After much uncertainty and anticipation, the 2020-21 NHL season is upon us! While of course, no one expected 2019-20 to be derailed, we know going in that 2020-21 will be a campaign like no other, from 56 games played to teams not even facing most other squads during the regular season. But that won't stop me from carrying on my annual tradition of making 15 Fearless Forecasts!

Can I build upon the momentum of last season, when I had more hits and near misses than usual? That's the hope. Still, I must add my usual disclaimer that these are termed "Fearless Forecasts" for a reason since they're meant to be plausible but also bolder than more traditional predictions. In other words, I try to swing for the fences on most; but as any sports fan knows, no one hits a home run every at-bat. The good news for you, DobberHockey enthusiasts, is no matter how many of these do end up correct, you'll still benefit by reading them, as each includes information and logic to help you in making key decisions in your leagues. But enough build-up; let's get to what all of you came here for.

1) Kevin Fiala's points per game scoring rate will be lower than it was in 2019-20

After a woeful start to 2019-20, Fiala worked his way out of the doghouse and from there it became a magical season that saw him post 53 points in his last 56 games, including 26 in his last 18 contests despite the fourth quarter in which he averaged – both highs for any quarter of the season – 17:20 per game and 2:58 on the PP. In doing so, Fiala showed why he was selected 11th overall in 2014 and made his February 2019 trade for Mikael Granlund look like highway robbery. So we should expect a point-per-game scoring pace or even higher from him this season, right? Not from where I sit….

For starters, the Wild are one of only two teams (Montreal is the other) which, for the second season in a row, had no forward average 19:00 TOI per game or 3:00 on the PP. So what though – look what Fiala did despite season-long totals of 15:24 per game and 2:23 on the PP; surely that means he can ascend to new heights once he gets more minutes all season long, as he was toward the end of last season?

Easier said than done. Let's say Fiala averages 17:20 per game, as he was in Q4 last season when he was as hot as any player in the NHL. Of the 234 instances of forwards who scored 69 points (Fiala's 82 game scoring rate from 2019-20) or more in a season going back to 2010-11, a mere three did so averaging less than 17:21 per game of ice time. Beyond that, the secret is out with regard to Fiala, whom defenses are now going to focus upon a whole lot more than they did in 2019-20.

And then there's the issue of who will play center with Fiala, as last season he lined up with either Eric Staal, Mikko Koivu, or Ryan Donato for upwards of 70% of his even-strength shifts, and they're all now gone. And when we look to Fiala's production, he was even more dependent on the three, as at least one of them was on the ice for 45 of his 54 points, or 83%. Sure, the Wild will have top prospect Kirill Kaprizov with the team; however, it is not clear who will center one or both of Fiala and Kaprizov.

Lastly, Fiala will bear the weight of being a marquee player, which was arguably not the case last season even as he was excelling, what with veterans Staal, Koivu, Devan Dubnyk, Ryan Suter and Zach Parise there during 2019-20. And although Parise and Suter are still around to help Fiala with the spotlight, many a supposedly blossoming star has faltered once he has all eyes on him and the weight of huge expectations firmly on his shoulders. Look no further than what happened to teammate Matt Dumba.

Do I think Fiala will be a one-hit-wonder? Not at all. But I believe it might be that we see him score at a 60ish point pace this season as he adjusts to all these new/changed situations.

2) Thomas Chabot will score at a 67+ point full season pace

In 2018-19, which was just his second full NHL season, Chabot tallied 55 points in 70 games (64 point full season pace) in 2018-19, putting wide smiles on the faces of those who'd pegged him for success and giving them visions of him being Erik Karlsson 2.0 in Ottawa. Then 2019-20 happened, a season in which Chabot played one more game but tallied 11 fewer points.

Why, then, do I think he can ascend to greater heights in 2020-21? It boils down to a combination of four factors.

First, although Chabot only had 39 points in 2019-20, he had 36 games in which he tallied a point. In fact, he had a mere one point in 33 games and two points in three contests. Looking at stats in detail, for 2019-20 only seven defensemen had points in more games than his 36 contests; and if you average their point totals, you get 57, or 18 more than Chabot posted. Also, it’s not like this is typical for Chabot, as for 2018-19 he tallied his 55 points in just 39 games with at least one point or only three more games with a point than he took to amass 39 points this past season! In fact, looking at all other defensemen who had point totals of 39 or lower in 2019-20, the most number of games in which any had a point was 31, or five fewer than Chabot.

