https://open.substack.com/pub/mystaes/p/drafting-and-development-in-the-modern?utm_source=share&utm_medium=android&r=7ecc7
great read on the red wings' prospects woes. doesnt leave yzerman blameless, but does note late-kenny's extreme failings.
"At last we come to it. The root of the Red Wings’ drafting and development hell. The reason that for seemingly a decade Red Wings fans have pointed to their prospects as a sign that things would turn around, only to be left disappointed. 2013 was a banner year for Detroit, where they found several impactful players that many will be familiar: Anthony Mantha, Tyler Bertuzzi, and Matthias-Janmark (even if he was traded before ever playing for the wings). What followed, however, was a half-decade of drafting darkness from which the Red Wings have still not emerged. It is my hope, not only to convey the scale of this disaster, but that others will use it as a precautionary tale: if you are about to enter a rebuild, you need to have your scouting and development system in order. Just as the Red Wings were beginning to falter at the NHL level, they entered a period of five years where the only notable NHL players that they managed to draft and develop were Dylan Larkin, and Filip Hronek - impactful and useful NHL players to be sure, but not enough to mitigate the missed opportunities elsewhere. During this 2014-2018 period, the Red Wings would under-perform the value expected of draft picks by a cumulative 5 average WAR per season. The 2017 and 2018 draft classes - in which the Wings walked away with Michael Rasmussen, Filip Zadina, and Joe Veleno - are particularly painful for Detroit Red Wings fans."