New Jersey Devils: Top 25 NHL Draft Picks Of All Time

The New Jersey Devils have been known for getting the most out of some of their early drafts to build a championship roster.

The New Jersey Devils built a franchise of winning thanks to the shrewd moves of general manager Lou Lamoriello. He used some of the best trades we’ve ever seen and a lot of negotiations that were borderline self-destructive to get one of the best rosters of the 90s and early 2000s. Getting Scott Stevens as compensation instead of Rod Brind’Amour and Curtis Joseph when the St. Louis Blues signed Brendan Shanahan in 1991.

That’s just one example of Lou changing the culture in New Jersey. It was that culture that kept players in the building for years. However, it was hard to get players into the building. Lamoriello wasn’t the best at getting free agents to come to the Garden State. They couldn’t bring in Brett Hull as Dallas did. Teemu Selanne refused to come to New Jersey, and instead signed with the Colorado Avalanche. The Devils also watched their biggest rivals sign all the big names right around them.

That means Lou had to draft extremely well to keep this team winning for a long time. In fact, it was his drafting that drove the Devils. When he was at his best, the Devils were a powerhouse. When he lost the ability to draft well towards the end of his career in New Jersey, it put the Devils in the position it is now where they are still rebuilding over seven years.

This New Jersey Devils team has a very important draft where they have three 1st-round picks for the first time in team history. So, to learn how to dominate this year’s draft, first, we want to learn about our history. We went deep in the well and we looked at the 25 best draft picks in team history.

25.

Nico vs. Nolan. That’s what this draft was all about. The New Jersey Devils and Ray Shero kept everything close to the vest before until he made the pick to bring in the first-ever player from Switzerland to be taken first overall. The Devils went for Nico over Nolan Patrick, who was an American with a long track record of dominance. However, Patrick had major injury concerns.

The fact that Shero went with Nico over Nolan is not the slam dunk people assume it is now. Patrick’s career has been derailed multiple times, and the Philadelphia Flyers aren’t positive how to move forward with him. Then, Nico Hischier is quickly becoming an amazing two-way center. Hischier is proven to be a top-line player from the day he entered the NHL.

Honestly, there are two reasons why Hischier isn’t higher on this list. For one, he was taken first overall. Having the pick of every single great player in the draft means a lot. Some would say the Devils should have taken Elias Petterson now of the Vancouver Canucks, but he wasn’t even NHL ready in that first year. The anonymous scouts who tell insiders they had Petterson top on their draft board are outliers at best and liars at worst. Second is he’s only been in the league for three years. A lot still has to happen to see what his career holds.

Hischier is going to keep getting better and better. He’s on pace to be the Devils top center for a long time. The Devils are looking to finally come out of their rebuild, and a lot of the hope is at the feet of Hischier. He’s the best forward on the team, and it’s not particularly close right now. It was undoubtedly a draft pick that will change the team’s history.

24.

Sergei Brylin is one of the biggest fan favorites in the history of the New Jersey Devils franchise. He is one of the few players to lift the Stanley Cup for all three Devils championships without having his number retired. Some players were there for some (Bobby Holik, Patrik Elias, et al), but outside of the Martin Brodeur, Scott Stevens, Scott Niedermayer, Ken Daneyko royalty, Brylin is one of the best.

He was drafted in 1992 with the Devils 2nd-round pick. Brylin had a very interesting career when you look at his stats. He’s someone that is looked at as one of the best, but he never really was. He played a role with the Devils, and he did what he was told. He didn’t even play the most games of Devils drafted that season. Defenseman Jason Smith played over 1,000 games including becoming captain for the Edmonton Oilers.

Brylin played 13 seasons in a Devils jersey. Over his 765 games, he had 129 goals and 179 assists. He put up one 20-goal season in his career, an outlier to an otherwise defensive career. He went to Russia to finish his career before returning to the Devils to become a coach in the AHL. His legacy is one of our favorites, but as a draft pick he’s not one of the best, but he is one that deserves recognition. To get someone who contributed to the team for well over a decade and three Stanley Cups can’t be ignored.

23.

