First Round Concludes

Look out! We've already started the second round of the Waiver Draft and it's only Wednesday morning. Hoorah! Oh happy days! Managing to plow through everyone in the first couple days was a big relief, because now we can almost float through the second round without much haste. I certainly can't complain about that. Well, let's see how the first round finished after an interesting first half to the Draft.

At pick number nine, John P. decided to drop the recently demoted Anton Stralman to pick up one of the high-scoring Blackhawk defensemen, Cam Barker. Barker has enjoyed a fairly productive year, but it was hampered a bit with injuries this season and a small stint in the minors at the beginning of the year. In 32 games, Barker has 19 points, which gives him one of the better points-per-game averages in the available defensemen column.

Dale C. decided to forego the second highest scoring forward available, taking a chance on Scott Hartnell, thinking that the Flyers are still yet to break out of their scoring funk they seem to be in. Hartnell was a big playoff performer last season and there are some high hopes that he can score like he did in the playoffs during the stretch run towards the playoffs.

Does that mean if Jamie Langenbrunner was skipped once or twice, that he becomes a better deal for the person who picks him? Yeah, I think Benson got a bit of a deal getting Langenbrunner down in the 11th pick of the Waiver Draft. He was pretty clutch in the Devils' game against the Senators on Tuesday night, scoring a pair of goals. Of course, those goals don't count, but his hot streak could continue through to next week... then we'll be sorry.

It took a few picks, but Ed Jovanovski, the highest-ranking defenseman available in the Draft was taken by Marcus. Jovanovski is the second player to be picked in the Draft that was dropped in the first Waiver Draft. He was definitely off to a slow start, but really picked it up in the following nine weeks. He can turn out to be one hell of a pick for Marcus, if he continues his scoring ways.

In the column of teams dropping one of their first Waiver Draft picks for another, Ryan dropped Curtis Sanford of the Canucks in order to pick up Andrew Raycroft of the Colorado Avalanche. Raycroft has started to get more and more starts from the Avs, as their starter going into the season, Peter Budaj, has not performed up to task in the net beforehand. Raycroft has himself a pretty respectable record of 9-5-0 this year, but has been awfully cold of late, going 1-4-0 in his last five.

Maybe it's more of a case of getting caught up in the All-Star hype, but Clayton managed to bump Blake Wheeler up the list of Waiver Draft picks into 14th spot, as he was still available for him to pick up. Wheeler, who had 5 points in the YoungStars game in Montreal, has enjoyed some scoring success with the Bruins this year and will be more than an adequate replacement for Paul Kariya, who is injured for the rest of the year.

One of the most promising goal scorers in the league was quick to be snapped up in the first round, as Jeremy picked up David Booth of the Florida Panthers in the 15th position, dropping Alex Steen from his crew. Booth scored his 20th goal last night against the Flyers and that was in his 40th game of the season. Booth missed out on a number of games due to injury this year, but it hasn't hampered his goal scoring ability. This should be a very positive move.

The last actual pick in the first round, as John B. decided to pass his picks again, was Pekka Rinne, who was taken by Peter. Rinne has now taken over the number one job in Nashville from Dan Ellis, who hasn't been able to keep the pucks out the net and put wins in the right column. Rinne was picked up for Joey MacDonald, another first Waiver Draft pick to be dropped.