Second, Chabot was very, very unlucky when it came to SOG. Not only did he hit eight posts, which was the second-highest total among all d-men, but his shooting percentage was half what it was in the 2018-19 season despite him having taken 186 SOG in 71 games in 2018-19 versus 185 in 70 games for 2019-20 and similar ratios in both seasons of SOG from 0-15, 16-30, and 31+ feet.

The third is the PP. Chabot saw more PP time per game in 2019-20 than 2018-19, with his man-advantage time per game ranking fifth among all rearguards. But due to the anemic Ottawa PP, which had the fifth-lowest PP conversion percentage of any NHL team in the past five seasons, his 11 PPPts ranked him only 31st among d-men, with the next lowest PPPt output coming from the rearguard with the 20th most minutes. But the Senators went out and added Evgeni Dadonov (13-17 PPPts in each of the last three seasons), Alex Galchenyuk (more cumulative PPPts in 2017-18 and 2018-19 than, among others, Mika Zibanejad, Sebastian Aho, Matthew Tkachuk, Artemi Panarin, Mark Scheifele, and Vladimir Tarasenko), and Derek Stepan (eight straight seasons of double-digit PPPts to start his career, with 18 PPPts in three of those campaigns), so their PP has nowhere to go but up, with Chabot a major beneficiary.

Fourth – appropriately so – is the fact that 2020-21 will be Chabot's "magical fourth season," when so many players see a big uptick in production. And he sits at 204 games played entering 2020-21, meaning he's right at Breakout Threshold as well, for an increased likelihood of enhanced success. Add all of these together and the recipe for a superb season is there.

3) Tony DeAngelo will not be one of the top 20 defensemen scorers

Last season a mere three defensemen scored more points than DeAngelo's 53; and he missed two games, so that total could've been higher. Many a poolie is expecting an even better output from the former first-rounder, what with the Rangers poised to improve and DeAngelo, at 25, just entering his prime. But from my vantage point, DeAngelo's 2019-20 output was being the result of unsustainably excellent luck.

What factors point toward DeAngelo's 2019-20 scoring rate being unsustainable? For starters, his ice time and OZ%. In terms of ice time, his .78 points per game pace came despite just 19:17 TOI per contest. And if we look at the 52 instances since 2010-11 of a defenseman scoring even 0.75 points per game, DeAngelo's 19:17 TOI was the lowest……by a lot. In fact, his TOI was not only more than a minute less than the lowest of the other 52, but there were only five instances where the defenseman failed to average at least 2:00 more than DeAngelo did in 2019-20! Although DeAngelo did average 21:50 over his last nine regular-season games for 2019-20, when the all-important playoffs came around his ice times in New York's three contests were 19:23, 18:22, and 19:16. DeAngelo also had a 56.3% offensive zone starting percentage during the season and did not kill any penalties. As good as the Rangers figure to be, DeAngelo cannot see ice time gains unless he becomes a more well-rounded defender; however, if he becomes more well-rounded then he won't be deployed in a manner conducive to scoring. It's a Catch-22, and it suggests DeAngelo will shed points in the normal course.

Then there's DeAngelo's IPP, which, at 56.4%, was the eighth-highest among all 40+ game defensemen in 2019-20, with seven of the eight have at least one previous season of 55%+, whereas DeAngelo went from 41.7% in 2018-19 all the way to 56.4%. Chances are that number drops, especially with all the talented forwards on the Rangers to syphon away points. DeAngelo also averaged 2.19 SOG per game, which is decent for most d-men, and a 10.1% shooting percentage, which all would agree is quite high for a rearguard. And if we look back to those 52 instances of 0.75 points per game d-men since 2000-01, just two had a per-game SOG rate lower than his while also sporting a double-digit shooting percentage. What happened to those two the following season? One was Erik Gustafsson in 2018-19, who we know all too well had a quite poor 2019-20, while the other was Lubimor Visnovsky back in 2010-11, when he posted 68 points in 81 games, only to follow that with 27 points in 68 games in 2011-12. So IPP, SOG rate and shooting percentage are also all pointing to lower scoring for DeAngelo in 2020-21.

