Every Sunday, we share 21 Fantasy Rambles from our writers at DobberHockey. These thoughts are curated from the past week’s 'Daily Ramblings'.

Writers/Editors: Ian Gooding, Michael Clifford, Alexander MacLean, and Dobber

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1. What can you say about Carter Verhaeghe during these playoffs? There was some concern that he wouldn’t be able to play in Game 6 after he missed the morning skate. Yet, not only did he suit up, but he also scored the overtime winner to advance the Panthers to the second round for the first time since 1996.

Verhaeghe also chipped in an assist on Claude Giroux‘s goal, giving him 12 points (6 G, 6 A) over the six-game series. Entering Saturday, he was in a tie with Connor McDavid for the playoff lead in points. If the Panthers advance deep into the playoffs, many winning playoff pools might include Verhaeghe. Perhaps he flies under the radar with Aleksander Barkov and Jonathan Huberdeau the main attractions on the Florida roster, yet Verhaeghe has been on a 60-point full-season pace over his two seasons for the Panthers. (may14)

2. The Hart Trophy talk this season was as vibrant as any in recent memory, maybe as far back as the Taylor Hall MVP season. There were many great campaigns across the league, from goalies to defensemen to forwards. It seemed likely Igor Shesterkin and Auston Matthews would get nods, but the third spot was wide open. Or, at least it seemed that way. The actual finalists: Matthews, Shesterkin and Connor McDavid, as voted by members of @ThePHWA.

Not much argument from me here. There are cases for guys like Johnny Gaudreau, Jonathan Huberdeau, and Roman Josi, and to a lesser extent guys like Jason Robertson, Cale Makar, and Patrice Bergeron. But, again, no real argument from me on the finalists. (may13)

3. The Calder finalists for rookie of the year were released on Wednesday. As also voted by @ThePHWA: Michael Bunting, Moritz Seider and Trevor Zegras.

No real complaints from me. This is probably the right top-3 to put on the finalists list, even if I think Anton Lundell should be up there. But I will say that had Matthew Boldy played 70 games instead of 47, there’s a good chance he’s here instead of one of the others. He could have threatened 60 points while playing good defense for a Cup contender. Last week I wrote about how, on a per-minute basis, Boldy was one of the most impactful players in the league, not just among rookies. The Wild have a big incoming cap crunch so it may be a couple years before we get a team as good as this season’s again, but he could also see a big increase in his power-play role. (may12)

4. The Vezina nominees were announced Tuesday, with Juuse Saros, Jacob Markstrom, and Igor Shesterkin as the three finalists. This is Shesterkin’s award to lose, and it would be shocking for it to go anywhere else. He had one of, if not the best season, since the 2005 lockout.

The nominees were all deserving this year, though it does feel a little like Ilya Sorokin was robbed. He was a top three goalie this year, and there’s an argument to be made that he was the second best one overall. (may11)

5. As for the Norris Trophy, the NHL released the finalists last Monday, and they are as follows: Victor Hedman, Roman Josi and Cale Makar, who threatened for 30 goals, something defensemen rarely do, while posting 86 points in 77 games.

We can speculate about the impact of Devon Toews on Makar, but according to HockeyViz, the team was still very strong offensively (expected goals/60 of 3.06) and defensively (expected goals against/60 of 2.29) when Makar wasn’t playing with his regular partner. That tells us that Makar was still super-elite even without Toews beside him, and very worthy of this award.

Roman Josi finished with 96 points, the best production season by a defenseman in decades. While his actual defense remains in question, he seemed about average for his team, and he was the engine of the offense outside of the top line. He carried a heavy burden for this team, as he usually does, and a Norris finalist appearance was the result.

And then there’s Victor Hedman, who is in the running for this trophy nearly every year, it seems. He had career-bests in goals, assists, and shots, and will finish as a Norris finalist for the sixth season in a row (one win). He finished top-5 in the league among defensemen in wins above replacement, third in points, and was again good defensively. He seems like he deserved a finalist spot, again. (may10)

6. Still regarding the Norris: I will say, eventually, Charlie McAvoy has to get his due. He’s done a lot of heavy lifting on the blue line for Boston for three seasons now and I have to think it’s only his point totals (118 points in his last 196 games) that is keeping him from top-3 recognition. He is going into his age-25 season, though, so there is still lots of time for him to get his proper respect. (may10)

7. Let’s look at scoring chance jumps at all strengths per 60 minutes, and there is some overlap with what we discussed in yesterday's Ramblings. Just for fun: Erik Karlsson (further below) saw the biggest jump in scoring chances, and it wasn’t even close.

