One thing I am noticing lately from NHC modeling the past few years is that they are understating strength. Trek wise, they did pretty decent job, as the official land fall pretty much was located in FL for the entire run, even back into the eastern Caribbean.
In this case, the fact that the entire gulf was untapped of energy for the entire summer?
Yes, this wasn't the same storm as Allen in 1980, but the premise was the same. 90 degree water that hasn't seen any thermal churning since April, is likely going to have some rapid intensification when a tropical cyclone is present..