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

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1. One of the ways the NHL has changed in the last 10 years is the involvement of defencemen in the offence. Being able to make a first pass has always been important, but being able to carry the puck out of the zone, jump into the play, and become another attacker in the offensive zone is vital to producing points.

To that end, let’s look through data from AllThreeZones to see which defencemen have improved (or declined) in offensive areas other than just points to see which might be ready for takeoff in 2024-25, or might be hit with a red flag. With fantasy trade deadlines approaching, being able to identify rearguards making genuine improvements is important to rebuilding fantasy rosters for future seasons. We will limit our search to players with at least 150 tracked minutes in both seasons. That will necessarily preclude rookies from consideration.

Today, we will look at those jumping into the rush. The tracking data has both shots off the rush and assists off the rush, and they combine for overall rush offence. There are four blue liners that have added at least two shots/assists per 60 minutes off the rush at 5-on-5 from last season (at time of writing):

Adam Pelech

The Islanders are fourth in the league for share of their 5-on-5 shot attempts coming from defencemen with only Carolina, Colorado, and San Jose (?) ranking higher. The Islanders are not a team that plays off the rush very much though as they have the sixth-lowest rating in rush offence this season. Pelech’s point production has suffered because of his one goal (and zero at 5-on-5) but missing so much time due to injury gives us a wonky sample. With a new coach in town and the core locked up for a while, Pelech doing more of this should be good for future seasons, though this is now two years in a row he’s missed at least 20 games, and he turns 30 years old this summer. (feb27)

[Follow the link for the complete breakdown]

2. In Tuesday’s Ramblings (above), we looked at which defencemen have improved their offensive contributions off the rush when compared to 2022-23. We briefly touched on a couple of blue liners that have seen declines, but it’s worth looking more into which defenders have been less involved off the rush.

Again, the primary data source is the game tracking at AllThreeZones but we will also be using data from Natural Stat Trick, Evolving Hockey, and Frozen Tools. We are limiting our sample to defencemen with at least 150 tracked minutes in each of the last two seasons (160 defencemen total) and it’s all at 5-on-5. At time of writing:

Kaiden Guhle

Though likely not thought of as a player that jumps into the rush all that often, Guhle was in the 86^th percentile for shots/60 and assists/60 combined off the rush in 2022-23, and higher than names like Mikhail Sergachev, Charlie McAvoy, and Quinn Hughes. That has dropped considerably in 2023-24, giving us the 16^th-largest drop season-over-season.

Montreal, as a team, is playing much less off the rush this season than last, going from a top-10 team to outside the top-20. There has been an increased focus on defence and it’s hurt Guhle’s production as his points/60 at 5-on-5 have fallen by 38%. The team is allowing fewer shots and far fewer goals with Guhle on the ice this season, so that focus is paying off, and this is just part of his development; he just turned 22 years old in January and his next game will be Game 100 of his career. It will be interesting to see if this swings back the other way in 2024-25. (feb29)

[Follow the link for the complete breakdown]

3. So yeah, the Senators could look different very soon. Vladimir Tarasenko seems like the perfect rental for someone. Same for Dominik Kubalik for a team on a tight budget. Could the Sens really shake things up and trade Jakob Chychrun? The trade deadline is in one week, so we’ll find out soon. (mar2)

4. Has Philipp Grubauer reclaimed the starting role in Seattle? Grubauer has four wins and five quality starts in his last six games, also appearing in each of the Kraken’s last five games. Meanwhile, Joey Daccord has allowed four goals in each of his last two appearances, getting pulled for Grubauer in his last game. I wouldn’t say that Grubauer is on completely solid footing here, but he has the advantage of the much larger contract ($5.9 million AAV versus $1.2 million AAV for Daccord). (mar2)

5. Ilya Mikheyev scored 10 goals over his first 28 games. Since then, he has been held without a goal in his last 30 games. Since I watch plenty of Canucks games, I can tell you that Mikheyev has speed to burn and can get to pucks, but he has absolutely no finish around the net. The Canucks are trying to break a slump (losses in six of past seven games), so they don’t have time to be patient with him. After spending much of the first half on Elias Pettersson‘s line, Mikheyev has been downgraded to filling in on the third line with Conor Garland and Teddy Blueger while Dakota Joshua is sidelined. If he still doesn’t start scoring, then he may end up even further down the lineup or in the press box. (mar2)

6. Lukas Dostal had to face everything but the kitchen sink on Friday night. Dostal had to make 50 saves, including on a penalty shot attempt from Jack Hughes with just two seconds remaining to earn a 4-3 win over New Jersey.

