Yeah, the goal posts have been moved a lot here.
The long-term project narrative is about on par with the “Brock Faber won’t sign with the Kings” one, it’s one of those things that is said a million times and becomes gospel. I went back and read the QB threads and like I remembered, the talk was he was not going to be a plug and play star like Matthews, not that he was going to be a 4-6 year project. All of the 4+ year project talk was invented as QB fell behind projections in year 2 and have continued as he fell more behind this year.
Just about everybody back then had QB as knocking on the door to the 1C by now, and being the clear 1C next season, and instead since he’s a struggling winger the narrative now changes to “everyone knew he was a long-term project”. It is just ignorance of how the draft process works in a cap league. No team is taking a player #2 in the draft if they are expecting to get almost nothing for the first 3 years the player is in the organization and nothing on an ELC.
And there is lots of “well next year is big for QB” or “I’ll be worried if he struggles again next year” but those same comments were made on this forum at the end of last season, and now he has struggled again and it’s the same comments except the year has changed. Eventually the problem can’t keep being pushed down the river and there has to be some acknowledgement that right now the pick looks like a big issue for the Kings.
Im not completely writing him off, but right now based on the history of similar players, the odds of that pick producing a good ROI worthy of what you expect from a 2OA is very low. I’m not saying he is a bust or or finished. But if you were setting odds on “What is QB’s career projection” and the two choices were star or bust. You would be getting a really good price if you chose star.
I think it falls somewhere in between. But somewhere in between isn’t going to be good enough for a player that much was expected of, a player who was supposed to be the main guy in the next era of Kings hockey.
Well, I have referred to him as a project since we got the #2 pick and the debate started. I won't try to paraphrase the group here, just state what I have always felt.
He was a kid who scored a lot by using his physical advantages over mismatched kids, but I didn't fault him for his success. You work with what you have. I understood the criticisms about the "rush" numbers but always felt that he had the tools at hand to evolve his game but it would take a lot more time than the usual #2 overall because he had to learn how to not use those crutches while growing into his body AND adapting to the pro game.
Based on the previous picks of Vilardi and Turcotte up the middle, I felt they were insulated against the patience it would take to nurture the rarest of NHL commodities - a huge, mobile #1 center. For that reason I felt it was worth the risk over Stützle even though the odds that he would hit were much higher.
Well, then Blake blew the rebuild to chase something that can't be caught. Vilardi and Turcotte failed to be NHL impact center men, and Byfield had a series of starts and stops before being converted to a winger to remove the pressure of producing up the middle.
I have always stated and still believe that it was a mistske to go for it so quickly as it puts undue pressure on kids to play a brand of hockey they aren't ready to play at this level. Sure enough, centers are on the wing, an offensive winger is butchering the #4c spot, a top 6 winger is scratched because he can't play 4th line hockey, a RHD is pigeonholed to the left while three high-end RHDs can't get any time at all, and a first round LHD is sent down just because they can.
This whole thing is an epic mess of poor judgement.
