Every Sunday during the regular season, we’ll share 20 Fantasy Thoughts from our writers at DobberHockey. These thoughts are curated from the past week’s “Daily Ramblings”.
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1. If they didn’t have an embarrassment of riches up front already, the addition of Paul Stastny make the Jets truly terrifying. Anytime Patrik Laine and Nikolaj Ehlers are justifiably slotted on the ‘third’ line, you know you have depth.
This embarrassment of riches is proving to be a sort of problem for Ehlers, though. Problem may be a bit strong. He currently sits at 25 goals on the year and is on pace to crack 60 points again. Considering it’s just his age-21 season and he’s already managed two 25-goal campaigns, it’s hard to say he has a problem. Ongoing issue, maybe?
The issue of course is the power play. He’s been stuck on the second unit for the majority of the year and there’s a clear delineation between the top quintet and the secondary one. Registering 12-15 power-play points is nothing to sneeze at but until he earns enough minutes to put up 20-plus consistently, Ehlers won’t reach his fantasy potential.
2. Stastny was scoring at a 50-point pace before landing in Winnipeg, a spot more conducive to production than he had in St. Louis. You don’t want to over-react to a two-point night in his debut this week but Stastny really could go for 15-20 points in Winnipeg’s final 18 games if things break right. I wouldn’t predict that he’ll collect more than 14 points in those 18 games (a 60-point pace) but variance over a small sample can swing things.
Stastny’s last great fantasy season came in 2013-14 when he put up 60 points in 71 games with a third-year Gabriel Landeskog, and rookie Nathan MacKinnon as his most common wingers. That was for the overachieving Avs who won 52 games in Patrick Roy’s first season as coach. It was also a contract year for Stastny.
3. Alex Ovechkin scored his 40th goal of the season on Saturday, making him the sixth player in NHL history to record nine 40-goal seasons. In this day and age where 40-goal scorers are rare, let alone 50-goal scorers, this is quite the accomplishment. Ovie is a consistently high first-round pick in fantasy drafts and arguably the top fantasy player over the last decade given his dominance in the goals and shots on goal categories. I hope he reaches 50 this season; otherwise, we may have yet another season without a 50-goal scorer.
4. Jonathan Toews’ point production is down further this season (0.66 Pts/GP from 0.8 Pts/GP last season), but you probably know by now that his reputation as a big-game performer doesn’t mean he’s a player to build around in fantasy leagues. But he’s hasn’t been as much of a bust as teammate Brandon Saad, who is currently on pace for 35 points. It’s been a very sad return to Chicago for Saad, who we’ve penciled in for 50 points each of the last few seasons. His shooting percentage is slightly down but more alarming is the fact that he is on pace for just 16 assists. That’s one assist every five games, which isn’t helping your fantasy team enough.
5. J.T. Miller has three points (1g-2a) over three games with his new team. He’s not the lucky guy lining up with Steven Stamkos or Nikita Kucherov (Alex Killorn is) but the sizzling Yanni Gourde (16 points over his last 15 games) and Brayden Point aren’t bad forwards for Miller to be surrounded with. I like Miller as a post-deadline waiver-wire grab.
6. Mikael Granlund is finally living up to the lofty expectations fantasy owners had for him all those years ago. By no means is he a roto stud; he’s still not a huge shot volume guy, he doesn’t take penalties, and he doesn’t do much in other peripherals. The production is there, though, and it should be there for years to come. That’s a significant deviation from where he was even two years ago and fantasy owners should be happy with that.
7. Craig Smith, Roman Josi, Scott Hartnell, and Yannick Weber were all ‘rested’ by the Predators on Friday night in Vancouver. They played Thursday night in Edmonton and have an afternoon road game on Sunday so I guess it makes sense. If this becomes a habit league-wide, though, especially considering there’s over a month left in the season, this could get annoying fantasy hockey-wise.
8. Will Jakob Silfverberg ever find that next level in the fantasy game? His 82-game paces this year are 18 goals and 20 assists. That’s while playing 18:18 per game. Was 2016-17 (with 23 goals and 49 points) as good as it’s going to get? Playing on a checking line with a supposedly injured Ryan Kesler obviously isn’t helping. Without power-play time and being stuck in a checking role, though, can we realistically expect more than 20 goals and 40 points a season? Doesn’t seem like it.
9. Roberto Luongo is 5-1-0 since returning from injury and is helping to power a late charge for the Panthers. This team is horrific defensively, mostly because they have no depth, but an elite goalie with some star scorers can make a lot of noise. For example, Aleksander Barkov, who has 29 points in 24 games since the calendar turned 2018. More importantly, he has been healthy (knock on wood). Availability is the best ability. It’s nice to finally see it from this star.
10. David Krejci has quietly been good when healthy, he just has not been able to stay healthy. He has 33 points in 47 games, almost a 60-point pace over 82 games, which is near the high end of the best you can do with only secondary power play usage. The addition of Rick Nash doesn’t necessarily boost Krejci but it certainly doesn’t hurt either.
