Thats great for the teams picking 3-8 can hope for, Kakko we should hope will be a much better player than only hitting 70 points once in his career.
That's my take.
I liked Rick Nash as a Ranger. I think the trade of Dubinski, Anisimov, Erixon, and a first was a smart trade on our part. The Rangers had lots of B level talent and needed another A level talent. Consolidation from an area of excess is a smart move. Nash was available and wanted to play here. He was still young-ish (he was able to give us 6 seasons, essentially, and were it not for head injuries and the breakdown of the team I think he could have lasted a good deal longer at reduced effectiveness). He was able to bring us quality, win-driving primary scoring when he was on, and he always played good defense, despite his all-too-often offensive slumps here.
But at the end of the day being a 30+ goal scorer who is not contributing to scores by also creating and getting assists, leaves something to be desired. Not that any player in that draft -- or even most drafts -- ends up any better than Rick Nash in their career. But when you are picking first overall -- or in our position, where you are picking second but with the premise that the second player is also a franchise-changing super stud -- you really want a guy to carry the team on his back for 10+ years. You want 40 assists to go with the 30 goals, even during "off" years. You want the peak to be more like 90-100 points, not 60-70. Nash only had two seasons where he was a point per game player.
We're sitting here talking about how Kakko is going to be the franchise-changing talent we've needed since Messier and Leetch, the talent that we lacked when we couldn't get over the hump from 2012-15. Well, that's not really Rick Nash. Rick Nash wasn't able to get us over that hump. I'm not blaming him, but we really needed, like, prime Marian Gaborik on this team as well -- a guy who had 5 seasons in a row at over a PPG. Even he topped out at 86 points in a season and by age 28 was not the same.
Maybe I'm being unrealistic, but the level of pre-draft hype and projection regarding Hughes and Kakko is way higher than normal. Experts don't seem to be saying that these guys are Ryan Nugent Hopkins and Gabe Landeskog. They don't seem to be saying that these guys are Nico Hischier and Nolan Patrick. I feel like we are hearing these guys are Matthews/Laine except maybe better. I don't want to say McDavid, but certainly Eichel.
I feel like my expectations are in the Stamkos/Tavares level. Nash wasn't that.
Maybe I'm being unrealistic, but based on the hype I'm hearing (I'm no scout, I'm just reading reports), that's where I'm getting the feeling these guys are projecting towards (talent level, not style comparison).