We are less than two months away from the season! To pass the time, we continue this summer’s buy and sell series. Here we run through each NHL team, and cover one player that you should be trying to get onto your fantasy team, as well as one player you should be trying to get off of your fantasy team. Teams 11 through 15 (going alphabetically from Edmonton through Montreal) are covered this week.

Part 1 of this series is here.

Part 2 of this series is here.  

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Edmonton Oilers

Buy: Jesse Puljujarvi

Cap Hit: $925,000 with two years remaining (Entry Level Contract)

Jesse Puljujarvi was supposed to be the third member of the awesome trio atop the 2016 draft class. Instead, he fell to fourth, where Edmonton grabbed him, and he disappointed in his first season. Playing only 28 games, he really wasn’t given a chance to get into a groove, but should be in line to get a spot locked down in the top six forwards for this season. After his lackluster start, some of the shine has worn off. He is still a top prospect, and will still cost you in a trade, but the talent is undeniable. Puljujarvi will be breaking out as soon as October, and this is the lowest his stock will ever be.

Sell: Jordan Eberle Ryan Nugent-Hopkins

Cap Hit: $6,000,000 with four years remaining

Out with the old, and in with the new. The Leon Draisaitl extension** has everything to do with why this is the time to be selling Ryan Nugent-Hopkins (Nuge). The big money given to Draisaitl shows that he should be carrying his own line. This means, that the top two centres are now Connor McDavid and Draisaitl. Nuge then gets relegated down to third line centre duties, and with fourth line centre Mark Letestu getting some of the specialty powerplay faceoff starts, there isn’t really much room at all for Nuge to produce offensively. With McDavid around, it seems like every Oilers’ stock goes up in fantasy. Try to build on that when shopping Nuge around to your leaguemates.

**Leon Draisaitl’s extension, as mentioned above, shows he should be a leader, and that he won’t just be a piece to be carried by McDavid. That is a lot of weight to put on the shoulders of a 21-year-old who is right now the team’s highest paid player. It would not be surprising to see Draisaitl falter this year, but in the long run, he will make himself well worth his new contract.

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Florida Panthers

Buy: Evgeny Dadonov

Cap Hit: $4,000,000 with three years remaining

*Note: Dadonov played the 2016-2017 season in the KHL.

This is a tough one to advocate, and if Jaromir Jagr were re-signed, then he would be in this spot instead. As it stands, Jagr’s replacement stands out as a good buy option. Evgeni Dadonov signed to play the first-line right-wing position, and he will be given every opportunity to do so. With both Aleksander Barkov and Jonathan Huberdeau healthy to start the season (*knocks on wood very softly*), the Panthers’ top trio looks primed to score a lot of goals. At 28-years-old Dadonov is not a typical new face, and should be able to jump right in after finishing 5^th in the KHL scoring race. At only $4 million, Dadonov should be relatively inexpensive even at the lower range of what can be expected from him.

Sell: Keith Yandle

Cap Hit: $6,350,000 with six years remaining

At the age of 30, Keith Yandle may be a tougher sell now, but the name value should still be there. The offensive rear-guard may be in line to be surpassed by some of the youth on the Panthers’ back end. Aaron Ekblad and Michael Matheson both look primed to take a step forward offensively. The offense will have to balance out, and Yandle stands to lose the most. He was already a tough sell at $6.35 million, so any hit to his totals would leave him as more or an anchor than a sail for your fantasy team.

In a multi-category dynasty league of mine, a few months ago, I traded Keith Yandle for Jake Muzzin. I am still very happy with the choice, and I think that a similar deal may get you the best value by trading him. And speaking of Muzzin…

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Loa Angeles Kings

Buy: Jake Muzzin

Cap Hit: $4,000,000 with three years remaining

As I mentioned above, the league in which I traded Yandle for Muzzin was a deep multi-category league where categories such as hits, blocks and penalty minutes are counted. This is where Muzzin’s real value lies. Not only can Muzzin put up a few points, but he can also contribute more than his fair share in the peripheral categories.

