The problem with Vegas is that everybody was wrong. Everyone expected them to either: i) Take players high quality players that had to exposed for roster/contract reasons like Vatanen or Brodin and compete immediately, or ii) Load up on a metric shitload of high picks and draft a prospect all-star team while building for the future. They split the difference and got both - great young developing talent like Glass, Suzuki, Brannstrom, Gusev, Theodore, etc as well as the #1 seed in the west.
I think a lot of the frustration was because they didn't follow any traditional schools of thought. They didn't tank, they didn't moneyball, they didn't go overboard with analytics. They did a little bit of everything. None of the tribes can really take credit for it, so people are eager to call it a fluke. People had very specific expectations and now they don't want to give credit where credit is due.