[Pacific Rim]

So Pacific Rim finished third at the box office this weekend behind Despicable Me 2 and ugh Grown Ups 2.... It didn't have a horrible weekend since it finished with just over $38million but you would have to think that the studio is a bit concerned with that number considering the films $180million budget.

 

The Grown Ups 2 thing is just stupid though. This is why we can't have nice things.

[NHL Offseason Part 2]

Also, the real reason the Oilers got terrible post-Gretzky and Messier was they sucked at the draft. Starting from the late 80's on, this is what we did with our first rounders:

 

87: Peter Soberlak, LW. 0 NHL games

88: Francois Leroux, D. 249 NHL games, 11 of them for Edmonton

89: Jason Soules, D. 0 NHL games

90: Scott Allison, C. 0 NHL games

91: Martin Rucinsky, LW. 971 NHL games, 612 points. Played 2 total games for the Edmonton Oilers. Traded for spare parts.

92: Joe Hulbig, LW. 55 NHL games, 8 career points.

93: Jason Arnott, C. The trend breaker. Over 1200 games and over 900 points. Really good player. Won a Stanley Cup with New Jersey in 2000.

93 part 2: Nick Stajduhar, D. 2 NHL games.

94: Jason Bonsignore, C. 79 NHL games.

94 part 2: Some guy named Ryan Smyth who played over 1100 games and had over 800 points.

95: Steve Kelly, LW. 149 NHL games. 21 career points.

96: Boyd Devereaux: 627 NHL games, but only 117 points. Fringe player at best.

96 part 2: Mattieu Descoteaux, D. 5 NHL games.

97: Michel Riesen, RW. 12 NHL games.

98: Michael Henrich, RW. 0 NHL games.

99: Jani Rita, LW. 66 NHL games.

00: Alexei Mikhnov, LW. 2 NHL games.

 

I mean for fuck's sake. That is an utterly terrible record even if you are throwing darts at a board as a scouting system. After that it starts to turn around (Hemsky, Dubnyk, Gagner etc) but what an abysmal track record there. Really only 2 good players you got anything out of in Arnott and Smyth out of 17 first round picks.

 

One of the things about other Oilers fans that pisses me off is this myth that Peter Pocklington singlehandedly ruined the team. He sure did his share, but goddamn that is a pretty rancid record at the business end of the draft.

 

My understanding of the Oilers scouting at that time was that their head scout basically spent the entire year living in Mexico. God, that draft record is awful. You could also add the likes of Marc-Antoine Poulliot, Jesse Niinimaki, and the legendary Rob Schremp.