Jay Pandolfo joined the Devils organization as the 32nd overall pick in the 1993 NHL Draft. He just finished his sophomore season at Boston University where he had 42 points in 37 games. He would go on to play all four years in college, finishing his senior season with 67 points as the captain of the team. He showed the abilities of an awesome fourth liner when he was in college running things on the top line.

Pandolfo had a similar career to Brylin, although he started a little later. He never hit the highs Brylin hit (his career high in goals is 13), but he had a similar impact over the long term. He played 13 seasons with the Devils before playing two seasons with the New York Islanders and Boston Bruins to finish his career.

Pandolfo was on two Devils Cup winners. He’s another fan favorite that spent more than a decade in black and red. Not bad for a 2nd-round pick in the early 90s. He was picked a couple picks ahead of a future Devils captain Jamie Langenbrunner. This was another good 2nd-round pick, but it’s hard to argue with the results Pandolfo brings.

22.

Another 2nd-round pick that worked out swimmingly for the New Jersey Devils. As you can see, when Sean Burke was taken in 1985, there were only 21 picks in the 1st round. Burke fell to the early 2nd round, as the Devils were still early in their franchise. As we all know, Burke’s biggest contribution to the Devils was what he brought back in a trade.

When the Devils traded Sean Burke to the Hartford Whalers for Bobby Holik and the draft pick that turned into the previous man on this list, Jay Pandolfo. It was a franchise-changing move on August 28th, 1992. Burke had just gone through an injury-riddled year, and the Devils had Martin Brodeur waiting in the wings.

Still, Burke had himself a nice career overall. This shows that the players don’t have to be lifelong Devils to make it on the list of good draft picks. Burke ended up playing 18 years for nine different franchises. Once the NHL made its way out of the insane 80s when teams were scoring at will, his save percentage and GAA numbers started to look like a legit goaltender. He ended up playing in the net into his 40s, and he is now moving through NHL front offices. Anyone who you can draft outside the 1st round that lasts into his 40s is a good pick. However, he does lose some serious marks since Mike Richter was still on the board.

21.

Willie Mitchell is the first player on this list that was a real surprise. We expect 2nd-round picks to at least make the NHL. Willie Mitchell was taken in a round that doesn’t even exist in the draft anymore. The Devils took him with the 199th-overall pick, which in 1996 fell in the 8th round. Mitchell didn’t even take that long to make the NHL, playing his first game for the Devils in 2000.

He didn’t spend much time with the Devils. Lou Lamoriello traded him and future considerations for Sean O’Donnell after just 18 games in New Jersey. Mitchell went on to play 907 games with six franchises, including raising the Stanley Cup with two Los Angeles Kings teams. He was logging well over 22 minutes per game in the 2012 Stanley Cup Finals, the last hope for the New Jersey Devils championship hopes.

Mitchell was never a superstar defenseman, but he was a really good one over a 15-year NHL career. Finding him in the 8th round of the draft was an insane steal. It was an interesting draft year, as Pavel Kubina, Tomas Kaberle, and Craig Adams were all taken after the start of the 7th round. Mitchell was still one of four out of around 80 players that made a decent contribution to this league after that round.

20.

We’ve come to our first current player, and it’s not a huge surprise that Blake Coleman made this list. Coleman took quite a while to make it to the NHL, but once he was here he made an immediate impact. He spent four years after he was drafted in 2011 at the University of Miami (Ohio). Then, after he signed with the New Jersey Devils, it took him another two years to be an NHL regular.

Then, Coleman exploded. He had a ho-hum rookie season, with just 25 points. However, he played a crucial role on the Devils penalty kill that led the team to the playoffs for the first time in five years. The next season, he became a 20-goal scorer and one of the most exciting players on the team. He had this crazy speed that seemingly came out of nowhere. Exactly when he needed to hit that extra gear, Coleman was on the other side of the ice.

This season, Coleman took it to yet another level, and the Devils used that momentum to trade him to the Tampa Bay Lightning for a top prospect in Nolan Foote and a 1st-round pick. To get all that for a player it took six years to develop and was taken 75th overall is quite the feat.

Looking at Coleman’s ranks in 2011, it looks like the Devils took a major swing on him. He was ranked 198th in Hockey Central Scouting’s final North American rankings. That is usually a player who falls to the final round or even outside the draft entirely. Instead, the Devils saw something in Coleman that ended up coming to fruition. We’ve seen Lou Lamoriello take major chances on players in the past and it comes back to burn him. That wasn’t the case here, as Coleman is now a special NHL player.

