Colin Wilson – USA Today Sports Images[/caption]

Thoughts on Wilson’s fantasy future, trends among defensemen, the fallout in Vancouver and more…

I have to say, and I hate to sound biased, but the new layout for the site looks fantastic. It's really hard to describe it as any other way than "clean". The new cosmetic details look sharp, but they still maintain the integrity and essence of the original site. Kudos to Dobber for the changes, and though there are bumps in the road like any roll out of any new site, it promises to be a great step forward for the entire Dobber Sports world.

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As always on Thursdays, I will have an open thread over on the Dobber Forums for readers to pop in and ask any fantasy question that comes to mind. Maybe a post has gone unread or unanswered elsewhere, and the reader really wants to get a second opinion on it. I'd be more than happy to help. Be sure to head over around lunchtime and I'll have my thread up for both fantasy and non-fantasy hockey questions.

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There was a signing that went kind of under the radar last week, and that was Colin Wilson re-upping with the Predators. From Cap Friendly, Wilson is going to carry an average annual value just under $4-million per year for the next four years.

Wilson has been a pretty good NHL player for a while, having played just under 300 games going into the 2014-2015 campaign. He never racked up the points – 35 was a career-high before last year – but he was good at driving the play away from his own end, or better than most Nashville forwards, anyway.

I was fortunate to get my hands on some zone entry/exit data from the 2013-2014 season, and it was something that I found very useful when figuring out who might be in line for improvement in the 2014-2015 season.

The math works out like this. It's not quite double the rate, but typically, teams and players will generate about twice the amount of shot attempts if they carry the puck in the zone with control rather than dumping it in. The Fear The Fin blog found this with the Sharks in 2013-2014, and also tracked their opponents in that game. Feel free to peruse the myriad of blogs that have found the same, but that's why zone entries carry so much importance. It's why you see teams (or at least the good ones) take the time to make 3, 4, 5 or more passes, or regroup if they can't enter the zone clean. There are teams that succeed at dumping/retrieving the puck (Los Angeles comes to mind), but that's not often not the case.

This is important because in the data I received – which covers a little over half the 2013-2014 season – Wilson was among the best Predators at entering the offensive zone with control. Only Matt Cullen and Viktor Stalberg were much higher, and Wilson was neck-and-neck with Mike Fisher. I wish I had a bigger sample, but I just don't have it yet.

It shouldn't come as a surprise, then, that Wilson's shot rate jumped by 0.85 shots per game last season from the year before, despite just about an extra minute of ice time per game. The added offensive pieces like Mike Ribeiro and Filip Forsberg were obviously a big help, but Wilson's style of game is one where the Predators should be able to generate a lot offence with him on the ice.

Wilson's best season saw him as 1 of 57 forwards (from Hockey Reference) that had 20+ goals, 20+ assists, 20+ penalty minutes, and at least two shots per game. That might sound like a lot of players, and it kind of is, but figure that in a 12-team roto league, that's fewer than five forwards per team. That's not bad.

I'm pretty sure Wilson will have C/LW eligibility again next year, and that helps. I also don't think last year was his "career" season; it might be more of a normal season moving forward. I think he's a top-100 forward next year in roto leagues, and won't be drafted as such. Welcome to Valuetown, Mr. Wilson.

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I would be remiss if I didn't talk about the Nick Bonino–Brandon Sutter trade.

This was a deal that seemingly divides the hockey community. The stats people love the trade for Pittsburgh, as it seems to give them that good third line centre that hasn't been around since the Jordan Staal days. The non-stats people love the trade for Vancouver, as Sutter is seen as a hard-nosed player who can kill penalties.

There may be something to Sutter's "hard-nosed" play theory. He is a crater in the possession numbers, but the Penguins always saved a much higher rate of pucks with him on the ice than without. It wasn't really close, either. I'm not a fan of relying on goal metrics, but over a 2 ½ season sample, it's worth consideration (Dion Phaneuf is in this conversation as well).

I don't think Sutter is a "bad" player. He's a fourth line centre who can kill penalties. That has value in the NHL, especially in the modern era.

The thing here is that the Canucks gave up Adam Clendening and a higher-round draft pick in the package to get Sutter and a lower-round pick. That's overpayment. They also see him as foundation piece, which he is not. If you think Sutter is one of your four or five best players, you have a bad team.

In and of itself, this isolated trade isn't a huge deal. In conjunction with things like signing Derek Dorsett for more than one year of lunch money, and trading for Brandon Prust; it starts to add up. This was happened with the Leafs years ago. It was one bad trade, then one bad signing, then another, and another. They're all symptoms of the same disease: a team that is going backwards.

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Last week, I talked a lot about how goal distribution in the NHL is changing in the NHL, and it's making the non-elite defensemen less valuable. I think it's time we sat down and had The Ryan Suter Talk.

The most important takeaway here is that Suter is not an elite producer among defensemen. At the least, he's not an efficient one. He's also never been a goal-scoring defensemen, and now that so many are contributing in that category, it hurts his value.

He also has 71 total assists over the last two years, which is good – the 71 assists are tied for ninth among all defensemen. He also needed over 1600 more minutes than Kevin Shattenkirk did to reach that number. On a per 60 minute basis, his assist rate at five-on-five over the last two years was lower than Niklas Hjalmarsson. His shooting rate was lower than Karl Alzner. His point rate was lower than Jordie Benn. This isn't good.

I bring this up because Ryan Suter has played a lot of minutes in his career: since becoming a regular NHLer in 2005-2006, the only players with more total ice time are Jay Bouwmeester, Duncan Keith, Zdeno Chara, and Dion Phaneuf. He leads all players in this regard in his three years in Minnesota.

Maybe Suter can keep up his 28-29 minutes a night, and this is all for nothing. The worry here is that maybe the Wild don't need to rely on him next year like they did last year, when they were fighting tooth-and-nail for half a season just to get to the playoffs. Guys like Jonas Brodin, Matt Dumba, and Marco Scandella are all primed to play more minutes, too.

If he backs off even to 26 minutes a game, and doesn't improve his production efficiency, he's a 35-40 point defenceman instead of 40-45. For me, in fantasy roto leagues, there's no way I draft him as a top-25 defenseman next year.