Happy Ending: Infamous Oilers pick at long last gets best of draft day nemesis
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It took 22 years but infamous Edmonton Oilers draft pick Marc-Antoine Pouliot has finally got the best of his draft day nemesis, Zach Parise.
For all the unending, sometimes angry criticism that the Oilers got for drafting Quebec junior star Pouliot ahead of Parise, a strong two-way centre in the U.S. National Jr. team program, Pouliot has successfull7 played the long game here. He is superior to Parise in one important hockey category: career longevity.
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Happy Ending: Infamous Oilers pick at long last gets best of draft day nemesis Back to video
Pouliot just concluded his 20th season as a pro. Parise’s pro career ended after the 2023-24 season, 19 pro seasons, one in the AHL, 18 in the NHL, where he played 1254 regular sesaon games, scoring 889 points. No doubt — and it’s not close — he was the superior player of the two.
Pouliot played just 192 NHL games, 176 of them with the Oilers, but he’s played 13 seasons as a strong forward in the top Swiss league. At age 39, he was a key player on the Geneve Servettte squad, scoring 22 points in 36 games. Pouliot, who became a Swiss citizen in 2021, has also signed on to play one more year with Geneve.
Team manager Marc Gautschi says of Pouliot: “He remains one of the best players around the opposing cage and on the power play, making a valuable contribution to our offensive production. His experience will also be an important asset in strengthening the group’s chemistry.”
Pouliot’s successful career stood out to me in my annual review of formers Oilers still playing pro hockey. He’s realized some of the potential the Oilers saw in him long ago in the 2003 draft, even as the team’s scouting department of that time has taken no end of abuse for passing on Parise, who quickly developed into an outstanding NHLer.
In 2012, beloved Cult of Hockey writer Bruce McCurdy named Pouliot the fifth worst draft bust all-time for the Edmonton Oilers.
Wrote McCurdy: “The 2003 NHL Entry Draft had been rightly hyped as one of the richest groups of young talent in years. There were any number of future impact players on the board, more than enough to go deep into the first round. The Edmonton Oilers, fresh off another low-seed playoff appearance — a six-game first-round defeat to guess who, the Dallas Stars — were sitting in a pretty decent spot with the #17 choice.”
Forwards taken early in that draft included Eric Staal, Nathan Horton, Thomas Vanek, Milan Michalek, Jeff Carter and Dustin Brown, but the highly-touted Parise was still on the board when it was Edmonton’s turn to pick. Here’s how McCurdy described the moment, with commentator Pierre McGuire salivating on-air for the Oilers to grab him at 17 overall.
Wrote McCurdy: “Unfortunately, it wouldn’t be the Oilers doing the picking. First there was a delay, then there was a time-out, then there was a phone call or was it a face-to-face? between Kevin Lowe and Lou Lamoriello. Eventually it was announced that Oilers had indeed made a deal with the Devils. They’d traded down to #22 and had gotten a second rounder as well, albeit a second rounder that was so freaking late it had the rather suspicious number of 68. This in a 30-team league, mind, although I’ll grant you math has never been its strength. Used to be lots of compensatory picks back in the day — and of course, New Jersey had just won the Stanley Cup so their pick was a late one.
“So there was Lou smirking into the mic with Oilers’ pick and of course he took Zach Parise, and of course Zach Parise turned into a star. I could see it coming from the moment Oilers called that timeout.”
In the next few picks, future NHL stars Mike Richard, Corey Perry and Ryan Kesler were taken. Ryan Getzlaf was also still on the board when the Oil drafted 17th.
McCurdy continued: “Once Pouliot turned pro, health and performance issues both started to surface. He spent a few years on the periphery of the Oilers, never really a top nine player, never really a centre or a winger, never really a key contributor to either special team; it just never happened for the guy. Seven years after he was drafted, Poo was gone without so much as a qualifying offer, receiving a “second opinion” in Tampa and a third in Phoenix while spending the lion’s share of his single year with both organizations down in the AHL. This year he’s in the Swiss League, and the dream is all but dead.”
In 2012, Sportsnet writer Ryan Porth listed the Oilers draft day trade as one of the worst in NHL history.
In 2023, Oil Rig writer Preston Hodgkinson ranked the 2003 draft day trade as the fourth worst in Oilers history.
And yet more than a decade later, Pouliot chugs along as a successful player in Switzerland.
Big names, big years, but no longer Oilers
Other notables when we look at former Oilers forwards still playing pro hockey?
Most beloved: Got to be Sam Gagner, one of the rare players to have two stints with the Oilers (Kevin Lowe, Glenn Anderson and Ryan Smyth being three other notables in that category). Gagner was a gritty checking forward in his second stint, winning widespread admiration for his battle level. Gagner tried to make it back to the NHL this past year, but had zero goals with 10 assists in 19 AHL games.
Biggest draft bust: Nail Yakupov. He was taken first overall — and most teams would have made the same pick — but he never came close in the NHL. He has, however, carved out a decent KHL career and just had a strong year with Omsk, putting up 38 points in 43 games.
Most regretted: Dylan Holloway. Enough said.
Second most regretted: Warren Foegele. Had a big season, playing fast and aggressive hockey for the L.A. Kings. But the Oilers chose Viktor Arvidsson over him.
Unsung hero: Mylan Kytnar played just one NHL game, but he’s hung in there as a pro, never scoring much, never sticking in a top Euro league, but slugging it out in the top Czech, Slovak and French leagues. He scored 24 points in 35 games for Rouen last season.
Most over-rated: Taylor Hall. The sun, the moon and all the stars were expected of Taylor Hall in his NHL career. He seemed to have it all as a prospect, size, speed, shot, charisma. And he had a few big years, in the NHL but for his talent and for all the hoopla, his performance never came together long enough to become a beloved star in any one NHL city. He’s now played for seven teams.
Most likely to get another shot with the Oilers: Klim Kostin might be worth a PTO as early as right now.
Most disappointing stint with the Oilers in a leading role: As bad as the Yakupov pick was, Matt Tkachuk was available in 2016 when the Oil took Jesse Puljujarvi. The big Finn was up and down with the Oilers but never stuck with the Oilers, partly due to injury and illness. Honourable mention goes to Tyler Benson, who had a great first year in the AHL but could never build on it at the NHL level and zero points in 31 games in the Swedish league.
Most disappointing stint with the Oilers in a minor role: Remember how the Oilers turned Jordan Eberle into Ryan Strome into Ryan Spooner? We’d all love to forget. Runners up: Andreas Athanasiou, Magnus Paajarvi.
The “Marc-Antoine Pouliot Award” for best career for a former Oiler in Europe: Anton Lander. Lander was so close to sticking with the Oilers, and might well have done so if his AHL coach Todd Nelson had kept the Oilers job in Connor McDavid’s first season. But Lander made his way home back to Europe where he’s since been a stalwart forward for Kazan and Yarosavl in the KHL, Zug in Switzerland and his old team Timra in the Swedish league, where he plays with his former Oilers, AHL and teen forward partner Magnus Paajarvi.
Best seasons in 2024-25: This one goes to a number of former Oilers, including Foegele, Holloway, Ryan McLeod, Iiro Pakarinen, who scored 30 goals in 58 games in the Finnish league, Teemu Hartikainen with 48 points in 42 games in the Swiss league, Taylor Beck, with 56 points in 57 games in the KHL, and, my personal favourite, 40 year old Patrick Thoresen, 41 points in 48 games in the Swedish second division.
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At the Cult of Hockey
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