Frozen Forensics: Ryan Spooner

Derek Gibson

2015-06-19

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Ryan Spooner deserves the attention of fantasy owners towards the end of drafts next season.

“Everybody’s got to win a job in training camp, but there’s no doubt Ryan showed a lot last year,” Boston Bruins' head coach Claude Julien was quoted as recently saying. If you've followed the career of Ryan Spooner, and witnessed his struggles as he rode the I-95 route back and forth from Boston and Providence, you have to see this as encouraging going into the 2015-16 season. As it stands, Spooner is considered the Bruins' third line center, and in deeper fantasy leagues, he should be a solid sleeper candidate. But as the offseason approaches, especially for a team like the Bruins who seem to be in a transitional phase, there are a lot of questions to be answered first.

EV

LUCIC,MILAN – PASTRNAK,DAVID – SPOONER,RYAN

11

61.11%

PP

BERGERON,PATRICE – ERIKSSON,LOUI – SPOONER,RYAN

4

22.22%

EV

CONNOLLY,BRETT – LUCIC,MILAN – SPOONER,RYAN

1

5.56%

PP

BERGERON,PATRICE – ERIKSSON,LOUI – KREJCI,DAVID – SPOONER,RYAN

1

5.56%

EV

MARCHAND,BRAD – SPOONER,RYAN – TALBOT,MAX

1

5.56%

Clearly, Spooner enjoyed a heavy percentage of his offensive success with Lucic and Pastrnak. The final numbers were impressive for Spooner, who scored the first eight goals of his NHL career during the 25-game recall and added 10 assists. But, as I stated earlier, there are a lot of question marks for the Bruins heading into the summer as well as the next season:

Question #1: Will Milan Lucic be dealt away at the draft? With only one year left on his current deal (Six million), there are whispers that newly appointed General Manager Don Sweeney may look to unload him, partly to provide much needed salary cap relief to the B's, and also due to his very inconsistent 2014-15 campaign. If Lucic does indeed return, it would be hard not to envision a scenario in which he is reunited with his longtime center in Krejci. Speaking of Krejci….

Question #2: Will rookie sensation David Pastrnak make the leap in his sophomore year to playing top six forward minutes? This is a very real possibility, not only playing on a line with Lucic and his fellow Czech countryman Krejci, but if he outperforms wingers Reilly Smith and Brett Connolly in training camp (certainly doable), he could be seeing top-line duties with Patrice Bergeron and Brad Marchand.

Those two questions could cause a lot of unknown at the wing spots for Spooner as he potentially seals up the third line center spot. But there are silver linings in the dark "winger" clouds. Spooner is an excellent passer, so much so that despite the fact he will most likely be in the bottom six of the forward rotation during Five on Five play, he could see a steady diet of man advantage time, perhaps even playing the point. Furthermore, after being encouraged by the coaching staff to take pucks to the net rather than remain on the perimeter, Spooner can certainly improve on his 2014-15 total of shots on goal (73). If he can remain in the lineup consistently and come close to last year's shooting percentage of 11%, there is absolutely no reason why Spooner can't score somewhere in the 15-17 goal range. Take that prospective goal total and add in possible assist totals of 30-35, and you can see there is a lot to like about Spooner's offensive potential. His fantasy value will come down to the size of your league as I previously stated. In 10-team leagues, you may find more productive, top-six players, but in anything deeper, Ryan Spooner should be on your radar come draft time.

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