Lastly, there's the looming presence of fellow rearguard teammate Adam Fox, who as a rookie scored at a 49 point pace, had 11 points in New York's last nine regular-season games, and had a higher TOI than DeAngelo in each game of the playoffs. If you're thinking to yourself that it's hard to remember a team having two top-scoring defensemen, that's because it is indeed a rare feat, with there having been only six instances of two 50+ point defensemen on the same team in the same season having occurred since 2010-11. And looking at just three instances in 2017-18 alone, the lowest ice time for any of those six was 21:36, and four averaged 24:00 or more. Seeing as there is no universe in which DeAngelo averages anything close to those ice times, the presence of Fox will hurt DeAngelo's numbers.

If Fox was not around, I could see DeAngelo being to New York what Torey Krug was to Boston. But given that Fox is very much in the picture and likely only going to get better and demand more PP Time, plus the multitude of factors pointing toward DeAngelo's production in 2019-20 being the result of unsustainable good luck, I think DeAngelo will see a big drop in scoring rate and, when the dust settles on 2020-21, will land outside of the NHL's top 20 rearguard scorers.

4) One of Victor Olofsson and Dominik Kubalik will not score at a 45 point full season pace

When 2019-20 was all said and done, Olofsson produced at a 64 point pace with nearly one PPG per five games played and Kubalik followed up 24 points in his final 27 games with eight in nine playoff contests. It sure sounds like both are on the fast track to stardom. But let's not forget each did this as a rookie at the ripe old age of 24. And doing a deep dive on productive older rookies reveals more who quickly flamed out than those who enjoyed further success.

Look no further than Olofsson's impressive 11 PPGs in a mere 54 games. While that was the highest per game rate for a rookie in nearly 15 seasons, two rookies bested that rate in the 2005-06 campaign. One was Alex Ovechkin, who did so at age 20, while the other was Michel Ouelett, who did so at 23…..and was gone from the NHL by age 27. Which of these two is more like Olofsson? As for Kubalik, if we focus on rookies who were age 23+ and had 30+ goals with a shooting percentage of 19% or higher dating back to 1990-91, we get, in addition to Kubalik, three others: Ken Hodge Jr., Petr Prucha, and Marek Svatos. What was the highest point total any of them had in any other season? Try 40 points.

Moreover, just as like Olofsson and Kubalik did in 2019-20, a total of 14 rookies who were 24+ years old averaged 0.6 points per game or better while playing 40+ games dating back to 1990-91. Although among them is superstar Artemi Panarin, plus Mike Hoffman, Nelson Emerson, Joe Juneau, Paul Yserbart, and Mikael Grabovski, each of whom had several productive seasons, eight of the 14 never topped their rookie scoring rate, with none of the eight ever hitting 50 points again and more than half of the eight not ever having another season of even point per every other game output.

Although past results are not necessarily predictive of the future, odds are at least one of Kubalik and Olofsson will have nowhere to go but down from what we saw in 2019-20. If you own one or both in a keeper I'm not saying you should necessarily cut bait, but perhaps you might be more open to selling now rather than risk one or both becoming yet another older rookie who fails to make a lasting impact.

5) Matt Murray will win more games than Ilya Samsonov

Originally this prediction was going to be that Henrik Lundqvist would win more games than Samsonov; but after Lundqvist announced he'd have to miss all of 2020-21 with a heart condition, I changed it to Murray instead. Still, though, a lot of the reasoning is the same.

Yes, Samsonov is a former first-round pick who, at ages 19, 20, and 21, had seasons in the KHL where his SV% was 0.925+ and his GAA no worse than 2.31. His arrival in North America was greatly anticipated, and Washington thought enough of him to let Braden Holtby walk as a UFA and bring in Lundqvist for what, on paper, was supposed to be a mentoring role, rather than acting like a 1B to Samsonov's 1A. And the team will be entering the season with one of Craig Anderson, Vitek Vanecek or Phoenix Copley as the back-up, which seemingly serves as a testament to their commitment to Samsonov.

But for all the hype surrounding Samsonov, his transition to US hockey has been less than stellar. First, he sported a sub-.900 SV% and 2.78 GAA in the AHL for 2018-19. Then last season he appeared in 26 NHL games, with a 50% quality start percentage, 2.55 GAA and .913 SV%. Not bad, or so it seems. But digging deeper, he gave up three or more goals in five of his final six starts. Also, in all those great KHL seasons he never played more than 27 games. And looking more closely at his 16 wins in 2019-20, nearly a third came against Ottawa, New Jersey, LA and Detroit, four of the league's worst teams, and a total of just two came against elite teams (i.e., the other four of the top five teams in the East and the top five teams in the West). So his numbers were just okay, despite being somewhat coddled.

