Team-by-Team Off-season Outlook – San Jose and St.Louis

Dobber

2014-08-29

Looking at the Blues and Sharks, from a fantasy hockey standpoint…

Note: Throughout the summer, I have been running a team-by-team fantasy review over at The Hockey News. Now that I am wrapping things up for that site and focusing on DobberHockey, I will post these articles here. THN will also post this article, as well as the final article and that will be my last one there. After 12 good years with THN.com, it’s the end of an era!

To see the other teams (remaining teams still to come), visit THN here.

It’s the 12^th annual offseason review of each team from a fantasy-hockey standpoint. Every year I run through the teams alphabetically – but switch starting points each year. This year I’m doing something different and reviewing the teams in reverse order of regular season finish. The Sharks and the Blues are on the docket in this our second to last week of the annual offseason fantasy looks.

Buy the 9th annual DobberHockey Fantasy Guide here – Updated just two days ago!

St. Louis Blues

Gone – Derek Roy, Brenden Morrow, Adam Cracknell, Ryan Miller, Roman Polak

Incoming – Peter Mueller, Jeremy Welsh, Paul Stastny, Carl Gunnarsson, Joakim Lindstrom, Jori Lehtera

Ready for full-time – Dmitrij Jaskin played 18 games for the Blues last season and could probably hold his own on the third line right away. However, the Blues added Peter Mueller and Joakim Lindstrom to the mix, making it a tough climb for Jaskin. Look for him to be an injury fill-in at some point though, and in the long term he has the potential to become a first liner.

Ty Rattie is at least one year, possibly two away from becoming a full-time NHLer. The future scoring-line sniper potted 31 goals in the American League last year for Chicago, but has some filling out to do and the Blues are deep enough to let him do it. He’s still only 21 so there is plenty of time.

Jake Allen is already on the NHL team and he has the potential to take the No.1 job from Brian Elliott. However, Elliott has his moments – enough of them that he can hold onto the job throughout much of the season. Allen will have his hot streaks, but for 2014-15 expect to use him sporadically (one week here, one week there).

Fantasy Outlook – The Blues boast two of the better fantasy owns on the blue line in Alex Pietrangelo and Kevin Shattenkirk. They also boast one of the best multi-category studs in the game in David Backes. They have a handful of players with the potential to top 70 points, and they may have a future superstar in Vladimir Tarasenko. Because this team is so deep, they have been allowed to groom their prospects. The pipeline has its share of quality fantasy players on the way. Fantasy Grade: A- (last year was B)