i liked this post but have to clarify: Drurys post round 1 drafting appears to have been savvy and deliberate - in service of a vision for roster construction that I can get behind (size and skating emphasis on bottom 6 types for consistent flow of depth to supplement high cap dollar top 6 talent).
Gorton's recouping assets when tearing it down however was not great. Miller/Mcdonagh return sucked, Nash return was good, Etc.
The McDonagh-Miller trade yielded -
A young center
A young D
A 1st
a 2nd that could turn into a 1st
a roster player
Thats 4 potential cost controlled assets and a body that they turned into more draft picks. Did he identify the wrong guys? Yeah. Did he not get back enough considering that Miller also went in that trade? Also yes. Did it turn out f***ing terrible? 100000%
But that trade had a ton of pieces coming back.
He also had 8 1st round picks in 4 years (9 before the Trouba trade.) In terms of stock piling futures, I think he did a good job. I don't think he (or the people he had working under him, more accurately) did a good job utilizing those futures and yeah, that falls on him.
Its funny that his last draft here is the one that is likely to bear the most fruit even though they had fewer picks in that one than they had in the previous 2. I also don't think it's a coincidence that seemed like it was the one draft where they told Bobrov to go sit in a corner and play with the iPad (the 1 euro they took semi early.... is probably the worst pick they made that year LOL.)