Drives me nuts listening to the idea that prospects develop in a linear curve. Just because someone is a 3rd round pick and their NHLe or D+1 or whatever projects them as such and such doesn't mean much to me.
Once they're drafted into our prospect pool it doesn't really matter anymore where they were drafted - that doesn't mean anything any more. It's how they develop and fit into our systems and team, and it's usually not something that happens in a linear fashion. Everyone develops differently at different rates, then add in things like having Fujita help with skating and things like that and you never know.
Otherwise how do you explain 4th and 6th round picks turning into excellent players? Player development seems to be coming along for us, hopefully we can continue to draft well and get players that end up useful for us. But I tend to take everything all of us fan 'experts' come up with a grain of salt.
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