Not saying you can’t get a good center outside the top 3-my sharks got 1b guys in Couture and Hertl outside the top 5, but an elite center?
If I wanted to win a cup in the next 5-10 years, here’s the centers I’d want:
1st overall: McDavid, McKinnon, Matthews, Hughes, Hischier, Bedard, Celebrini
2nd overall: Barkov, Carlsson, Eichel
3rd overall: Fantilli, Stuzle
Everyone else: Petterson (5th overall), Aho (2nd round), Point (3rd round, for the next couple years), and of course, if you count him Draisaitl (4th). Hintz, Suzuki, Thomas, may end up better than a few of the young guys, but more than 2/3rds the league’s premier centers come from 1/2 overall. If you go back 20 years you’ll find Getzlaf, Bergeron, Backstrom, and Kopitar as franchise centers outside the top 3, but then you’ve also got Thornton, Malkin, Crosby, Staal, and Toews in the top 3.
Franchise dmen are similar but not quite to the degree- the #1 dmen drafted top 4 (didn’t want to exclude Makar) are Dahlin, Hedman, Doughty, Pietro, Heiskanen, and Makar. Half of those six still have good years ahead, but are aging out. Seider, Sanderson, Hughes, Dobson, Werenski, and Bouchard were high draft picks, but not the coveted top 4. Fox, Slavin, Forsling, Josi, Morrisey, McAvoy, Theodore, Faber, Anderson, and the aged out Karlsson, Burns, Letang, and Karlsson were drafted outside the tank zone.
If you have a franchise C and a franchise D/G you’re in business as long as the GM does a half decent job of surrounding those two with good talent. Detroit may be able to thrive with a Larkin-Danielson-Kaspar provided their young D and goalies perform well, but I’d argue nothing drives team success like a premier center, as much as I love Seider.
You can’t just say, no franchise center, blow it up, we give up, time to tank, but damn it’s tough to win without one.