19.

Paul Martin is a forgotten great in terms of New Jersey Devils defenders. It’s mostly because he came to the Devils the year after they won all those Stanley Cup Championships, and he left in free agency to sign a big contract with the Pittsburgh Penguins. Still, Martin was one of the better offensive defensemen not named Scott Niedermayer in this team’s history. He didn’t get a ton of points, but boy could he move the puck.

The defenseman played 14 seasons in the NHL, including six with the Devils. He never once played a season that didn’t end with the postseason. He was drafted after winning the Mr. Hockey Award as the best high school senior in Minnesota. The Devils were betting early on Martin’s progression and were rewarded for it.

He spent three seasons at Minnesota before joining the Devils following their Stanley Cup win in 2003. He then stayed with the Devils until two seasons before they reached the Cup Finals again. It was weird timing for Martin’s entire career. He joined the Pittsburgh Penguins the year after they won the Stanley Cup then left the year before they won another Cup to join the San Jose Sharks. The Sharks made it to the Cup Finals in 2016, but he wasn’t able to push them over the top.

Martin still had a great career, and taking a chance on a very young defenseman paid off for Lou Lamoriello. He may have never won a championship, but he helped make three different franchises contenders of some kind. His career will be underrated overall because of luck. He’s still a very good player to get at 62 overall.

17.

Another player drafted from the Tri-City Americans, Scott Gomez’s career went a lot better in his time for New Jersey than Souray. He immediately made an impact just one season after he was drafted in 1998. He won the Calder Trophy in the 1999-00 season and helped the Devils win the Stanley Cup. He ended up winning another Stanley Cup in 2003 before leaving the Devils to go sign with the Rangers in 2007.

Gomez was one of the best 1st-round picks of the Lou Lamoriello era. It’s funny since the Devils had back-to-back 1st-round picks in 1998 thanks to trading up with the Dallas Stars for the final pick of the round. If that trade doesn’t work out, the Devils only end up with Mike Van Ryn, which would have been a disaster. Instead, they get the dynamic center out of Alaska as well.

Gomez’s career in New Jersey was heading towards Hall of Fame consideration. He was scoring between 60-80 points per game and he was still only 27 years old. He went to the Rangers, and something just didn’t click after the first season. He was eventually traded to the Canadiens and Gomez watched his career fall to pieces.

Despite the rough ending, Gomez still ended up with 756 points over 1,089 games. He’s a two-time Stanley Cup Champion, a rookie of the year, and a two-time All Star. Would his numbers look better if he chose to forgo the money to stay with the Devils? We’ll never know, but it’s impossible to say this draft pick and the move to trade up didn’t work out perfectly for the Devils. His contribution to this franchise will last in our memories forever.

16.

Picking between Petr Sykora and Scott Gomez was hard because they have remarkably similar careers. Sykora was able to contribute immediately, playing 63 games and scoring 42 points in his draft year. Despite that, he was sent to the AHL for most of his sophomore season. Once he returned to the NHL in the 1997-98 season, he was ready to become a scoring machine.

Sykora’s career is fascinating, as he ended his career where it started in New Jersey. He scored 350 points in his original stint with the Devils, which includes being part of the “A” line on that magical 2000 team. He scored 68 points that season. He ended up being even better the next season with 81 points and 22 more in the playoffs. In 2001, it looked like Sykora was a superstar.

His career took a step back starting the very next season. He only had 48 points the next season before leaving for the Mighty Ducks of Anaheim. Sykora became a 50-point there but helped the Ducks with 13 points in their run to the Stanley Cup Finals in 2003.

Sykora’s career got weird after that. He was traded to the Rangers where he spent 40 games and scored 31 points. He left that offseason to sign a one-year deal with the Edmonton Oilers (did not remember that at all), spent one season there before joining Sidney Crosby and the Pittsburgh Penguins. He had one good season there and was on a team that went to back-to-back Stanley Cup Finals. However, he was benched for the Penguins Stanley Cup win in 2009, except for one game where he was forced to leave after blocking a shot. Sykora went to the KHL, returned to the Devils for a nice final season, left for the Swiss leagues, and finally retired. It was a great career from a player who started contributing basically when the 18th-overall pick was announced.

