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Shayne Gostisbehere among players misjudged as prospects

Flyers defenseman Shayne Gostisbehere is one of the most exciting young blueliners in the sport, but he wasn't always viewed in that light. Kyle Ross/Icon Sportswire

This is one of the most important columns I write every year: A look into projections I got wrong. It's important for several reasons:

1. I take my job as a player evaluator seriously. This is not life or death, but it is my job and I strive to do the best I can. It is commonplace in the world of punditry for accountability to sometimes miss, but I have always tried to hold myself accountable. Nobody is a harsher critic of my work than myself -- and you can check my mentions on Twitter to verify that I have some harsh critics.

2. It shows I am willing to learn, and am not married to a set of guidelines. Through the years I have been accused of having different biases, that I'm in favor of small players, Europeans in general, Russians in particular, speedsters, flashy players, problem children, anybody that isn't a goaltender and so on. I've heard many people describe to me how I think. Truth be told, I don't take a player's background into account; my job is to find the best prospects, period. My process has evolved, and part of that process is examining players I project too high or too low.

3. Lastly and most importantly, it describes to the reader why I got a call wrong and why it's important. I'm off slightly all the time -- it's the product of making hundreds of projections each year. But again, examining why a projection is wrong is more illuminating than the simple fact that it was wrong.

Without any further preamble, here are some players who I rated either too high or too low in recent seasons: