Pittsburgh Penguins All-Time Draft - (Round 25)

[MRandall25]

That's why I'm drafting a different coach

[Gaucho]

Didn't know he waa that unhappy.

[mikey287]

Didn't know he waa that unhappy.

You'll come to know later, time permitting for these bios, that he wasn't alone in that line of thinking...

[Gaucho]

I knew this thread was going to be awesome.

[meow]

It is with great pleasure that I announce Muck, Grind & Repeats newest edition, Larry fricking Murphy!



Much like our first round selection, Mr. Murphy was a model for consistency, but also as one tough customer. He had to quit using his given birth name of Lawrence because he was tired of beating people up that made fun of it.

[Gaucho]

Whoop, whoop!

One of my favorites.

[mikey287]

Already had one made in advance for Mr. Murphy...

Larry Murphy



Position: Defense
6'2" / 210 lbs.
Shoots: Right

As a Penguin (Dec. 1990 - 1995): 336 GP 78 goals, 223 assists, 301 points - playoffs: 74 GP 15 goals, 57 assists, 72 points

Four full seasons + one partial season = 5 seasons

2x Stanley Cup Champion (1991, 1992)

---
Norris: 3rd, 4th, 5th, t-7th^

All-Star Defense Voting: 3rd*, 4th*, 5th, 8th
* - Second-Team All-Star (x2)
^ - one vote

1x NHL All-Star
---

[u[Scoring finishes vs. league defensemen:[/u] (partial season ignored)
1991-92: t-3rd in goals, 7th in assists, t-4th in points, t-4th in +/-
1992-93: 5th in goals, 3rd in assists, 3rd in points, 1st in +/-
1993-94: 8th in goals, t-6th in assists, 7th in points
1994-95: 2nd in goals, 12th in assists, t-5th in points, t-18th in +/-

Scoring finishes vs. teammates: (partial season ignored)
1991-92: 1st among d-men (by 20.3%), 4th overall
1992-93: 1st among d-men (by 193.1%), 6th overall
1993-94: 1st among d-men (by 151.7%), 4th overall
1994-95: 1st among d-men (by 137.5%), 5th overall

The usually dubious plus/minus stat vs. teammates: (partial season ignored)
1991-92: 1st among d-men (and overall)
1992-93: 1st among d-men
1993-94: 3rd among d-men
1994-95: 1st among d-men

From 1991-95: Murphy was a plus-100! Second among all defensemen in that span to Nicklas Lidstrom (plus-101).

- Murphy is the all-time Pens leader among defensemen in plus/minus (+102) and is third overall to Jaromir Jagr and Mario Lemieux.

---

Approximate Ice Time as a Penguin
1990-91: #2/3 defenseman, 3rd in overall ATOI
1991-92: #2 defenseman*, 2nd in overall ATOI*
1992-93: #1 defenseman (by nearly 3 minutes!), 1st in overall ATOI (by over 5 minutes!)^
1993-94: #1 defenseman, 1st in overall ATOI
1994-95: #1 defenseman, 1st in overall ATOI

* - Until Coffey was traded, then Murphy took over the reigns.
^ - Projected to have played the most ATOI in the entire NHL by minutes - with an 's'

---

'Quiet, thoughtful, methodical,' wrote the National Post, summarizing the outstanding career of Larry Murphy.

...

The story of Larry Murphy is one of perseverance and longevity. Quietly yet efficiently, Murphy has delivered one of the most productive careers of any blueliner in NHL history.

...

Murphy's slick playmaking and good slap shot helped Pittsburgh win their first Stanley Cup. Murphy played a huge role in that initial Cup victory, scoring 23 points in 23 games.

...

Murphy was more of a passer than a rusher, preferring to pinch into the offensive zone while expertly manning the point. He was one of the best I have ever seen at holding the blue line, almost always blocking bad clearing attempts by desperate defensive teams. He was a great skater in his younger days, and possessed an excellent collection of shots.

Though he had good size, he never really played a physical game. He would bump his check off the puck rather than make strong takeouts. He relied on an heady stick checking defensive game that he excelled at due to his great hockey sense, ability to read the oncoming attack, and his flawless positioning.

Murphy was a smart, studious player. It was his understanding of what he could do that made him special. He formed a great partnership in Pittsburgh with XXX XXXXXXXXXX.

He was good because he read the plays so well. He never got flustered.

He's the smartest player I've ever seen.

Larry Murphy is traded for a defenseman who makes about one-third as much money and has been about one-third the player.

[Rylan]

With the 9th overall pick, the Degloving Kings are proud to select:



1x Team MVP
1x NHL All-Star
1x Stanley Cup Champion

When it comes to just accomplishments as a Penguin, Fleury seems to be the better option. And with only a few star goalies in Penguin history and the log jam of forwards that we are involved in I feel getting a goalie is a solid play here.

[meow]

Interesting. Very interesting.

[Rylan]

I had 2-3 names in mind for this pick and felt that at least on of the 2 will be available for my next pick, but I wasn't sure if either Fleury or any of the other top quality goalies would be available for my next pick. Probably a reach, but as a goalie enthusiast it is important to me to have at least one of the 2 top goalies.