15.

Brian Rolston is one of the last 1st-round picks of the Devils being outside the playoffs. He was drafted in 1991 before going to Lake Superior State University. He ended up going to back-to-back National Championships, winning one in college. It took Rolston until the lockout-shortened 1995 season to make the NHL, but he immediately contributed to the Devils first Stanley Cup run.

Rolston ended up playing more than 1,200 games over 17 seasons. He ended up having two different stints with the Devils, both of which just missed his prime. The Devils traded Rolston to the Colorado Avalanche to bring Claude Lemieux back for another Cup run. Rolston was terrible for the Avalanche, and they traded him in the deal that brought Ray Bourque to Colorado.

Boston is where Rolston found his game. He scored nine points in his first 16 games in Boston to end the 2000 season. Then, he scored between 58 and 62 points over the next three seasons. He ended up joining Jacques Lemaire in Minnesota after his four-and-a-half-year stint in Boston.

Overall, Rolston was top ten in Selke Trophy voting four times in his career (including once with the Devils in 1999). He was one of the most underrated two-way players in the league. He is best know for playing on a lot of teams, but his 33 shorthanded goals rank 14th all time. It seems like he was a player with a ton of talent that just kept going to the wrong situation. His team lost in the first round of the playoffs for his final 10 appearances. It’s not his best look, but it tells a story of an interesting career that will probably get lost in time. Still, it was the right pick at the time. When looking at all the other picks after Rolston, there’s not a lot of regrets. The Devils did well in the 1991 NHL Draft.

14.

Henrique, it’s over.

Those words live on in the history of the New Jersey Devils. It’s Game 6 of the Eastern Conference Championship. The team is facing their bitter rival the New York Rangers and the game is now in overtime. If the Devils win, they are going to the Stanley Cup Finals. A rookie center is in the right place at the right time, and a familiar voice in Doc Emrick says those wonderful words.

Adam Henrique will always be most known for what he did in the 2011-12 season. It wasn’t his best season, but it was where he had the most impact. Even beyond his ECF heroics, he also scored in 2OT in Game 7 of the first round of the playoffs against the Florida Panthers. Henrique was on the top line with Zach Parise and Ilya Kovalchuk after Travis Zajac tore his Achilles tendon. It was a big task for a rookie, but Henrique was clearly up for it.

For a 3rd-round pick, Henrique’s progression to the NHL came pretty fast. He spent another two seasons with the Windsor Spitfires, the team he was once teammates with Taylor Hall. Then, he jumped in the AHL where he had a 50-point season before becoming an NHL regular for good.

Henrique is never going to be the best forward on your team, but he’s a player everyone roots for, and every other season he contributes. He has one 30-goal season and was likely on his way to his second this season. He turned 30 years old this year, so there’s a lot of career left for him. However, he will forever be known for his clutch gene. He has 34 game-winning goals, which means more than 18 percent of 182 goals were game winners. Nothing will be scoring five goals on the way to the Stanley Cup Finals in 2012, three of which were game winners and two were overtime series winners.

13.

John MacLean was the first great New Jersey Devils forward. Before Patrik Elias came along, he was atop most of the Devils scoring record holders. John MacLean had an interesting career with the Devils as the player who remains atop the charts for point totals but never seems to make the conversation for Mount Rushmore or even Ring of Honor. His jersey doesn’t hang in the Prudential Center rafters, and he only got one of the three Stanley Cup rings.

MacLean was picked sixth in the 1983 NHL Draft, the draft that came after the Devils first full season after moving to New Jersey. This draft year was really, really good at the top. Hall of Famers Steve Yzerman, Cam Neely, and Pat LaFontaine were all taken in the top ten. It’s hard to argue MacLean wasn’t at least in the ballpark of a Hall of Fame career before it all fell apart. He had three-straight 40-goal seasons for the Devils from 1988-91. He even got a 3rd place vote for the Hart Trophy in 1991.

