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, Brennan Des and Dobber

—

There's still time to fix your pool with the 2024 Midseason Guide!

You’ll find second-half projections, sleepers, advanced stats, historical trends, prospects you need to know, and much more. For more information and to make your purchase in case you haven't done so yet, click here. Help support what we do by grabbing your copy today!

—

1. Top-tier rookies like Adam Fantilli, Leo Carlsson, Luke Hughes, and Brock Faber have all met and exceeded expectations for what they could do so early in their careers. Fantilli has been playing a top-line center role in many games, and has a 47-point pace to show for it. He has upped his rate from his Q1 numbers of 10 in 23 to 15 in 21 for Q2. Carlsson has been similarly successful, albeit in a limited number of games due to injury and load management. He is playing over 18 minutes per game with top scorers though, but his on ice shooting percentage is half of what it should be. The numbers should tick up in the second half.

On defense, Luke Hughes was the big name at the start of the season, and has been putting up similar fantasy numbers to Miro Heiskanen – if Heiskanen has a ton of value in your league (and he should), then Hughes is right up there as well. The flavour of the month though has to be Brock Faber, who has taken over a lot of Calder discourse, and he may even get a couple of Norris mentions when the season is through. He has been spectacular in all corners of the ice, and in Q2 has been getting some heavy power play usage as well which really makes him fantasy relevant. Once Minnesota is healthy on the back end that may recede, but Faber and Hughes will both be solid owns all year. (jan17)

2. The rest of the rookie group can be sorted into three quick headings.

– Surprised early on and should continue to succeed:

Connor Zary, Dmitri Voronkov, Pavel Mintyukov

– Strong in the first half but may tail off to some degree (or already have):

Logan Cooley, Tyson Foerster, Bobby Brink

– Struggled in the first half but should do better to close out the year:

Devon Levi (assuming he isn’t demoted again), Matthew Knies, Luke Evangelista, Simon Nemec (only here because he was called up late)

Overall, lots of fun rookies this year. The next few years should be no different. (jan17)

3. As expected, the Senators have signed Shane Pinto to a one-year, $775,000 contract. Pinto is expected to return from his half-season suspension on Sunday, so it will be interesting to see how the Senators draw their lines up the middle with Josh Norris projected to return at around that time as well. In the Midseason Guide, we projected Pinto to center the third line while scoring at about a 40-point pace. Since he is rostered in only about 4% of Yahoo leagues and 32% of Fantrax leagues, he could be worth taking a flier on in deeper leagues. (jan20)

4. I’m kind of surprised that Vitek Vanecek is still rostered in so many leagues (87% Fantrax/67% Yahoo), although that could be because he was drafted in so many leagues. Among the 18 goalies with as many games played as Vanecek (26 GP), only Joonas Korpisalo has a lower quality start percentage than Vanecek (38.5 QS%). New Jersey goalies are still kind of risky while they’re battling a bunch of injuries, although they’re a team that could be much stronger if they start to return to health. I’d lean toward Nico Daws if picking a Devils goalie, although he could very easily be returned to the AHL if he struggles. (jan20)

5. What about Brandon Montour, you ask? It’s been tough sledding for Montour, who has just one goal and 10 points in 29 games since returning from offseason shoulder surgery. Montour is at least shooting the puck, having averaged four shots in each of his last three games. The overall ice time (over 23 minutes per game) and the power-play time are also still there, so it simply might be a matter of being patient as his luck will eventually turn around. Yet because of the surgery and late start, 2023-24 simply was never going to be the same as his breakout 2022-23. (jan20)

6. I’m going to cut right to the chase here. If you need goaltending help, go kick the tires on Ukko-Pekka Luukkonen, who posted back-to-back shutouts this week. It’s clear that 6K has taken over the Buffalo net with his recent play, forcing Devon Levi into a backup role. I think the better scenario for the Sabres would be to send the 22-year-old Levi to the AHL for more playing time and promote Eric Comrie to be the backup. The best short-term solution to get back into the playoff chase, and the best long-term solution for goalie development. Since being sent to the AHL in early January, Comrie has two wins and a shutout in three games.  (jan19)

7. Jared Spurgeon will miss the rest of the regular season with multiple injuries. Spurgeon will undergo hip surgery in early February and back surgery in early March. He is expected to be ready for training camp in September.

Spurgeon’s absence will hurt the Wild, who are trying to climb back into a Western Conference playoff spot. However, Brock Faber should continue to benefit with high overall minutes and top power-play usage as he makes a run at the Calder Trophy. Since Spurgeon has a $7.575 million cap hit that they can hide on LTIR, don’t be surprised if Minnesota acquires another defenseman. (jan19)

8. Jonathan Huberdeau, waiver wire pickup? Huberdeau had eight points over his last six games entering yesterday's matchup against the Oilers. Yes, that seems to be the basic criteria for recommending adding any player, let alone a slumping former 100-point scorer. Huberdeau has even been back on the first-unit power play for the past few games. (jan19)

9. Injury update for the Golden Knights:

Jack Eichel underwent knee surgery recently and is expected to miss the next four to six weeks.