[Gaucho]

I fear the worst. Well, no reason to be secretive. I'd be shocked if mikey doesn't pick Barrasso next, who, at this point, is a better option than MAF, imho.

[meow]

:deleted:

[Rylan]

what were you trying to tell us meow?

[meow]

does that link not work for you?

[meow]

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/pub ... utput=html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

[Rylan]

First one no, that does though. Thanks.

[Sarcastic]

Mikey, how are you guys going to decide who wins?

[Sarcastic]

Oh, voting.

'At the end, we'll pit the teams against each other in a tournament and have the board vote on the winner. We can make little bios of the players with stats, notes, scouting reports, videos, etc. to make a case for a player and really do a lot of fun learning in the process.'

[mikey287]

Thanks for the spreadsheet meow! Good work. When you get to it, there will be 25 rounds total - I haven't even got that far with post #24 myself. It'll take some time certainly...

My comment is as follows: I'm pretty confident that Marc-Andre Fleury will be the best goalie in franchise history when it's all done. But, there's no projecting in a situation like this. It's WYSIWYG. With that said, I firmly believe that Barrasso is still the best goalie we've ever had. It gets closer when you take out what he did in Buffalo of course, but I'm still pretty confident that Barrasso is better. Fleury could have pulled ahead if his last two seasons were closer to top-10 instead of bottom-10 but that's neither here nor there. (well, actually, it's both).

I'll also say that I - and by extension, we - are tainting the results of an all-time list by drafting teams for competition. But this way, I've found, is more fun than sitting there and trying to compile top-10 lists of every position and merging them and what not. Here we can draft and make teams and get people involved without it seeming like a research paper. I say this because Marc-Andre Fleury - with respect to the pick, it had to be done, I know - is not the 9th best player in our history. Nor is Barrasso 10th. Nor is Barrasso 9th nor is Fleury 10th. But, when you're put in this type of atmosphere - this is what happens.

So there will be four of you that don't get two goalies that are well ahead of the pack and it will make your teams weaker. When it comes time for discussion and what not, that can't be held against you. It's purely circumstantial, it's not an indictment of your ability to make a team, it's an indictment of this team to produce quality goaltending. I just want to put that out there for those that are bummed about it...it's not a death sentence. Anyone that knows this team's history (those that will be participating in such discussion) will largely ignore goaltending at the end of the day because there's just not enough quality out there...

At the end of the day, we'll go back and see how far off this really is after all the picks are out there and we've had time to absorb the information...

Tom Barrasso, G

[no name]

Thats a tough one, but i would have to pick Tommy B ahead of Fleury. But i think you might, i said might, be right he might go down in the end as the best Penguins goalie. He just ins't there for me right now.

[Rylan]

I'll also say that I - and by extension, we - are tainting the results of an all-time list by drafting teams for competition. But this way, I've found, is more fun than sitting there and trying to compile top-10 lists of every position and merging them and what not. Here we can draft and make teams and get people involved without it seeming like a research paper. I say this because Marc-Andre Fleury - with respect to the pick, it had to be done, I know - is not the 9th best player in our history. Nor is Barrasso 10th. Nor is Barrasso 9th nor is Fleury 10th. But, when you're put in this type of atmosphere - this is what happens.

I agree with this paragraph completely. Because we are building teams, I felt the small pool of goalies makes these 2 goalies valuable.

But, when I took out what Barrasso did as a Sabre I felt that Fleury was the better player. But, for me it was a really tough choice and I probably allowed for my own bias towards Fleury to get in the way. Its 1a to 1b though. I felt it was splitting hairs, especially going between different eras of hockey for goalies. I mean aside from the poor playoff series this year Fleury played exceptionally well and it was him that the past 2 years has been one of the few reasons the Pens were even where they were going into the playoffs. A bad playoff series does not make a bad year for me.

[mikey287]

Yeah, I think we're all quickly on the same basic page here. And this is what this is all for, to learn and get perspective on things. And hopefully discussion in conjunction with some of these profiles/bios that are percolating, we'll be able to make a better judgment for next time - if there is a next time.

You're spot on, goalies are super-valuable and the two best went in the top-10. I'll make a profile for both and post them at the same time (when I get time to do so) and we'll see what comes of it. In my preliminary research, Barrasso came out on top. Maybe others will see it differently...

[Gaucho]

Well, I was hoping to get either Barrasso or Fleury, but unfortunately that didn't work out. Still, I really feel I need to pick a goalie at this point, as I don't want to end up with JS Aubin or Roberto Romano between the pipes.

Les Binkley, G

I'm sure some of you will disagree with this pick. Binkley is certainly not the 12th best player in Pens' history and maybe he isn't even the 3rd best goalie. However, he has been the Pens' starting goalie for their first five seasons and put up respectable numbers for an often struggling expansion team: 196 G, 58 W, 94 L, 34 T. Not to mention his awesome playoff record: 5-2. Hey, and he wore contact lenses.

[Rylan]

Interesting pick Gaucho.

[Gaucho]

Not exactly the best player available, eh?