Things sort of fell apart after that. He’d only have one more 70-point season in his career. He did have really good playoff runs in 1994 and 1995, scoring close to a point per game in both. MacLean had five points in a four-game Stanley Cup sweep. His season after New Jersey is not why he’s on this list. He had 701 points with the Devils, second on the franchise list. If he was taken outside the top ten, he’d be way up the list. However, with a sixth-overall pick, the Devils should expect close to this kind of production.

12.

Kirk Muller will always go down as “not Mario Lemieux”. The New Jersey Devils were the second-worst team in the league when Lemieux was one of the best prospects to ever enter the league. The Devils goal differential in 1983-84 was -119. Still, they had one more win than the Pittsburgh Penguins, and that meant they had to settle for second best (or worst in this sense). The consolation prize wasn’t half bad, as Muller turned into a really good player.

Muller dominated almost immediately, scoring 54 points as a rookie. (Lemieux had 100, but we’ll stop bringing that up now.) Still, to be the second-overall pick and still make this list, he has to a world beater. He eventually became that. In 1988, he finished the season with 94 points and he and Sean Burke both came away with a Hart Trophy vote that season, one of only 11 players to do so. (Don’t look to see who won. Just don’t.)

Muller ended up going head to head with Lou Lamoriello about his contract, and that never ends well for the player. They ended up trade Muller to the Canadiens after five-straight 70+ point seasons. They only got Stephane Richer and Tom Chorske in return for him and Devils’ current goalie coach Rollie Melancon. He was close to a point per game for those bad early Devils years, and the Devils fans who have been around since the beginning will always have a soft spot for Muller. He played 1,349 games and scored more than 900 points. Even as the second-overall pick, it’s hard to say he was anything but a very successful pick.

11.

Brian Gionta will always be a huge fan favorite among New Jersey Devils fans. He stood at just 5’7, yet still holds the team record for goals in a season when he scored 48 in 2005-06. He never came close to those heights again, but that 89-point season was straight magic.

He had 312 points in the first seven years of his career, all with the Devils. He moved on the Montreal Canadiens in free agency, where he played decently well into his 30s. Then, he went to the Buffalo Sabres and eventually chose to play with Team USA in the Olympics before finishing his career in Boston.

Gionta was the captain for the Canadiens, the Sabres, at BC, and the Olympics. The only time Gionta wasn’t a captain was with the Devils, where he only rarely even got to wear the “A” on his sweater. He was a heart-and-soul player that did everything right for a very long time. This is the type of player teams want to get in the 3rd round. Gionta was drafted after his freshman year at Boston College, so the Devils knew they were at least getting a decent asset when he scored five goals in seven games at the 1998 World Junior Championship.

Zero players in the 1998 draft were picked after Gionta but played more than his 1,026 games. Ottawa Senators’ 6th-round pick Chris Neil played the exact same amount of games, but nobody played more. That shows the Devils hit the nail on the head with this pick, and it’s one of Lou Lamoriello’s greatest moves. He never broke past his 2006 peak and will go down as a one-hit wonder, but Gionta’s value goes way beyond the score sheet.

10.

Looking back at the late 80s and early 90s, taking a player from Russia was always a huge risk. You never knew if they would decide to stay true to the then still together Soviet Union, and a team could end up getting nothing for their asset. Still, the Devils getting Valeri Zelepukin with their 11th-round pick is just insane. Not only did he play the most games of his round, but he’s only one of only 19 players to play any games after being picked after the 7th round in 1990. That’s more than 80 players who didn’t play a single game.

Zelepukin is best known for one goal, but he was a really good player for a short amount of time. He only played one more season for the Khimik Voskresensk before coming over to the Devils in 1991-92. He immediately scored 31 points in his rookie season, only playing 44 NHL games. He almost scored a goal per game in 22 games in the AHL, so it was clear his skill was ahead of the minor leagues.

Of course, Zelepukin is best known for one goal that’s also forgotten. With just 7.7 seconds left in Game 7 of the Eastern Conference Finals in 1994 against the hated New York Rangers, Zelepukin tied the game. A puck came past Claude Lemieux and Zelepukin got not one but two whacks before it went past Mike Richter. It was wonderful until Stephane Matteau ruined our lives.

Zelepukin’s following seasons were never quite the same. It’s sad really since an injury in practice knocked his career right off the rails. Zelepukin was on the way to being one of the best stories in hockey, but now he’s known for being a fleeting moment in Devils history. Still, really good for an 11th-round pick.

