The NFL doesn’t have a KHL. There isn’t a way for guys to get as good as Kaprizov was when he did joined the league. So their rookie of the year award is one where a first year pro player beats other first year pros. It’s apples to apples.
But MLB does. So does a guy like ichario get to win rookie of the year when he joins MLB at age 32 with 3,000 pro hits, +$20mm in earnings and a few MVPs to his name?
Kaprizov showed up in the NHL as fully developed. He was professionally accomplished and fully grown. If the league allows guys like that to win rookie of the year awards vs 18 year olds like an Auston Matthews putting up crazy goal stats for a teen or a just turned 18 year old Barkov playing well as a rookie… it’s a pretty stupid award.
And trying to compare the rookie season of an 18 year old to a 1st NHL season to a highly accomplished, much older professional player like Kaprizov is also stupid. Kaprizov is a wonderful player but he never was a rookie in the NHL. He was a first NHL year veteran professional hockey player when he joined the NHL. Similar to Kuzmenko.
That makes sense for the NFL, since there is a direct line from college to the NFL, and the top players all hit it within a year or so of each other in age. That is not the case in the NHL, so the rules are different. Growing up seeing governments do their thing it may not seem like it, but sometimes rules follow reality.
Also... the average age for a rookie in the NFL is the age Kaprizov was as a rookie, so what is the point you're making with this tangential argument?
Kaprizov was well developed already, but actually improved after his rookie season, so he wasn't
fully developed, was he? In fact, Jason Robertson has improved by about the same margin, so maybe Robertson was also too old at 21? Or did the AHL prepare him so quickly? If so, we should take Calder eligibility away from players who have a year in the AHL, or players who are 21, or both.
If you take nothing else away, please take this away:
Players develop at different rates and at different ages, so maybe it's not a great idea to limit the window too much, or you remove almost all the competition from it, making it meaningless. If it were for 18-20 year olds only, the only player actually competing for it realistically this year would be Bedard (he'll win and should, but Faber at least made it interesting for a while). Pretty boring, which is not a favorable attribute for entertainment.
I have no idea what any of this has to do with Rossi, though, or his trade value. Good kid, good player. I hope the Wild keep him!