Scouting is, at best, an imperfect discipline.
Every year at the NHL entry draft players that should get selected fall through the cracks. This happens for a variety of reasons: sometimes they weren’t scouted closely enough, sometimes they were late bloomers and later had standout seasons, sometimes a team likes a player but doesn’t have any draft picks remaining, and so on.
The most important thing, though, is recognizing when you’ve missed a good prospect and taking steps to fix the problem.
When it comes to Czech defenseman Ondrej Vala, 30 NHL teams passed up on him at the 2016 draft.