Speaking of Nash, the big winger is up to two goals, three points and a whopping 23 SOG in four games with the Bruins. He has skated on the top unit in all three games. As for the Bruins’ other Nash, Riley, he has four points in three games doing some filling-in time for Patrice Bergeron on the top line. If you’re in a pinch or a really deep league, there’s use here. He’s getting you exposure to Brad Marchand and David Pastrnak, albeit only at even strength.
11. Update on Matt Murray: He skated before the team did on Friday for practice. He did not take any shots as he recovers from his concussion but it’s nonetheless a good sign that he’s on the ice in full equipment. I’m sure they’ll be very cautious here so there’s no need to activate him from the IR anytime soon.
In the meantime, the Pens’ current Casey DeSmith/Tristan Jarry goalie combo can be useful while Murray is out. The million-dollar question is which guy the Penguins roll with. I’m in the Tristan Jarry camp but this is really a win-and-you’re-in situation.
12. I don’t think anyone has faith in the Avs but Nathan MacKinnon is back healthy and looking to drag them there. He has 15 points in seven games since returning from injury. I’m not sure there’s a guy I’d rather have for the fantasy playoffs than MacKinnon. He is in full superstar mode, having the season I thought the Sabres’ Jack Eichel was going to have.
13. Thought to be on the outs fantasy-wise after his days in Carolina were reaching an end, Eric Staal has enjoyed a renaissance in Minnesota. He is scoring at just under a point-per-game pace (64 points in 65 games), pushed by a white-hot tally of 13 goals and 21 points in just 14 February games. That torrid goal-scoring pace has also vaulted him to a tie for fifth in NHL goal scoring with 33 goals. Needless to say, he has provided exceptional value from where he was drafted (Yahoo ADP: 135).
14. Remember when Brayden Schenn, Vladimir Tarasenko, Jaden Schwartz and Alex Pietrangelo were tilting fantasy leagues? Should have sold high. Tarasenko remains relevant but that might be it from that quartet. Schwartz has been up and down. Schenn saw the regression we were all calling for. Pietrangelo has been passed for power play time by Vince Dunn! I’m definitely guilty of hanging onto Pietrangelo too long. I tried to make the swap to Dougie Hamilton but couldn’t ultimately swing the buy low/sell high. I probably waited too long.
15. What an exorbitant price Vegas paid for Tomas Tatar. I’d have figured that for such a haul they could have gotten a better non-rental but perhaps not.
Apparently, Vegas also went hard after Erik Karlsson and I wish they would have gotten it done. It’s tough to see them getting back in at the draft after having moved three picks in exchange for Tatar. They did a reasonable job of spreading the picks out across multiple years but still lose some draft capital that they’ll need to fill out their organization.
I think they just really like the length of Tatar’s deal. With three years left, Tatar can provide middle-six scoring at market rate for three more seasons. He’ll essentially replace James Neal when the forward hits free agency this summer. Why pay Neal for his age 31-35 (or older) years when you can pay Tatar for his age 27-30 years?
16. Seth Jones is officially winning the battle with Zach Werenski for No.1 billing in Columbus. It’s the case on most teams, there can only be one truly star defenceman and Jones is doing it.
It’s worth considering that Werenski has basically been a 35-40 -point guy since the bottom fell out on Columbus’ power play around Christmas 2016. He really only had a couple of months of elite offensive production. Jones’ track record seems longer. Still time for this to flip back in Werenski’s favour but right now he’s losing. In your average one-year league Werenski isn’t even rosterable.
17. Mitch Marner has 16 points in the last 11 games. Just like that he’s on pace for 65 points, just shy of the 70 that I forecasted.
I held strong on Marner until January and then I started to have doubts. This run is all worth it. I hope he can maintain this through the fantasy playoffs. I also need him to get at least 65 points to hit as one of my few aggressive over bets this season. Until this week, it really didn’t feel like it was in play.
18. Possibly the biggest opening due to the Trade Deadline is the one left by Vladislav Namestnikov as the net-front presence on the Lightning’s top power play unit. There isn’t as much of an opening in the top-six considering Namestnikov fell out of favour of the past couple of months. J.T. Miller, Chris Kunitz and Ryan Callahan are all candidates here. As I suspect is Yanni Gourde but I suppose we’ll wait and see further.
19. Evan Rodrigues missed Buffalo’s game Friday night with what the team is calling an upper-body injury. Hopefully it’s nothing too serious as he’d been pretty good for the Sabres of late, managing nine points in 13 February games. He had been centering the second line and was slotted on the top power-play unit.
Rodrigues had 61 points in 41 games for Boston University in his final season there, playing with Jack Eichel. Ironically, it’s Eichel being out of Buffalo’s lineup that has given Rodrigues this kind of ice time and opportunity. His late-season production is reminding me of Jordan Weal last year. It’s enough to earn him a similar two-year, one-way contract – assuming he keeps it up.
20. Here’s a thought regarding Minnesota’s top prospect and potential superstar, Kirill Kaprizov. He’s signed to play another two years in the KHL but that still doesn’t mean he’ll cross the pond for 2020-21. If the NHL locks out the players, he may be inclined to just re-sign in the KHL. And his KHL team would obviously be wise to lock him up for another three years or more. Anyway, he’s a bigger risk then I had originally thought.
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