Sidney Crosby did it. Mario Lemieux did it. Mike Bossy too. Michel Goulet did it, Pierre Turgeon and Dale Hawerchuk as well. This year, Justin Poirier, from the Baie-Comeau Drakkar, did it too. He scored over 50 goals at the age of 17 in the QMJHL.
It’s incredible. This has happened to around thirty players in the long history of the league. Most of them were in the 70s or 80s. Since 2000, only one player had achieved this, twice at that: Sid the Kid.
Of those who did so, 19 were first-round picks, 23 had successful NHL careers and 27 played at least one game there. Five are in the Hall of Fame.
It makes no sense what he manages to do, this Justin Poirier. He’s fearless, rushes headfirst into the corners of the rink, he’s strong as a horse, he can score from anywhere and he has a major league shot.
Photo provided by Kassandra Blais
He marks and blows on his palette, as if it were on fire. Imagine, he’s playing with 20-year-old guys, he’s just finished puberty, and he dares to do that. He is comfortable and very confident. He believes in himself.
And when it counts, he’s even better. In the playoffs, he is insane. He has 24 points in 12 games. He is obviously the best scorer in the league and becomes the engine of the Drakkar, who can aspire to win everything this year.
His brother, Jérémie, has been playing in the American League for two years. Justin can therefore talk to him every day to understand what it takes in professional hockey.
Justin Poirier is eligible for the NHL draft on June 28.
The teams’ dream? No!
If you don’t follow the field of hopefuls much, you will tell me that he risks being among the first called up.
Alexis Lafrenière was a first overall pick. At the same age, he scored 37 goals. Shane Wright, fourth overall in 2022, had scored 32. Matthew Savoie, ninth in 2022, had 38 in the Western Junior League.
What do you want more? Imagine how many jerseys this guy is going to sell for a club. NHL teams must be salivating at the thought of having a player like that.
Actually not at all. Teams all seem to view Poirier as a risk. A guy who doesn’t deserve to be picked in the first two rounds. More of a third or fourth round pick. The odds of a player playing more than 100 games in the NHL for a third-round pick are 27%. In the fourth round, it’s 22%.
NHL Central Scouting places him 82e among North American skaters. So it’s even much further than the third round.
It’s incredible though. It fascinates me. Especially when we see the careers of most who scored more than 50 goals in the QMJHL at 17 years old.
A scandal or not?
Initially, I was ready to start a revolt. I couldn’t believe it. I told myself that it was still discrimination for QMJHL players. I spoke to a few well-placed people in the league who expressed their indignation at the lack of consideration regarding Justin Poirier.
But I told myself that not all scouts and draft experts were idiots. They know it a lot more than me and above all, they follow it a lot more than me.
So I contacted a few scouts from NHL teams to understand if all this was an injustice, a scandal.
They all spoke to me confidentially. It was often heated and fascinating discussions. I wanted to understand and I was very stubborn. I’m capable.
What I haven’t told you from the beginning is that Justin Poirier is 5 feet 7 inches tall. Sometimes it’s 5 foot 8, it depends on who’s measuring him. But on the NHL Central Scouting website, it’s 5 feet 7.
And that’s bad. Very bad.
Of the 224 players drafted last year in the NHL, how many were 5 feet 7 inches tall? A.
The year before? Zero. The year before? A.
Be big, little ones
In three years, that’s two guys out of 672. In short, before believing that smaller players are incapable of playing in the NHL, they must still have a chance of being drafted.
David Desharnais was shunned by scouts after a season of nearly 100 points in the QMJHL. He is 5 feet 7 inches tall. He played 524 games in the NHL. Of the 30 players selected in the first round in his draft year, 18 did not play as many.
Archive photo Stevens Leblanc
Jonathan Marchessault was nearly 5-foot-7 in 2010 when he went undrafted. He has 487 points in the NHL. In the first round in 2010, 23 of the 30 players chosen did not have as many points.
I can give other Quebec examples, like Yanni Gourde. Or Samuel Girard, who would be a first round pick and not a second if it had to be done again.
Do you think the Kings would take Alex Turcotte or little Cole Caufield if they had to do it again?
Do you think little Alex DeBrincat would be a second round pick if we redo the draft?
Do you think Brayden Point would have been a third-round pick if he had been two inches taller from 5-foot-9 when he was drafted?
