Its true. We has Sproul looking like a 6"4 Rafalski (before we found out his defence would never improve) , Ouellet consistently being the smartest D guy in the Q (before we found out his skating would never improve), Jensen was a late bloomer but had 2 great late years in College (but his offence didn't translate). Marchenko projected as a nailed on 3rd d pair guy (and probably still is in some teams, but can earn a lot more in the KHL - but his skating actually got worse), and Backman had a +25 +/- in the SHL in his final year and a great 1st GR playoffs (before tailing off and being worse at 25 than he was at 20). Add in Almqvist who in his post draft season as an 18 year old put up 34 points in 15 j20 games before being a 50 point guy in GR before the 2nd dirty hit in row cemented the fact he lacked the skating to be evasive enough for the NHL, and Kindl having his one good season before reverting back to being scared of his own shadow, and Smith having not yet shown that he was definitely the scarecrow of our yellow brick road....
Even around the league analysts were impressed with our rebuild on the fly prospect pool. No one forsaw Jensen being the best of that group and as really a 3rd line D.
The thing that gives us hope now, is at least Cholowski and Hronek have shown genuine smarts and guts at AHL & NHL level. Will they pan out to be the 2nd pairing guys we hope? Hard to say, but both look better at the NHL level than most of the above list ever did.
