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. Three teams returned home with 0-2 deficits in their series and all pulled out wins to get back into their series on Friday. In fact, I would argue that Friday was the day that the 2025 playoffs really started to get good. 

Here's what's on tap today:

Jets (2) @ Blues (1)
Hurricanes (2) @ Devils (1)
Capitals (2) @ Cabadiens (1)
Kings (2) @ Oilers (1)

Still with Friday, the storyline entering Game 3 was the fact that Oilers' backup Calvin Pickard was tasked to after Stuart Skinner had allowed 11 goals over the first two games. This was a similar scenario from last season, where Pickard replaced a struggling Skinner for a relief appearance followed by two starts in the second round against Vancouver. The goaltending situation has some fantasy implications, as another subpar playoff performance from Skinner could mean that the Oilers decide to move on from him. Skinner has one year left on his contract, entering UFA status in 2026. (apr26)

2. After nearly three years without being able to play in an NHL game, Colorado Avalanche winger, and captain, Gabriel Landeskog made his return to the lineup. It has been an extensive recovery from his knee cartilage transplant surgery but he has made it all the way back in one of the best stories of the season.

Also returning to the lineup after an extended absence was Edmonton Oilers forward Evander Kane. He missed the entire 2024-25 regular season with hip, abdomen, hernia, and knee surgeries. He took the place of Jeff Skinner, who was healthy scratched after playing his first-ever playoff game. (apr25)

3. Defenceman Zeev Buium, playing his third career NHL game, registered his first career NHL point by assisting on Kirill Kaprizov‘s first of two PP goals in the Wild's Game 3 win against the Golden Knights. That was the second game in a row where Buium was on the top PP unit, for those thinking ahead to the 2025-26 fantasy hockey season. (apr25)

4. My two Ramblings this past week started the review of my preseason projections. On Tuesday, we discussed forwards whose goal-scoring totals were far lower than my projections, and yesterday (Thursday) we covered forwards whose goal-scoring totals were far higher than my projections. Today, we’ll look at the goal totals that landed very close to my personal projection.

As always, final season totals are from Natural Stat Trick. Also, we are looking at forwards with at least 41 games played and were projected for at least 10 goals, which is a sample of 285 forwards. (Oddly enough, there were 283 forwards who played at least 41 games and scored at least 10 goals, so we aren’t far off, overall). Let’s go through some key names that were +/- 2% from their projected goal total:

Adam Fantilli (Columbus Blue Jackets]

Yesterday’s Ramblings looked at Kent Johnson, who greatly out-scored my projection. The total for Fantilli, though, was nearly bang-on. That projection is why Fantilli was one of my most-drafted centres this season. It wasn’t just the time without Sean Monahan on the roster, either, as Fantilli scored 19 of his 31 goals in the 54 games with Monahan in the lineup (a 29-goal pace).

Of course, Fantilli shooting 17.9% at 5-on-5 had a lot to do with his success. He also played for the team that led the league in 5-on-5 goal scoring and is tied for second in goals/60 minutes at 5-on-5 over the last two seasons. How much of it is Fantilli and how much of it is his environment is a fair question. All the same, he’ll be in the same environment next season so it’s hard to not be excited. (apr25)

5. Alex Tuch (Buffalo Sabres)

This is a case where I was high on the Sabres because of the downturn they had the season before. That led to coach Don Granato being fired and Lindy Ruff being hired in the offseason. To me, hiring Ruff meant Buffalo creating more off the rush at 5-on-5 than in 2023-24, and creating more high-danger shots. That is exactly what happened.

Along with his team, Tuch created more shots off the rush than the year before, and his rate of shots off high-danger passes from teammates more than doubled. Maybe there was a bit of luck (his 17.2% shooting at 5-on-5 was a career-high) but there were also fundamental (and predictable) changes that came to Buffalo’s offence with the introduction of their new coach. It will be hard for Tuch to replicate a 36-goal season without more shots just because of the elevated shooting percentage, but if he can be a regular on the top PP unit next season as he was over the final month of this season? It would help him repeat as a 30-goal scorer for the first time in his career. (apr25)

6. Jake DeBrusk (Vancouver Canucks)

It doesn’t feel like DeBrusk set a career-high with 28 goals, does it? If only because of how the Canucks’ season progressed, but he did, so kudos to him.

The big reason for the career-best mark was the power play as half (14) his goals came with the man advantage. This is a guy who had never had more than eight in his career and had 13 total PP goals across his prior 262 regular season games. He did it while shooting 25.5% on the power play, which might sound high but consider that across three seasons and 171 games from 2018-2021, DeBrusk shot at least 25% on the power play in each season and averaged 27%. The only difference for him was skating 209 minutes on the man advantage, having never had a season with at least 190, let alone 200.

