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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The 2025-26 Fantasy Guide is now available for download! Projections by team and by point totals, sleepers, drafted players, rookies, goalies, advanced stats, and much more!

As for the French-language version of the Guide, it can be purchased here.

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1. Just a heads up that next week is Bubble Keeper Week here at Dobber Hockey. It is that time of year where we discuss those end-of-the-roster keeper questions that keeper league fantasy hockey owners make every year. We aren’t interested in ‘Do I keep Jason Robertson or Seth Jarvis?’ and more interested in decisions like ‘Do I keep Sean Couturier or Gabriel Landeskog?’ or ‘Do I keep Jamie Drysdale or Pavel Mintyukov?’ If anyone needs help with those decisions, leave a comment below or reach out to me on Twitter here or on BlueSky here.

2. In a Ramblings last week, I talked about Best Ball formats, and why they are popular with some fantasy managers. For anyone unfamiliar with Best Ball formats, go check that out.

I wanted to talk today about my first Best Ball draft of the season. I am not sure how many I’ll do, exactly, but I did 18 of them last year and will probably be around 20 again this year. As a first foray into fantasy values for the season, getting one done this early can help set a baseline to measure ADP movement (a couple more drafts in the next week or so will help create the true baseline). It also helps with seeing what kinds of players are being drafted early or late, who might be a value right now, and so on. Let’s break down my first fantasy draft of the season.

A reminder that this is a points format that gives points for goals (6), assists (4), power-play points (0.5), shots (1), blocks (1), and hits (0.5). Goalies get points for wins (6) and saves (0.6) while losing points for goals against (-3). These are 12-team leagues with centres, wingers, defencemen, goalies, and one skater utility spot. (aug7)

3. * Editor's Note: This year, Underdog Best Ball Formats have moved up to two utility skater slots. Here is an excerpt from Mike's first fantasy draft of the season:

Early Goalies

There is always the debate about whether to take a goalie early or not, so I wanted to share the draft position of the goalies taken in the first six rounds:

• Connor Hellebuyck 15^th overall (ADP of 15)
• Andrei Vasilevskiy 21^st overall (ADP of 20.1) *
• Jake Oettinger 30^th overall (ADP of 28.7)
• Igor Shesterkin 31^st overall (ADP of 34.3)
• Mackenzie Blackwood 48^th overall (ADP of 48)
• Filip Gustavsson 50^th overall (ADP of 42.9)
• Ilya Sorokin 51^st overall (ADP of 50.8)
• Darcy Kuemper 52^nd overall (ADP of 62.4) *
• Sergei Bobrovsky 56^th overall (ADP of 57.6)

*These were my picks

That makes no goalies in the first round, two in the second round, five in the first four rounds, and nine in the first six rounds.

If I could do it over again, I would have skipped on Darcy Kuemper at 52^nd overall and grabbed Jacob Markstrom a couple of rounds later. I thought Markstrom was slept on last year and I think he’s being slept on again this year. He had the eighth-best goals against average in 2024-25 and that was with a .900 save percentage. If he can boost that save percentage a bit, and New Jersey’s blue line stays healthy, I think he’s in for a very good season.

Blackwood is a good pick at the end of the fourth round. He is locked into being Colorado’s starter and has been a top-10-ish goalie by Evolving Hockey‘s Goals Saved Above Expected on a per-shot basis over the last two years. He feels like a very good bet for 30 wins with good ratios and I wouldn’t mind having him as my top netminder if I miss out on the top tier. (aug7)

[Follow the link for more…]

4. In yesterday’s Ramblings, I wrote about my first best ball draft of the season, which I did last weekend. In that draft, only five defencemen were taken in the first four rounds, with Zach Werenski in the second round. It is a function of the format (only one defenceman counts towards weekly scoring, though more may count in the utility slots) but it got me thinking: If we wait for defencemen, how can we find the next Zach Werenski?

My reason for being very high on Werenski last year (he was my most-drafted defenceman and second-most drafted player overall) was that he had years of great even-strength production, but had some injury issues, and Columbus often had a terrible power play. If he could be healthy and the Columbus power play wasn’t terrible, he could be a fantasy monster. So, if we apply some of the same logic, who stands out as being a defenceman that can be drafted in the later rounds and finish as a top-5 blue liner? (aug8)

[Follow the link for more…]

5. Vitali Kravtsov, the 9^th overall pick from the 2018 draft who has spent the last two seasons in the KHL, signed a one-year deal with Vancouver. It is for the league minimum and a two-way deal, so he can be sent to the AHL. He finished second in points per game among skaters age-25 or younger this past KHL season.

