I think some people are generally confusing the idea of a player being a lower ceiling type with a player being a "ready soon" type. I think the difference can be highlighted with a guy like Gauthier who, when drafted, was sort of billed as the ultimate "low ceiling but safe bet" kind of guy and while there's some evidence to suggest that still might be the case I don't think too many of us are really expecting him to be a NHL regular until at least draft+4.
A lot of the things being cited as positives with the draft class(the ability for europeans to come to AHL immediately, european prospects playing against "grown men", different players having different development curves) aren't exactly new so it would stand to reason that there should at least be something in the way of evidence supporting this as a draft theory. I think the reason we're not seeing that is that a lot of what they did is actually bucking the information we have. As an immediate example, there's not a strong history of undrafted CHL players making big impacts in the NHL but there is a pretty extensive history of undrafted 20 year olds in the CHL putting up big numbers as overagers.
Bucking the evidence we have isn't always a recipe for disaster or even a bad decision but I do think it should at least be acknowledged.
