I've been thinking for a while that he should have just selected the best players that were made available and then deal with it after the ED. Except for the trades that netted 1st rounders. Overthinking on McPhees part and if he doesn't get a great return for Neal, or is able to sign a top FA, he will be an abject failure thus far. Lol, he's already in salary cap trouble, the franchise has been alive for one week.
His goaltending is above average with Fleury and had he kept Methot, his defense with Methot, Miller, Theodore, Schmidt, Engelland, Garrison, and Emelin (in no particular order here) would have been serviceable if not even above average overall. His forward corps has a bunch of guys who can play defense like Haula, Bellemare, Karlsson, Eakin so this would improve their overall defensive play. He drafted a few guys who can score in Perron, Neal, and Marchessault and signed Shipachyov. He could have drafted a few more scoring forwards as well but chose guys like Schlemko over Boedker, etc. etc.
The NHL gave Vegas every opportunity to come into the league as a competitive team that would at least be hard to play against. They obviously lacked a 1D and 1C but the players available were enough to ice a decent team. Instead, we'll see McPhee slowly whittle away any player with value so they can tank this season and next and build through the draft. I'm not saying that's the wrong choice in the long run, but it is disappointing to see a brand new franchise with every opportunity to ice a half decent team spurn it all in favor of a scorched earth style rebuild (first build).
I think a lot of people are giving them credit because they have seen how poorly past expansions have fared from the get-go. But this was done under different rules and was only one team rather than the typical two teams at a time. There were more quality players available and the draft lotto system is now in place so even if they were able to ascend to a playoff bubble team they still would have had a chance at a higher pick in what looks to be a good 2018 draft.
I think they did their fans a disservice by committing to a tank rebuild style build rather than trying to start a winning culture right away. The tank rebuild works but for every Pittsburgh and Chicago there is a Phoenix and Edmonton (pre 2016). Its better to start a winning culture and become a place UFAs want to sign with and draft well with early to mid 1st rounders, than start off tanking and flounder for many years until you have been able to draft two or three cornerstone players (one seemingly needing to be a generational-type talent) and build around that.
