It will be very cool and very positive if dumb blind luck can bail out an awful process. But relying on that while routinely doing all you can to make getting lucky unlikely isn't a great way to build a team
I guess this is where perspective and bias come in.
The process here indicates that the Flyers passed on a suite of externally ranked prospects to pick somebody they personally had ranked higher (this assessment is what can be challenged by us).
But in hindsight, we would also crucify them if they didn't pick their own internally ranked prospects higher and went with the consensus blindly (NoPa, JVR, etc.).
Feels like this board will always crucify the management.
For the record, I think they made a mistake and should have taken a defenseman that was putting up historic numbers, because my general philosophy on drafting talent is that people that put up numbers will always do so. Very rarely do people suddenly start producing as they move into higher levels (it happens, but it's rare). I've seen highlights of Luchanko, and his circumstances mitigate his production - but it's a very risky bet to make. He's talented and has more upside than I think the board is giving credit for, but I'd have done 32 + Farabee to get another top 15 pick if you liked him so much and come out with Buium + Luchanko. That would have been an A+ draft. Chicago moved up, SJ moved up so it was clearly feasible - after a failure of top 5 advancement, they should have been like "let's see who's at 12, and if there's 2 players we like, let's get anotehr top 15 pick and take both since we didn't get in the 5."
And I am upset quite a bit by the fact that we could have had 2 players now with absolutely massive records pre-draft that fell to us, and they could have easily been both top 5 picks.
If you are going to avoid tanking, and you get top 5 talents falling to you, you have to make those picks, period. Ironically, that's the most frustrating part to me. They've had top 5 talents (2!) that they could have had WITHOUT tanking (which is their whole motto) and you just have to accept those graces and move on - and they didn't.
THAT process I can take exception with, and has made me finally think about switching teams.
I do believe, though, that there's more to the story with Buium and why he fell. We'll never know - I've heard rumors of him wanting to stay in the midwest, or that he won't sign - but this could all be idle speculation. We'll never really know.
Michkov + Buium plus the supporting staff sounds a lot better, then use the stupid 1st picks and trade for a C and be done with it. I would have much preferred that.