My Draft Day: Shawn Thornton
Selected in the seventh-round by the Toronto Maple Leafs in the 1997 NHL Draft, the Oshawa, Ontario native went on to win two Stanley Cups (2007, 2011) before finishing his career as one of only two players in the history of pro hockey to play in 700 NHL games and 600 AHL games.
During his successful 14-season career in the NHL, Thornton tallied 102 points (42 goals, 60 assists) and 1,103 penalty minutes over 705 games split between the Florida Panthers (2014-17), Boston Bruins (2007-14), Anaheim Ducks (2006-07) and Chicago Blackhawks (2002-06).
Among the 246 players in his draft class, Thornton competed in the 17th-most NHL games.
"I'm lucky," said Thornton, who currently works as a Senior Vice President with the Panthers. "I wish I would've made it [to the NHL] a little earlier, but who knows looking back if I would've played as long if I had… Maybe I wouldn't have matured as much as I did in the minors and had that same level of leadership and work ethic. It all works out for a reason. I have no complaints."
With the 2020 NHL Draft slated to get underway on Oct. 6-7, FloridaPanthers.com's Jameson Olive recently caught up with Thornton to take a look back at his draft day and the events leading up to it, including an impromptu trip to the draft in 1996 and a lunch that would change his life forever.
OLIVE: What were your expectations heading into the 1997 NHL Draft?
THORNTON: I had absolutely no expectations. The year before, I went to the 1996 draft in St. Louis with my sort-of mentor and strength coach at the time, Lionel Ingleton, who worked for my soon-to-be agent. He had some other players that were definitely getting drafted that year, one of them in the first round. I think his name was Jeff Brown, a defenseman playing in the OHL.
For myself, I went just to shake hands and kiss babies. I was eligible, but it was after my first year junior. I got drafted late into the OHL, so I played my first year with Peterborough as an older guy. I wouldn't say I was coming off my best year either. I was mainly an enforcer. I had, I don't know, 14 points or something like that. I definitely wasn't at the top of anyone's draft list.
OLIVE: Did anything good come out of your trip to the draft in 1996?
THORNTON:Yeah. I secured a verbal walk-on with the Dallas Stars while I was there through just meeting different GMs. I think maybe they just liked me as a person more so than a hockey player. That actually ending up falling through, but then the Colorado Avalanche stepped up and gave me a walk-on to their main camp. I tried out with the Avalanche the fall after they beat the Florida Panthers in '96. I got in an exhibition game and I thought I had a decent camp for a kid.
After that, I went back to Peterborough. I had a pretty good year in junior, but had no plans of getting drafted in '97. I was actually looking at what college I was going to go to. I was looking at how my deal was set up and stuff like that. In junior you get a college package, so I was looking at schools. I was also working in the steel mill in Oshawa full-time from May until whenever.
OLIVE: Did you feel like scouts were looking at you during the 1996-97 season?
THORNTON:Not really [laughs]. When we went to the Memorial Cup Final the year before, it was my rookie year and I didn't play much. But whether I was being scouted or not, I knew there was going to be a lot of scouts at those games. While they're scouting the big boys, I potentially could be scouted by association.
The next year, I played defense half the year, forward half the year. I wasn't focused on where I was going to land in the draft. Like I said, I was 19 and didn't think I was going to get drafted at all. I was talking about colleges or potentially doing one more year of junior and then college.
My big break came when I met with a scout for the Leafs, Dan Marr. Coincidentally, he was also the scout that found Derek MacKenzie for Atlanta. He was on the way to the Memorial Cup in May of '97. He said he was stopping in Oshawa and asked if I wanted to grab lunch. We grabbed a bite to eat and then at the end of it he said, 'I like your character. I like how you're built. I think there's a lot of potential with you. I'll see what I can do.' That was it. There was no follow-up afterwards.
OLIVE: So when the draft finally rolled around on June 21, 1997, what were you doing?
THORNTON: On the day of the draft I was golfing at a municipal 9-hole course in my hometown with two of my high school buddies that I played hockey with growing up. We were either on the eighth tee or fairway and the draft was going on. One of them played junior in Guelph, so we were joking around that we could've got drafted today. It was just like, 'Haha. Really funny.'