In points-only leagues, he is not exactly a slacker either. After two straight seasons of 40+ points, Muzzin dropped to 28 last year. This creates a nice buy-low window, as he should bounce back. Maybe another season of 40+ points isn’t in the cards if teammate Alec Martinez eats into his production, but a number between the two benchmarks from recent years is a good place to peg him. This leaves us around 35 points, which would be a very solid total from a defenceman being paid $4 million.

Sell: Drew Doughty

Cap Hit: $7,000,000 with two years remaining

I wanted to put Jeff Carter here, but he is still good value at his salary (just a shade over $5.2 million). Assuming that it is already understood that Anze Kopitar is overpaid and all you have with Marian Gaborik & Dustin Brown is a sunk cost at best, Drew Doughty becomes the scapegoat for the LA sell. Maybe in the right league Doughty can warrant his cap hit, but in most he is making too much to really be valuable to your team. His name value is extremely high, and that is likely what keeps him rostered. He is currently in his prime, thus still a very tradeable asset, however his cap hit certainly won’t be going down in two years when he needs a new contract, so now may be the best time to get out from under that.

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Minnesota Wild

Buy: Charlie Coyle

Cap Hit: $3,200,000 with five years remaining

The Minnesota Wild have amassed quite the deep forward core, and somehow Charlie Coyle seems to sometimes get forgotten amongst the masses. The young winger has seen his point totals increase for five straight seasons, and should the trend continue for the 2017-2018 season, then we would be looking at a 60-point player who is only making $3.2 million. That is an exceptional bargain, and one that would be extremely tough to find anywhere else. With Zach Parise slowing down, Erik Haula plucked by Vegas, and Jason Pomminville traded to Buffalo, there is even more room for Coyle to take on some more responsibility (and offensive ice time) this coming season.

Sell: Their Defencemen

Selling Zach Parise is too obvious to even need to be discussed, and other than newcomer Tyler Ennis, the forward core is generally on team-friendly deals. Devan Dubnyk is on one of the best goalie contracts in hockey, which then leaves us with the defencemen. The top three Wild defencemen in terms of cap hit are all sell candidates due to them all eating into each other’s production. Add in Matt Dumba on his last year of a $2.55 million contract, and there just isn’t enough production to go around for the cost. Ryan Suter is the safest bet to keep up his production just because of the major minutes he plays, but sooner or later the 32-year-old defenceman will be passed by the younger players. Other than Matt Dumba, I would try to stay away from the Minnesota defence in general in cap leagues.

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Montreal Canadiens

Buy: Brendan Gallagher

Cap Hit: $3,750,000 with four years remaining

This was a tough call between Jonathan Drouin, Max Pacioretty and Brendan Gallagher. Gallagher wins out here because of the relative cost to acquire him versus the reward he can provide you with. In 2015-2016, Gallagher was the 11^th-ranked skater in standard Yahoo leagues when he broke a bone in his hand. After missing some time last year as well, Gallagher will be looking to break back out with a healthy season. The long offseason should help, plus the departures of Andrei Markov and Alexander Radulov will open up a spot on the top powerplay (assuming Drouin takes the point position like he held at points in Tampa). Gallagher has the talent and opportunity to put up 60 points, in addition to some very good peripheral stats for those in leagues counting more than just scoring stats.

Sell: Carey Price

Cap Hit: $6,500,000 with one year remaining before his eight year extension at $10,500,000 per season kicks in.

I hate to have Carey Price here, as he is arguably the best goalie in hockey right now, but it needs to be done. We have seen how well the last massive goalie contract given out to Henrik Lundqvist aged. The short of it is not all that well, especially in fantasy circles. Goalies with larger contracts are generally tougher to manage in cap leagues, and Price will be no exception at this price. Let another manager try to make the money work around Price, and in the meantime, build up your skaters around a lesser goalie at half the price. This doesn’t mean to just dump him, as your league should put forward some solid offers for a top-tier goalie, but at minimum look into moving Price and his contract before it becomes too much of a burden to your team.

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All cap related info is courtesy of Capfriendly. All player data was pulled from Frozen Pool.

Thanks for reading. I would be curious to hear if you have any buy/sell candidates on the above teams, and why.

As always, you can find me on twitter @alexdmaclean where I post some of my other smaller musings that don’t make it into the articles.