Looking back to April of 2009 and the value of fried calamari as an appetizer and Mike Cammalleri in your pool

I'm in a 10-team dynasty league and over the past few seasons we've had a running joke around Mike Cammalleri. At some point every manager will ultimately run into an offensive dry spell and end up scooping Cammalleri from the waiver wire. Inevitably, two weeks will pass, and he is back on the free agent list until another manager is lured into his trap.

This endless cycle of taking a chance on aging, once-upon-a-time useful fantasy assets is not reserved solely for Cammalleri, but he is certainly a prime case study.

This season, or more accurately, over the past 18 games, the Flames' winger has more than delivered on the production that his name suggests. As of writing this he has 22 points over the previous 18 contests, including 13 goals. I like to think of him as Nyquist-lite nowadays.

It would seem that this late season surge is coinciding quite nicely with his contract expiring (amazing coincidence!). He is currently in the final year of a deal that carries a six million dollar cap hit. He'll turn 32 in June, not ancient, but an age where goal scorers would be expected to decline, or at least be less consistent than they were in early years. (Check out the blog Outnumbered for some fantastic work on aging and its fantasy impact).

Even with his age and somewhat inconsistent play with both Montreal and Calgary I have the feeling Cammalleri is going to fool NHL General Managers and poolies alike this offseason. He'll ultimately sign a four or five year contract at a cap hit that shoehorns him onto the top line well into his late thirties. And poolies will shift him from a late round wild card into the prime mid-rounds.

The question is why will this happen?

To answer this I looked back at Dobber's player rankings in April of 2009.  Here we find the former King ranked at number 30. An early round draft pick listed above such players as; Semin, Toews, Perry, Gaborik, and Richards.

So how did he end up that high?

Looking over Cammalleri's career his two best seasons came very close to one another. In 2006-07 he posted 34 goals, 80 points, and 299 shots with the Kings. Then, two years later, while in Calgary, he finished with 39 goals, 82 points, and 255 shots. Those are impressive numbers that more than warrant early round consideration. I actually give Dobber a lot of credit for keeping him down at 30, as there surely were many poolies selecting him inside the top 20.

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Unfortunately for Cammalleri, and those who hitched their figurative wagon to him five years ago, the rewards haven't justified the cost in some time. He has dealt with injuries in some form for each of the past six seasons. He has never again approached the point per game pace that was teased in his mid-twenties.

Even with his struggles over a half decade there will be NHL front office staff and poolies lining up for a shot next year, which brings me to my theory of Residual Value.

Residual Value is essentially the value of an item that remains after its initial value has depreciated. In the case of Cammalleri he was able to raise his fantasy value so considerably between 2006 and 2009 that even with natural depreciation through aging his name still carries a lot of weight.

Had he not enjoyed that level of success most of us would have long given up hope on him as a reliable scoring option. However, now that he is producing again at that elite level (albeit over the incredibly small sample size of 18 games) managers are looking back to 2009 as proof that he can sustain it. For me, that is a risky proposition. A player that is entering what we would expect to be his sunset years and is miraculously producing at a level we haven't see in five seasons.

But, that is how residual value can work. Another two examples from his generation would be Thomas Vanek and Mike Green. Both players established themselves as fantastic assets in their mid-twenties but have failed to recreate that magic consistently. However, every season a poolie will gamble on either one in the mid rounds in hope of recapturing even a portion of that previous production.

I don't know exactly what kind of value you'll derive from Cammalleri next year. But if recent history is any indication it will be closer to 65 games and 20 goals than it will be to a full season and 82 points. I'll be sticking a giant BUYER BEWARE sticker beside his name on my 2014-15 draft board.

Darren is a fantasy hockey writer for DobberHockey and retired Halo aficionado. You can follow him on twitter here.