It is not given that Kravtsov will earn an NHL roster spot in October. Vancouver has Brock Boeser, Conor Garland, and Jake DeBrusk as its top three wingers. They brought over Evander Kane, they still have Nils Hoglander, they had Kiefer Sherwood in a bigger role last season, and have Drew O’Connor as well. A skilled player like Kravtsov should play with other skilled players, but he’s going to be no higher than the fourth winger on the depth chart, may well be a number-7 or number-8 winger, and there is still Jonathan Lekkerimaki for consideration. For fantasy, Kravtsov is a wait-and-see type of player, not a draft-in-September type, unless we are in a very deep league. (aug7)

6. Matthew Schaefer signed his ELC on Monday, and while it didn’t seem like the NCAA was ever a serious consideration for him, it does rule it out as an option now. With the current outlook being NHL or OHL for Schaefer, a nine-game trial is likely the minimum of the time he’ll see at the NHL level this year. However, after missing so much development time, in the long run a full season at the OHL level would not be a bad thing, especially since the Islanders have a lot of options on defense and aren’t necessarily looking to ice their best team this year no matter the cost.

For those of you hoping for more than nine games out of Schaefer this year, my advice is: prepare to be disappointed. However, for a contrasting opinion, Dobber does have Schaefer in the Fantasy Guide with an 80% likelihood to make the team, so there are many people who are more confident in him sticking around than I am. (aug6)

The other contract that we saw get signed on Monday was Sam Colangelo. He signed a two-year deal with a two-way contract for the 2025-26 season, which turns into a one-way deal the following year. I can almost guarantee that if he doesn’t end up making the team this year in a full-time role, then he will be profiled in the guide next year as one of the players to watch due to their one-way contract status.

What I see with these deals that have the framework of a year or two with a two-way setup, and then the year or two following that as a one-way setup, it means that the team is on the fence about whether there is room or there has been enough growth from the player for them to make the team for the first year, but that they think there is at least a two-in-three chance that they make the team the following year.

Colangelo fits the bill here, as he just put up a point-per-game season at the AHL level as a rookie, but there isn’t much room on the roster for him this year. Next year, with another year of growth from Colangelo, on top of a few UFA contracts expiring, his chances are much better at making a real impact for the team. Perhaps even as high up the lineup as a second-line winger. (aug6)

7. A Matthew Tkachuk update. According to Greg Wyshynski of ESPN, Tkachuk said he is undecided about undergoing surgery for a torn adductor muscle before the season, but confirmed that he’ll miss the first 2-3 months of the season if he chooses the surgery. This indecision puts fantasy leaguers drafting early in a tough spot on what to do, although my recommendation would be to err on the side of caution. If Tkachuk decides to play through the injury, then he could still opt for the surgery during the season or not be as effective playing through an injury. (aug9)

Yahoo doesn’t have ADP data yet after opening its fantasy leagues very recently. Tkachuk is currently ranked 19 over there. In the mock draft I participated in recently (more on that coming up), Tkachuk was picked 20^th overall. You’re probably best to let someone else draft him in that spot, although a healthy Tkachuk could be drafted even higher than 19 or 20.

8. As for my mock draft itself, yes, Yahoo fantasy hockey is back. Shortly after it reopened, I participated in my first mock draft of the season. Nothing has really changed from last season. The mock draft had standard Yahoo categories (G, A, +/-, PPP, SOG, HIT, W, GAA, SV%, SO) with 2 C, 2 LW, 2 RW, 4 D, 2 G, and 4 BN. You can choose the number of teams (8, 10, 12, 14), from which I can choose 12.

For full mock draft results, go to my personal blog Goods Fantasy Hockey. I hope to participate in more mock drafts through the offseason, keeping in mind that I may adjust my Top 100 Roto Rankings based on what I discover.

One debate entering the season will be who should be drafted first overall. Connor McDavid has been the consensus first overall pick the past few seasons, but I don’t think his grip on that spot is quite as strong. Nikita Kucherov has won back-to-back Art Ross Trophies while McDavid has missed a combined 21 games over the past two seasons. The top tier (at least in my mind) consists of four players in no particular order: McDavid, Kucherov, Nathan MacKinnon, and Leon Draisaitl. In this draft, the order went McDavid, Draisaitl, MacKinnon, and Kucherov. The pick I like the most out of that group is Kucherov at fourth overall. Maybe that’s the sweet spot in this year’s fantasy drafts. (aug9)

[Follow the link for more…]

9. The Los Angeles Kings extended winger Alex Laferriere for three years with an average annual value of $4.1-million. Ian wrote about this signing, and that of Nick Robertson, over the weekend. I want to give my take.

