The Top 25 Under 25 Returns! (These Guys Aren't In It)

Here's all you need to know about Matt Marquardt. The Oilers traded for him, giving up Cody Wild. Cody Wild's best position is defense, whereas Matt Marquardt's is press box. The Oilers partially traded Wild because he had a brain and thought it was a bit odd that he was being yanked between the AHL and ECHL despite being virtually the only Springfield Falcons' defenseman who knew what a puck looked like. The Oilers traded for Marquardt because he's 6'3". Perhaps he reminded them of a young Geoff Paukovich, except not all that young. Also, to be fair, Paukovich scored five AHL goals last regular season, and between four teams in two leagues Marquardt only managed three. The Oilers trading Wild for Marquardt is like a boss confronting an angry employee, saying "I'll show you!", then punching himself really hard in the testicles.

Cameron Abney. I'm not sure what to say about him. He reached a career high in points last season, but that career high was thirteen. But you have to take that in the context of the draft class - the next Western Hockey League player drafted after Abney was Cody Eakin and he only had ninety-one. Plus two more in the American Hockey League. Abney had less than half the WHL offense of Boston draft pick Ryan Button, an Edmonton native who was picked four spots after Abney.  And plays defense. But, hell, he can fight! Not particularly well but he is physically capable of getting his gloves off his hands even though they're made of cement. Maybe we can just punch the puck into the goal! If you can't beat them in the alley, then really the rest of the game is irrelevant so why play it?

Last year's Tail-End Charlie, Jordan Bendfeld moves up to prestigious Not Last Place on the strength of the acquisition of Matt Marquardt and the existence of Cameron Abney. Moreover, by all accounts Bendfeld was a moderatly effective member of the moderately talented Stockton Thunder last year and in a cameo role with the Springfield Falcons didn't look completely out of his depth. Praising a twenty-two year old defenseman for not looking "completely out of his depth" in the AHL isn't on anyone's road map to the Norris Trophy, but that's the difference between being garbage and just being on the trash podium.

Rounding out the Loon Goon Trio is bewildering nobody Drew Czerwonka. Actually, that's not really fair to Drew. Goons are known for their ability to fight and injure people and generally make lives worse, but the only lives Drew Czerwonka makes worse are those of fans who cheer him on. Okay, yeah, he scored sixteen goals in 2008-09 in the WHL, but he also added two assists, which might have been a sustainable score line back in Cyclone Taylor's day but in the age of the forward pass seems a bit of a fluke.

Actually, maybe we're looking at Czerwonka the wrong way entirely. Perhaps he's a time traveling hockey player, launched into our era from the distant past when sticks looked like they were made from plywood and Eddie Shore was still paralyzing people. Confused, he signs on with the Western Hockey League confusing it with the old professional circuit of the same name. His coach struggles with a brash young man who keeps showing up on the team photo in sepia tone and insists that he play at rover, loping on long runs from his own goal line and deftly handling the puck all the way down the ice before tucking the puck past the wicketkeeper and expressing bewilderment to the referee that no penalty was called when the goalie went down to make the save.

I guess last year, when Czerwonka's statistics adjusted to a far less interesting four goals and nine assists, his coach finally got it through Drew's head what year it was and turned him into yet another tweener with not enough skill to be notable for it and not enough muscle to be notable for that either. While it'll be interesting to see how Czerwonka adjusts to wearing a helmet that isn't made of leather, I'm not too hopeful we'll get to see his tube skates flashing in the NHL anytime soon.

Oh, god, not this bum again. I put Bumagin last on my list because even though he's obviously a better player than the likes of Matt Marquardt it would be hard to think of anybody less likely to ever play in the NHL, except maybe John Goodman. The others have placed him a little higher because he does know how to play hockey and was a lofty ninth in team scoring for the KHL's Nizhnekamsk Neftekhimik (English: HC Gesundheit). The player who was ninth in scoring for the Oilers was Andrew Cogliano. So think of Bumagin as the Andrew Cogliano of Copy-Paste Hockey Club, except without the skating (i.e. the only thing that makes Andrew Cogliano even marginally bearable). Aren't you ready to hand this kid a seven-figure contract?

Yeah, now we're talking. Bryan Pitton. Hockey nomad. Wherever there was a bench that needed warming, there was Bryan holding down the fort. Scouts raved at his opening-the-door sense and his uncanny ability to limply glove jellied donut wrist shots in the pre-game skate. When Pitton was obliged to borrow his seat in Edmonton during one of his too-frequent trips to an NHL crease, Devan Dubnyk said that he'd never seen a bench kept so toasty and welcoming. Also, he posted a save percentage above .900 for the first time in his professional career, which would have been a lot more impressive if this weren't his third professional season and he hadn't done it in the ECHL. He may, however, have been the first NHLer considered so not valuable that he was called up as an NHL backup goaltender because it didn't make any difference whether he played AHL games or not.

Hey, Tyler Bunz is from my old home town of St. Albert! I did not know that.

What I do know is that being ranked above Bryan Pitton in the Top 25 Under 25 is easily the most significant praise Tyler Bunz will ever receive in his career.

Kellen Jones Speed Scouting Report

Cons: Only 5'9". Slightly worse than a point-per-game player in a tier II junior league. Turns twenty years old in August despite just being drafted a couple weeks ago. Have I mentioned that he's only 5'9"? Not actually all that fast, that skilled, that good a stickhandler, that excellent a defensive player, or frankly that interesting. At all. If Kellen Jones can make the Oklahoma City Barons they should probably save time and run the "2010-11 American Hockey League Basement" t-shirts right now.

Pros: Still better than Tyler Bunz.