Dougie Hamilton: A few days ago, our own Brennan DeSouza wrote about Dougie Hamilton being a bounce-back candidate for 2022-23 and it’s hard to disagree. He had a good start to the season before injuries slowed down his production or kept him out of the lineup entirely. He was tied for the eighth-largest jump in iSC among defensemen, but he shot a career-low 4.6%. We have to wonder how, or if, the injuries factored in, and he probably should have cracked double-digit goals despite missing 20 games.

Like Doughty and the Kings, there are a lot of good things coming for Hamilton and the Devils. Nico Hischier asserted himself as a top-line center, Jack Hughes to a huge step forward in his development and is now on the cusp of superstardom, Dawson Mercer had a good rookie season, Jesper Bratt solidified himself as a top-line winger, Pavel Zacha has started to make good on his middle-six upside, and Alexander Holtz tore up the AHL. There is more than enough here for a very good top PP unit and two good even-strength scoring lines. That is enough to support a high-end fantasy season from Hamilton if he’s healthy.

Nothing is guaranteed but the Devils are on the upswing and Hamilton showed plenty of flashes of what made him such a good fantasy asset over the years. His ADP this coming September should be interesting as there’s a balance between what we saw from his in 2021-22 and what we might expect in 2022-23. (may13)

8. MacKenzie Weegar: There was another Florida defenseman in the top-10 for iSC jumps and that was Brandon Montour. Like Doughty, though, MacKenzie Weegar is typically the defenseman that will be drafted in fantasy leagues – outside of Aaron Ekblad, of course – and that’s why we’re going to discuss his season.

Weegar set career-bests in a number of shot metrics like shot rate, ixG, iSC, and more. That shouldn’t come as a huge surprise for a guy playing on arguably the best offense in the league; every Florida defenseman in our sample saw a positive increase in scoring chances. But it didn’t necessarily translate to more points, as his PPG dropped to 0.55 from his career-high 0.67 last season. The simple reason for that was a four-year low in individual points percentage (36.7%). IPP, for the uninitiated, is the rate at which a player garners a point when the team scores with him on the ice. His three-year average heading into 2021-22 was 45.4%. That may not seem like a huge gap, but had he managed around 45% IPP, he adds 10 points to his final total. It seems a bit of luck was the difference between a very good and a great fantasy season for Weegar, and that’s what we need to take away here.

We will have to see what Florida looks like next season as both Claude Giroux and Mason Marchment are UFAs, and the team doesn’t have much cap space to work with. At the least, like New Jersey, there is enough left for two very good scoring lines and an elite top PP unit. Weegar won’t get much run on the power play, but I think we saw his floor this season, and a jump in shooting percentages from his 4-year low should see him crack double-digit goals for the first time in his career. (may13)

9. Oliver Kylington: This may not come as a huge surprise as anyone that has watched Kylington and the Flames for a few years now saw a big jump in his play in 2021-22. He had 16 points in 95 career games heading into this season and nearly doubled that output with 31 points in 73 contests. A higher-scoring environment (across the league and within his team) helps here, but that doesn’t give the young blue liner his proper due. The Swede’s offensive shot-quality impact has improved for three straight seasons, culminating in what we saw this season, a mark that put him inside the 75^th percentile of the league. His issue is that he’ll likely remain the #3 option behind Noah Hanifin and Rasmus Andersson unless he has another big jump, so his fantasy upside is capped for now. But he improved his team’s offense, and his own, when he was on the ice, and that’s a big development for him and the Flames. (may12)

10. Erik Karlsson: Despite the Sharks being generally under-skilled through three quarters of their roster, Karlsson had a very nice rebound season in his own right. He had huge gains in his personal shot-quality metrics, and his offensive play-driving impacts, as measured by Evolving Hockey, were among the best in the league. His defense has fallen off considerably, depending on your view of his defensive ability 4-5 years ago, but the offense is back. Playing a full-ish season is still a big question for him and the quality of the roster in front of him is still dubious. With that said, more of this from Karlsson will go a long way to supporting his fantasy value next year and in the years to come. (may12)

