The 2024-25 Dobber Hockey Fantasy Guide has been released! We like to get it out earlier than other publications so that it gives fantasy hockey fanatics a couple of months to prepare for the season at their leisure, but there is another by-product, too. With it being online-only, it gets constantly updated through to the start of the season, and that means we can keep track of changes on how players are viewed through the offseason and right until opening puck drop. Help support what we do year-round by grabbing your copy of the Guide today!

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I am someone who doesn't sports bet a lot. I will throw some money on some teams' full-year point totals or on the (hopeful) Stanley Cup winner, but that's about it. The betting markets are very useful, though, for gauging interest in certain players and teams. For that reason, I thought it'd be worth taking the time to go over some particular betting markets and then check back in before the season starts to see how things change.

The sites mentioned here – Bet365 and Pinnacle, mostly – are not affiliated with Dobber and we do not have any sort of partnership with them. I just use these sites because they're easiest for me in my jurisdiction. Alright, let's look at where some bettors stand.

New Jersey Devils

What stuck out to me like a Where's Waldo puzzle set in the Antarctic was the view on the Devils. Pinnacle has the Devils at ~13.5-1 to win the Stanley Cup with only Edmonton, Florida, Colorado, and Dallas having shorter odds (meaning more likely to win). Things stand out even more at Bet365 where the Edmonton Oilers are the only team with shorter odds than the Devils:

There is more to this than simply adding Jacob Markstrom, Brett Pesce, and some depth options. This is also about a team rebounding from a season where they endured a lot of critical injury issues (something I wrote about in their season round-up back in May). Adding a goalie, a top-4 defenceman, and some depth doesn't take a non-playoff team and makes them one of the most likely candidates for a Stanley Cup; the injury rebounds from Jack Hughes and Dougie Hamilton are absolutely part of that.

It makes me wonder where we see some ADPs land for all their fantasy-relevant options. I noticed that Jack Hughes is the fifth-ranked centre by Underdog Fantasy best ball league ADPs while Hamilton is a top-8 defenceman. There may not be much of a discount on the top options when drafts roll around in a month or so.

Columbus Blue Jackets

As far as the Stanley Cup goes, this certainly isn't the year for Columbus. One thing I did not expect, though, was how low the betting markets are on the Jackets. Pinnacle has them 31^st by Cup odds at 235-1 with Bet365 at 201-1. If we look at the line for their season's point totals, they're sitting at 69.5 points. The only team with a lower full-season point total outlook is San Jose at 63.5. Another Lottery season for the Jackets is a bleak outlook.

If the Devils are set for a big rebound due to better injury luck, it's hard not to imagine the same for the Jackets. Patrik Laine will either be back or traded for a reasonable haul, Adam Fantilli is back to full health, Boone Jenner wouldn't have missed so much time if not for a personal tragedy, and so on. All their young prospects have another year of experience under their belt. They even have a coach that should make it all the way to Game 1 of the regular season. This is a team that finished with 66 points last year, so just a couple more wins would move them past that 69.5-point line.

All that isn't to say that the Blue Jackets are a great, or even good, team. But it feels like there are going to be some good draft values. If guys like Fantilli and Kirill Marchenko keep dropping outside the top-150 picks of fantasy drafts, I will have a lot of Fantilli and Marchenko on my fantasy rosters this season.

Nashville Predators

The darlings of the offseason have it reflected in the betting markets. Over at Pinnacle, the Predators are fifth by Cup odds among Western teams (~19-1) with only Edmonton, Colorado, Dallas, and Vegas being higher. On Bet365, they are sixth from the West but have shorter odds overall (~18-1). Regardless, after Edmonton, Colorado, and Dallas, the markets have the Predators in the mix with teams like Vegas and Vancouver, and in some cases are closer in odds to Colorado than they are to the next tier down (Los Angeles and Winnipeg).

