The Vancouver Canucks have decided not to trade J.T. Miller after all, instead signing him to a seven-year extension worth $8 million per season. Cap leaguers should consider the new contract a very reasonable cap hit, even if it is a significant raise over his current $5.25 million cap hit.

Miller finished this past season with a career-high 32 goals and 99 points (1.24 PTS/GP), which was 31 points clear of the next-highest-scoring Canuck. Although trading him for future assets might have been the better long-term play, Miller is arguably the most valuable Canuck at the moment and a necessary part of any plan they have to contend now.

Over his three seasons in Vancouver, Miller has more points than any other Canuck, and it's not even that close. If the top of the tweet is cut off for you, Miller leads the group with 202 GP – 74 G – 143 A – 217 PTS.

Top 20 #Canucks scorers since the start of the 2019-20 season pic.twitter.com/WK8ozjT0ys

— Rob Williams (@RobTheHockeyGuy) September 2, 2022

Now that we know that Miller is staying in Van City, we can more easily project his point total. For the first time in his career, Miller took 200 shots in 2021-22. In addition, take away the shortened 2020-21 season and he has reached at least 100 hits over his past six seasons. Pushing for 100 points again might be a reach, but at minimum we should expect at least a point per game plus the previously-mentioned peripherals. He's a top-20 option in the Roto Rankings, and Vancouver has proven to be the right environment for him to continue to create those type of numbers.  

During Bubble Keeper Week, I mentioned that Miller is my centerpiece keeper on one of my keeper teams. To summarize why, he was a top-10 scorer while being tied for third with 38 power-play points while finishing in the top 50 with 171 hits. In other words, he currently holds elite status in multicategory leagues.

As far as Canuck-related ripples related to the Miller signing, just a reminder that Bo Horvat is on the final year of his contract (more on Horvat below – I wrote that part before the Miller signing, but I don't think much changes for Horvat this season). I don't think much changes as far as the Canucks' plans to sign Horvat, as he is their captain and he has played in Vancouver for his entire NHL career. The Canucks are coming up on Sunday in the Offseason Fantasy Grades articles, where I'll break down their situation a little more.

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Friday also featured a couple of lesser, low-risk signings – these ones with familiar names finding new homes.

Sam Gagner has signed a one-year contract worth $750,000 with the Jets. Gagner needs 32 more games to reach 1000, which he should be able to reach in Winnipeg as long as he's not a frequent healthy scratch. Gagner has been a power-play specialist in the past, although he has chipped in just six power-play points over the last four seasons. In other words, this signing shouldn't matter a ton in fantasy leagues.

Ryan Murray has also signed a one-year contract worth $750,000 with the Oilers. You may recall that the Oilers had a chance to draft him 10 years ago and instead took Nail Yakupov. Murray didn't turn out to be the franchise defenseman that he was projected to be back then, but he certainly would have been a better pick than Yakupov. That being said, 2012 sure wasn't a banner draft year (HockeyDB).

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Who you are more likely to draft if you are on autopick?Just for fun, I decided to find out what kind of team I'd end up with if I let the autopick do its thing. Several times, even. If you've played fantasy sports as long as I have while raising a family and holding down a full-time job, chances are that you've missed a fantasy draft and been forced to go the autopick route. Through the years, I've missed part or all of drafts because of work, dinnertime, other social commitments, and even having a much-needed nap. It's not beneath me to say that.

Here are a few players that have appeared in multiple drafts where I used the autopick feature. Just because a player is autopicked doesn't necessarily make them a poor choice. However, each of these players has at least one red flag in terms of where they seem to be drafted.

Claude Giroux (Yahoo ADP: 55)

I wrote about Giroux last month as a player that I thought was ranked too high by Yahoo relative to the Top 100 Roto Rankings. Sure enough, other live mock draft participants didn't seem to think he's worth drafting in the 50s. If you are pre-ranking players (which I recommend anyway in case you have to autodraft for whatever reason), I stand by my earlier analysis that you should move Giroux down your rankings. If you are looking for a right wing, Vladimir Tarasenko, Kevin Fiala, and Nikolaj Ehlers are all RW-eligible, have a similar ADP to Giroux, are all younger than Giroux, and are all projected to outperform Giroux.

Torey Krug (Yahoo ADP: 103)

Krug was picked in the ninth round in multiple autopicked teams, similar to what his ADP is listed as. On the surface, it seems as though that Krug is one of those solid PP1 defensemen that you can slot into your lineup and not worry about. Yet it's worth mentioning that Krug's scoring rate has declined from a 0.8-0.85 PTS/GP scoring rate over his last two seasons in Boston to about a 0.65 PTS/GP pace over his two seasons in St. Louis. In addition, Krug does not offer much in the way of peripherals, which you may have to address among your defensemen. Darnell Nurse, Brent Burns, and Dougie Hamilton all offer a similar scoring pace and much better peripherals if you are picking a defenseman at around pick 100. 

Bo Horvat (Yahoo ADP: 150)

Horvat was picked in the 13^th round in multiple autopicked teams, also around his ADP. He's generally an easy player to project, as he's finished between a 55-65-point pace over each of his last five seasons. Yet here is where it could get problematic for Horvat fantasy-wise:

heard #Canucks Boudreau on 650 this morning talking again about his big 3 centres. So pretty clearly he's planning to start camp that way. Can always load up with 9 + 40 together, but certainly expecting team to roll out top 3C on separate lines to start

— Jeff Paterson (@patersonjeff) August 31, 2022

It's probably way too early to analyze line combinations, the Canucks boast a pretty decent top 9 after adding depth this offseason, and Horvat has been a consistent fantasy producer in spite of not having the Canucks' best scoring options on his lines through the years. At this point in a draft, I'm not usually one to get too picky about who to select, and many of the centers being drafted around him are similar options. Yet the line combinations are something to keep an eye on here.

Carey Price (Yahoo ADP: 173)

This one should be a no-brainer, since Price may not play at all this season. The fact that he was autopicked for me multiple times should suggest that he is a player to move to your Do Not Draft list. By this point, you may be replacing your pick in this spot early on anyway, but why not pick something that is more useful to you? Leagues are often won by those who find diamonds in the rough here. It goes without saying that you would have lots of potential options if spanning all positions, but if you're looking for a goalie, Carter Hart, Cal Petersen, Vitek Vanecek, and John Gibson are all being drafted at around that spot. You may not be comfortable starting these goalies in every matchup, but at least each of them can provide goaltending depth.

Here are the Fantrax ADPs for these players, which I think are in general a little more in line to where they should be drafted:

Giroux: 96

Krug: 133

Horvat: 140

Price: 355

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Follow me on Twitter @Ian_Gooding for more fantasy hockey.