Again, yes we did.
Pretty much every half-decent prospect that hit the NHL for the better part of a decade went on to become a quality NHL player. The problem is that our drafting was so atrocious that the majority of our picks were never worth signing/never even able to be AHL regulars. And no amount of 'development' can fix picks that bad.
Our drafting was terrible. Our development during the Manitoba Moose years was awesome.
Disagree.
Who did we really develop?
Cory Schneider.
Kesler, Bieksa, and Burrows really only played in the AHL during the lockout year.
Jannik Hansen only became a 3rd/4th liner. Not a top 6 impact player.
Our drafting has been poor, which is a root cause for us having not developed well, but some of the prospects we have tried developing down there like Hodgson and Schroeder (moreso recent years) haven't panned out. Going back 10 years ago we failed to develop the likes of Nathan Smith (who was a terrible draft pick if you ask me), Brandon Reid, Steve Kariya, Fedor Fedorov.
Kirill Koltsov wasn't given an opportunity until he bolted to Russia.
Michael Grabner spent years in our development system and he ended up on waivers in the NHL. Outside of one year he hasn't done much.
How well have we done drafting in the late 1st round, 2nd round, and 3rd round? These are guys that we draft and expect to have to develop. We really don't have much to show from these rounds. Some part poor scouting, some part poor development.