Here's the great (read: horrible) thing about cheering for the Edmonton Oilers. Kristians Pelss was a seventh-round pick last year. He's small enough that he makes Sam Gagner look like he strides amongst skyscrapers. Prior to last season he played for teams none of you have heard of, whereas last season he played for a team just most of you haven't heard of. When he was drafted he was so obscure that not only did the NHL not have a little insert for him on the draft board, but when they handed out the lists of draft picks about forty-five minutes later his birth city was shown as "Latvia" and his team was left entirely blank. And we think that eight prospects on this team are worse than him.

Robby Dee completed his third year at the University of Maine last year, where he scored a career-best 25 points in 33 games and seventh in team scoring behind (as I never tire of observing) a kid named "Spencer". At 23 years old and with as much professional hockey under his belt as I have, it's safe to say this kid isn't replete with either experience or potential. That's a relatively polite way to say that Robby Dee sucks so hard British Petroleum is trying him on the oil spill. But he's a finance major and a successful one with two appearances on the Hockey East Student-Athlete Honor Roll, so he doesn't have to rely on hockey. Like Ned Braden. Except, you know, shit.

Coming in at number thirty-two (or: "Robby Dee territory"), Ryan O'Marra is our lowest-ranked participant who has actually played in the National Hockey League. He got in three games with the likes of Colin McDonald and eighteen other gentlemen who were probably horrified to fall far enough they were playing hockey with Ryan O'Marra and Colin McDonald. But those three games weren't bad! O'Marra played with nobody against nobody, got an assist, and managed not to defecate all over himself at centre ice (high praise for the 2009-10 Edmonton Oilers). His NHL points-per-game of 0.33 is easily better than his career AHL points-per-game (0.24), which clearly means that he rises to big occasions. Also, he has a reputation as a big-time defensive player in the American league, one hell of a trick for a guy who went -19 last year and -12 the year before. Clearly he has the rare ability to influence people's minds with some sort of space ray. You can't coach that.

Yes, Troy Hesketh is really surging in these rankings. Thirty-first, guys! He's ahead of a guy who has played in the NHL and hasn't suffered debilitating joint trauma! What possibly could have sent Hesketh shooting up like a French rocket in that tenth of a second before it explodes all over the countryside? Perhaps it was the way his team abused a bunch of overwhelmed Minnesotan high school students to the tune of a state finals appearance. Maybe it was the fact that Hesketh, who turned nineteen three days ago, is going to play in the United States Hockey League in hopes of playing college hockey later and getting his first taste of even modestly equal opposition after he turns twenty. Perhaps it's because he's just got to fill out his frame, even though we've been saying the same thing since the day he was drafted and it looks like the only way he can fill out that frame is with donuts. Maybe it's the way he tore his labrum (playing against, remember, high school kids), which is a very manly sort of career-affecting injury. Troy Hesketh was easily the most utterly indefensible draft pick of the Tambellini regime, a record that lasted for maybe half an hour until they took Cam Abney.

Every single one of Milan Kytnar's seasons is exactly like the previous one, except just a liiiiittle bit worse. He's not so much deteriorating as eroding.

Cracking the top thirty may seem like an immense achievement for an immense defenseman who was drafted in the fourth round as an overager from a tier II junior team, who plays for a not really good college hockey program, and who can't, strictly speaking, skate. And it is. But unfortunately for Kyle "Top 30 Under 25" didn't have a ring to it, so he must take my mockery for his reward. He's big, slow, penalty-prone, not actually that effective a player, and is a business major, which at Merrimack seems to rank just behind "Undeclared Arts" on the scale of "well, we have to pretend that you're taking something".

Toni Rajaaaaaalaaa! Na-na-na-na-naaaaa! Toni Rajaalaaaaaa! Na-na-na-na-naaaaa! Na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na naaa-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na, Toni Rajaaaaalaaaaa! Na-na-na-na-naaaa!

But seriously, he stinks.

I was so stoked when we drafted Jeremie Blain! At least, after I figured out who he was. But he's 6'2", which is good! He got a few points for a QMJHL team, which is even better! He went -22 on that same QMJHL team, which is so terrible I burst into non-stop hysterical laughter and had to change my pants afterwards! Now, Jeremie gets some points for the sheer horribleness of the goaltending - their starter was Guillaume Nadeau, owner of an .875 save percentage and a goals-against average above 4, which I'm pretty sure you could improve upon by putting in the Shooter Tutor. It doubtless hurt his numbers and prepared him for life as an Edmonton Oiler. All the same. -22. It's hard to imagine a defenseman who's in that -20 range ever ranking better than twenty-seventh no matter what league he's in and how bad his goaltenders are. No. Impossible to imagine.

Taylor Chorney. Forty-two NHL games last season. Minus twenty one, which over a full season pro-rates to "it's adorable that you let that disabled kid take an everyday shift on your blue line". No introduction is required, and yet none will suffice.

Do you know who the twenty-sixth player in the Top 25 Under 25 last year was? The now ineligible Jean-Francois Jacques. Fitting, isn't it? This seems to be fast becoming the slot for the player who you know is terrible, who we know is terrible, who everybody including the player's mother knows is terrible, and who keeps getting run out for an NHL shift. He fails, and he fails so egregiously it's like a plea to the hockey gods: "Please, rain lightning down upon me and smite me into the earth for my blasphemy against this beautiful sport, please tear out my eyes and cast me down the Gemonian Stairs, please do anything to take me off the ice and put me out of my misery."

Well, Jean-Francois Jacques got his back injury, which just goes to show that the hockey gods grind slow but exceedingly fine. Taylor Chorney has so far been spared, and I think we can safely put down to the hockey gods abandoning the Oilers entirely for a while there. Now, however, he has been given the mark of death, the Sign of the Least, two-six branded on his forehead in white-hot letters.

Actually, we probably should have put him lower. You really think he's better than Jeremie Blain? Come on.