In last week's article we touched on players who were off to hot starts, but more specifically were looking at goal scoring and shooting percentage. This week we are going to flip the script a little bit. Fantasy circles are full of concerns these days for players off to slow starts. Timo Meier, Alex Ovechkin, Tage Thompson, Jason Robertson and even Connor McDavid to some extent – there are a lot of big names not producing for their managers. For this week then we are going to dig into some of the players who have been the biggest busts so far and see if we can find any signs of life.

In order to review we need to set some level of preseason expectation. For that I am looking at the Dobber Guide and the point pace projections. Now a great thing about the guide is that it is continually updated, but these numbers are actually from the start of preseason. I did that on purpose so we would have in mind where most folks were coming from when they were drafting. It does mean that the numbers in the most recent edition of the guide may look slightly different than these.

I then pulled a Big Board Report to get all of the player data as of 10/26. I exported it so I could use the point per game numbers and compared them to the current production numbers. I applied a couple of filters because I really want to focus on guys we actually had expectations for. Guys like Dawson Mercer, for example, would have otherwise been included on this list, but while there was a shot at a breakout from him this year, expectations were quite different for him than they were for Tage Thompson for example.

The following table then contains basic player performance data, and then the projected points per game number from the Guide, and then is sorted by the difference between the two. With the filters applied we have the top ten most disappointing players thus far who were projected over 65 points prior to the start of the season. (Data as of Thursday night.)

Tage Thompson is not technically at the top of this list, but we are going to start with him anyway. He has the highest projection on this list and his start is certainly concerning for folks who spent big on him on draft day. Thompson's four points is buoyed by his three-point night in his 10/24 game. Prior to that he had only one point over his first six games. A very rough start for him. Buffalo has shaken up their lines a bit and now Thompson is skating with Dylan Cozens and Jordan Greenway. It doesn't really seem like the best line combination, but it at least paid off in the last game. For the most part though it looks like this slow start is due to some bad luck. He is equalling his time on ice numbers (both at even strength and on the power-play) and is averaging a higher shot rate than in his previous two seasons. His personal and team shooting percentages are well off the mark of the last two seasons, and his points participation rates are also down. This is a bit of a chink in the armour though after two seasons of maintaining higher than expected numbers (both personally and on his line). He should rebound, though if he and his line don't return to those previous heights percentage-wise he might not hit the 100 point pace from 22-23.

Let's start with a couple of positives for Nikolaj Ehlers. His total time on ice is about the same as in past seasons, and with Gabriel Vilardi out he has gotten a couple of turns on the top power-play which means his total power-play time on ice is a bit up on average over 22-23. That's it. That's the positive. Ehlers does not have a goal so low shooting percentage of course, but he also only has 10 shots. He would historically have double that. His expected goals numbers have cratered to less than half of his average from the past two seasons. Sure his point participation rates, and his team shooting percentages are low, and yes if those were to bounce back a bit he could be on a 45ish point pace. Yes, mid 40s. This is not a drill, Ehlers is very definitely on notice. He has a few weeks until Vilardi comes back, but if he doesn't start shooting or clicking on the power-play he won't be worth holding.

For Trevor Zegras the situation is a bit less dire. He is getting slightly less time on ice on average, but his shot rates and expected goal numbers are up from 22-23. The implication here is that if things were clicking a little bit more in his favor he might actually be improving on his production. The problems are the usual culprits (he has no goals, so a shooting percentage of zero, plus low team shooting percentages, points participation numbers, and no power-play points to date). I don't see this continuing for Zegras, and it seems like a good time to try and buy.

Nico Hischier is an interesting case. He clearly is cold, but unlike some of these other players his shooting percentage is actually a touch too high. He has two goals on 14 shots, which isn't ridiculous, but this isn't a case of Hischier not scoring. What he isn't doing is getting assists; he has zero. He has a terrible team shooting percentage at five on five while he is on the ice and a worse points participation number. Those should dramatically improve. On the downside though he is seeing less time at even strength (about a minute and a half), is on the second power-play unit, is shooting about one shot per game less than in 22-23, and is significantly down in expected goals. These are not great indicators. So yes, he should have a few more assists at this point, and maybe another goal or two scored while he is on the ice, but I am not loving the way the numbers are trending here.

That is all for this week.

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