronto Maple Leafs have made some terrible choices at the draft. Information for this article was taken from wikipedia, hockeydb.com and nhl.com.
Let us know if we missed anyone!