Bettors being moderately bullish on Nashville is also reflected in some ADPs. While perusing the best ball ADPs from Underdog, I noticed that Stamkos (27.8) is going early in the third round and is in the same tier as Kyle Connor (25.6) and Alex Ovechkin (26.9). It does make for an interesting question – would you rather draft Stamkos or Ovechkin this season in leagues that count hits – but it also shows us there won't be any sort of discount on Stamkos this year. There won't be one on Filip Forsberg, either, as his Underdog ADP is about 10^th overall, and ahead of Matthew Tkachuk, William Nylander, and Artemi Panarin:

Again, this is a format that counts hits, but that feels like an ADP that takes all the value out of drafting Forsberg.

Anaheim Ducks

It was a bad year for Anaheim last season, but they did finish the year with as many regulation wins (21) as Columbus, and one more than Montreal (20). The Ducks had such a low point total because they didn't go to overtime very often, but their points line is still 70.5 on Bet365. That would require them to add six wins from last season.

It makes for a lively discussion. Anaheim should have a healthy Trevor Zegras and Pavel Mintyukov, a full year from Leo Carlsson, more experience for Mason McTavish, the introduction of Cutter Gauthier, and a hopeful rebound from Troy Terry. There are a lot of nice pieces, but adding six wins in a Conference with some heavy hitters at the top and a basement that saw teams improve across the board might make it a tall task.

Whether they add six wins doesn't really matter for fantasy, though. It isn't hard to see this team being somewhat similar to the Montreal Canadiens roster from 2023-24: good offensive production at the top but a bad defensive roster that keeps them far from the playoffs. They likely aren't even a bubble playoff team, but it's not hard to see them being a middle-of-the-road offensive side but with a lack of defence that hurts the team's point total.

That could make for some wild fantasy valuations. Some players could end up with 30-goal, 60-point seasons but with awful plus/minus ratings (Frank Vatrano) that hurt them in some formats. In the non-plus/minus formats, they will carry a lot more value. Someone like Zegras could be a 70-point guy but without much for peripherals which would make him a pretty good points-only value but a pretty bad multi-cat value. There may not be a more fascinating team in the league, from a fantasy perspective.

Jacob Markstrom

Earlier, we discussed how high the betting markets are on the Devils. However, when looking at Vezina Trophy odds, there is a clear top-5 of Igor Shesterkin, Jeremy Swayman, Connor Hellebuyck, Ilya Sorokin, and Thatcher Demko. After that, there is a group of six goaltenders and one of them is Markström at 13-1. My thought process goes like this: if the Devils end up as a top-5 team in the league this season, and Markström makes 55-60 starts, it seems like there's a decent chance the Devils are a top-5 team because Markström plays very well. New Jersey's offence will be part of the equation, but that will only help their new netminder rack up the wins, and that's something that the Vezina voters love.

That is why when I look at the Underdog ADPs, it's kind of jarring seeing Markström at 12^th overall. How much bigger of a risk is he, really, than others ranked ahead of him like Andrei Vasilevskiy or Alexander Georgiev? Out of that trio, I would way rather have Markström, and if I can get him at a discount, all the better.

Matvei Michkov

One thing I've wondered about with Matvei Michkov is this: if Philadelphia leaves him at right wing, how much ice time can he possibly earn? The team just extended Travis Konecny for eight years, and they still have Tyson Foerster whom may have earned John Tortorella's trust. Even if they move players to the left wing, it's hard to see Michkov come anywhere close to the same level of ice time as Konecny, and that would cap his ice time at around 17, possibly 18, minutes per game. He has the shortest odds at Bet365 for the Calder Trophy but Macklin Celebrini and Logan Stankoven (yes, he still qualifies as a rookie) are very close behind.

One thing I will say is that Michkov's ADP looks like it'll be a lot more reasonable than Connor Bedard's was last season. Over at Underdog, Michkov is carrying an ADP outside the top-100 picks, whereas last season Bedard was sometimes going in the first three rounds. I think taking Michkov sometime in the 9^th-10^th round is perfectly fine, though I'm not sure he'll be put in a position for a huge rookie season simply because of where he'll be slotted on the roster.