Dostal had not earned a win or a quality start in his previous six games, so don’t blame yourself if you missed out on this one. This is the second time this season that Dostal has made 50+ saves in a game. That seems par for the course if you’re a Ducks goalie, though. It’s not going to get easier with their young defense.

The Ducks had just traded Ilya Lyubushkin, and Cam Fowler was out of the lineup with a facial injury. That meant that not only was Olen Zellweger recalled from the AHL, but he was on the top power play. He didn’t register a point, but he might be worth adding to your watch list. Pavel Mintyukov and Jackson LaCombe both logged over 20 minutes and should continue to receive plenty of ice time with the vacancies on defense. Mintyukov received over 26 minutes on Thursday against the Sharks. (mar2)

7. Frank Vatrano, who has eight goals over his past 11 games, is also one goal shy of reaching 30 goals for the first time in his career. He is also two points away from reaching 50 points for the first time. Vatrano has a very affordable $3.65 million cap hit, so the Ducks are probably taking a few calls about him. However, he has another season left on his contract. Vatrano is averaging over 18 minutes of total icetime and over two minutes of power-play time per game, which I’m not so sure he would receive with a deeper contending team.

8. One Duck who seems even more likely to be dealt is Adam Henrique. On the final year of his contract, Henrique has 23 points over his last 22 games, including a goal on Friday. Henrique also has a cap hit of $5.825 million, so teams will be more likely to ask whether the Ducks can retain a bit of salary. Henrique would help a team with his scoring and ability to win faceoffs (52.9 FOW%), but like Vatrano, he could be pushed down the lineup of a team with more depth than the Ducks. (mar2)

9. The Devils’ goaltending has been anything but great. But the Devils don’t defend well either. As a result, they have a team goals-against average that is barely better than the league’s worst teams. If Jacob Markstrom is in fact traded to Jersey, I don’t like his fantasy prospects for the rest of the season. Have you noticed yet that I’m not that high fantasy-wise on players getting traded at the deadline? The latest Frozen Tools Forensics research from Chris Kane seems to support that.

Maybe Markstrom would improve on Vitek Vanecek, Akira Schmid, and Nico Daws, though. All three of those goalies have a 3.00+ GAA and sub-.900 SV%. Daws allowed four goals on 14 shots before getting the hook after two periods on Friday. He has a bright future, but he has been tagged with three really bad starts over his last five games. (mar2)

10. In case you missed it, the possibility of a Markstrom trade seems to be more of a possibility, according to Eric Francis of Sportsnet. With the Flames already moving out Elias Lindholm and Chris Tanev, and with Noah Hanifin a strong possibility to also be traded, Markstrom might not be long for the Flames either. After all, the Flames might be able to get by with Dan Vladar and Dustin Wolf in net. (mar2)

11. Joseph Woll made his long-awaited return to the Leafs lineup on Thursday. Playing in his first game since December 7, Woll stopped 30 of 32 shots while earning a 3-2 win over Arizona. Hopefully you were able to activate him in time.

With Woll back, the Leafs are now carrying three goalies. Sending Martin Jones to the AHL doesn’t seem fair with the way he held their season together when Woll was injured and Ilya Samsonov was struggling. The three-headed monster won’t be ideal if you need volume, but any of these three are worth starting with the Leafs having won eight of their last nine games. (mar1)

12. Late on Thursday, the Leafs also acquired Ilya Lyubushkin in a three-way trade with Anaheim and Carolina involving draft picks. Lyubushkin is just outside the top 10 in the combined hits/blocks category (250 HIT+BLK), but he rarely scores (0 G and 4 A in 55 GP entering Saturday action). He should help in the physical department as the Leafs push for the playoffs. (mar1)

13. It might be time to bench Connor Ingram, if you haven’t already. After a surprisingly strong first half, Ingram is without a win or a quality start in his last six games. Karel Vejmelka hasn’t exactly made a strong case for more starts, as he recorded his first win and quality start in 10 games just this past Thursday. Avoid Coyotes goalies until the team shows signs of getting back on track. (mar1)

14. Logan Stankoven (3-1-4 in five games) might be generously listed at 5-8, but he is already standing tall at hockey’s highest level. Stankoven has been on a line with Jamie Benn and Wyatt Johnston most of the time, a line that is taking more shots and shot attempts than it is allowing (63.6 SF% and 59.8 CF%, respectively).

