To the NHL via ECHL?

Kekkonen · Post by **Kekkonen** » Mon Nov 20, 2006 12:55 pm

I've noticed that in all versions of EHM, a trip to my ECHL affiliate has almost always been a career-busting move; the only exceptions have been goaltending prospects who may get sent there because I have another guy in the AHL team and I want them both to get a lot of games. For everyone else, if you can't make it in the AHL straight out of juniors/college/Europe, you're on your way out. So, the question is this: am I just being trigger-happy, or is it in reality exceedingly rare for anyone to make it to the NHL from ECHL?

Post by **E5150_ca** » Mon Nov 20, 2006 1:10 pm

It is verrrrrrrrrry rare for a player in the ECHL to make it to the NHL. Infact I can only name one off the top of my head: Martin St. Louis (I'm sure there's others though)

Joe · Post by **Joe** » Mon Nov 20, 2006 2:38 pm

Fedor Fedorov played 42 games in the UHL (He played for my home town team, and boy did he draw a lot of fans), he then went back and played 2 years in the OHL, then 2 games in the ECHL, and from there on out he was either in the AHL, NHL, and Russia (but only during the lock out)

Post by **batdad** » Mon Nov 20, 2006 3:39 pm

Alex Burrows, and Rick Rypien in Vancouver. Although...Ahhh enough said. But very very rare. NHL teams use AHL for every type of prospect they have, and ECHL for the leftovers.

Fedor Fedorov? Bwahhhhhh....Please do not remind me Joe. So much talent, so little brain.

Post by **inSTAALed** » Mon Nov 20, 2006 8:52 pm

There has been 306 former ECHL players to make it to the NHL.

http://www.echl.com/alumni/

A little research goes a long way, eh?

Forsberg · Post by **Forsberg** » Mon Nov 20, 2006 11:17 pm

Interesting how many decent goalies that have have played in the echl: Byron Dafoe, David Aebischer, Alex Auld, Martin Biron, Johan Hedberg, Olaf Kolzig, Patrick Lalime, Manny Legace, Mike Morrison, Corey Schwab, Steve Shields, Tomas Vokoun and some other lessers I have skipped.

flea · Post by **flea** » Mon Nov 20, 2006 11:33 pm

Forsberg wrote:Interesting how many decent goalies that have have played in the echl: Byron Dafoe, David Aebischer, Alex Auld, Martin Biron, Johan Hedberg, Olaf Kolzig, Patrick Lalime, Manny Legace, Mike Morrison, Corey Schwab, Steve Shields, Tomas Vokoun and some other lessers I have skipped.

Yeps, same thing that I was thinking, but on the other hand there were really only a handful of really good players (except goalies) in the NHL coming from the ECHL....curious isnt it??

Kekkonen · Post by **Kekkonen** » Tue Nov 21, 2006 5:22 am

inSTAALed wrote:There has been 306 former ECHL players to make it to the NHL.

http://www.echl.com/alumni/

A little research goes a long way, eh?

Cool! Thanks. I did try the ECHL web site yesterday, but for some reason I could never get the sidebar to load.

Yeah, a lot of the guys whose names I recognize are goalies, but it makes sense. The ECHL is a viable alternative for your #2 goaltending prospect. And there are a lot of names whom I don't recognize at all, and many I wouldn't recognize if it wasn't for EHM.

Post by **Minstrel** » Tue Nov 21, 2006 7:12 am

Ahhh... nice work inStaaled; as they say in the biz: Google that s--t!

There were a bunch of goalies that made it from the ECHL to get signed with the AHL last year when the spots opened back up without NHL prospects playing at the AHL anymore.