11. Aaron Ekblad: His inclusion here is to just kind of hammer home that this is not strictly a defense-first blue liner. He has (or had, maybe it’s not as strong as it once was) a reputation as a defensive defenseman, and that’s just not the reality. Fantasy owners caught on this year, which is why he had a high ADP among rearguards, but the public can be a bit slow to catch up. Either way, this makes three seasons in a row that his offensive impacts were similar to his defensive impacts, showing his well-rounded game. He plays monster minutes, should get his PP role back next regular season, and can generally shoot for a high percentage. His increase in shot quality should only help that last part moving forward. He could be on the verge of a 20-goal season. (may12)

12. We’re well into the playoffs and that means there’s not a lot of fantasy decisions left for the 2021-22 season, while the 2022 offseason hasn’t really begun yet. Things do start to get rolling a little with the draft lottery though, which saw the Montreal Canadiens land the first overall pick this week. New Jersey jumped up to second overall, while Arizona fell to third. It’s going to be a fun show with Montreal hosting the draft and selecting first overall.

One of my fantasy leagues ties our non-playoff teams to the respective NHL teams for our own draft lottery. That means our draft order is now set, and I have the 10^th and 21^st overall picks. As a result, I’m trying to be as on top of the tiers as possible, and making sure I know what I want to be doing at each selection. Throughout the year I keep my eye out for any prospect rankings, prospect opinions, and noteworthy production (both positive and negative).

I don’t pretend to be a scout, or someone that intricately knows NHL prospects, let alone those not even drafted. However, after years of playing in dynasty leagues where up to 1300 players are owned, and then we draft 120 prospects on top of that, you get to the point of finding a system that works. For me, I have found a knack for amalgamating the work of a lot of the scouts in the public sphere, and fine tuning that into a fantasy hockey draft list.

One of the biggest weightings goes to the DobberProspects Fantasy Draft Ranking, which is an incredible resource every year. On top of that, you find the rest of the Dobber scouts, and the guys they are bouncing things off of, expanding the network from there. (may11)

13. Tier 1 (1): Shane Wright is still in his own class here. His numbers as an exceptional-status rookie in the OHL were better than McDavid’s and he did so with the majority of his point totals being goals. After the lost season due to Covid, it seems as though Wright needed time to adjust back to the flow of the game. In the second half of his pre-draft year (D-1 season), everything seemed to sync back up and he was averaging two points per game.

Corey Pronman had an article yesterday behind the Athletic paywall that outlined the Wright debate and whether he should still be considered a shoe-in for first overall. In it, he posted a chart of first overall picks from the CHL since 2005, and their productions pre-draft. Wright sat second last on the list, nestled below Nico Hischier and Nail Yakupov, and ahead of only Rick Nash. However, if we use his second half of the season and give him a bit of leeway for the lost developmental year last year, Wrights numbers would instead put him fifth on the list, behind only Sidney Crosby, Connor McDavid, Patrick Kane, and Alexis Lafreniere. The upside is there, and one thing that everyone seems to agree on in the public scouting sphere is that the floor is also high because of how smart and responsible Wright is as a player.

Wright is your first overall pick in fantasy drafts, and don’t overthink it. (may11)

14. Tier 2 (2-5): Logan Cooley, Frank Nazar, Juraj Slafkovsky, Brad Lambert.

The first three in this tier appear to be the easy consensus, and you can put them in any order with no one getting too worked up about it. Slafkovsky has shown himself better against men in the Olympics and in European play, however, some do see Cooley and Nazar as higher upside plays, so when we have more upside in a similar tier, that goes higher on my board. The bottom of this tier goes to Brad Lambert, whose production in Finland is extremely divisive. He hasn’t put up the numbers expected of someone that was viewed as a contender for the top forward in the draft as recently as last season, but the upside is still there. He is a risky pick, so if that’s not to your taste you can drop him down a bit, especially once we see where he lands in the NHL, but Lambert is simply the last player in this draft with upside to match the other four ahead of him.