And although Washington's window to win another Cup with its age 30+ stars is closing, meaning they really want Samsonov to be "the guy" now, they also want to protect Samsonov, who's a big part of their future beyond their current core. What I mean by that is if Samsonov falters, they might not want to continue sticking with him as the #1A and in doing so risk hurting his confidence, instead opting to let Craig Anderson, or even Vitek Vanecek or Phoenix Copley, step into the role for at least this season.

As for Murray, yes, his durability has been a recurring issue. Still, this is a goalie who, over the past four seasons, has a 60% winning percentage, with only two goalies who started more games sporting a higher percentage, not to mention only 28 Really Bad Starts, with just four other goalies who started more games during the same time frame having fewer.

Yes, Ottawa is a far cry from Pittsburgh; but is that an entirely bad thing? For one, Murray should be plenty motivated to show he was worth the investment the Sens made in him. Moreover, the defensive corps of the Sens stacks up against that of the Caps, who only allowed 26 fewer goals in 2019-20 than Ottawa, and that was despite Ottawa having a three-headed goalie corps consisting of Craig Anderson, Anders Nilsson, and Marcus Hogberg, only one of whom had a single season of sub-3.00 GAA in the past three. There's also the fact that Ottawa players will likely see this signing as a reason to step up their game, as this was the team bringing in and committing to a goalie with two Stanley Cups to his credit and who, at 26, should be just beginning to enter his prime. On top of that, the team traded for Derek Stepan, Cedric Paquette and Braydon Coburn, plus inked Evgeni Dadonov and Alex Galchenyuk, whereas the last offseason their highlight was……….signing Ron Hainsey.

I'm not saying Samsonov won't necessarily pan out over time. I just think Murray is the safer bet for 2020-21 than the youngster, who might still need to fully find his game. 

6) Quinn Hughes will yet again score at least twice as many points as younger brother Jack

Quinn had a tremendous 2019-20 regular season, following that up by nearly posting point per game numbers in the playoffs. Beyond that, he was getting more ice time per game with each passing quarter during 2019-20; and after a regular season in which he had the third-highest PPTOI per game among all d-men, he proceeded to play the most man-advantage minutes among all NHL rearguards in the playoffs despite skating in only 17 contests. Moreover, Vancouver as a team looks to be poised to improve, with a top-line who all are young enough to still get better in the normal course, a second line that should be among the better trios in the NHL, and – buoyed by Quinn – a potent PP1. As such, their scoring should increase, which should only help Quinn pad his point total.

Then there's younger brother Jack, whose rookie season was subpar, to put it mildly. Not only did he fail to come close to reaching the point per every other game mark, but he barely averaged two SOG per contest. His scoring rate also declined with each passing quarter. In fact, if we go back to 1990-91 and look at other players who, at age 18 and like Jack, had 60+ games played while averaging under 2.1 SOG per game and 0.35 points per game, seven met the criteria and have already played their second year. Of the seven, a mere one (Vincent Lecavalier) exploded as a sophomore, while just two, including Lecavalier, even averaged more than a point per every other game. Could Hughes be Lecavalier 2.0? Although it might indeed happen, the odds are more so he has another season where his output is under a point per every other game, as occurred with other players under similar circumstances.

Why else am I not optimistic about Jack? For one he's not surrounded by top tier talent to lift him, and he doesn't seem to be a do it himself player, at least not yet. Case in point – Hughes tied for 45th in PP Time per game among all forwards, yet his mere nine PPPts ranked him tied for 116th. Also, his IPP was 50%, meaning of all the goals scored while he was on the ice, he nabbed a point on just half. How bad was that? It ranked him tenth worst among all forwards who played 60+ games last season. If anything, centers should have high IPPs, as the offense is supposed to flow through them; so his IPP being so low does not bode well for him to be an impact player in 2020-21.

Does this mean I'm ready to label Jack bust in the making? Although it is indeed rare that a forward picked first overall doesn't live up to the hype, as looking at the list of the last fifteen picked number one overall (Nico Hischier, Auston Matthews, Connor McDavid, Nathan MacKinnon, Nail Yakupov, Ryan Nugent-Hopkins, Taylor Hall, John Tavares, Steven Stamkos, Patrick Kane, Sidney Crosby, Alex Ovechkin, Rick Nash, Ilya Kovalchuk, and Patrik Stefan) there were two busts (Yakupov, Stefan), one TBD (Hischier), two solid but not spectacular players (RNH and Nash) and the rest turned out to be bona fide stars.