9.

Jesper Bratt could retire tomorrow (please don’t) and he’d still be well worth the 162nd-overall pick in the 2016 NHL Draft. Bratt came out swinging as a rookie, faced some adversity in the next few years, and now looks like a scary winger in the top six. After a slow start (like literally every Devils player) he went off towards the end of the season. After a two-point November, he scored eight in December, four in eight January games, 10 in February, and three in five March games.

36 points are nothing to go home about, but it was still third on the team at the end of the season, with only Nikita Gusev and Kyle Palmieri ahead of him. Bratt is quickly becoming one of the best offensive players currently on the Devils, and he could be one of the keys to rebuilding this franchise. We hear everything about Nico Hischier and Jack Hughes, who should be the centerpieces, but if Bratt develops like he looks like he should then he will be a key cog in the machine in a couple of years.

For now, he’s 100 points in 185 games to start his career. That includes a stretch where he scored four points over 26 games to finish his rookie season. 96 points in 159 games look a lot better (.60 points per game). It’s all about the future for Bratt, and if he keeps going on this trajectory he will easily make the top five of this list. That’s saying something since there are a lot of Hall of Famers here. He’s already ahead of a lot of really good players thanks to already exceeding expectations just three years into his career. Is this an overplay for a player that’s only 21 years old? Possibly, but for how good Bratt has been this pick could be one of the best in the history of the team.

8.

We go right to another current Devils player, but one that has much more of a career to speak for than Bratt. Travis Zajac feels like he’s already had two careers. One where he was the top-line center worth big money and scoring at will and another where he was a defensive-minded center who killed penalties and built up the young players.

People forget that a younger Zajac was a 20-goal, 60-point player. It looked like he was going to be the next really good scorer for this team. Then, he struggled in 2010-11 under John MacLean. Then, he hurt his Achilles tendon in the offseason and missed more of the year before returning right before the Stanley Cup run. Then, the team went in the tank and didn’t have anyone worth a darn to put next to him. For a while, it was him and Jaromir Jagr providing the only offense. It wasn’t a lot of offense, either.

Zajac is a player that’s turned a corner in the last two years. He was downright bad the last time the Devils made the playoffs, and it looked like his contract was an anchor on this team. Now, he’s one of the better penalty killers in the league and can provide enough offense to be a reliable forward in all situations.

He’s no longer a power-play contributor, and he’s likely done scoring 20 goals a year, but there’s a lot more contributing Zajac still has left to do. Still, looking back at where the Devils drafted him, he was well worth the 20th-overall pick. The only player in his draft year who played more games is that year’s number-one overall pick, Alexander Ovechkin. That’s a huge honor. We’re not saying he’s the second-best player in that draft (that’s no doubt Evgeni Malkin), but the Devils avoided an insane amount of landmines in taking Zajac. Lukas Kaspar played less than 20 games for the San Jose Sharks and was taken two picks after Zajac. Kris Chucko played two. Andy Rogers played zero. Zajac was an awesome pick that may one day be the last person to wear the number 19.

7.

Full disclosure, this was the hardest one to rank on this list. Brendan Shanahan is a Hall of Famer, he’s one of the best players of the 90s, he comes with an awesome story with his impact for the Devils, and he’s likely one of the most recognizable names on this list to the fair-weather fan. Shanahan had an immense impact on the game and was a multiple-time Stanley Cup winner. However, isn’t that all you expect from players taken in the top two?

Shanahan ended up with the second-best point share in the 1987 NHL Draft (Joe Sakic as the 15th pick beat him out). He spent his first four seasons with the New Jersey Devils, and honestly, it was probably best for his career and the Devils in general that he left. His career took off with the St. Louis Blues, scoring 69, 94, and 102 points over his next three seasons. The Devils, of course, were handed Scott Stevens as compensation because Shanahan was a restricted free agent and the Blues didn’t have the necessary picks to sign him.

So, Shanahan plays a Hall of Fame career with St. Louis and later Detroit. Then, he brings the Devils the key to their three Stanley Cup wins. At the end of his career, Shanahan had 1,354 points. He ended his career where it started, joining the Devils stretch run in 2009 at 40 years old. It was a nice little run to end his career, but the Devils couldn’t get out of the first round that year. We were hoping for a better end, but it’s a fun career.

