Hello and welcome back in to all my Cap-Friendlies out there. Fantasy playoffs are now all but over, but the best time of the year, in my opinion, is finally upon us and this goes beyond the ice as well; the Masters (hello friends), baseball is back with us, and of course round one of the NHL playoffs.

This week I wanted to touch on some injured players that you may have forgotten about you could (emphasis on could), return for playoffs. Obviously here we're only talking about players who will be on clubs that are playing next week…so for any and all Connor Murphy injury news make sure to check back over the summer.

Gabriel Landeskog – C– Colorado – 31 years old

Contract: $7M – Six years remaining – NMC

*** Missed Regular Season***

Anyone remember Gabriel Landeskog? It's hard to do sometimes with just how dominant the Colorado top line has been without him this season, but we don't have to go too far back to recall what this line with Nathan MacKinnon and Mikko Rantanen looked like together at even strength. We obviously don't have any data to pull from the regular season with Landeskog on the sideline but going back to 2021-22 he played in 51 games mounting up 59 points. That's impressive in itself but that's before playoffs where he had 22 points in 20 games along with 56 shots on goal before ultimately winning the Stanley Cup with the Avalanche. Colorado has been very quiet with his injury, and I'd like to say that they might think they could win a round one matchup without him, but look where that got them last season, as the Seattle Kraken showed them the door for an early exit. We have seen videos oh him on ice going back to January so my guess here is if he's healthy enough to suit up it might be right off the bat, or this is something that we're looking closer to early May if the Avalanche are still in the mix at that time.

Mikhail Sergachev – D– Tampa Bay – 25 years old

Contract: $8.5M– Six years remaining

2023-2024 Regular Season

GP          G             A             PTS         PPP        TOI         PPTOI    SOG       HIT         BKS

34           2              17           19           7              22:33     1:41        53           36           70

I honestly was ready to call Mikhail Sergachev out until next season coming off a broken fibia…and tibia, but then two days ago, there he is out at Tampa Bay morning skate wearing a non-contact jersey just two months after sustaining his injury. NHL players are just built different. Like I said, I had thought that this Tampa team should have maybe gone out and gotten a defenseman at the deadline before the Sergachev injury, but I have to hand it to Tampa, this is a club that's playing well right now and I could see being a hard out come playoffs. For Sergachev it's a question here of when, and of course, if. Tampa has already announced that he will not be part of the roster for round one so let's let's toss that out. Say though that Tampa is able to win a round or two and put us somewhere around the May 15^th range I could see it being feasible for them to add Sergachev to their roster prior to a round if he is healthy enough to go. It's remarkable that we're here even talking about the possibility of him returning and playing meaningful playoff hockey given his injury, tip of the helmet to him.

Aaron Ekblad – D – Florida – 28 years old

Contract: $7.5M – One year remaining – NMC

2023-2024 Regular Season

GP          G             A             PTS         PPP        TOI         PPTOI    SOG       HIT         BKS

51           4              14           18           4              20:52     1:26        98           81           60

I wrote about Aaron Ekblad in one of my recent Looking Ahead's and had written something to the effect that in order for us to assume he's going to be healthy for all of playoffs, we'd need to see four weeks of healthy hockey for him, which we just haven't seen. This was before his most recent injury and my guess here is if you're holding out hope that he's going to be back at any time for the Panthers, I'd say it's very doubtful. Even if the Panthers made it all the way back to the Stanley Cup, I just don't see a roadmap for his return, and that's going off of how quickly the Panthers dispelled him from the rest of the regular season. Crazier things have happened I know, but this is one that is far less likely than the others we've listed thus far.

Tomas Hertl – LW – Vegas – 30 years old

Contract: $6.7– Six year's remaining – RS NMC

2023-2024 Regular Season

GP          G             A             PTS         PPP        TOI         PPTOI    SOG       HIT         BKS

49           15           20           35           10           20:53     2:57        114         52           46

April 2^nd, Tomas Hertl is on the ice for Vegas. Deep breaths, it's happening. April 10^th, Tomas Hertl listed in the lineup for Vegas. Exhale, it's happening. Let's be honest with ourselves here, Vegas is one of the savviest organizations we have right now in the NHL, there's no way they make the trade for him two months ago to hopefully have him on the roster come this October. This was always part of the plan and I'm very curious to see just how this all looks on the ice for Vegas. I take Hertl's stats with a grain of salt a little bit here because of the situation he was in with the Sharks, but in his last playoff appearance back in 2018-2019, he did have ten goals in 19 games played. I think here, we reacted to the trade but remember even when the trade deadline happened, Vegas wasn't a sure thing to make playoffs at the time. Now circumstances are different, but this is a club with a very good top six forward and tp four defense that could really go on another run here.

*Salary Cap data from CapFriendly.com

For continued fantasy news and notes, follow me on Twitter @ndySanz.