When it comes to the annual NHL Entry Draft, few draft years are held in such
high esteem as the 2003 NHL draft class.

Considered one of the best drafts in NHL history, many of the players that were
 drafted that year can also easily be found in a "who';s who" list of the
NHL';s top superstars today: Eric Staal, Ryan Getzlaf, Corey Perry, Ryan Suter,
 Thomas Vanek, Shea Weber, Zach Parise, Dion Phaneuf, Marc-Andre Fleury and
numerous others. The full list of picks is nothing short of staggering.

While many of those players were dominant sensations for their junior clubs
heading into the draft, the transition from being a highly-touted prospect to
becoming an NHL star is neither easy nor quick. Oftentimes the developmental
process requires a lot of strategy and planning on behalf of the teams, and it
can go horribly wrong if they aren';t careful. Look back throughout the last
30 years of the league and you';ll find many players that were brimming with
potential, but got rushed into the NHL before they were ready or placed into a
less-than-ideal team situation, and then never recovered to become as good of a
 player as they were projected to be.Was Eric Staal';s path to NHL stardom
helped by the 2005 lockout? (Photo by Andy Martin Jr)

Mikhail Grigorenko of the Buffalo Sabres is a good recent example. One of the
best players from the 2012 draft, the Sabres have badly mishandled the last two
 years of his career, and now there are legitimate concerns that his long-term
development might never fully recover. And all it takes is one look at the
habitually dreadful Edmonton Oilers, despite their embarrassingly rich wealth
of junior phenoms, to make you wonder how much damage gets caused when you
bring players into a difficult situation before they are fully ready.

Which takes us back to the 2003 NHL draft class.

Even with all their natural talent, one of the most important factors that
helped many of them get to the point where they are today might have been one
of the NHL';s biggest black eyes, a disaster that shook the very foundation of
the sport: the 2005 lockout. Let';s take a look at how this happened.2003 NHL
Draft Class Making the Jump to the Pros

Like most draft years, the majority of the 2003 class was drafted out of the
three junior leagues that the Canadian Hockey League is composed of: the
Ontario Hockey League, the Quebec Major Junior Hockey League, and the Western
Hockey League. The CHL, the NHL, and the two other North American professional
minor leagues, the American Hockey League and East Coast Hockey League, have an
 agreement when it comes to player development and advancement: players must be
 at least 20 years of age (by December 31 of that year) to be AHL or ECHL
eligible. This agreement is in place to protect the CHL from losing many of
it';s top players directly to the AHL.Shea Weber. (Jean-Yves Ahern-USA TODAY
Sports)

However, that same agreement does not exist between the CHL and the NHL. So
long as a player is 18 years of age he can be brought into the NHL by the team
that retains his rights. Many 18 and 19-year old players throughout NHL history
 have made the jump from the CHL to the NHL, bypassing the AHL altogether and,
in some cases, foregoing their final years of junior eligibility.

While many young players have successfully made that jump over the years, there
 are countless others, such as Grigorenko, that have struggled to do so. There
is a growing movement of voices in hockey circles that are making the argument
that prolonged junior and minor pro seasoning, as opposed to immediate NHL
advancement, is the best course of action when it comes to player
development. Proponents of this idea point to the Detroit Red Wings, with
their consistent yearly success (22 consecutive playoff appearances) and
slow-and-steady approach to their prospects, as the shining example of how
effective this method can be.Dion Phaneuf. (Marc DesRosiers-USA TODAY Sports)

What makes the 2003 draft class so interesting, when following this train of
thought, is that all of those players were unable to take the short route to
the NHL, simply because there were no NHL games for them to participate
in.Which 2003 NHL Draft Players Benefited From The Lockout?

Did that extra year of development, the 2004-2005 season, help to make those
players the stars that they are today? Looking at a few individual cases makes
the question all the more interesting.Would Marc-Andre Fleury have become the
same goalie were it not for his season in the AHL? (Cliff Welch/Icon SMI)

Marc-Andre Fleury, drafted 1st overall by the Pens in the 2003 NHL draft,
actually played in the NHL prior to the lockout, appearing in 22 games for the
Pens in 2003-2004 where he posted a record of 4-14-2 with a 3.64 G.A.A. and a
.896 save percentage. However, the Pens were a defensively abysmal team during
that time, making life terrible for any goalie that dressed for them. Because
he was a late birthday in his draft year, Fleury spent the 2004-2005 lockout
season in the AHL as the number one goalie for the Wilkes-Barre/Scranton
Penguins, gaining confidence and experience that helped him take the reigns as
the go-to goalie in Pittsburgh after the lockout. Would Fleury, who backstopped
 the Pens to a 2009 Stanley Cup Championship, have been the same goalie if he
would have been shellacked nightly in the NHL as a 20 year-old?Eric Staal, 2003
 NHL draft

Eric Staal, drafted right after Fleury at 2nd overall by the Carolina
Hurricanes, also played in the NHL prior to the lockout, putting up a
respectable 31 points in 81 games for the Canes. Another late birthday, he also
 played in the AHL in 2004-2005, scoring a then-franchise record 77 points in
77 games for the Lowell Lock Monsters. How did Staal follow that up at the NHL
level after the lockout? He posted 100 points and helped Carolina win the 2006
Stanley Cup, the first in franchise history, including the days when they were
the Hartford Whalers.More 2003 NHL Draft Players Who Benefitted

Corey Perry, drafted 28th overall by the Anaheim Ducks, used his 2004-2005
season to put up one of the best performance years in OHL history. Perry scored
 130 points in 60 regular season games, as well finishing with a +66 rating,
before adding 38 more points in 18 playoff games as he led the London Knights
to a Memorial Cup Championship. His efforts that season won him the honours of
OHL MVP, which he eventually followed up by winning the Hart Trophy as NHL MVP
in 2010-2011.Corey Perry';s 2004-2005 OHL season was one for the ages. (Gary A.
 Vasquez-US PRESSWIRE)

Jeff Carter and Mike Richards, drafted 11th and 24th, respectively, by the
Philadelphia Flyers, were leaders on their OHL teams that year, and were called
 up to the AHL';s Philadelphia Phantoms for the playoffs after their junior
seasons expired. The two players excelled that postseason, helping the Phantoms
 win the 2005 AHL championship, the Calder Cup.Jeff Carter, 2003 NHL draft

The list goes on and on. Many players that probably could have played in the
NHL that season tore up the junior leagues and made names for themselves in the
 AHL.2003 NHL Draft Class and the World Juniors

On the international level, 2005 also saw one of the most compelling iterations
 of the World Junior Championship. With no players kept out of the tournament
due to NHL responsibilities, the competing nations iced some of their most
stacked rosters in tournament history. None moreso than Team Canada, which
consisted of Perry, Carter, Richards, Weber, Phaneuf and others. The Canadians
outscored their opponents 32-5 during the preliminary round, and defeated
Russia by a score of 6-1 in the final game to win Gold. It was never even
close.

Like any thought exercise involving history, it';s always impossible to say for
 sure what would have happened if things had gone different. Even if there was
an NHL season in 2004-2005, the same top prospects might have gone on to the
same star careers. But as far as development is concerned, confidence builds
momentum, and you can';t help but be in awe of how much confidence was amassed
by the 2003 draft class during that historic lockout season.

This article was originally published in November, 2013.

The post Did The 2005 NHL Lockout Help Make The 2003 Draft Class Great?
appeared first on The Hockey Writers.

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