So one could look at this and figure Jack should be able to get his career on course before too long. Or I suppose one could also say there's been a bust about every ten years or so, and it's been eight since Yakupov was drafted and 21 since Stefan, so maybe Jack will suffer a similar fate? For now though, and looking at just 2020-21, I think Jack continues to sputter while Quinn makes even further strides, yet again more than doubling Jack's point total in the process.

7) Pavel Buchnevich will be a point per game player

If it seems like not so long ago that Buchnevich's effort level and commitment were being questioned, that's because it was happening pretty much every season, even including 2019-20, where after starting with 17 points in his first 19 games he slumped to just four in his next 20 contests. But looking at things more closely, all Buchnevich has done is increase his scoring in each of his seasons. So although he was perhaps performing below lofty expectations, he still was making strides.

Also, Buchnevich finished even better than he started, with 20 points in his final 18 games. And looking at his last six regular-season games paints the picture of a player poised to explode, as he took the ice for 19:44+ in five of those games and saw time on 59% or higher of his team's man-advantage minutes in each, tallying eight points – two on the PP – and firing 19 SOG in the process. In doing so, he seemingly cemented a spot alongside Mika Zibanejad and Chris Kreider, and on PP1.

Also, Buchnevich is just beyond his breakout threshold, and, depending on whether or not you count his 41-game 2016-17 campaign, will be entering his "magical fourth season" in 2020-21. Moreover, he has realistic room for organic scoring growth, what with his season-long SOG per game being 2.17, or well below his three per game as his season was ending. Plus his IPP, in general, was 56.8% and was only 42.9% on the PP. In part, this was likely due to adjusting to playing with better players, which, as was seen by his stats in those final games, he had learned to do quite well.

Given that he already played a 37 game stretch of 2019-20 at a point per game level, and the trust the team showed in him as the season was winding down, coupled with his organic room for more points and the stage of his career that he's entering, the ingredients seem to be there for Buchnevich to be a point per game player for 2020-21. If you don't have him in your league, try to wrest him free from the GM who owns him, so you can enjoy the resulting benefits.

8) Miro Heiskanen will score fewer in the 2020-21 regular season than he did in the 2020 playoffs

First and foremost, I'm not here to question whether Heiskanen is going to be an impactful fantasy defenseman, since all signs point to the answer to that question being a resounding yes. But he had 26 points in 27 games during the playoffs; and with 2020-21 being 56 games, I think there's a chance he doesn't reach that 26 point mark.

Why not? For one, his playoff output was inflated by unsustainable good luck. His 10.2% shooting percentage in the playoffs was more than double his percentage during the regular season. So right there he should've had three fewer points. His IPP also was 73%, which would be superb even for a forward. By comparison, just two d-men in the entire NHL had an IPP over 58% during the 2019-20 season, and Heiskanen's own IPP was 48.6%. Also, Heiskanen had one more PPPt in the playoffs than he did in the entire season despite still taking the ice for less than 50% of his team's overall PP minutes. Lastly, his secondary assists rate was 50% higher during the playoffs than the regular season. So clearly his playoff output was far higher than it should've been.

But still, this is a player who scored at a 42 point full-season rate during 2019-20; so with the season being 56 games, all Heiskanen would need to do to beat his playoff output would be to play just as well as he did last season. Isn't that a no brainer? Maybe, maybe not. After all, he finished with 16 points in his last 37 regular-season games, whereas John Klingberg – remember him? – tallied 29 points in his final 42 regular-season games, of which 16 were PPPts. In other words, Klingberg was the far better of the two for the bulk of last season. Lastly, Dallas – already handicapped by missing camp time due to COVID diagnoses – knows it will need to win games based on its defense, not offense, as its wingers are ageing and its best offensive player is going to miss a chunk of the season. Given this mentality, they figure to be among the NHL's weaker teams in scoring, hurting the output of Heiskanen in the process.

So while I'm not advocating to go out and trade away Heiskanen, I am saying to pump the brakes big time in terms of what he might bring to the table in 2020-21 vis-à-vis what he did in the playoffs.

