That's an opinion, you are welcome to have it. My counter is:
Matthews, Marner, Domi, Nylander, Tavares, Knies, McMann, Kampf, Jarnkrok have nine spots locked up. That leaves three or four for Holmberg, Robertson, Paccioretty, Dewar, Lorentz, Reaves, Steeves, Cowan, Minten, Grebenkin, and A Nylander. That's 11 guys fighting for three or four spots. They will start to push Kampf and Jarnkrok too. I feel like thar is more than previous years.
On D we have Reilly, Tanev, OEL and McCabre as four locks with Liljegren, Benoit, Hakanpaa and Timmins fighting for two or three...not to mention Niemela, Myers and Mermis.
If Murray is healthy this is a three deep competition for the crease without even looking at Hildeby or Akhtyamov...as we shouldn't be
Last year we had Bert, Domi, Jarnkrok, Kampf, Marner, Matthews, Nylander, Reaves, Tavares for 9 spots locked in
We had Abruzzese, Blandisi, Cowan, Clifford, Gregor, Gambrell, Holmberg, Knies, Lafferty, Minten, Robertson, Shaw, Steeves - 13 guys with NHL experience or a legit shot at competing for a spot
Plus Caufield, Ellis, Frasca, Hirvonen, Kressler, Lisowsky, Mastrosimone, O'Brien, Ovchinnikov, Shea, Singleton, Suthers, Tverberg, and Weiss at camp too
McMann and Voit injured.
Two years ago, Bunting, Jarnkrok, Kampf, Kerfoot, Marner, Matthews, Nylander, Tavares were locks
Anderson, Aston-Reese, Aube-Kubel, Blandisi, Clifford, Engvall, Gaudette, Holmberg, Malgin, Robertson, Shaw, Steeves were competing
2021, the last spots were battled for by Amadio, Anderson, Brooks, Clune, Engvall, Gabriel, Gusev, Ho-Sang, Ritchie, Robertson, Seney, Simmonds
etc.
I will say, I like this year's quality of competition better, I'm with you on that, but organizational depth and internal competition really hasn't been an issue for years