Whether DeBrusk can reach 30 goals next season relies on this continued PP usage and the health of Vancouver’s current top two centres Elias Pettersson and Filip Chytil. If the team has to endure long stretches with Pius Suter and Teddy Blueger as their top-6 centres, then DeBrusk’s offence will suffer. If those top centres can stay healthy and return to form? There is 30-goal potential here. (apr25)

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7. As mentioned above, in Tuesday's Ramblings, we started a review of preseason projections and what went right or wrong. Those Ramblings covered forwards with goal totals who came in far below what I had projected for them. Today, we’ll stay with the forwards but cover those who came in with far more goals than I projected. We will be using end-of-year data from Natural Stat Trick, limit it to forwards with at least 41 games played and those projected for at least 10 goals scored.

Here are the forwards who scored at least 50% more goals than I had projected. For example, if someone was projected for 10 goals, their 82-game pace was for at least 15. If they were projected for 20 goals, their pace was for at least 30, and so on:

Let's review some of the notable ones:

Dylan Holloway (St. Louis Blues)

For people who believed that Holloway would be a top-6 forward in the league, this may not have been a huge surprise. All the same, this is a player who nearly doubled his points per 60 minutes at 5-on-5 in 2024-25 (2.32/60) compared to his first two seasons (1.17/60). By some full-season measures at Evolving Hockey, Holloway didn’t just have a breakout year with 26 goals and 37 assists in 77 games, but was a top-30 skater in the league (and probably even higher).

It isn’t a mirage, either. His play-driving numbers improved, his tracking data from AllThreeZones improved, and his shooting percentage (14.6%) wasn’t far off the league average from regular forwards (13.1%). For him to take the next leap in fantasy value, he needs a lot more power-play production after posting just 13 PP points this season, but if he plays like this again in 2025-25, he has 30-goal, point-per-game upside. (apr24)

8. Morgan Geekie (Boston Bruins)

Geekie scored 33 goals in 77 games, which is pretty surreal considering he scored 39 goals in his prior 256 games. It really helps to play with David Pastrnak, though: Pastrňák assisted on 21 of Geekie’s 33 goals, and had the primary assist on 16 of them. This is a guy who had a career shooting percentage of 11.4%, had a career-high of 13.1% in 2023-24, and finished second in the league by even-strength shooting percentage (21.97%). It is hard to bank on Geekie repeating that next season, but a bit more ice time overall with consistent top PP minutes all season will help soften the shooting percentage regression. With this role and Pastrňák as a consistent line mate, Geekie is a 25-goal guy. (apr24)

9. Jonathan Huberdeau (Calgary Flames)

Huberdeau finished the season with 13 goals at 5-on-5 after having scored just 17 in his first two years with Calgary. He did that by shooting 13.3%, a big improvement on the 8.95% he shot in the prior two campaigns with the Flames. It wasn’t just luck, either, as he got way more shots off high-danger passes from his teammates than he was getting previously (again from AllThreeZones). 

Of course, the big improvement came on the power play where he scored 10 goals after scoring just eight the prior two seasons. He did that by shooting 26.3% on the PP, a career-high (he had never exceeded 20% prior to 2024-25). It was a great year from Huberdeau, and maybe his even strength scoring stays higher than where it was from 2022-2024, but it’ll be hard to replicate that kind of power-play success. (apr24)

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10. And in Thursday's Ramblings, we looked at goal totals from forwards, and which ones grossly under-performed relative to my projections. We will use a cut-off of 41 games played and forwards with at least 10 projected goals – for fantasy purposes, I am not overly concerned about projecting some fourth liner for seven goals and they actually score three. I also extrapolated their actual goal total from however many games they played to 82 games to equalize games-played totals for everyone.

To begin, there were 15 forwards where I over-projected their 82-game goal total by at least 100%. That means if I had someone projected for 20 goals, they scored 10 or fewer. Let’s talk about a few of them:

11. Alex Holtz (Vegas Golden Knights)

I write a weekly newsletter and, back in February, wrote about what was happening with Holtz. This isn’t to absolve myself – this was a huge, huge miss no matter what – but that Holtz was not getting quality shots to take undoubtedly hurt his production this year.

This also highlights how much players are at the mercy of percentages, especially players at the margins like Holtz. He shot 12.3% across 110 games with New Jersey and then shot 5.8% in 53 games with Vegas. If he A) shoots 10% and B) plays 75 games, he more than doubles his goal total. So it goes.

Holtz was a player I had high hopes for the moment he was drafted. He has 39 goals in his last 82 AHL games, so he’s clearly a talented offensive player. The concern is that he’s going the way of players like Martin Frk or Riley Barber where he has the skill to dominate lower levels but can’t put it all together at the NHL level. (apr22)

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12. Philadelphia Flyers defenceman Rasmus Ristolainen may be out to start the 2025-26 season:

@KKurzNHL: Per Flyers, Rasmus Ristolainen “underwent successful surgery on his right triceps tendon rupture on March 26.” Expected to miss training camp and is out “about six months.”