9) Jakub Vrana will outpoint Alex Ovechkin

Alex Ovechkin just keeps chugging along, even last season at age 34. Father time seems to have basically lost his address. Or has he? Last season Ovi failed to hit the point per game mark for the first time in three campaigns, this as the Caps scored more goals per game in 2019-20 than they did in the prior two when Ovi was well above the point per game mark. And although Ovi's 48 goals for 2019-20 were indeed impressive, he did so while hitting three posts and no crossbars despite taking 311 SOG. This compared to an average of ten combined posts and crossbars and posts in his prior four seasons. So in other words, Ovi finished below the point per game mark despite getting very good luck when it came to clanging the iron.

As for Vrana, all he's done is get more ice time, take more shots, and produce at a higher scoring rate with each passing season, culminating in 0.75 points per game rate for 2019-20 despite not taking the ice for even 15:00 per game. The last player to hit that point per game rate or higher even though he had a sub-15:00 per game average was some guy named Nikita Kucherov. What did Kucherov do in his magical fourth season, which Vrana will be entering in 2020-21? Just score 85 points in 74 games. 

On top of that, Vrana's IPP has risen each season too, while his OZ% has dropped. These metrics are key since they show Vrana is still able to get points now that he'd been skating with better players, plus he does not need to be coddled in terms of zone starts, opening the door to far more ice time. He also is already consistent, having amassed his 52 points by scoring a point or more in 40 contests. Looking at the seven other forwards who had one or more points in 40 games in 2019-20, they averaged 59 points, showing that Vrana has room for scoring gains once he gets even more ice time. And whereas Ovi was helped by hitting posts, Vrana was hindered, hitting ten in 2019-20, further indicating that he should have scored even more in 2019-20.

Moreover, Vrana could – and likely will – get more PP time. Why? For starters, although Vrana took the ice for just 36% of his team's PP minutes, translating to the 140th most PP minutes among all forwards, he still managed 12 PPPts, tying him for 83rd among forwards. And Vrana made the most of his PP opportunities, with all but one of his PPPts coming in games where he took the ice for 43% or more of his team's PP time, and with more than half coming when he saw over 60%.

Am I predicting Ovi's scoring will crater? No, but he's showing his age; that, plus Vrana's seemingly inevitable huge 2020-21 should be enough to have Vrana be the highest scoring winger for the Caps.

10) Sergei Bobrovsky will finish in the top five in goalie wins

After destroying the fantasy season of many a poolie in 2019-20, some have said that Bob's days as a top fantasy netminder are done. But I think his talent, plus prior comparisons, suggest otherwise. For starters, let's not forget Bobrovsky already had a lousy season in his career, with a GAA of 2.75 and SV% of .908 back in 2015-16. What did he do the following season? Oh, just lower his GAA to 2.06 and raise his SV% to .931, winning his second Vezina trophy in the process.

That gets me to the next key point. By winning two Vezinas by age 30, Bobrovsky became one of a select few to have done so, most recently Martin Brodeur, Dominik Hasek and Ed Belfour. How did they fare from age 32 – Bobrovsky's current age – onward? Hasek and Brodeur both had five more 30+ win seasons out of six where each started 55+ games, while Belfour had five more out of seven. While past comparisons do not automatically result in the same future performance, it sure seems like if a goalie has what it takes to win a Vezina twice by age 30 he also is far less likely to be washed up by age 32. Between that and Bob's already demonstrated ability to come back with a vengeance after a poor season, look for him to go back to his dominating ways in 2020-21.

11) At least 30 players will average at least a point per game

The last time there was a planned abbreviated season was 2012-13, which saw 21 players score at or above the point per game mark, versus only ten and 15 in the previous two seasons. Why is this? For one the season was less of a grind, not wearing down one's body as much as 82 contests. Also, players went on hot streaks and did not have the remaining 30+ games to cool or renormalize.

These same things should hold true for 2020-21, except due to the schedule there should be a lot more games being played against 1B or back-up goalies, further helping to boost scoring. So although there was only 23 point per game scorers in 2019-20 despite it being a shorter schedule, and only an average of 22 in the prior two seasons, I'm banking on there being enough high scoring such that once the dust settles we'll finish with 30+ players hitting the point per game mark in 2019-20.

12) Nathan MacKinnon will finish outside the top five in scoring and/or points per game

There's been chatter among poolies that in standard roto leagues MacKinnon should be the first overall pick, and thus far in Yahoo leagues he's being grabbed, on average, second overall. He also finished fifth in scoring in 2019-20 then proceeded to post 25 points in 15 playoff games, for 1.67 points per game, which is a higher average than has been seen from someone over the course of a regular season in decades. Plus MacKinnon is still only 25, and thus one would think more likely to continue to further improve until he hits his peak in a few seasons.