Every year, there are a few players whose play turn around my opinion of them, and one of those guys is Laferriere. It wasn’t that I was particularly low on him as a rookie in 2023-24, it’s just I thought he was being given too big of a role too fast. The numbers bear that out as Evolving Hockey had him with the worst even-strength impacts among Los Angeles’ regular forwards on both expected goals and actual goals: (aug5)

[Follow the link for the full analysis…]

10. With the signings over the last 10 days, all arbitration cases have been settled, so that part of the NHL offseason has wrapped. As mentioned earlier, Ian wrote about the Nick Robertson extension, and I want to add a bit to it.

There are a few things simultaneously true about Robertson right now:

• He has been an excellent goal-scorer in his limited minutes as he’s scored 1.1 goals per 60 minutes at 5-on-5 over the last three years. Of the 386 forwards with at least 1400 minutes in that span, that is 27^th, and higher than names like Roope Hintz, Jack Hughes, Nikolaj Ehlers, and Kirill Kaprizov.
• He hasn’t shown much of a playmaking dimension with 0.78 assists per 60 minutes at 5-on-5 over the last three years, which is a low-end third-line rate.
• His defensive impacts are about league average, per both Evolving Hockey and HockeyViz.
• He has helped elevate the offence of Toronto’s bottom-6 forwards but hasn’t found much success when moving up the lineup.

That last point is important. It is fair to say that Robertson hasn’t had much time in Toronto’s top-6, but he also hasn’t done much with the time he has been given. For example, per Natural Stat Trick, here is John Tavares‘ actual goal share and expected goal share over the last three years when on the ice with Robertson, and when on the ice without him: (aug5)

[Follow the link for more…]

11. If you need offensive production from your defenders in a fantasy league, you’re targeting blueliners skating on the top power-play unit. The problem is that most power-play quarterbacks across the league are established. Everyone knows about them, so you have to pay a premium to get them on your team.

The exception here is with rookie blueliners, who tend to be available in the later rounds of one-year drafts because their roles aren’t fully established and we haven’t seen much of them at the NHL level, so outcomes can be a mystery box. To help you capitalize on these late-round steals, here are a few blueliners with solid potential for power-play offense this year. To be clear, these rankings are based on potential power-play production in one-year leagues, not who is the best overall asset in a multicategory or keeper league.

Zeev Buium

The 19-year-old’s offensive skill is undeniable, and I’m optimistic about his fantasy outlook as he has the inside track to a star-studded PP1 in Minnesota. In recent years, it’s been Jared Spurgeon or Brock Faber holding that power-play quarterback role, but Spurgeon is 35 with a troubling injury history and Faber is better known for his defense than his offense. Spurgeon and Faber aren’t really barriers to PP1 for Buium, as we saw in these past playoffs. where Buium played on PP1 in his NHL debut even though Spurgeon and Faber were also available. The only thing holding Buium back is his own readiness and maturity. He eventually became a healthy scratch in the postseason as the moment might have been a little too big for him. However, that’s less of a concern with a full training camp to prepare and the more gradual buildup of regular season play instead of being thrown to the wolves in the playoffs. Sharing power-play ice with Kirill Kaprizov and Matt Boldy should help Buium post strong offensive numbers in year one. (aug4) 

12. Sam Rinzel

While other players on this list must steal the PP1 quarterback role from their team’s incumbent, Rinzel is in the unique position of being the incumbent himself. Sure, he only ran Chicago’s top unit for six games at the end of last season, but he tallied three points with the man advantage during that stretch and looked quite comfortable in the spotlight. While he may face competition from Alex Vlasic, Artyom Levshunov, and Kevin Korchinski, being the incumbent means he’ll have a longer leash, and one of those guys will have to do something significant to replace him. He’ll benefit from playing on a Chicago power play that performed surprisingly well last year – however, beware of regression as the Hawks scored on a league-leading and lofty 20.61% of their shots with the man advantage, which they’ll be hard pressed to replicate this season. While the teenagers on this list may have more raw skill, Rinzel’s a little bit older and already looks comfortable in the NHL, so his role is a little more concrete. (aug4)

13. Zayne Parekh

My placement of Parekh below Buium is because of team circumstances, not individual talent. While Minnesota implements more of a 75/25 split between their two power-play units, Calgary’s is closer to 60/40, so skating on PP1 with the Flames means less offensive opportunity than PP1 with the Wild. Calgary’s lineup also features less offensive firepower than Minnesota, which means Parekh would have to work harder to produce points and wouldn’t be able to rely on teammates the same way Buium might. It shouldn’t be too tough for Parekh to oust Mackenzie Weegar, who ran the Flames’ top unit last year. However, it’s worth noting that unlike Rinzel and Buium, who have already seen reps on PP1, Parekh was on the second unit for both power-play opportunities he saw in his one and only NHL game last year. (aug4)