Ristolainen had turned around his career in Philadelphia so hopefully this doesn’t affect his performance next year. It’ll be interesting to see what the Flyers do to bolster the blue line this summer. (apr25)

13. It was noted during San Jose's locker cleanout day that Will Smith would be tried again more fully at Centre next year, with the intent to have him stick. If he does have to play center, then expect a drop in his scoring rate, at minimum for the first half. It's hard for young players to adjust to playing center in the NHL, and many do struggle to keep up with everything at once, prompting a drop in production when players do make the positional shift. I'm not concerned with Smith's potential in the long run, but I won't be buying any short-term shares on him at the moment. (apr23)

14. I'll be keeping an eye on any notes from Jamie Drysdale this offseason, as he hasn't really had a healthy summer in a while. He's healthy now, and while there is a change coming with a new coach, he should be at least settled into Philadelphia now, and could be primed to bust out in a big way if the team can shore up at centre ice as well to support an increase in scoring for the team. (apr23)

15. Luca Marelli is one of my favourite under the radar prospects right now. He's a smart defence with size who had been improving with the puck every game this season. He loves to shoot the puck too, and while his regular season numbers might have only been "good", his playoff numbers are spectacular, with 18 points in 11 games. That's tied with Colby Barlow for the team lead, and ahead of Beckett Sennecke and Cal Ritchie. For those not very IPP on prospects, all three are highly regarded forward prospects who are former first-round picks. Marelli is a third-round pick from 2024, and he's starting to look like a steal. 

Columbus has plenty of defencemen on their depth chart, between Zach Werenski, Denton Mateychuk, Daemon Hunt, and others. One way or another though, the cream rises to the top, and with prospects you're better off betting on talent than opportunity (of course it's best to have both). (apr23)

16. Patrick Kane noted during locker cleanout day that he would be open to returning to the Red Wings, and that he was hoping to hit 1500 career games. He's currently sitting just over 1300, meaning he would need at least 2.5 more seasons. For those of you in keeper leagues, there's little risk of a sudden retirement at the moment. (apr23)

17. One of the top prospects outside of the NHL, Danila Yurov, was released from his KHL contract and could be signing with the Minnesota Wild in short order.

@russohockey.bsky.social: Danila Yurov was released from his KHL contract today, meaning he's technically free now. No contract is done with the #mnwild yet. Metallurg still owns his rights, so if an NHL deal can be reached and he doesn't make the Wild next season, he could always be loaned back rather than Iowa.

Yurov doesn’t come with quite the same fanfare as Alexander Nikishin or Ivan Demidov, but he’s not far behind them either, and he also has a few more years of growth than Demidov does, meaning an immediate and lasting impact is more certain. (apr23)

18. Lou Lamoriello won't return as GM of the Islanders. Not much immediate fantasy impact here, but it does make me much more interested in thinking that there's going to be a more light and positive atmosphere around the team which could give them some hope for a rebound next year. At minimum, I think we'll see a jump in the second half after Patrick Roy is let go – he seems like a coach that would have a short leash with a replacement GM. 

In Islanders' injury news that might be flying under the radar: Mat Barzal and Semyon Varlamov will be ready for camp. (apr23)

19. We got some news on what was ailing winger Chris Kreider all season. There had been talk that there was some back issue(s) that had been bothering him towards the middle of the season, but it was more than that as we got a full list of the injuries he was playing through: back troubles early in the season, an illness that resulted in vertigo midseason, and then suffered a hand injury that might require surgery the first game after 4 Nations,

Seems to me that, given how ineffective he was compared to how he usually plays, that this was not a wise decision, but that’s how it goes.

We also got news that defenceman Braden Schneider was playing through a torn labrum for which he had surgery. He is hopeful to be ready for the start of the 2025-26 season. (apr22)

20. The Seattle Kraken fired coach Dan Bylsma after just one season behind the bench. The team didn’t really progress very far after moving on from Dave Hakstol, so maybe a new voice will help, or maybe it’s just the roster itself. (apr22)

21. I thought I would wrap up my fantasy season quickly, with a few thoughts on what went right and wrong. I finished with one of each of the podium places in my three main leagues this year, such is an excellent accomplishment considering how competitive these leagues are. I have one other league with some code friends if mine that's very laid back, and I suffered a first round kiss in that H2H league after running into some hot goaltending – such are the bounces. 

My teams did very well despite the most frequent players across them being Aleksander Barkov (injuries and a slow second half), Roope Hintz (a very slow first half), Roman Josi (disappointing production and half a season lost to injury), and Patrick Kane (solid from the mid-point of the year which is when I acquired him in three different leagues). 

In my Roto league I was very fortunate to win, after nailing the entire draft, and dancing some trades around injuries… (apr23)

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Have a good week, folks!

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