Maybe nothing ruins your fantasy season more than injuries. We’re not just talking about your chance for a championship, although that’s the main goal. Too many injuries can also suck all of the fun out of your season.

After all, for underperforming players, you can always hold out hope that they will bounce back to their normal selves. You can watch their games and see signs of optimism. But when your fantasy team’s IR is longer than an old phone book, you almost want to give up on the season.

Below are 10 players whose injuries screwed your season.

A few ground rules before we start. Timing will play a factor. Missing a month of action in October isn’t the same as missing the past month of action during fantasy playoffs.

Also, we’re not including players that you knew were injured going into the season. So no Carey Price, Jack Eichel, Evgeni Malkin, etc.

Finally, every year when I write this column, I figure there must be someone out there who has seven or so, or maybe even 10 of these players. Odds are likely that person is in a keeper league, but if you do have many of these players and it screwed over your fantasy season, I’d like to hear about it. You can hit me up on Twitter here.

10. Erik Karlsson

If you were banking on a bounce-back season from Karlsson, you may have been a little disappointed. When it comes to points, we saw a big improvement as he went from a point-per-game mark of 0.42 a year ago to 0.70 this year. However, his per game rate for power-play points, shots, hits and blocked shots were still low. If someone isn’t producing at his usual standards, you hope it can be offset slightly by playing more games. However, that doesn’t seem to be possible for Karlsson anymore. It looked encouraging early as he only missed six games due to covid and two games due to an upper-body injury by the middle of January. He then missed almost two months of action after left forearm surgery. He came back for about six weeks, but has now missed the last six games with a lower-body injury.

9. Sean Couturier

You wouldn’t have been the only one who went into the season fooled into thinking that the Flyers were due for a big year. Not only was Couturier a disappointment when in the lineup (an 82-game pace of 48 points after four straight in the 70s), but he only played 29 games. Sure, he’s a Band-Aid boy trainee, but this was ridiculous. He hasn’t seen action since December 18 when back surgery knocked him out for the rest of the season. Many of you may have already dropped him by then, but any hope of a return to normality was quickly squished.

8. Patrik Laine

There may have been some skepticism once Laine went to Columbus, but the change in scenery proved to be beneficial for the 24-year-old. In 56 games this year, Laine was on pace for his first-ever 80-point campaign. He also was on pace for 38 goals, the second-highest of his career. However, he missed 19 games in the middle of the season with an oblique strain and has missed the last few games with a knee injury. With his size, his breakout threshold is 400 games, and he’s now at 407. Expect big things from him next year.

7. Nikita Kucherov

Kucherov is on pace for 116 points over 82 games (the second-highest 82-game point pace of his career and the fourth straight year above 100), but he will wind up around 70 points if he has a great last few games. That’s because he missed 32 games with a lower-body injury. Even though it was in the first half of the season, it was long enough that it would have a major impact on fantasy squads. It’s hard enough to replace your first-round pick with a waiver-wire addition two weeks into the season, but that loss would have cost your wins early in the season. This is the second straight campaign he’s missed a significant chunk of action after missing all of last season with an injury that miraculously healed itself by the start of the postseason.

6. Drew Doughty

The player I once called the most overvalued based on name, Doughty was enjoying a renaissance season. Despite missing a little more than a month of the season from October to November, Doughty was playing as if he was 28 again. He had 31 points in 39 games, and was putting up PIM, shot and power-play per-game rates that we haven’t seen from in almost a decade. He hasn’t played since March 7 with an upper-body injury (missing your fantasy playoffs), which is truly tragic considering his return to glory.

5. Gabriel Landeskog

It’s no surprise that Landeskog missed some action this year, but the amount of time was a little startling. He’s missed 28 games already this season, the most he’s missed in a season since 2012-13. Which is a shame, considering he was on pace for career highs in goals, points and PIM, and was experiencing higher than his normal rate in shots, power-play points and hits. Even though he missed two games with a suspension in October, three games with a lower-body injury in December and three games with covid in January, it wasn’t until a knee injury in mid-March that screwed fantasy general managers.

4. Nazem Kadri

He didn’t miss as much time this season as many others and he returned to action last Wednesday, but the timing of his injury was the absolute worst. He missed about three weeks of action with an upper-body injury when many were in the fantasy postseason. Things were looking great for Kadri this season. On March 31, Kadri was tied for sixth in points with Matthew Tkachuk and Kirill Kaprizov. Those other two have now hit the 100-point mark, and there was a very good chance that Kadri would have done the same. Even in points-only leagues, the timing of the injury stung as it was after most fantasy trade deadlines.

3. The Vegas guys

Yeah, I’m not even going to attempt to split the Vegas players up as they would have taken up too many slots. Here’s a quick rundown:

• Mark Stone has missed games on six occasions, ranging from 12 games due to a lower-body injury to four contests with an upper-body injury to two matches due to covid-19 to two months with a back injury.
• Max Pacioretty missed 17 games early in the season with a broken foot and 10 games late in the season after wrist surgery.
• Robin Lehner missed five games with a lower-body injury in January and 10 games in March/April with a lower-body injury.
• William Karlsson missed 15 games in the middle of the campaign with a broken foot.
• Alec Martinez missed 56 games due to a facial injury.
• Nolan Patrick missed 30-plus games throughout the season due to various ailments.
• Reilly Smith hasn’t played since March 8 with a knee injury.

And none of this includes Eichel, who I mentioned at the start wouldn’t be eligible for this list.

2. Aaron Ekblad

This is the second season in a row that Ekblad has suffered a major injury that caused him to miss significant time and the fantasy playoffs. A year ago, he suffered a fractured left leg and missed the last 21 regular season games (and all six Panthers postseason matches). This season, he suffered a lower-body injury and hasn’t played a game since March 18. There’s still a chance he gets back in time for the NHL playoffs, but it may not be until the second round, if the Panthers make it that far. Ekblad was a beast this season, and had an 82-game pace of 21 goals, 77 points, 240 shots and 27 power-play points while averaging a hit and a blocked shot per game.

1. Jack Hughes

Hughes will be a popular pick to reach the 80-point mark next season, but he’s going to have to stay healthy enough to do so. He put up a 94-point pace this year but was limited to 49 games. He missed 17 games at the start of the season with a dislocated shoulder, three games due to covid, and now he hasn’t played since April 3 with a lower-body injury. You have to hope that these injuries won’t derail his progression into becoming a superstore. He’ll still be worth a high pick next season, but you’ll be holding your breath every time he gets hit.