A Graphic Guide to the NHL Draft

There are only two things we can be sure of on NHL draft day. First off, no matter the hype, very few picks fall into that "no brainer" category, and second, most draft day commentary does not involve the use of a brain. The latter is especially true of Pierre McGuire.

Read on for more in our Graphic Guide to the NHL Draft.

I certainly don’t envy what NHL GMs and scouts have to go through on draft day.

Every decision will be analyzed and criticized. Dissected and autopsied. Parsed and panned. But it’s not easy to find that perfect balance and of skill and work ethic in an 18-year old. The best that you can hope for is that you wind up with draft picks that will leave you somewhere between what Don Cherry and Mike Smith would have picked: 

So, we’ve covered the commentators and the GMs/scouts. But the focus of draft day is really on the nervous hopefuls waiting anxiously with their parents up in the stands for potentially life-changing results:

Not every 18-year-old can get drafted into the NHL, but either way, your biggest worries are about being "late" or that things might turn out blue.