After golfing, I went over to my buddies house, had a couple beers in his parents' pool and then we drove to my mom and dad's house. We needed beer [laughs]. We were young, and I had a case of Labatt Blue at my house. So I went home to grab some more beer and I got a call from Toronto's assistant general manager Bill Watters on my house phone. He said, 'Shawn, it's Bill Watters from the Toronto Maple Leafs. We've selected you in the seventh round. Our scout had a lot of great things to say about you. We know a lot of the same people. I just wanted to say congratulations.'
OLIVE: That's incredible! How did you take the news?
THORNTON:[Laughs] I said, [expletive] off! Who is this? That's not funny.' Then my agent got on the phone and told me that I really got drafted by the Leafs. I said, 'Oh [expletive], can you put Bill back on?' I told him that we'd been joking about it all day and that I thought it was a prank call. He said, 'No, you've been drafted. We'll send you your jersey and we look forward to seeing you. We'll get in touch with you about development camp and get in touch with you about main camp in the future. Welcome to the Toronto Maple Leafs.' That was my draft day. It was probably a bit different from a lot of others because I didn't think it was happening until it actually happened.
OLIVE: After hanging up the phone, who was the first person you shared the news with?
THORNTON:It was just my friends, my mom and my sister at the house celebrating. My dad was working at the factory that afternoon, so he didn't find out right away with the rest of us. Later on, we all went to a local sports pub that we always liked to go to and had a good time.
OLIVE: What was his reaction when he finally found out that you'd been drafted?
THORNTON:He couldn't get out of the plant. He was there from 3 p.m. until midnight or something like that. He might've been working a double, so we called him. He was excited, but again, he's in the middle of a steel factory so it's not like he could just stop [laughs]. You're probably not healthy if you stop what you're doing and stop paying attention in those places.
OLIVE: As a kid from Ontario, did being drafted by Toronto make the day that much more special?
THORNTON:Yeah, it did. Looking back, I didn't play for them. I got to play for a lot of great organizations and Toronto's AHL club, but I never got to play for their big club. But being from there, my first training camp was weird. I tried to keep this in my mind when I turned to my older years of pro when we had kids coming in. The two years before I went to my first camp, I was in high school talking about Mats Sundin. I was a fan, and now suddenly I'm rooming with guys like Derek King and Mats Sundin. You had to change your mindset. I always thought about that when we got new young guys after I got established in the NHL. These kids might have been Bruins fans or Panthers fans just a few years ago. They seem like adults, but they're probably looking at us like, 'I was just cheering for this guy and trading his hockey cards three years ago.'
OLIVE: Have you held on to any mementos from your draft day?
THORNTON:I might have my first contract somewhere, but I don't know if it got lost in the shuffle moving from Oshawa to Boston. I have my draft jersey and I have a picture of me and my sister with it. When they finally sent it to me, we took a picture with it together in my parents' backyard. That's about it.
OLIVE: With the 2020 NHL Draft coming up in a few weeks, do you ever find yourself getting nostalgic around this time of year?
THORNTON:Not really. That's probably just because I wasn't there and didn't get to experience the whole thing. The last two drafts I went to as an executive - Chicago and Dallas - that actually brought back more feelings of that first draft I went to in '96 when I walked around the building undrafted. It was just shaking hands, making introductions and trying to get my foot in the door somewhere. I get a little more nostalgic when I'm in the arena. It reminds me of being in St. Louis as an 18 or 19-year-old kid. I was never rated and never thought I was getting drafted. Whether I was picked or a walk-on, I was going to do whatever it took to get noticed.
OLIVE: Speaking of getting your foot in the door, what advice would you give this year's class of soon-to-be draft picks, especially those that end up being selected in the later rounds like you were more than 20 years ago?
THORNTON: It doesn't matter if you're drafted in the first round or the last round, you've got to make your own story. First rounders will get a lot more looks, but… Like you said, I had the 17th-most games played out of that draft. I didn't know that stat. It's amazing to me. If you went games pro, I don't even know where I'd sit. You've got to make your own story. You can't let a number define where you think you sit on the depth chart.
