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A couple of days ago in my Ramblings, the discussion revolved around the fantasy performances of some key players from Columbus. The most notable of all these players is obviously Sergei Bobrovsky. Following a season with a .908 save percentage, the 28-year-old netminder turned in easily turned in the best fantasy season from the twine, and was undoubtedly the fantasy MVP.

Performing to the level Bobrovsky did is not possible to predict, repeatedly, with any accuracy. It was, however, kind of obvious that a rebound season coming. I wrote as much last summer. Columbus improved both their adjusted shot attempt and scoring chance differentials from 2015-16 to this past season, and Bobrovsky showed why he was ninth of out of 38 goalies in five-on-five save percentage from 2010-2015. Again, rebounding to a .931 overall save percentage is not predictable, but returning to the .918-.920 range was.

The question becomes: which goalies can emulate the performance from the Russian goaltender? Not being a .931 goalie, but rebounding from a poor single-season performance. We’ll look for goalies that satisfy some of the same conditions that Bobrovsky had:

1. Is the starter for a team that didn’t get crushed in shot metrics last year, and shouldn’t again in 2017-18,
2. Is an established, above-average starter (about a .926 goalie at five-on-five),
3. Performed worse than expected based on that established career.

Steve Mason

Philadelphia, in contrast to 2015-16, wasn’t a bad defensive team. They were 20^th in adjusted shot attempts allowed per minute at five-on-five (just below Columbus, coincidentally), ninth in adjusted scoring chances allowed per minute at five-on-five, and tenth in high-danger shot attempts allowed. Over his first three years in the orange and black, Mason had a .935 save percentage at five-on-five. That number cratered to .919 this past season. The question, then, is whether to trust the 7300-plus minutes from 2013-16 or the 2500-plus minutes from 2016-17. I am trusting the former.

It helps that the team appear to be on the rise. A few of their core players are in their late-twenties, but there is a very good core in their early- or mid-twenties that is ready to play a big role for this team, and are more than capable of doing so. Guys like Sean Couturier, Ivan Provorov, and Shayne Gostisbehere (yes I’m still a big believer in him) are ready to be focal points of this team. They also have a good group of prospects that may crack the roster. This team should show better this coming season.

Of course, this is all moot if the team decides not to bring back Mason, as he is a pending unrestricted free agent. They have options: go with Michal Neuvirth and let Mason go; trade for a top-end starter; bring back Mason. I do think Mason can still be a good goalie for this team. Most goalies have bad seasons once in a while, and he had a .921 save percentage in all situations in his three full years with the Flyers before this past season. Regardless of where he lands, he should be able to help the team that signs him. I’m hoping it’s with the Flyers. He should be very cheap in drafts next year, making for a very viable third goaltender in 12-team leagues.

Brian Elliott

I’m sure I’m not the only one that was hoping for a big year from Brian Elliott. After going from St. Louis to Calgary, he was finally in a situation where he was the full-time starter on a team that was on the rise. Despite a .925 save percentage in all situations from 2011-2016, which included the third-highest five-on-five save percentage in the league, he managed just a .910 with the Flames in all situations, and .922 at five-on-five. It was a significant departure from what we had come to expect.

Calgary was a very good defensive team last year. They finished in the top-10 for fewest adjusted shot attempts, scoring chances, and high-danger attempts against per minute last year. The only other teams to do so were among the best defensively in the NHL, including Los Angeles, Boston, and Minnesota. The core of their blue line will return, and none of their top forwards are set to leave. This is a team that should largely perform similarly next year as they did the last, if not even better, should they improve the bottom end of that defence corps.

This is another goalie were the future is a bit uncertain. He is an unrestricted free agent as well, but so is Chad Johnson, which differentiates them a bit from the Flyers. With Elliott’s poor performance, he shouldn’t be too expensive to bring back, and I would like to see him given another shot. Like Mason, his play in 2016-17 likely means a discount at the fantasy draft table come September, and given the situation, it’s a perfect opportunity to grab a good goalie on a good team later in the draft.

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There was an interesting segment on TSN Friday night with Bob McKenzie and Darren Dreger. The topic was which players specifically could be on the move at some point this offseason. The three names mentioned were Jordan Eberle, Matt Duchene, and Tyson Barrie. Having already covered Barrie, and thinking Duchene deserves some more ink at another time, I’m going to focus on Eberle.

It was definitely a down year for the Edmonton winger, even though 20 goals and 51 points isn’t particularly horrific. Given that he started the season playing with Connor McDavid, hopes for fantasy owners were high (I know I was very high on him; for a different site I write for, I had him inside the top-60 picks in a roto league). Things didn’t work out at all, and he was eventually moved down the lineup, appearing on the third line at times.

In order to get ahead of this one, I will just say that yes, maybe he didn’t look as… engaged… in some games as people would hope. I have no idea if this is necessarily true or not as I didn’t watch all 82 regular season Oilers games accompanied by copious notes on how he played in each of them. What I do know is that he had shot at least 11.4 percent in each NHL season he had played, at least 14 percent in half of them, and averaged 14.1 percent over his six campaigns. That number dropped to 9.6 percent this year. Had he shot just his career average on the 208 shots he managed, he would have pushed for 30 goals.

It should be noted that Eberle set a career high in shot attempts per minute at five-on-five, and a four-year high in shots on goal per minute. The next question is, then, was did his shot pattern change, i.e. was he shooting from further away, or worse angles. For that we check HockeyViz.com:

The only season that really stands out as considerably different from the rest is the 2013-2014 campaign when he was shooting from further out in the slot. From 2014-2017, Eberle had a pretty consistent shot pattern. It’s curious, then, that his five-on-five shooting percentage was 8.97 percent, the lowest of his career, and considerably lower than the 12.69 percent he shot on aggregate from 2013-2016. Maybe there are other factors in play, but it seems there was a bit of poor luck from this campaign.

Outside of the drop in shooting percentage, the drop in ice time was a big factor here. Averaging just 16:46 per game this past year, Eberle posted his lowest minutes per game of his career. He averaged nearly 18 minutes through the first two months of the year, but that number sagged as he was moved down the lineup. That, in combination with the drop in shooting percentage, are big reasons why his offensive numbers suffered.

Nothing is a certainty in sports, but given his track record, and no real indicators of downward trends, the talented winger is probably set to bounce back in 2017-18. It does not appear, however, that he will be doing so in an Oilers uniform. A plethora of teams could use a very good scoring winger. If he can land in a spot where he’s back on the top line, and given top power-play minutes, a return to 25 goals and 60 points is in the cards. He should come at a discount at the draft table next year, so be sure to keep him on your watch lists, especially if he can land in a prime situation.