6.

The New Jersey Devils found themselves a gem in their first draft after moving from Colorado. In the 3rd round, they selected Pat Verbeek 43rd overall. He’s one of those players that falls outside of the realms of history, mostly because he never played for the Devils outside of the awful 80s. It’s the same way we’d look at Chico Resch if he wasn’t the team’s lovable color analyst. He helped the Devils through a tough time, but he left before things got good.

For the longest time, Verbeek was just a name tied to the Devils record for most goals in a season. He scored 46 in 1987-88, the year the Devils made their run to the Eastern Conference Finals in the first year they made the playoffs. Verbeek showed how good of a goal scorer he could be in the wide-open spaces of the NHL.

Verbeek tried holding out for a better contract, which we’ve seen how it works with Lou Lamoriello. He was the first star to try and play hard ball to get more money. Then, he was the first player to get the door because he didn’t fall into place. He went to Hartford where he dominated as a member of the Whalers. Verbeek scored 40+ goals in his first two seasons after he was traded.

Verbeek had an interesting career. He scored 30+ goals for three different franchises and scored 40+ for four different franchises (included those lowly New York Rangers). He’s one of 45 players in NHL history with 500 goals in his career. He’s one of three players with 500 goals, 1,000 points and 2,000 penalty minutes. Verbeek won a Stanley Cup with the Dallas Stars in 1997. It’s a career that’s fallen completely under the radar not just for those in the Devils fanbase, but in the NHL entirely. To get someone this good in the 2nd round is something to brag about, especially for a team that just relocated across the country.

5.

Scott Niedermayer came to New Jersey out of pure luck. More specifically he came to the Devils thanks to the stupidity of the Toronto Maple Leafs. They traded a 1st-round pick for Tom Kurvers in October of 1989. It worked out for the Maple Leafs, as Kurvers helped them get over .500 by solidifying a flailing defense. However, the Devils didn’t trade for a 1990 1st-round draft choice. They wanted a second shot at the Eric Lindros sweepstakes and took a 1991 1st rounder. The Leafs were terrible, and while the Devils didn’t get Lindros, they might have gotten an even better player.

Niedermayer fell to the Devils with the 3rd-overall pick, and the last piece of the Devils dynasty was now in the Devils system. Scott Stevens would join the team later that offseason. Niedermayer is widely known as one of the best puck-moving defensemen in NHL history.

We’re full entrenched in “Hall of Famer” territory now. However, we’re in that part where we are grading draft picks based on point of selection, and Scott Niedermayer being taken 3rd and as the first defensemen, he’s graded on a scale.

Do you need us to go through the numbers? He scored 740 points as a defenseman. If he was playing in the 80s, he probably scored 1,000 points, but he ended up on the mid-90s Devils that were more interested in stopping goals (although they scored a lot more than they were given credit for).

He won four Stanley Cups over his career, including bringing the Anaheim Ducks their only championship. He won the Norris Trophy right before the lockout when he had to step up and wear the “C” when Stevens was out with concussion symptoms. He did everything a defenseman is asked and more, and it was the second-best trade in New Jersey Devils history.

4.

Ken Daneyko is one of those players where you look at his stats page, and you have serious questions. We want to know what caused him to go from the St. Albert Saints to the Spokane Flyers (we’re assuming a promotion) to the Seattle Breakers. Either way, his journey in 1982 led to the Devils taking him in the 1st round of the 1982 NHL Draft. When the Devils took him, they weren’t even the Devils yet.

Daneyko wasn’t the Devils first-ever pick. That honor goes to Rocky Trotter and his 38 NHL games. Still, he was the team’s most significant. Daneyko is known as Mr. Devil for his time with the early struggling Devils and his time spent through their Stanley Cup-winning days. He was the ultimate team player and was ready for anything the Devils needed from him. That includes being a healthy scratch for six Stanley Cup Finals games, only to dress for Game 7 and helped the Devils shut out the Mighty Ducks in the deciding game, even being on the ice for the third goal that put the game away.

That was just his last game. His last of 1,458 total NHL games (including playoffs). Daneyko has his number retired by the Devils, despite not putting up Hall of Fame numbers. He was so important to this team for so long, there’s a reason why we’re still listening to him to this day.

