Why NHL Fans Should Curb Their Enthusiasm on Undrafted NCAA Players

The NCAA season is approaching an end with the NCAA tournament getting under way this weekend and the Frozen Four right around the corner. That means it's that time of year when you will hear about NHL teams in hot pursuit of the hottest commodity (possible in late-March) on the market: undrafted NCAA free agents.

The Chicago Blackhawks signed Colgate junior forward Kyle Baun, the San Jose Sharks signed Wisconsin senior goaltender Joel Rumpel and Boston University senior goaltender Matt O'Connor is reportedly whittling down a list of NHL teams eager to sign him.

Over the next couple of weeks, as more NCAA teams are eliminated, there will be more signings and reports of teams having interest in undrafted NCAA free agents.

How excited should you get about these signings?

It's not that you shouldn't be excited at all, it's that your excitement levels should exist in that same place they do when you and 50 other people throw five bucks into an office lottery pool; there's almost zero chance you're going to win the massive jackpot, but you may win a little something that allows for a happy hour drink or a nice lunch.

The hype for these signings rarely matches the results. Here are, by far, the three best current NHL players that were signed out of college after going undrafted. 

Player	Signed	NCAA team	Goals	Assists	Points
Martin St. Louis	1998	Vermont	390	638	1,028
Dan Boyle	1998	Miami	152	426	578
Chris Kunitz	2003	Ferris State	223	287	510

There's a lot to like there. Martin St. Louis has a Stanley Cup and Hart Trophy; Dan Boyle has played 1,000 games, also won a Stanley Cup and has been one of the top offensive defenseman in the NHL for a long time, while Chris Kunitz has his own Stanley Cup and six seasons of at least 20 goals.

Those are your undrafted free-agent jackpots. 

But in a way, they are just like lottery jackpots, in that the people that held the winning tickets frittered away the fortune far too quickly.

St. Louis was signed by the Calgary Flames and two years later, he was blossoming into a potential Hall of Fame player with the Tampa Bay Lightning. Boyle had 10 goals over three-and-a-half seasons with the Florida Panthers before a trade to Tampa sent him toward his best years. Kunitz has a weirder route, as the Anaheim Ducks signed him, lost him on waivers to the Atlanta Thrashers after the 2004-05 lockout, then got him back. 

Kunitz won a Cup with Anaheim in 2007 but has had his best seasons since joining the Pittsburgh Penguins in 2008-09.

Those are the happiest of happy stories about current players who went the undrafted NCAA free-agent route, and most of them took place with teams other than the ones that signed him. And you may have noticed, all those stories began before the 2004-05 season, which was a long time ago, a time when great players were more susceptible to falling through the cracks.

What has the undrafted NCAA free agent yielded since the 2004-05 lockout?

Nothing to get too excited about, unless you really like lunches or happy hour drinks.

Player	Signed	NCAA team	Goals	Assists	Points
Matt Read	2011	Bemidji State	64	76	140
Andy Greene	2006	Miami	31	138	169
Tyler Bozak	2009	Denver	91	133	224
Jason Garrison	2008	Minnesota-Duluth	42	96	138
Justin Fontaine	2011	Minnesota-Duluth	22	27	49
Christian Folin	2014	Lowell	2	9	11
Teddy Purcell	2007	Maine	85	173	258
Torey Krug	2012	Michigan State	26	50	76
Danny DeKeyser	2013	Western Michigan	6	43	49

Those are all nice, decent, fine professional hockey players you wouldn't mind having on your team. There are other younger, more recently signed players who could join that list in the coming years, but there aren't any foundation players on this list, which is fine. Yet sometimes the hoopla and "will they/won't they sign" nonsense conveys of a different idea.

Throw Daniel Winnik and Curtis Glencross into the mix with the players listed above, and you are looking at the best of the 77 undrafted NCAA free agents currently in the NHL (complete list available at College Hockey, Inc.).

When it comes to these players, we're talking almost exclusively about role players—guys every team needs, sure, but guys that probably don't need the fanfare of endless tweets, retweets and speculation about where they are going to sign over the next few weeks.

Could Baun become an effective top-nine or top-six forward? Sure, why not? Rumpel and O'Connor could become starting goaltenders, too, or maybe backups or maybe decent enough AHL guys.

The last decade shows the odds of these guys making huge impacts aren't all that great. John Scott was an undrafted NCAA free agent too. Hold that close to your heart.

All statistics via NHL.com and Stats.HockeyAnalysis.com. Cap information via Spotrac.

Dave Lozo covers the NHL for Bleacher Report. You can follow him on Twitter: @DaveLozo.