"Trade the pick!? That would require an ability to do more than sit around and pray for the lottery."

A couple of years ago Scott Cullen of TSN wrote a couple great articles breaking down the value of draft picks. It basically broke down how likely a team was to draft a quality player from certain spots in the draft. Amazingly, even if a team owns one of the first three picks there is only a 60 percent chance that player turns out to be at least a top-6 forward or top-4 defenceman. 60 percent! That's crazy.

Here's a graph I made showing how likely a player is to develop into a top-6 forward or top-6 defenceman based on when they are drafted in the first round. After round one the chances are less than 10 percent.

Likelihood of a first round pick becoming at least a top-6 forward or top-4 defenceman.

He also looked at the chances of a player suiting up for at least 100 games in his career. After the first round even that minimal accomplishment is a pretty difficult feat to achieve. In conclusion: drafting is hard!

Likelihood of a draft pick playing at least 100 games in the NHL.

I've used this data to take a look at when it is best for teams to trade up or down in the draft. You can read more at The Good Point.

In 1991, the Quebec Nordiques had the privilege of drafting first overall for the third straight year, giving them the chance to draft Eric Lindros, dubbed the next Wayne Gretzky. Lindros, however, had other plans, refusing to play in Quebec and holding out until being traded to Philadelphia the next season. Flash-forward 20 years and the Edmonton Oilers own the first overall pick for the third consecutive year. Like the Nordiques before them, they too might see that pick slip away, albeit for entirely different reasons.

The Oilers are in a unique predicament this year: they have spent the last few years drafting high-end forwards and lack the same quality of talent on the backend. Although Edmonton’s system does possess a good amount of NHL-calibre defenemen, there is not a No. 1 quality blueliner among them. The Oilers have a choice: continue to add up front, which is almost entirely unnecessary, or deal the pick to add much-needed pieces to the blueline.

Although this draft class is full of defencemen, the first few picks will likely be forwards. This means that the Oilers can trade down, possibly as low as five, and still have a chance to take the best defenceman in the draft.

By trading down the Oilers would also be able to grab a young player and/or a handful of picks from a team eager to land Nail Yakupov, the highly skilled Russian winger from the OHL. This is an opportunity for the team to fill their greatest need, and at the same time add more pieces to their growing cupboard.

It isn’t every year that a team is willing to trade away the first overall pick, and the return varies based on the needs of the teams involved. But we can look back at some of the teams that have traded the No. 1 pick to see what type of return the Oilers can expect and whether it is in their best interest to pass on Yakupov.