If he was 6 feet tall do you think Connor Garland would have been a 5 picke round, he who collected nearly 130 points twice in the QMJHL? Garland smashed everywhere he went. He continued to do so in professional hockey. He is a multi-millionaire and has already played over 400 games in the NHL. That’s a home run for a fifth-rounder. He has a premier career. But he wasn’t big.
In short, all of this is small players who did better than the scouts believed.
It’s easy not to draft a small player. If you fish one out and it’s rotten, it’s a disaster. But if you screw up with a big player, it’s a lot less worse. 98% of players drafted in the last five years are taller than 5 feet 8. So, it’s normal that it doesn’t work for everyone.
The scouts I’ve spoken to must be ecstatic about everything I’ve just written.
But their job is to evaluate the players. We can also evaluate them well.
Already strong, so less potential
In short, what people explain to me about Justin Poirier is that he is small and that he is not likely to be much stronger, because he is already very heavy. To give you an idea, Macklin Celebrini, who will be drafted first overall, is only five pounds heavier than Poirier, even though he is 6 feet tall.
What that also means is that Poirier has a silhouette like Martin St-Louis or Cole Caufield, that is to say: not tall, but two tree trunks instead of thighs.
But for scouts, that also means: he has reached a certain physical maturity, so the projection is less interesting.
Poirier’s other problem is his skating. People in the QMJHL tell me that he is perfect in junior and that he will surely be able to manage to be correct in the NHL.
But for scouts, it’s a huge problem. He has a lot of work to do technically, they say. I am even told that he is starting too far and will never be able to get there.
I remind you, these scouts, it’s their life to evaluate all that. They know this much better than me.
The neglected one who could change everything
But Justin Poirier could be the one who questions everything: the place of small players and the value of QMJHL players.
I remind you that in December, it was the match for the best Canadian junior prospects. Justin Poirier was then the top scorer in the QMJHL. He was not invited among the 40 players. It’s terrible. There were 18 players from the WHL, 18 players from the Ontario League and four from the QMJHL.
And all this, even if a QMJHL team has just won four Memorial Cups in a row and two Telus Cup titles (M18 AAA). But that doesn’t change anything, it seems.
We look at what the NHL Central predicts and players who do not come close to Poirier in terms of statistics are “listed” beforehand.
One guy made 38 points this year. But he’s 6 feet 2 inches tall.
Another scored 5 goals in 40 games. But he’s 6’3.
An American played 19 matches. He made eight points with the supposedly exceptional United States National 18 and Under Development Program.
I could go on. I have plenty of examples of players who haven’t done anything comparable to Justin Poirier. But they are ranked ahead of him.
I know we can’t be ruthless with scouts either, but I have such a hard time believing that all these beautiful people will have a better career in the NHL than Justin Poirier.
Especially since if it works for the latter, he won’t be a guy to kill punishments. It will be to be in a top 6, to score goals. Guys like that are much more difficult to find than fourth-line guys who are responsible defensively, right?
In short, I really can’t wait to see what Justin Poirier will do in his career. In my opinion, if he succeeds, it could raise a lot of questions about how to evaluate a player.
And the beauty of it all is that if I’m wrong, I tell myself that I’m not the expert, so it’s normal.
The question too is that maybe an NHL team will pounce on Poirier well ahead of schedule. There are a lot of NHL scouts who have discovered Baie-Comeau in recent months, I am told. A lot, for an average skater who is too small.
*Source: DobberProspects, Jokke Nevalainen (2020)
Poirier among the greats
List of scorers of 50 goals or more in the QMJHL over the past 40 years
- Justin Poirier 2024
- Sidney Crosby 2004
- Sidney Crosby 2003
- Ramzi Abid 1998
- Daniel Briere 1995
- Martin Gendron 1992
- Yanic Perreault 1989
- Steve Larouche 1989
- Reginald Savage 1988
- Martin Gelinas 1988
- Pierre Turgeon 1987
- Jimmy Carson 1986
- Stéphan Lebeau 1986
- Pat LaFontaine 1983
- Mario Lemieux 1983
- Sylvain Turgeon 1983
- Steve Pepin 1983
*Source: Denis Demers, chief statistician of the QMJHL
The little place for little players
- Players 5-foot-7 or shorter drafted: 0.7% (8)
- Players 5-foot-8 or shorter drafted: 2% (24)
- Players 5-foot-9 or shorter drafted: 7% (80)
Of the total 1,107 players drafted between 2019 and 2024