I hate to rain on the MacKinnon parade, but I think he's peaked already, based on data from other top quality centers. And the 100-105 points pace at which he figures to score probably won't be enough to land him in the top five scorers or in points per game when the dust settles on 2020-21.

Let's start with the 25 points in 15 games. Was it impressive, especially amidst the pressure and the spotlight of the playoff? Most definitely. But MacKinnon had 25 points in a 15-game stretch in 2017-18 when he finished with a 107 point full season pace, and in 2019-20 he tallied 31 points over a 19 game stretch, on his way to a 111 point scoring pace. So taking nothing away from MacKinnon's playoff run, it's not uncharted territory for him and, in turn, does not signify he's ready to carry over that scoring into the 2020-21 regular season.

There's also the reality that MacKinnon is essentially maxed out when it comes to SOG and PP Time; and when he received more ice time in 2018-19, he actually did worse points-wise. MacKinnon also set highs in IPP in general and on the PP in 2019-20, at 78.8% and 86.1%, so it's not like he has room for gains in those areas either.

Here's another fact – looking at centers who, in the past 20 seasons and like MacKinnon, had a season of 40+ goals and 50+ assists by age 25 and are now 30+ years old, we get Sidney Crosby, Eric Staal, and Evgeni Malkin? What do all three have in common? Their best points output occurred by the time they were 25, with only Crosby topping 100 points again thereafter. As such, despite MacKinnon, on paper, still being young enough to not have peaked, chances are indeed he has.

Anyone who owns MacKinnon in a fantasy league is going to benefit tremendously from his scoring, SOG and PPPts. But visions of him leading the NHL in scoring or even being among the handful of top scorers are unlikely to come true, as while indeed he's a top player he's not at the very tippy top.

13) Carter Hart will win the Vezina Trophy

Are you thinking tabbing Hart for the Vezina isn't a bold prediction? Well consider this – the average age of all Vezina winners is 28.9 years old, and Hart won't turn 23 until the 2021-22 offseason. And care to guess how long it's been since a player who was as young or younger than Hart won the Vezina? Try 25 seasons, dating back to Jim Carey in 1995-96.

Why, then, am I making this prediction, when not only age but Connor Hellebucyk and Andrei Vasilevsky being at their peak, not to mention former winners Bobrovsky, Tuukka Rask and Carey Price being still in the picture, are working against him? For one, Hart got better as 2019-20 rolled on, with his SV% going from .903 in Q1, to .906 in Q2, to .921 in Q3, to .936 in Q4, and he ended the regular season with 11 quality starts in his last 14 games and, despite nine really bad starts over his 43 games played, only one in his final ten regular-season games. Beyond that, he received invaluable pressure-packed experience during the 2020 playoffs, were posted a 2.23 GAA and .926 SV% in 14 games with just one really bad start, to show not just how great he'll become, but how great he already is.

Hart also is playing for a coach in Alain Vigneault who was at the helm during the many seasons that saw Henrik Lundqvist a perennial top netminder. Also, with the acquisition of Erik Gustaffson, that means the team's best rearguard Ivan Provorov can be utilized in more of a defensive role, where he will be able to help bolster Hart's stats.

Moreover, in the crazy climate that will be present during 2020-21 the young Hart likely will not feel the same pressures as others or, if he does, will be able to handle it in part due to his youth but also his ability to appreciate that he has the full confidence of his team behind him. Yes, he fully realizes the fate of the Flyers rests more so on his shoulders than, arguably, those of Provorov or veterans like Claude Giroux, Sean Couturier, and Jakub Voracek; however, that was already becoming the case last season and saw Hart thrive nevertheless.

14) Auston Matthews will finish the season with 0.75 goals per game average

Maybe 0.75 goals per game don't seem like a lot at first glance. Heck – it's probably happened plenty of times over the years, right? Try no. In the history of the NHL, no center not named Mario Lemieux or Wayne Gretzky has accomplished the feat, and each of them only did so twice in a season where they played 40+ games. So why do I believe Matthews has what it takes to do what only these two legends have ever done a combined four times?

