Dobber’s offseason fantasy hockey grades – Carolina Hurricanes

For the last 18 years (12 with The Hockey News) Dobber has reviewed each team from a fantasy-hockey standpoint and graded them.

The 19th annual review will appear here on DobberHockey throughout the summer. This is not a review of the likely performance on the ice or in the standings, but in the realm of fantasy hockey both for the season ahead as well as the foreseeable future. Offensively, will the team perform? Are there plenty of depth options worthy of owning in keeper leagues? What about over the next two or three years? These questions are what I take into consideration when looking at the depth chart and the player potential on that depth chart.

Enjoy!

Gone – Brock McGinn, Warren Foegele, Dougie Hamilton, James Reimer, Petr Mrazek, Jake Bean Alex Nedeljkovic, Jani Hakanpaa, Cedric Paquette

Incoming – Derek Stepan, Alex Lyon, Antti Raanta, Josh Leivo, Ethan Bear, Tony DeAngelo, Ian Cole, Frederik Andersen

Impact of Changes – It was a complete overhaul in net and there was significant turnover on the blue line. With goalies, the impact is always uncertain. Raanta comes in as one of the top goalies in the league by a couple metrics over the last three seasons like fourth by WAR/60 and 14^th by overall save percentage. That isn't bad, though there are other metrics that can help predict future performance, like high-danger save percentage, where he performs poorly. Regardless, he goes to a better defensive environment and he will have his best offensive team since he left New York. It will be hard for him to have more impact than Nedeljkovic did last year, though, and the same goes for Frederik Andersen. In fact, Carolina was third by save percentage in 2021. It will be very, very hard for either goalie to really help this team more than Nedeljkovic, Mrazek, and Reimer did last year. In that sense, Andersen and Raanta could have good years for Carolina and this team could still be worse off than they were two months ago. It will be hard for the incoming goaltending tandem, plus Alex Lyon, to have a positive impact for this team. If they do, Carolina might win the Presidents' Trophy.

The other big overhaul was on the blue line. Three-time top-10 Norris candidate Dougie Hamilton is gone, as is budding young star Jake Bean. In come a trio of defencemen, each very much different from the last: Tony DeAngelo's no-defence defensive approach, Ethan Bear's still-growing all-around approach, and Ian Cole's veteran, defence-first approach. There is no one defenceman capable of filling the hole left behind by Hamilton's departure, but DeAngelo, if he can stay of Twitter and away from the Capitol, should be a PP1 monster for this team. It remains to be seen, though, if these moves are a straight upgrade for them overall, or perhaps just a boost to the power play.

Carolina didn't change much up front, and there wasn't much need to. They were just outside a top-10 team by scoring and did so with a comparatively low shooting percentage. If that can tick up a bit, they should be fine, though it remains to be seen if they made too big an overhaul to their blue line in one offseason.

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Ready for Full Time – Depending who one talks to, Seth Jarvis should be ready for the NHL. He has 57 goals in his last 82 WHL games, so there's nothing left to prove in Junior. He posted 11 points in 9 games last season in the AHL, posting 2.5 shots per game as an 18/19-year old. While the AHL may have been a bit watered down, it seems he's ready to go. It could be a case where he doesn't join the team until later in the season, but if he keeps producing as he has, there's no reason to have him anywhere but the NHL. Keep an eye out for Dominik Bokk, as well. Though he's not a producer like Jarvis is and should be, he could fill a role similar to that of the departing Warren Foegele – checking role with the bottom-6.

Fantasy Outlook – Assuming that DeAngelo can step in and fill Hamilton's shoes on the power play, they should be fine. Keep in mind that this team was second in the entire league in goals per minute with the man advantage. A big fall-off here could hurt players like Sebastian Aho or Vincent Trocheck. If the power play can't click like it did last year, or DeAngelo gets suspended for any number of reasons, we could see a step back offensively from this team. However, they were 27^th by 5-on-5 shooting percentage, so a rebound there could help offset a decline in PPPs, though that obviously doesn't help PPP-specific categories in fantasy. If Ethan Bear doesn't rebound from last season, this team could struggle defensively with both him and DeAngelo in the lineup. This is a team that had great goaltending and a great power play, then got rid of their goaltenders and their PP1QB. That is fairly significant upheaval and it isn't a slam-dunk that Carolina improves much fantasy-wise this year. If most of their players can keep their status quo from last year, and Andrei Svechnikov has a rebound, then they'll be fine. It is a matter of how all the new pieces fit, though.

Fantasy Grade: B+ (last year was B+)

Offseason Grades: