The fantasy impact of Martin Erat being dealt to the Coyotes

Fantasy Impact: Capitals trade Martin Erat and John Mitchell to Phoenix for Rostislav Klesla and prospect Chris Brown, plus a fourth round pick.

The Coyotes get: A forward having a bad year and a 27-year-old who hasn't played in an NHL game.

The Capitals get: A veteran defenseman and a prospect with some promise.

Fantasy Players impacted: Erat, Klesla, Brown, Kuznetsov, Klinkhammer, Moss, Korpikoski

The Capitals didn't get a return that is going to contribute right away, but Brown looks like he has some promise. You can check out his profile here from DobberProspects and as Dobber mentioned in the write up, he has a chance to hit 25 goals, 55 points, 110 PIM, and more than 200 shots in the American Hockey League this season. That's not a bad versatile option whenever he does make it to the NHL.

Klesla hasn't played a game since January 14^th and only has four points on the year. He's not an offensive defenseman and barring an injury will likely have little impact in Washington.

Erat gets a fresh start in Phoenix, but his play this season gives you little confidence who is going to make something of his opportunity. Looking at his most frequent line combination this season, Erat has played with Alexander Ovechkin and Nicklas Backstrom, so I'm not sure he is going to find a better situation than that in Phoenix. In fact, he is likely going to have a tough time cracking the top six in Phoenix. He may be destined for third line duties, which means David Moss, Rob Klinkhammer, and Lauri Korpikoski are going to have someone else challenging their minutes.

The big winner in this could be Evgeni Kuznetsov because if he comes over he may get a chance to jump right onto the first line for a shot. Or at the very least he has one less forward to deal with on the pecking order.

Fantasy players this helps, in order:

Chris Brown

Evgeni Kuznetsov

Fantasy players this hurts, in order:

David Moss

Rob Klinkhammer

Lauri Korpikoski

Martin Erat

Feel free to discuss the trade here.

Michael Amato is an Associate Editor for DobberHockey and a News Editor for theScore. You can follow him on Twitter at @amato_mike