This is something we've been discussing in reasonable detail on the Habs board -
@NotProkofievian @G0bias @Mrb1p. Personally, I am not the most versed on the NTDP guys, having watched less than a dozen of their games. So I'm not confident in a cross-comparison in that direction.
However, I have watched an utter ****load of the WHL (and Victoria Grizzlies) last/this year - Krebs has
every trait you want in a top 6 FW. The biggest question for me is whether he ends up at C or W.
I think fans tend to not put enough weight into how playing in an adverse situation affects a player. I mean a) it's boring to watch a bad team, and b) we collectively have a very "what have you done for me lately" mentality. Compare that to NHL teams - some of them obviously put a lot weight on extraneous circumstantial factors - see Ty Dellandrea.
At the end of the day, it's really tough to be the best player on a terrible team - and we see very few top prospects on said teams. Most of them are on decent-good teams, while very few top 10 picks come from bottom-feeder teams. And that makes enough sense. So it's a bit of a challenge for evaluators to place those types of guys, and that's what we are seeing with Krebs..
I think a lot of people respect Mark Edwards/HP's rankings the most, and they have Krebs as the top WHL FW right now...