For one, last season Matthews averaged 0.67 goals per game. How impressive was that? Among centers, only Mika Zibanejad (who averaged 0.72 per game in 2019-20) and Steven Stamkos (who averaged 0.73 per game in 2011-12) had a higher per game goal scoring average in a single campaign over the past 25 seasons. And Matthews' 0.56 goals per game cumulative rate over the first four seasons of his career is the highest among centers dating back to 1990-91; better than Steven Stamkos, Sidney Crosby, and Connor McDavid to name just a few.

And looking at Zibs' 0.72 per game season, he averaged 3.64 SOG per game and shot 19.7%, while Stamkos, in his 0.73 per game season, averaged a comparable 3.69 SOG per game and also shot a very similar 19.8%. Matthews shoots more than both, having seen his per game average climb from 3.01 two seasons ago, to 3.69 in 2018-19, to 4.14 in 2019-20. And despite Matthews firing that many SOG per game in 2019-20, he still shot 16.2%, or right at his 16.3% career rate.

How many prior instances have there been of centers who also averaged over four SOG per game yet still shot 16% or higher? Just five in the modern era, with four being those seasons by Gretzky and Lemieux where they averaged 0.75 goals per game. And in those four seasons, the lowest shooting percentage by them was 18.3%, which, if Matthews had shot in 2019-20, he'd have finished at 0.75 goals per game. Can Matthews shoot at that high of a rate? He already did – 18.5% in 2017-18.

So I think it's time to get ready to rewrite the history books to etch Matthews' name next to those of Lemieux and Gretzky as the greatest goal-scoring seasons by a center. And if somehow Matthews does not manage to accomplish the feat in 2020-21, I'm convinced he'll do so before all is said and done on what will be a venerable NHL career.

15) The Strome brothers will combine to score at a point per game level

In the two seasons where they've both been full-time NHLers, it's thus far been the case that one of the Strome brothers has performed well while the other has fallen short. In 2018-19 it was Dylan bursting onto the scene with 57 points in 78 games (a 60 point full season pace) in his first full season, whereas older brother Ryan failed to even reach the point per every other game mark while splitting the season between the Oilers and Rangers, then it was Ryan producing at a 69 point pace in 2019-20 while Dylan slipped to a 54 point pace.

This is the season, however, where I believe it will come together for both to an extent that their combined points will total at least as much as their combined games played. For one, after signing his new deal, and with the trio of Zibanejad, Buchnevich and Chris Kreider seemingly locked in, Ryan is all but assured to remain on a line with Artemi Panarin, who's made a career of getting the best out of those who play with him. Also, Strome's 17 PPPts likely assure he'll keep his spot on PP1, helping to boost his point total. Chances are he'll do even better than the 69 point pace he produced in 2019-20.

Then there's Dylan. While it looks like his 2019-20 was a step back if you remove a stretch of one point in 11 games before and after he missed games due to injury, his scoring pace would've been 64. And it so happens that the third quarter also was the only one during which Patrick Kane was not Dylan's most frequent linemate, along with Alex Debrincat, who had he shot his normal rate would've had a scoring rate of 73, and likely given Dylan a bunch more assists to pad his point total. It also happens that by the time the 2020-21 season is ending, Dylan should be hitting his breakout threshold of ~200 NHL games, making it all the more likely that he'll see a spike in scoring. On top of all those factors, Kirby Dach will miss most of 2020-21 and the outlook for Jonathan Toews is uncertain, making it all the more likely that Dylan will be the top-line center at ES and on the PP for a while, or more than long enough for him to rack up points.

So between Ryan's superb situation and Dylan's upward trajectory and opportunity due to players not in the line-up for a while, there should be enough scoring for their combined points total to be at least equal to their combined games played total. In doing so, they'll become the best brother tandem the NHL has seen since the Sedins.

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So there you have it – 15 Fearless Forecasts for the 2020-21 season. All that's left is to see how many end up being accurate. Well, that's actually not all that's left, because as per usual I'm giving you the chance to vote on which of these predictions will end up coming true. Here is the link to cast your votes, and it's also where also you can add your own predictions!

Next week it'll be back to Roos Lets Loose content as per usual, with an edition of Forum Buzz. Looking ahead, my monthly mailbag column is just a few weeks away, so be sure to send your fantasy hockey question(s) to me for in-depth, deep-dive answers. You can either (1) private message “rizzeedizzee” via the DobberHockey Forums or, instead, (2) send them to me via email to [email protected] with “Roos Mailbag” as the subject line.