Once again this season, he's the best forward on his team. For some reason, most people don't project him as a first round pick. I don't understand it. He doesn't have any major weaknesses. Maybe you could say he's slightly undersized, but he's a great skater and has a great work ethic, so he mitigates that, and he's incredibly skilled. He has definite 1st line upside.
He has 12 points in 11 games this season. Comparing him to the players on last year's 18's would be a terrible comparison because that team regularly scored over 10 goals per game, and his team doesn't do that. They are one of the least talented NTDP crops in years. I think he suffers from coming around in the wrong year. Over 1PPG on this team is a big accomplishment.
A good comparison for this year's 18's might be to the the 2016-17 18's that didn't have many high profile draft eligible players either, similar to this team. That season, no one averaged above 1PPG. The best was Josh Norris with 61 points in 61 games. Among the notables were Brady Tkachuk with 54 in 61, Quinn Hughes with 53 in 565, Evan Barratt with 56 in 63 and Grant Mismash with 61 in 65.