In 20 years, Daneyko has two seasons where he scored 20+ points. It just wasn’t what they needed from him. Daneyko’s job was to keep goals out of the net. After 1993, when the Devils took a turn towards contention, he was on the ice for less than 100 goals every season. There’s a reason stay-at-home defensemen were coveted at this time since when you had one they were usually extremely reliable.

3.

Just hold on, before you leave we know Zach Parise is not the most loved player in New Jersey Devils history, but you can’t deny his insane career just because he spurned the team eight (8???) years ago. Parise looked like he was on his way to being one of the game’s best when he had 94 points in 2008-09. He was just 24 years old, and the Devils were one of the most consistent franchises in the league. They weren’t going to go anywhere, and they usually kept their best players.

Parise never really hit those peaks again. He did get 82 points the next season, but he never hit 40 goals or even 70 points after that. He’s still a really good player, but he looked like one of the game’s best in 2009.

So, what does his career look like now? It’s strange to say. However, the Devils taking him with the 17th pick in the 2003 NHL Draft was an absolute steal. Even in 2003, which might be the best draft of all time in terms of depth. Just look at the names there (there are literally too many to name). Parise is still one of the better picks in that 1st round.

Is Parise a Hall of Famer? That’s going to be a fun question we will likely try to answer later in this offseason. For now, as we look at Parise strictly as a draft pick, he was the top three for the Devils in history. The fact they traded up to get him makes it even better (especially since the Oilers took Marc-Antoine Pouliot with the pick they traded for instead of someone like Corey Perry or Ryan Kesler).

2.

The New Jersey Devils took a slow-burn approach with Patrik Elias, which is a stark difference than most picks on this list. He played on the Albany River Rats in three different seasons before he became a full-time Devil. Once he was in the NHL, he started the greatest forward career in Devils history.

No other player scored more than 701 points in their Devils’ career. Elias had 1,025. He’s the franchise leader in points, goals, assists, game-winning goals, hat tricks, and more. When it comes to Devils’ offense, Elias broke the mold.

What makes it even better is the Devils got Elias in the 2nd round. Only four players besides Elias taken after the 1st round of the 1994 draft played at least 1,000 games. Daniel Alfredsson, Milan Hejduk, Steve Sullivan, and Tomas Holmstrom. Even if you take the 1st-round picks into consideration, who was better than Elias? There is no 1st rounder even close. Maybe you can argue Alfredsson, but it’s very much up in the air.

Elias will always be one of the best to ever wear the Devils jersey, and unlike most of the players on this list, he never wore a different jersey. His entire career was here, and they got that insane value from the 2nd round. We’ll be talking a lot more about Elias as the summer goes on, but for now, all you need to know is this was Lou Lamoriello’s second-best move of his career. Second only to Marty.

1.

C’mon, you didn’t get through 7,000 words on the greatest draft picks in the history of the New Jersey Devils just to figure out who was number one, right? Martin Brodeur is the greatest everything in Devils history and the greatest goaltender in hockey history. If the Devils took Brodeur with the first-overall pick, this would still be the best pick in franchise history. It doesn’t matter where you draft the G.O.A.T. as long as you actually draft him.

Brodeur said he expected to get drafted in the 2nd round based on projections, so he was surprised the Devils took him at 20th overall. That’s probably why the Devils felt comfortable with trading the 11th-overall pick to the Calgary Flames for 20th overall and a couple of 2nd-round picks.

The Devils didn’t get much with the other picks (Chris Gotziaman and David Harlock), but they knew the best goalie in that draft would still be available at the end of the 1st round. Even they probably didn’t know he’d be the best, but at least he’d be their guy.

Brodeur’s just great. We don’t have to go through all of his stats. We can go through some other facts like his presence allowed the Devils to trade Sean Burke for Bobby Holik and the pick that turned into Jay Pandolfo. He also helped develop one of the best defensive teams of the decade. Honestly, if it wasn’t for Martin Brodeur the Devils may not be the Devils at all. They could be the Nashville Country Singers or something like that. Instead, they have one of the coolest stories for a franchise less than 40 years old thanks to the man who sat in net for 21 years.