Quote:
Originally Posted by New Era
So you can tell how a player stacks up against another through a scouting report? You can tell how far along a player is against another through this same scouting report?
What do these scouting reports have to say about Jankowski's development over the past season? The previous reports said the biggest knocks against him were his size and adjusting to a much superior league. Jankowski is now about the same size as Monahan. Disaster averted. Jankowski adjusted quite well to the college game and has a great second half of the season, finishing only six points off the team lead and finishing top four, trailing players three to five years his senior, while playing four less games. In fact, Jankowski's performance and production was superior to that of Corbin Knight when he was a freshman, so it seems his adjustment was quite successful. Disaster averted again.
All this hand wringing over Jankowski is completely blown out of proportion. The kid is a whole month older than Monahan and appears to be at the same skill and developmental level based on the prospects camp. All this stuff of him being 4+ years away is a bunch of BS dreamed up by the talking heads who were left looking stupid on draft day a year ago. They didn't know this kid, hadn't seen him, and decided that he was an off the board pick that needed years of development, and that narrative has stuck with joe fan. This is why I like to judge these kids based on what they do after their draft year and how the development of their game is. Monahan, Poirier and Klimchuk were just at their first camp and were told what they have to work on. Let's see what improvement they make in their respective games before we call them our best prospects. Your best prospects are the ones who have shown continued growth and success each and every year, not the ones who just had their name called. The new guys hold promise, but have to live up to that promise to prove worthy of their draft position.
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Love the first half of your post.
Disagree with you that he isn't still a project though. He needs a longer development curve because of both the poor level of hockey he was playing at when we drafted him combined with the fact he wasn't physically mature. Fast forward a year, he had a solid freshman year for his age and seems to be adapting well to a much, much higher level of competition. He also has put on some muscle but still needs to improve in that area.
So what does he still need to become an NHLer? He'll need to dominate college, either this year or next. He'll need to physically mature in the next few years. Depending on how mature his game is after he leaves college he may need a year or more in the minors. So when he was drafted I think it was totally fair to say he was 4-5 years away. Fast forward a year and he's probably still 3-4 years away.
Like him a lot as a prospect though and I do think some people underrate him and underrate how successful his freshman season was for his age and for his previous playing level.