Top 10 Injuries That Screwed Your Season

Tom Collins

2021-05-24

It's always frustrating when you look back at a season and you think you could have been a contender if it wasn't for your players all getting injured.

We've all been there. Even if you shy away from Band-Aid boys, there's always a chance that your guys spend more time on the IR than Kris Letang. It sucks, and there's nothing you can do about it. At least a struggling player might have some value in a trade, but no one is going to want to grab an injured guy.

Below are 10 players that wiped out your fantasy season. This might have been one of the worst seasons ever to count on your studs to stay healthy. Even though the season was only 56 games long, four of the top seven skaters and five of the top nine netminders in Yahoo drafts spent time on the IR. Except for the netminders, every player that made this top 10 list missed at least the end of the season, which hurt many fantasy general managers trying to win a championship.  So many impactful players missed time that players such as Max Pacioretty, Cale Makar, Alex Pietrangelo and Anders Lee didn't make this listing.

As well, none of the players on this ranking missed time for COVID protocols, which means you won't find Phillip Grubauer, Jake DeBrusk, Adam Boqvist, Mikko Rantanen, Mackenzie Blackwood, Evgeny Kuznetsov and Ilya Samsonov listed below.

For the record, I'm only including guys who didn't start the season on the IR, so you won't see Nikita Kucherov, Vladimir Tarasenko, Tyler Seguin or Ben Bishop on this list either. In one-year leagues, most drafts took place after the news of their injuries came to light, so it couldn't have screwed your season that much.

10. Petr Mrazek

Mrazek's injury may cost him more than games, it may have cost him his role as a starting netminder. He never put up imposing numbers as the top guy in Carolina, but he was adequate enough that the Hurricanes chose to waive Alex Nedeljkovic at the start of the season. Mrazek missed two months after thumb surgery, which allowed Nedeljkovic to snatch the starting job. Mrazek is a UFA this offseason, so there's a good chance that he'll have to re-sign somewhere else next year. How many teams will have openings for a new number one netminder? San Jose, Buffalo and maybe Edmonton, and that might be it.

9. Aaron Ekblad

Halfway through the game on March 28, Ekblad was on pace for highs in many categories. Although he was in his 35th game at that point, Ekblad already had 11 goals, five off his career high. His 2.9 shots per game were the second-highest of his career and his power-play time and overall ice time were the highest he's ever seen. While he was on pace for a career-high 52 points, his six power-play goals already matched his highest mark and his 11 power-play points were two off his all-time best. It was tragic when he suffered a left leg fracture and missed the rest of the season.

8. Alexander Radulov

He started the campaign with 11 points in eight games before missing more than a month with a lower-body injury. He got back into the lineup for three games in mid-March before undergoing season-ending core muscle surgery. Radulov might be a sneaky buy-low this offseason. In 2019-20, he had 34 points in 60 games, a 46-point pace over 82 games. This year, he had 12 points in 11 games. You might be able to find a Radulov owner who is frustrated with unproductive back-to-back seasons if you're willing to take a chance on the Stars forward.

7. Robin Lehner

Last off-season, Lehner was a hot commodity in fantasy circles as many believed it was a matter of time until Marc-Andre Fleury was dealt to another squad. That's one of the reasons why Lehner was the fifth goalie drafted on average in Yahoo pools. Then he missed a portion of the season to a concussion, and by the time he was healthy enough to play, Fleury was too good for the Golden Knights to bench. From March 17 to the end of the regular season, Lehner started 14 of 30 games and never started two games in a row. He was still a must-own as he put up excellent numbers, but he didn't play enough games to help your squad too much.

6. Tuukka Rask

Even without an injury, if you owned Rask in a fantasy league, you were already concerned he might only play 50 per cent of the games as the Bruins like to ensure that Jaroslav Halak gets plenty of starts. An upper-body injury knocked Rask out of the lineup for several weeks. If you drafted Halak as a handcuff, then an injury to Halak allowed the Bruins to start dressing some of their younger netminders in Jeremy Swayman and Dan Vlader. This might have been your last chance to have Rask in an optimal fantasy setting. There's not only concern that Rask might retire this offseason, but he's also an unrestricted free agent, so there's a chance the Bruins decides to go with another option in net next season.

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5. Elias Pettersson

He might be one of the most overhyped young players, but there's no doubt that fantasy general managers missed him this season. Pettersson was having a poor season by most standards, but you would still rather lose with your studs in the lineup than on the IR. After a poor start, he had 10 goals and 20 points in his last 20 games before going down with a wrist injury. He missed the remaining 30 games of the season.

4. Evgeni Malkin

The fact that Malkin missed 23 games isn't a surprise. The big shocker is whenever he stays healthy. Malkin was injured on March 16 and didn’t get back into the lineup until May. That means he missed the stretch drive for your squad (an almost annual occurrence) and might have cost you a championship. It doesn’t help that his points-per-game, hits, faceoff winning percentage, shots per game and power-play points were all significantly lower than last season.

3. Steven Stamkos

While Kucherov isn't on this list, Stamkos obviously needs to be covered. The Lightning forward was having a decent season with 17 goals and 34 points in 38 games when he was knocked out of a game on April 8 against Columbus. Stamkos was diagnosed with a lower-body injury and missed the team's final 16 games. It was a big blow for Stamkos owners, who were uncertain how good he could be after recovering from core surgery that caused him to miss most of the postseason last year. This is the fourth time in the past eight seasons that Stamkos has missed significant time.

2. Jack Eichel

I didn’t include Eichel in my list last week of most disappointing players because I don’t think he was that bad when he played. Sure, his two goals weren’t ideal, but he was averaging almost three shots per game, producing on the power-play, winning faceoffs, averaging close to a hit per game and was close to a point-per-game pace. He also had points in four straight before his injury. Eichel was selected in the first round in most Yahoo drafts last season. Having your first-round pick miss the last 30-odd games of the season helped no one except your competitors.

1. Alexander Ovechkin

Ovi didn’t miss as much time as some of the others on this list, but the timing of his injury hurt fantasy general managers that were in the hunt for a championship. He missed eight straight games (I’m including the game where he had 39 seconds of ice time as a missed game) at the end of the year, getting back in the lineup for the final game. When it mattered most, you were without his goals, his four shots per game, his power-play production and anything else that might have won it for you.

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