Shea Theodore is expected to remain sidelined for another three to four weeks.

William Karlsson might be available in early February following the All-Star break. (jan19)

For injury news and other player news, check out the news page on Frozen Tools. 

10. Martin Necas returned to the Hurricanes’ lineup on Friday after a five-game absence (upper-body injury). He made his presence felt with a goal and an assist with a plus-2 and six shots on goal. I nearly had to drop him in one league because I had more injured players than IR slots, but fortunately I was able to hold on. Glad I did. (jan20)

With Carolina’s power play rolling the way it is, it may be a while before he sees top PP time, so it’s unlikely he sees much of an uptick in production anytime soon. Things (lines) change quickly in the NHL, though. (jan18)

11. Boone Jenner (broken jaw) back in the fold is a big deal for the Columbus goaltending in particular. The team’s penalty kill was very poor with both him and Sean Kuraly out of the lineup. With Jenner back, and Kuraly having returned already, it should be a bit easier for the Blue Jackets’s netminders on the PK. (jan18)

12. Back in November, I wrote about how players were missing the net an awful lot when compared to recent seasons. Fellow fantasy hockey enthusiasts are encouraged to go see what was going on in the NHL through the first month, and the follow-up to that piece that expanded on things like hits and blocks per game played. For a brief summary:

• Through four weeks, just 50.6% of all shot attempts landed on target. Recent seasons had seen marks of 55.8% and 53.7%. That means for every 100 shot attempts taken, an extra ~five were not hitting the net when compared to just two seasons ago. The 2022-23 NHL season had 152 702 shot attempts so that change would result in thousands of fewer shots in a season.
• Blocked shots per player per game went up 20.8% between 2021-22 and the early portions of 2023-24.  

Now that most of the league has played at least 41 games, it’s time for a check-in to see if (and how) that has changed. Again, data from Natural Stat Trick for this.

As of Wednesday afternoon, there was a total of 24 762 individual player games in the NHL thus far in 2023-24. Those 24 762 games have resulted in a total of 21 691 blocks, or 0.876 blocks per man game played. (jan18)

[Follow the link for the complete analysis…]

13. If what you’re looking for isn’t in our 2024 Midseason Fantasy Guide, then maybe it can be a new feature on FrozenTools. We’re adding new pieces all the time!

14. I have been working on updating my Salary Cap Keeper League Rankings for the month of January should be out on the 25^th as usual), and I wanted to go over a bunch of players who I am revisiting from pre-season projections, and what they have done to this point.

Let’s start with Josh Morrissey, whose bandwagon I did not get on at all last season. Well he just kept trucking along, and finished the 2022-2023 campaign with 76 points in 78 games. He has followed it up with a 62-point-pace (entering Saturday), and the underlying numbers all look super smooth. He should be able to continue clicking in the 60- to 70-point range for a few more seasons. Especially if Winnipeg continues to score like the top-seeded team in the standings that they currently are. (jan17)

15. Two other interesting names high up the cap rankings list are Alex Tuch and Ryan Nugent-Hopkins, who are both on long-term, extremely team-friendly deals. Tuch seems to be settling into that same points range as Morrissey, which isn’t as spectacular for a right winger, especially considering the shot and hit rates are pretty similar too. Solid, but unspectacular at this point, though still someone you should be very comfortable owning assuming you didn’t spend a top-50 asset acquiring him.

A top-50 asset like Ryan Nugent-Hopkins for example, who may be turning 31 this year, but is picking up close to where he left off from last year’s 100-point season. His shooting percentage and PPIPP have normalized, so this 80-point range seems to be more in line with what we should expect moving forward. Still excellent, but hopefully you sold-high in the offseason.

Brayden Point is another player who has dropped similarly to RNH, from the 100-point range to a point-per-game pace. Point has a previous history of putting up a 95-point-season, but that appears to be his ultimate upside, when he has everything fall his way, and shoots at 22% on the season. This year, he’s back down to his much more consistent 17% shooting percentage (entering Saturday), and around his usual 80-point-pace. That’s likely what we can expect for the next few years, because you can’t bank on those big years popping up every five seasons, you just have to ride them when they come. (jan17)

[Follow the link for more…]

16. Let the rumours on Anthony Duclair begin… He could see a big stock jump with a move. Especially if it’s somewhere with some high-octane forwards like Colorado or Vegas as fill-ins for Valeri Nichushkin or Jack Eichel. (jan17)

17. In a game against Boston earlier in the week, Luke Hughes and Simon Nemec both skated over 25 minutes (the former over 28 minutes) thanks to an injury to Brendan Smith. I wonder how often a (likely) playoff team has had two rookie blue liners skate over 25 minutes in any game. (jan16)

18. Forty (40) games in, 40 games, let's take a measured look at which players have improved or declined in various fantasy stats in their most recent first 20-or-so games as compared to the first 20-or-so contests of the season.

