Hello and welcome back to another edition of Lining Up! This iteration will be a Free Agent Frenzy Fallout Edition, taking a look at the implications and potential line combinations of the recent trades and signings. With more big free agents still yet to be signed, information is coming quick and could mean the following prognostications will be obsolete so be sure to keep an eye on any big moves still to come.

Let's dive in.

Brent Burns

The long-time San Jose Shark defensemen made a huge career change by placing his bets on the Carolina Hurricanes and trying to win that elusive Cup. For their part, the Hurricanes shipped out Tony DeAngelo and with minimal options internally to immediately fill the power-play quarterback role, they decided to bring in a long time specialist in Burns.

Over his career, Burns has averaged 3:06 of PPTOI and 57.9% PP share. Most recently from the 2014-2015 to the 2018-2019 season he averaged 27 PPP per game before dropping down to 16 in the three seasons since. For comparison, DeAngelo averaged a PPTOI of 3:03 and a 67.5 %PP share and ended the season with 20 PPP. If we expect Burns to completely fill the vacant role, it should be a fair assumption that he will continue to see power-play time close to what DeAngelo had. The big difference? Even though his power-play deployment is unlikely to fluctuate drastically, Burns is moving from a bottom ten team to a top five team in the league in terms of power-play. He could potentially see a decent spike in production close to the levels of the 2014-2019 seasons mentioned above where he averaged a 0.88 pts/g production during that time as opposed to his recent three seasons where the average was 0.61. It is likely unreasonable to expect Burns to average a 0.88 point per game pace given his age but maintaining this power-play deployment on a dominant Hurricanes squad could mean a regression to somewhere in-between.

If you miss out on a top tier defensemen consider waiting and gambling on Burns, his return on investment for draft capital could be a big payoff.

Boone Jenner – Jack Roslovic

With the Columbus Blue Jackets landing the biggest fish in Free Agency with Johnny Gaudreau, the implications for which centre gets to line up alongside the star winger could be massive. Especially if the winger on the opposite side is Patrik Laine. Most likely there are two options here, Boone Jenner or Jack Roslovic.

Jenner was off to a stellar and surprising season this year, notching 23 goals and 44 points in only 59 games played before his season ended with an injury. He was contributing as usual in the peripheral categories with over two and a half shots and nearly one and a half hits per game. Jenner was also seeing time on the power-play with the first unit and hit career highs there with 2:58 PPTOI and a 68.2 %PP along with a career high 20:28 of ice time. Overall, if Jenner can continue with this kind of deployment and replace his most common line mate of Gustav Nyquist with Gaudreau, he could easily surpass his career high 0.75 point per game pace that he set last season.

If Jenner does not resume his deployment, the alternative would likely be Jack Roslovic who filled in for Jenner when he went down. Prior to assuming Jenner's role, Roslovic only had a 0.48 point per game pace over the first three quarters of the season. During the last quarter however, Roslovic received an additional six minutes of total ice time including one full minute of power-play time and increased his point per game pace to 0.79. Based on that small sample size, it is conceivable that he would have exceeded his career high in points if that deployment was consistent throughout a full season.

Keep watch on what line combinations Columbus decides to roll out in training camp because if Roslovic is a centre between Gaudreau and Laine he could absolutely be worth a spot on your roster and likely had at a deep discount. The choice could be a lot easier if we get news on Jenner's health situation soon.

Vitek Vanecek

Lastly, let's take a quick look at a goalie who could be in line to see a major increase to his workload. It appears as though the New Jersey Devils have committed to their new goalie in Vitek Vanecek by giving him a three-year contract, while Mackenzie Blackwood is set to become a RFA next season. Given Blackwood's subpar performance last season of 9 Wins, 3.39 GAA, 0.892 SV% and a QS% of only 32 in 25 GP, Vanecek could be in line for as many starts as he can handle.

Take this with a grain salt however, as New Jersey was in the bottom five teams in the league for Goals Allowed last season so the averages may not be amazing. If Vanecek can replicate his 2.67 GAA and .908 SV% that should be considered a win. But this should not take away from a potential big increase in workload and allow him to surpass his 42 starts last season. In addition, provided there is some better health from Dougie Hamilton and Jack Hughes, expect a modest step forward from this young group to help. This trade has elevated Vanecek to someone who splits starts at best on a good team to having potentially a full starter's role on a not great team, a boon for leagues with volume stats especially. Not spending your precious draft capital on the elite-tier assets and waiting to snag someone like Vanecek in the late rounds could be a good way to go.

Thanks for reading.