Islanders are very competitive despite whiffing on 5OA Dal Colle, 4OA Reinhart (of course salvaging Barzal out of it is huge), 5OA Ryan Strome underperforming (Eberle), 5OA Niederreiter underperforming (Clutterbuck), and letting their 1OA go for nothing.
The Kings won 2 cups after picking Thomas Hickey 4OA despite getting 0 NHL gp before losing him on waivers.
Erik Johnson wasn't a 1OA calibre player - St Louis turned him into Shattenkirk and Stewart (which eventually turned into part of the price for Brayden Schenn)
Tampa didn't hit a homerun with 3OA Drouin (Sergachev contributing) or 6OA Connolly (turned into 0 NHL gp so far)
Chicago picked Barker 3OA and Jack Skille 7OA in the 2 years before Toews and Kane.
These terms weren't crippled by these failures. Missing on a Top 5 pick isn't a death sentence. Sure, LA got Doughty 2OA and Schenn 5OA, but they won the cup through shrewd deals and doing well with lower picks. Same story with Tampa - Stamkos and Hedman alone do not make them the juggernaut they are. The Blues have had 1 other Top 12 pick since 1990 - picking Pietrangelo 4OA is not the only thing that made them a winner. Since Dipietro in 2000, the Islanders have had six picks between #4-9, and only 'hit' on Bailey (9OA) and Okposo (7OA).
Only Pittsburgh seems to have a close to perfect track record, though you could probably say that MAF, Staal, and Ryan Whitney 5OA slightly underperformed their draft spots.
Similar situations as Calgary:
- Vancouver is still competitive despite 0 games from 2016 5OA Juolevi (early days)
- Coyotes salvaged 3OA Strome into Schmaltz
- Columbus has done okay despite 2OA Ryan Murray underperforming
- Florida missed on 3OA Gudbrandson
I'm not a big trade Bennett guy, but from looking through this list it does seem that the salvage trade pans out more often than not.