[Follow the link for the rest of Alexander MacLean's Draft Lottery prospects]

15. We’re into double digits with the number of teams in the playoffs that have used at least two goalies, but I would not have guessed that Minnesota would be one of the last not to do so. They rode trade-deadline acquisition Marc-Andre Fleury, while their starter all season, Cam Talbot, rode the pine until he finally got the nod for Game 6.

Talbot has one more year after this one, and is being paid under $4M. He will be 35 by the time the 2022-23 season gets underway, but he may still be one of the best value netminders for the year. He should be a volume starter for a top team in the league, and likely won’t be one of the first eight or so goalies off the board in redraft leagues. (may11)

16. Very big and very surprising news came down last Monday morning when the New York Islanders announced they fired coach Barry Trotz. The team missed the playoffs this year, but had made the postseason three years running, and had won at least a round in all three seasons. That was the first time the Islanders managed that in over 30 years. That is why this is such a shock; this is a great coach that took the team further than anyone else in decades. Dobber had his thoughts on the firing here.

Whether Trotz wants to keep coaching, or move into management, there’ll be opportunities for him elsewhere in the league. It’ll be interesting to see who ends up with the Islanders, because this is not a high-end offensive team, and they have a lot of aging core players. (may10)

17. Goaltending remains one of the bigger challenges in hockey, whether in real life or in fantasy. Some of the top goalies in the league this year included Jacob Markstrom, Tristan Jarry, and Ville Husso, all goalies that weren’t necessarily drafted highly in fantasy leagues. In fact, Husso was the backup to Jordan Binnington – the Stanley Cup-winning goalie with a huge contract – and was likely undrafted in most leagues. Husso then finished the season with more starts than Binnington.

One of the big problems with goaltending in the fantasy game is that goalies are generally at the mercy of their team’s quality. For example, Anton Forsberg (.917) had a slightly higher save percentage than Andrei Vasilevskiy (.916), but won just half his starts (22/44) while Vasy won 62% of his starts (39/63). Not to mention that because Ottawa allowed way more shots than Tampa Bay, Forsberg’s goals against average was higher by 0.32. The goalie who was, ostensibly, a better performer was a magnitude-worse fantasy option.

To that end, I wanted to look at three goalies (two of them below) who had good seasons, but not necessarily good fantasy seasons. It could help us find some gems in fantasy drafts this coming September. We will be grabbing data from Natural Stat Trick, Evolving Hockey, and our own Frozen Tools. (may10)

18. Ilya Sorokin: This may be one of the more obvious options, given his .927 save percentage over the final three months of the season. He was good all year long, really, one of the few Islanders players that was. His problem is that Semyon Varlamov has another year left and that could keep him from reaching 60+ starts. There is also the issue of the aforementioned Trotz getting heaved from the franchise, and there’s no telling how good/bad the next coach will be. At least in the bubble 2021 season, Trotz’s defensive prowess helped the Islanders goaltending tandem to very good seasons. His replacement is far from certain to have the same impact on Sorokin, so this is a lot more tenuous than it was just 48 hours ago.

Regardless, Sorokin led the league in high-danger save percentage at 5-on-5, and it wasn’t even close. Over his two seasons in the league, Sorokin is second in the league in HDSV%, behind only Igor Shesterkin. At all strengths, his goals saved above average is second, a bit behind Shesterkin and just ahead of Markstrom. There is a lot of mounting evidence that Sorokin is climbing into the rung of elite goalies alongside Shesterkin, Saros, Vasilevskiy, and the like. At the same time, Sorokin has just 73 career starts (Vasy had 63 this past season alone), the Islanders are getting older, and will have a new coach behind the bench. There are enough question marks here to not put him in that top tier just yet, but one more season anywhere close to this, and he will be. (may10)

19. Jake Oettinger: Another goalie without a lot of regular season starts is Dallas’s hopeful goaltender of the future (and likely the present) in Oettinger. While he only sports only a career .913 save percentages at all strengths, that is well above average, and those were his age-22 and age-23 seasons. He still has several prime years left to go, and if this was a preview of what’s to come, then Dallas Stars fans and fantasy hockey owners should be excited.

