Alexis Lafreniere is having himself a year! He put together a great season, scoring 28 goals and 29 assists yet he’s stood out in the playoffs more with seven goals and six assists. It makes Lafreniere a pleasant surprise, except this is what was expected of him coming into the NHL. After all, he was the number one overall pick in the 2020 NHL Entry Draft.
It wasn’t long ago that Lafreniere was considered a draft bust. He was struggling to make a significant mark at the NHL level and along with Kaapo Kakko, the second overall pick in the 2019 NHL Entry Draft, it looked like the New York Rangers whiffed on two top draft selections.
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Lafreniere’s trajectory is a reminder that some prospects, even elite ones, require patience. They won’t stand out in their first or even their second season but with time and the right role, they can become stars in the NHL. More importantly, Lafreniere is a reminder that the bar is frankly too high for a lot of top picks. Sidney Crosby, Connor McDavid, and Connor Bedard are some of the generational talents that went number one overall but there’s a reason they are generational. Not every top selection will be that great.
Lafreniere isn’t the only player who fits into this box. Plenty of top picks currently look like draft busts, but they can turn a corner and become elite players in the long run.
Shane Wright
Shane Wright is the first player who comes to mind who can have a Lafreniere-like trajectory. He entered the 2022 Draft as the presumed top pick and a player poised to have a great career with any team that landed him. He fell to the fourth pick on draft night, a shock at the time but apparently, teams saw something the fans and mock draft experts didn’t.
Fast forward two seasons and he’s behind schedule of all three players who were selected ahead of him. Juraj Slafkovsky, who the Montreal Canadiens took at one, looks like a rising star, scoring 24 goals and 36 assists in 121 games played. Simon Nemec already looks like a reliable defenseman on the New Jersey Devils roster. The Arizona Coyotes took Logan Cooley at three and he already looks like a dynamic forward at the NHL level with 20 goals and 24 assists. Wright meanwhile has yet to make an impact with the Seattle Kraken, playing only 16 games and scoring only five goals and two assists while spending most of the last two seasons at the American Hockey League (AHL) level.
It’s early but it looks like the teams that passed on Wright made the right decision. That said, he isn’t a bust and could ultimately end up being the best player in the draft class. While he was deemed the most NHL-ready player at the time, he’s a center who still must round out his game. When he does that, he can become one of the elite two-way players, someone who is a constant Selke Trophy finalist, and a key part of the Kraken roster.
Cutter Gauthier
The pick after Wright in the draft. Cutter Gauthier has only played one game at the NHL level but has had quite the journey already. He was drafted by the Philadelphia Flyers in 2022 with the fifth selection but in the middle of the 2023-24 season, he decided he didn’t want to play for them anymore, and thus came the blockbuster trade. He was dealt to the Anaheim Ducks in exchange for defenseman Jamie Drysdale, and as a player who has already asked his way out of one organization, there’s a dark cloud hanging over him.
Now Gauthier is with the Ducks and has a chance to rejuvenate his career. He still has the high upside as a power forward who can win with speed and on the Ducks, he can be a key part of a great young roster. Gauthier is only 20 years old and has plenty of time to carve out a great career and more importantly, become the star that many thought he’d be when he was drafted in the top five.
Bowen Byram
Bowen Byram looked like the next great two-way defenseman and the Colorado Avalanche seemed like the perfect destination for him to start his career. With Cale Makar and Devon Toews as mentors and the team competing for the Stanley Cup every season, he was poised to slowly become a valuable part of the defense and a key part of a championship-caliber team.
Everything that could go wrong for Byram did. He dealt with setbacks, and long-term injuries, and failed to become the reliable skater the Avalanche hoped they were drafting with the fourth overall pick in the 2019 Draft. Eventually, the Avalanche pulled the plug and traded him to the Buffalo Sabres in exchange for Casey Middlestadt.
Byram is looking to restart his career and the Sabres seem like the team to do just that. Sure, they haven’t made the playoffs since the 2010-11 season, but the defense has plenty of talent to compensate for his weaknesses. Notably, Owen Power and Rasmus Dahlin are the bigger-bodied skaters while he adds speed and puck movement to the unit. The upside is there and after Byram scored three goals and six assists in 18 games with his new team, he showed he can turn around his career with the Sabres.
Jesperi Kotkaniemi
It’s hard to call Jesperi Kotkaniemi a prospect considering he’s 23 and has been in the NHL for six seasons. However, it’s safe to say that his promising career looks like a mess, especially since the Carolina Hurricanes acquired him in the 2021 offseason. Once a skater with a lot of upside, he’s played a minimal role on the Hurricanes and was a non-factor in the playoffs, contributing only one assist and averaging only 11:01 of ice time in 11 games played.
With a $4.8 million average annual value contract that has six more seasons remaining, it’s not crazy to think the Hurricanes will buy out his contract or try to package him in a trade this offseason. Kotkaniemi needs a new setting and it would be no shock if his career took off somewhere else. He has a lot of upside, something the league saw firsthand when he was with the Canadiens and helped them reach the Stanley Cup Final in 2021 with five goals and three assists in the playoff run. The hope is that he gets that chance somewhere.
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It’s all about finding the right setting and the right role on the roster. Lafreniere struggled under Gerrard Gallant, the Rangers’ previous head coach who notably favors veteran skaters over younger ones. When Peter Laviolette was hired, his career took off in part because of the head coach’s willingness to play him but also the situations he was put in. Lafreniere is a fast skater who makes his biggest impact in space and the Rangers started to allow him to make plays on the rush and provide him open looks on the wing.
These young skaters were all former top-five picks for a reason. They all have high upside and it takes a team, starting from the front office to the roster itself, to buy in. It’s paying off for the Rangers, who are six wins away from a Stanley Cup title and the other teams will benefit as well when they work around their young player and their skill sets.