Although nothing is ever certain, expect Stankoven to remain with the big club even when Tyler Seguin returns. As of a few days ago, Seguin is considered week-to-week with a lower-body injury. (mar1)

15. Alexander Nylander probably isn’t on your fantasy radar either. He certainly hasn’t been on mine. But I’ll just throw his Thursday statline out there: 1 PPG, 1 A, 4 SOG, 19:40 TOI, 70.2% PP (yes, top power-play minutes).  Do with that what you will. Since the Blue Jackets are nowhere near a playoff spot, don’t be surprised to see them give former first-round pick Nylander (now 25 years of age) a bit of a run with some important minutes. He has posted some decent AHL numbers but has never been able to gain much traction in the NHL. (mar1)

16. Morgan Geekie completed his first career hat trick on Thursday, also reaching 30 points for the first time in his career. As a result of moving from Seattle to Boston in the offseason, Geekie has seen his ice time increase five minutes per game, with some of the ice time in the form of power-play time. With just 235 career NHL games as a 6-3 forward entering Saturday, Geekie could continue to build on his point total. (mar1)

17. Minnesota announced the signing of Marat Khusnutdinov, a second-round pick from 2020. He had 20 points in 55 games this season in the KHL and 41 points in 63 games last season. The forward's Dobber Prospects profile can be read here. (feb29)

18. Calgary traded defenceman Chris Tanev to the Dallas Stars for a second-round pick, a conditional third, and prospect Artem Grushnikov. Alex had his take on the trade here.

There isn’t too much to add to what Alex said. Fantasy-wise, I think Oliver Kylington will be the big winner with Tanev gone (and potentially Noah Hanifin in the next few days), and all of Nils Lundkvist (when healthy), Ryan Suter, and Jani Hakanpaa (when healthy) take a ding to their fantasy value. It should help the Dallas netminders a bit, though, which is good news for Jake Oetinger owners. (feb29)

19. Jack Eichel is back on the ice, and while he was still wearing a red no-contact jersey (at mid-week), it’s a good sign that he will be returning to game action soon. With Eichel returning soon, his most common linemate Ivan Barbashev is likely to benefit as well. Barbashev tends to revert to a 40-point-pace most of the time, but he does put up 60-point stretches sometimes – most notably last year’s playoffs. He could very well start another streak with 20 games to go. (feb28)

20. As an owner of his in a cap league where I am approaching the deadline without a championship hope, I have had some inquiries on Travis Sanheim. He’s a tough player to pin down exactly what to expect with, so I just want to put in my two cents on what to expect moving forward. The 27-year-old isn’t buoyed by any kind of high underlying metrics, so I think this season’s jump is just him developing as a player which has lined up with the team around him finally scoring more. He was way too hot at the start of the year, but then went ice cold for a while too. He seems to have settled into the middle-ground now with a 50-point-pace. (feb28)

21. According to Frank Seravalli: At least one team, believed to be #njdevils, has shown real interest in Juuse Saros last few weeks. But #preds say they’re intent on keeping Saros so long as they’re in the playoffs.

Looking at another trade deadline situation, I can’t help but think as a Preds fan that this would be a missed opportunity to get a massive haul for Juuse Saros. Yaroslav Askarov is the goalie of the future here, and a trade has to come either now or in the offseason to maximize the return. The team may be the in playoff hunt, but they are not necessarily worse off with Askarov in net and a larger package in return for Saros, especially if there was a higher-end young forward coming back like a Dawson Mercer or Martin Necas that could help lengthen the Predators’ forward group. Maybe that’s just me talking with my fantasy hockey glasses on. (feb28)

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Have a good week, folks!
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