In 2021-22, Oettinger finished tied for 6^th among regular starters in high-danger save percentage at 5-on-5, one measure of goaltending prowess. (It makes sense intuitively, right? Most NHL goalies don’t have trouble with low-danger shots, it’s high-danger saves that separate the good from the great.) He didn’t rank as strongly by other measures, like goals saved above expected, where he measured similarly to other low-end starters like Robin Lehner and Carter Hart. By the same token, this past season was an improvement basically across the board in his underlying numbers compared to his rookie season, and improvements are always a good thing.

There is also the postseason to consider. In just a few games, he has been a big reason why the Stars are in this series, with a save percentage bordering on .970 heading into Game 4. It is too small a sample to really draw any conclusions, but not seeing him wither in high-pressure situations is a good sign, at least so far.

The big issue here is what kind of roster the Stars will have going forward. They are likely to lose John Klingberg and big chunks of their core are over 30 years old. They do have a handful of excellent players, but 4-5 very good players being supported by 13-14 very mediocre ones does not make for a great goaltending environment. All the same, Oettinger is starting to show flashes of why he was a first-round pick five years ago. He is a pending RFA so his next contract should be interesting. (may10)

20. It wasn’t a great year for me in fantasy hockey, as I didn’t win either of my dynasty leagues, nor my keeper league (keep 12), but thought I'd share a few thoughts on some of my players as I look toward 2022-23.

Jesper Bratt: How did I get him in the 10^th round? Amazing. Right now, I consider Bratt a 70-game guy (he just played 76 but his track record still has me playing it cautiously with my expectations), but I think he can get 80 points in those 70 games. He began the season pointless in five games, so he had 73 in his last 71.

Kent Johnson: Based on his success rate in limited late-season action, I think the points will be slow to arrive. He may even see a few games in the AHL to start. But I think in the second half next year we’ll see signs of what’s to come, and I feel like 2023-24 will be a great year for him.

Ryan Strome: The pending UFA is coming off his weakest year in three seasons, with a 61-point pace. And on a different team, I just don’t know if he can be that 70-point guy. Can he go anywhere else and play with a winger half as good as Artemi Panarin?

Nicklas Backstrom: After 10 straight seasons of producing at a minimum 72-point pace, the veteran produced at a 54-point full-season pace. At 34, he’s no spring chicken (though he’s 14 years younger than me haha), but I always give players a break those first 25 games or so after returning from an extended injury. That being said, at his age, what are the odds of bouncing back to 70-plus?

Yegor Sharangovich: A tremendous finish to the season put this guy back on the fantasy radar, as he tallied 29 points in his last 36 contests playing with Jack Hughes. He’s 100% reliant on linemates for his production, but the odds are in his favor that he holds onto this spot. I put my odds of keeping him at 20%. (may9)

21. Adrian Kempe‘s most notable accomplishment of the season was reaching 35 goals. Considering that he had never scored 20 goals previously, that seems like an accomplishment. However, Kempe recorded just 19 assists, cutting into that value. No player who scored as many goals as Kempe had that few assists, although Andrew Mangiapane and Josh Norris scored the same number of goals with just one more assist each (Norris 66 GP, Kempe 78 GP, Mangiapane 82 GP).

Kempe had been an incredibly streaky player, something I experienced on two of my fantasy teams. Although his quarter-by-quarter results didn’t show major peaks and valleys, the hot and cold runs were definitely there. Kempe followed up a streak of seven goals in six games in February with no points in 10 games into mid-March. After that dry spell, Kempe finished the season with 10 goals and 19 points over his last 18 games. You just had to know when to start him.

When I investigated Kempe’s shooting percentage for possible regression, I noticed that it was a bit higher than normal this season (14.2 SH%). However, one stat jumped out at me as not making any sense. That stat is his secondary assist percentage, which is quite a bit higher than normal at 57.9%. I though the assist total was low? Perhaps the improved goal scoring is from playing on Anze Kopitar‘s line more frequently. Kopitar’s point total tends to be assist-heavy, so perhaps that is the right match if his purpose is to score goals. (may8)

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Reminder to everyone with a subscription – the payments for this processes for the next year on May 15. So this coming Sunday. That’s the day I will also make available for presale all of next year’s items. Leading it off: The Fantasy Prospects Report, released on June 14.

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Have a good week, folks – stay safe!!

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