I actually did not think he had a great WJC. He was good, but his shot selection did not mirror his shot selection in the DEL. He also was fumbling the puck quite a bit. I attribute that to just excitement and nervousness. I'm pretty sure this was his first international tournament where he was able to play against the best players in his age group, and he probably knew that Germany needed him to produce if they were going to make any noise.
My biggest complaint about Stutzle is his decision making. He tries too often to make the play that will for sure lead to a goal if it works, but the probability is super low that it will work. That is what separates Lafreniere from him, for me. You can see Laf angle his blade and his body, scanning where to go. Stutzle is fast-paced. He gets it, makes a move, and the puck is being fired to where he thought it should go before he made the move. He needs to recalibrate after the move, sometimes, to improve his overall effectiveness. He also needs to get stronger on his skates.
I'm not sure what you mean by perimeter player. He constantly brings the puck from the boards into the middle of the ice. I don't think he is afraid to take it to the middle or go the middle, but he isn't going to post up in the middle of the ice, but, again, I'm not exactly sure what you mean.
The scoring thing is interesting. You look at his shot, and while I have never watched him live, it looks to have a fairly quick release, and it seems like it has some heat on it, so I would guess his goal-scoring problems boils down to not having the most accurate shot, or he is just getting very unlucky right now. To see how SH% can influence a player, look at Lafreniere. He is on pace for 43 goals, which is one more than his rookie year, and six more than last year, but this year he is averaging 5.2 shots a game. In his other two years, he averaged about 3.4. Somehow, his goal scoring has stayed the same, yet he is averaging almost 2 more shots per game. Even if those extra shots were all bad shots, we should still see a spike goal scoring, but we don't, and we don't see that increase because his SH% is at a low. Before this season, Laf was a 17% shooter. This year, he is at 13.6%. Regressing his SH%, he would be at 30 goals and 79 points. What I am saying is Stutzle could just be in a dry spell caused by random variation in SH%. I am not saying that is what is happening (like I do believe for Laf), but it is a possibility to explain Stutzle's poor goal scoring and make no mistake, it is poor. Corsica's model does not like him because of his weak goal scoring. The model had him as one of (if not the) poorest goal scoring top-rated forwards since 2013. His adjusted goal rate is about the same as a top-ranked defenceman; however, only one player since 2013 has a better-adjusted assist rate than Stutzle, and if you remove late birthdays, he is basically tied with one player. That one player currently leads the NHL points. For reference, McDavid had an adjusted assist rate of 0.24, and Stutzle was bouncing between 0.25-o.27 (Corsica's model is no longer live, but I was looking at it every morning before it went down, and I have all data from previous years saved).
I like Raymond a lot. The kid is super smart. Higher hockey IQ than Stutzle. Raymond's positioning is also better (probably due to higher IQ); they both forecheck hard and backcheck hard, but Raymond is much more effective at closing lanes, forcing turnovers, etc. Although he has low point totals, I also get a dangerous vibe from Raymond. You just get the feeling something can happen when he has the puck. His stats are similar to Nylander, but his IQ and compete are higher. I have no problems with someone preferring Raymond over Stutzle.
Holtz, though, I don't know. I don't see it. I don't think he is BPA at #3, not my type of player, nor the type of player this team needs. We need to be stronger in transition. We need players to get the puck out of our zone and into the opposition's zone, so our big bodies like Tkachuk, Brown (hopefully he pans out), and even Paul can do work down low, and so Chabot doesn't have to lug the puck every second shift (so inefficient, and maybe he will have energy to actually defend, improving his overall impact). Holtz does not help us with that, at least not to the extent of other players, but I am a little worried I caught him in some not so great games. Analytically, he is probably the second or third best player in this draft. His adjusted goal-scoring rate is top 3 or 4 since 2013. The kid can score, no doubt. I am going to try and watch him more. He is having a great year.
