The 2022 Dobber Hockey Midseason Guide is currently under preparation, and that will be available in the Dobber Shop in the near future. For the guide, I wrote about a lot of players that could be on the move at the trade deadline, and the general state of each team as they consider their seller/buyer status. Despite the cap crunch, there are a handful of players that are likely to be on the move by the deadline as their teams fall further out of the playoff race. Here are five guys we should be keeping an eye on, how they're doing this year, how much they can actually help a team and, in turn, help fantasy roster. Contract information from Cap Friendly.

Phil Kessel

The two-time Stanley Cup champion is a free agent at the end of the year, but one sticking point could be his contract. Even pro-rated at a 40% cap hit, his deal is still well over $2M for the balance of the season. That is not nothing for teams that are near the cap, and that's a lot of them, so money will likely have to be moved back the other way, and that will involve a roster player of some sort.

Anyway, Kessel has 23 points in 33 games this year, pacing for over 50 points, which feels like a miracle on that Arizona roster. He is being short-changed, too, as he's shooting 6.7%, having shot 12.6% over his previous 208 games. He should be closer to a 60-point pace with a goals bump, and it's not luck, either: his primary assist rate at 5-on-5 is 75% higher than his secondary assist rate, which can be more luck-driven. By HockeyViz's impacts, he is also helping the team's power play go from abysmal to below-average which, again, feels like a miracle in itself. He is doing a good job of driving offence on a team that is truly awful offensively, and that speaks to him having something left to give for a playoff run.

Most playoff teams could use a middle-six scoring right winger. How about his old stomping grounds in Boston? Calgary? It is fun to imagine a Sutter coaching Phil Kessel. Nashville could also probably use his services. All this is to say, maybe he's not trade to a spot where he gets top PP minutes, but he should get better line mates and 16-17 minutes a night. Really, just a continuation of what he has done to date, with some positive shooting regression, makes him a valuable fantasy commodity again. Certainly roster-able in 12-team leagues.

Tomas Hertl

The crunch of having half the team's cap tied up in five players has finally hit San Jose hard, and that's with shedding themselves of Evander Kane's deal. They need to sign Jonathan Dahlen and Mario Ferraro, replace the entire bottom-6, and have $18M to do so. Bringing back Hertl at $7M a season or whatever it ends up being is just too steep and they need to look to the future.

Remember when Hertl couldn't score? He went from 2015-18 averaging about 20 goals/82 games. That's fine, but certainly not what he's shown since, which is 35 goals per 82 games over the last four seasons. He averages about 36 assists in that span, so team's are looking to acquire a defensively-adequate centre capable of 70 points. That should fetch a nice price.

What we should note about these point totals as he's averaged just 14 power-play points per 82 games. What if he does get traded somewhere like Nashville or Minnesota where he could jump to the top PP with good line mates? There may be a point-per-game centre in the waiting here.

One concern is his shooting percentage. He's been able to sustain a high rate for years – 17.6% over his last 212 regular season games – and that's abnormal in general. Is that something that would carry over to a new team? It should, but where he doesn't rack up assists, a hit to his goal totals is a really big hit to his overall fantasy value. It's something to keep in mind, but we should be excited about him moving elsewhere in the next couple months.  

J.T. Miller

This one is a bit more precarious because there's an extra year here on the deal. Vancouver has looked like a different team under Bruce Boudreau and maybe they hang onto J.T. Miller. This team still seems to think they're in a Cup window and might want to hold him for another year to see how 2022-23 goes before trading him at the next deadline. With that said, if things go south again, he could be moved this year to maximize a return, so we should discuss what he can do.

Things haven't gone well for the Canucks but Miller is over a point per game on the year. It should be noted he's playing over 21 minutes a night, which he's unlikely to play elsewhere. That will mean his 2.5 shots per game, a career-best, will decline when/if he's traded.

Miller has 16 PPPs on the year, which is a big reason why he is where he is. Being on pace to push 40 power-play points will make anyone look good. That will decline wherever he goes, and that's a big problem here. He is generally a good, not great, offensive play-driver at 5-on-5, so there needs to be a lot of slack picked up there to make up for the PP decline. The question is if where he lands can help him make up the points at even strength.

It seems like a tall task for Miller to repeat his fantasy value elsewhere. He plays too big a role on this Vancouver team. He could end up in Boston as the 2C and second PP unit, which is 18 minutes a night and a PP hit. A scenario like that would be bad, so the best thing for him, fantasy-wise, may be sticking around another season.

John Klingberg

On the year, Klingberg is on pace to crack the 50-point mark – over 82 games, of course – and that's with a career-worst 2.3% shooting (one goal on 43 shots heading into Wednesday night). Again, he keeps proving himself as a top-end distributor and transition defenceman, something that teams covet a lot.

Where he can help a team the most is on the power play. Evolving Hockey has him with some of the best offensive impacts with the man advantage over the last few seasons in the league, and teams want that. While penalties are few and far between in the playoffs, that just makes being able to actually generate goals on the power play that much more valuable. Bad PP teams can't rely on 4-5 kicks at the can every night, and need to be efficient. There is almost no defenceman more efficient on the power play than Klingberg.

To be valuable on the power play, he needs the power-play minutes. If a team like Colorado, or Nashville, or Tampa Bay were to somehow acquire him, it would be a problem for his fantasy value. He can still contribute enough at even strength to be valuable, but it's the power play where he makes his living. That means we would like to see him go somewhere like Calgary or Winnipeg instead.

P.K. Subban

It will be interesting to see where Subban lands. He has a very big cap hit, even pro-rated to two-thirds of the season, for a team to acquire at the deadline. There aren't a lot of contenders that can fit him in. Would a return to Nashville be in order? Just wondering

Regardless, it's important to note that the Subban of today is not the Subban of 2017. At one point, despite what his detractors may say, he was good defensively, but that has disappeared. He still is good offensively, but it can lead to some risky passes and moves, and the defensive prowess isn't there anymore to make up for the mistakes. Wherever he goes, it's likely in a third-pair role, which is fine. He's under 20 minutes a night as it is and is more reliable for peripherals than anything these days.

On the flipside, because he is still good offensively, maybe he finds another gear in a new location as a team chugs towards the postseason? It could be worth adding him for the peripherals alone and then seeing if the points can come.

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Brad Marchand had himself a game in Boston's win over Montreal on Wednesday night, managing a hat trick before the midway point of the game. For Marchand, that gives him 19 goals on the season and he would be pacing for over 50 goals over a full 82-game season. Just a remarkable start to this season for a guy who turns 34 in the spring.