Data from Natural Stat Trick or Frozen Tools, unless otherwise indicated, and as of last Monday morning. We will limit it to players who’ve managed at least 10 games in both ‘halves’ to give us some sort of sample to work with. We will quickly hit on the important points to try and cover as many players as possible.

Improvements

Nazem Kadri

Aside from Jacob Markstrom (.926 SV% through 12 starts in this sample), one of the biggest reasons for Calgary’s recent surge is Kadri. He had 4 goals, 10 assists, and 66 shots in 22 games to start with but has 10 goals, 10 assists, and 70 shots in his last 21 outings. Part of the credit goes to Connor Zary, too, but positive regression is a hell of a drug.

Bo Horvat

On the topic of positive regression, Horvat’s points/game has risen 60% over the two halves as his line with Mathew Barzal finally saw their shots find the back of the net (Anders Lee deserves a nod here, too). New York has split up this duo recently but keeps reuniting them for the third period. It is little wonder why.

Sebastian Aho

Though he didn’t have a bad start with a point-per-game mark through 17 games, Aho has 10 goals and 21 assists in his last 22 outings. Notably, Aho has added over 0.3 shots/game to his repertoire, and that’s push him north of 3.1 shots per game in that second half. He and Andrei Svechnikov have been on another planet. (jan16)

[Follow the link for more…]

19. Declines

Leon Draisaitl

In a weird twist, despite Edmonton’s scoring rebound, Draisaitl had 19 assists in 20 games in the first half but just six helpers in 19 games in the most recent stretch. He has even seen his shots/game drop by 0.3 in that span. The note here is that his Individual Points Percentage (IPP, or the rate at which he registers a point on goals scored) fell from 77.8% to 51.5%. He has zero seasons with at least 50 games played where his IPP is below 70%, so a rebound should be coming.

Mason McTavish

It has been tough sledding for the second-year forward as he was injured in early December and missed nearly three weeks. With that said, he has seen sizable drops in goals, assists, and shots per game. The concerning part, aside from all of Anaheim’s injuries/trades, is his shot attempts/minute fell 34.5%. Regression hit his line, but the collapsing shot volume is the red flag.

Brayden Point

Small drops in goals and shots per game don’t mean a whole lot when splitting samples like this, but Point has seen a massive drop in his assists going from 0.82/game to 0.27/game. He has just six in his last 22 contests, and that’s a problem for a guy who doesn’t normally offer high peripheral levels. He isn’t an elite playmaker so it’s likely just regression from the fast start he had, but it’s something to monitor. (jan16)

[Follow the link for more…]

20. I don’t think the magnitude of Charlie Lindgren‘s accomplishments this season have been discussed enough. Among goalies that have made at least 10 appearances (entering Saturday), he ranked second in save percentage, posting a .927 through 18 games. His 2.22 GAA placed him tied for fifth among the same group. In contrast, Washington’s other goalie, Darcy Kuemper, owned a .895 save percentage and 3.13 GAA through 23 appearances.

Given the margin by which he’s outperformed Kuemper thus far, I imagine Lindgren should see more action in the second half. Goalies tend to take more time to develop than skaters, so it’s not outlandish to suggest that Lindgren is breaking out at 30 years of age. A delayed breakout makes all the more sense when you consider he played just 28 NHL games between the 2015-16 and 2021-22 seasons. His largest workload came last year when he started 31 games for the Capitals. If all goes well, he should eclipse that this year. Concerns about (1) his lack of experience and (2) the quality of his team are valid, but considering he was available in ~60% of Yahoo/Fantrax leagues, you’d be hard-pressed to find better options just sitting on the waiver wire. (jan15)

21. On the topic of underrated goalies, it’s criminal that Samuel Ersson hasn’t received more love this year, but maybe that’s fitting given all the robberies he’s committed. Although he got off to a rough start early on, allowing five goals in his first appearance and seven in his second, he hasn’t surrendered more than three goals in a game since. Ersson’s 12-4-2 record in that span is icing on the cake. Although Carter Hart started this season as the Flyers’ undisputed number one, we’re starting to see a time share develop in Philadelphia. Like Lindgren (above), Ersson was still available in most fantasy leagues. (jan15)

—

Have a good week, folks!

Thanks for continuing to support the website and if you’re bored and need a fantasy hockey fix – visit the gang in the forum here.