It’s a tale as old as time: a camp invitee scores an impressive breakaway goal during the Future Stars Game and Preds Twitter goes wild demanding an entry-level contract be sent his way immediately. It often doesn’t work like that (Zach Magwood being a good exception), and it shouldn’t, but Development Camp is still an important week for the organization and fans.
The opposite phenomenon happens often, too: a highly-touted prospect in the organization comes to camp and looks out of place to fans or doesn’t score two highlight-reel goals on Saturday. The result? Everyone freaks out.
Earlier this week, Justin Bourne penned an excellent piece for The Athletic that detailed the point of this week in an anecdote about Mitch Marner, stating, “It was at that camp where I truly began to appreciate the difference between assessing raw tools and a player’s actual ability to have success within a hockey game.