I agree with Axe too.
Skating can be "improved"... it can't be "fixed". If it's bad... it's bad.
Poor skating means a guy can't help carry a puck through the neutral zone.
You can't have a single forward on NHL ice unable to do that.
(And usually - when critics rag on a guys skating... it's "with the puck".)
(Conversely - if the skating is generally not good - then your line is in trouble if that forward NEEDS to be the first forward back to mark 3rd opposing F. You get in trouble there.)
re: Great skating vs No Skills
John Beecher is another guy I thought of re: Skating.
2019 late 1st pick for Boston.
Great skater.
Does nothing else well.
Raise your hand if you are still expecting something significant from John Beecher.
re: Bad Skating vs. Other Skills.
That's a major concern, because skating is the "basis" of hockey.
Kids/young-men have learned all of their skills while they are skating.
So your pace for anything: thinking the game, anticipation, gap control, stickhandling, passing, shooting, forechecking... its all based on YOUR PACE.
If you go and try to fix that... you mess almost everything up.
So... at best... a "slight improvement" to skating might be done - and it might, still, throw other-skills a bit out of whack.
I'd say skating can be improved maybe 10% from draft year. Maybe.
If NHL-low-average skating is a 6.
Then a guy could be at a 5... and make it (Boldy, Kaliyev, Maccelli).
But he can't be at a 4. (for example, Alex Beaucage - 2019 3rd rounder to COL... Nolan Foote - 2019 1st rounder to NJ... these guys are probably career AHL-ers. *Some sources suggest that Foote's skating has improved since his draft - we shall see once he gets more NHL games.)