OHL Flashback Trade Tree Jordan Mayer

With the OHL Priority Selection behind us I thought I would look back at some of the post draft trades that have occurred involving 1^st round picks that refused to report to the team that drafted them. After all this is hardly a new thing. Eric Lindros refused to report to the Soo Greyhounds and the resulting traded helped build the foundation for 3 straight memorial cup appearances. The Generals did alright themselves with a league championship during the Lindros era. Some of these spawn rather interesting trade trees through the years.

In recent years players like Kerby Rychel and Max Domi have refused to report to the team that drafted them only to find success elsewhere. While I will get to them later in the series I thought I would start with one of the last players to pull the no show card before the 1^st round compensation pick rule came into affect.

OHL Flashback Trade Tree 

Jordan Mayer

Going into the 2007 season the Soo Greyhounds were primed to make some noise. After pushing the London Knights to 7 games the previous year in the 2^nd round of the playoffs Craigh Hartsburg and Dave Torrie had built a team that was knocking on the door of a potential Western Conference run.

Looking to add an impact player to their team in hopes of bolstering their run they selected Jordan Mayer out of Kingston Ontario. Unfortunately the Hounds were unable to convince him to report to Sault Ste Marie. With the draft pick compensation rules still a few years from being in place they didn't have an opportunity to trade him for a boatload of picks in an effort to boost their trade deadline buying abilities.

With Mayer holding out Hartsburg and Torrie went to work putting the team in the best position to succeed. Final near the trade deadline the Greyhounds and the Mississauga St. Micheal's Majors hooked up on a trade. To Mississauga would be disgruntled forward Jordan Mayer and to Sault Ste Marie would be local kid Matt Caria. A former NOJHL rookie of the year with the Soo Thunderbirds.

For his part Jordan Mayer turned in a solid OHL career. It may not have lived up to that of other 1^st round picks as he only topped the 30 goal mark once in his career but he played 296 career OHL games and added 95 goals and 101 assists. Lost an OHL finals while with the Majors but also got to play in the Memorial Cup that year as Mississauga was the host.

Matt Caria made an instant impact with the Hounds. Coming off of a 75 point season the year before as an 18 year old Caria would slide into the Hounds lineup behind 1^st line center Dustin Jeffery and add some much needed scoring depth picking up 31 points in 26 games. In the playoffs he would add another 14 points in 14 games as the Hounds ultimately fell to the Kitchener Rangers in the conference finals.

Matt would return to Sault Ste. Marie for his OA season and add another 30 games with the program and tacking on another 35 points. It was at this moment in time when Hounds GM Dave Torrie would present him with a trade opportunity to Plymouth. Matt Decided to waive his NTC allowing the Hounds to pick up 3 draft picks. A Windsor 3^rd in 2009 and Plymouth 2^nd in 2010 and a Plymouth 6^th in 2011.

Matt Caria would end strong adding 57 points in his final 37 games with Plymouth before picking up 15 in 11 playoff games.

The 3 draft picks the Hounds picked up would all see time in the Red and White with varying degrees of success.

First up was the Windsor 3^rd from 2009. Coming off of a league championship that pick turned out to be the 60^th of that draft. The Hounds took a shot at a skilled late birthday forward playing for Team Illinois named Trevor Morbeck. Trevor was one of 4 players from this draft to play more than 170 OHL games joining Daniel Catenacci, Nick Cousins and Ryan Sproul in the Hounds draft haul. While there is no doubt Trevor showed flashes during his time with the Hounds things never seemed to click. Trevor would add 15 goals and 19 assists in 127 games before being dealt.

The Plymouth 2^nd in 2010 turned out to have some rather big franchise changing implications for the Hounds. With this pick they took a lanky goaltender out of Thunder Bay named Matt Murray. Matt would go on to start 4 consecutive season opening games for the Greyhounds. Matt would finish 2^nd on the Greyhounds all time career list in GP by a goalie as well as minutes played.3^rd in wins and 2^nd in shutouts (since passed). He was a homerun 2^nd round draft pick and an outlier as to what fans can realistically expect with a 2^nd round pick. On top of this Matt was drafted and then signed to play in the NHL which to an extent adds value to an OHL team.

With Plymouth's 6^th round pick in 2011 the Greyhounds took a flyer on a player from Florida playing minor midget hockey in Illinois named Gabe Guertler. Gabe would go on to play his age 16 and 17 seasons in the USHL before commiting to play for the University of Minnesota. After an up and down freshman year he left the team to join the Hounds as a 19 year old. In his age 19 yo season as well as his OA season Guertler would provide much needed offensive flair to the Hounds. In 135 games Guertler would add 53 goals and 72 assists.. His season point totals of 57 and 68 were higher than any that Jordan Mayer put up while in the OHL.

The final branch of the Jordan Mayer trade tree would be a small deal that sent Trevor Morbeck to Kingston for forward Dylan Staples. Dylan was a gritty bottom six forward who stuck around with the Greyhounds for a but just before the Kyle Dubas area started to kick into another gear. Dylan would add 22 goals in parts of 3 seasons with the Hounds.

In the end the Jordan Mayer deal is one that worked out for both teams. The Majors got great value for Matt Caria. As Mayer was an integral part of their team that made it to game 7 of the OHL finals.

The Hounds meanwhile turned 5 years of Jordan Mayer into over 500 games of OHL service. Now what should be noted with their draft selections is that their 2^nd and 6^th round picks were outliers in terms of return. While fans have a fixation on 2^nd round picks the return that Matt Murray gave was quite extrodinary. Gabe Guertler while delayed his 2 years of high leveraged value is also something that should not be expected with a 6^th round pick. Trevor Morbeck was about average to just below for a late 3^rd rounder but when you someone taken in that position plays 170 OHL games you take it.

The Greyhounds overall did fantastic work in maximizing the value of their assets in this deal. From getting much needed scoring depth in a year they were all in to maximizing the assets on a 2^nd deal during a rebuild which had 2 key components in their next run to the top.

Next week I look into the first trade of a non report 1st round pick that came with a comp pick as Lucas Lessio chose not to report to the Niagara Ice Dogs.