14. Alexander Nikishin

At 23, with three years of strong offensive production in the KHL, Nikishin is probably the most NHL-ready youngster on this list. However, he also has the most difficult path to PP1, blocked by bona fide power-play quarterback Shayne Gostisbehere. While Nikishin’s shot and goal-scoring ability may be better than Gostisbehere’s, Ghost has flirted with a 30-PPP pace these past two seasons and will probably stay on PP1 unless that unit experiences a really long stretch of struggle this year. Regardless, Nikishin’s high-end individual ability, combined with an above-average PP2 cast in Carolina, should lead to a productive rookie campaign. (aug4)

15. Luca Cagnoni

I’m picking Cagnoni over Sam Dickinson here because Cagnoni is a year and a half older, plus he’s already produced offense at the professional level, racking up 52 points in 64 games with the Barracuda last season. Since the focus here is one-year leagues and not keeper formats, Cagnoni seems to have more fantasy potential than Dickinson next season. Although Cagnoni saw reps on PP1 with the Sharks late last year, San Jose signed John Klingberg and Dmitry Orlov this summer, which likely pushes Cagnoni down the power-play depth chart. While I think Klingberg is primed for a bounceback campaign now that he’s free from hip injuries, it’s been a long time since he successfully quarterbacked a top PP unit, and his defensive deficiencies may cause him to fall out of favour, potentially opening the door for Cagnoni on PP1. (aug4)

16. On the topic of power plays, here are some thoughts about shifting power-play dynamics in Vegas and Toronto…

Vegas Golden Knights

Vegas had the league’s second-best power play last year, clicking at an impressive 28.3%. Take an excellent power play and add a world-class player like Mitch Marner, things can only get better right? Well, not quite. My concern with Vegas’ power play this year is that there may be some growing pains as they figure out how to integrate Marner into the top unit. The Golden Knights have a lot of options when it comes to PP1 configurations, making it hard to pinpoint the fantasy value for some of the team’s skaters. If we’re going based on seniority, Marner might replace 24-year-old Pavel Dorofeyev – who scored 35 goals last year, 13 of which came with the man advantage. If we’re going based on skillset, Marner’s two-way playmaking style might be most similar to Mark Stone, so that swap might make sense in order to recreate the dynamic Vegas had last year. There’s also a world where Marner takes on the role of blueliner as he did in Toronto, sending Shea Theodore to PP2. With so many possible PP1 configurations, Vegas’ power-play personnel will have highly variable fantasy outlooks depending on where they end up. Even someone like Jack Eichel, who’s virtually guaranteed a spot on PP1, might need time to adjust to the new dynamic of a different power-play cast. Even a short adjustment period can hinder overall totals, which is something to keep in mind as you evaluate a Golden Knight’s fantasy outlook this year. (aug4)

[Follow the link for Brennan's take on the Maple Leafs' PP…]

17. Over on the DobberHockey forums, 18 members have their annual mock draft underway, where the even serves as a mock draft for fantasy this upcoming year in a multi-category league that’s about as general as can be (to make it more relatable and useful for those participating to then apply to their own drafts) while also tracking the results of the draft through the year to both give a sense of competition to the draft, as well as allowing for some proper reflection on strategies from the year before.

I don’t participate myself, partially due to the time commitment, but also because I find it fascinating to see where players I like might slip to if I wasn’t in the draft to take them a little earlier. This then gives me a great framework to research from for my own redraft leagues, and for mapping out strategies of when tiers from specific positions occur and when they might drop off.

For goalies it’s especially relevant, and while this mock draft and its 18 teams might not be properly indicative of where goalies will go in every other draft, it will show where the tiers are, and how soon after the first goalies go from a tier that we get to the end of that same tier. As someone who waits on goalies (and sometimes defensemen too) as long as I can, it’s a key piece of information for my draft strategies.

I’m looking forward to mock-draft season starting up over the next little while and being able to get into all those theoretical discussions again. (aug6)

18. Looking at the first 18 picks in that draft, there are a few notes to make already.

To ruin the surprise, Brady Tkachuk was the first-overall pick, and it makes sense in a league like this where the peripherals are weighted as much as the points. Brady gets you a huge advantage in the peripherals, and at least doesn’t really hurt your team in the scoring categories. I do think he has a season of 90+ points in him, so if he hits on that as well as adding close to 300 Hits and four shots per game, then no one is going to debate you on the selection.

Connor McDavid went second, Nathan MacKinnon third, and Leon Draisaitl… seventh. After McDavid and B Tkachuk, there’s a plateau with the superstar players, and I think it extends to at least the eight slot and maybe past that depending on how you feel about a few other players. I have one draft where we get to pick our slots, and if I don’t select first or second, then this year I’m again going to be aiming for a pick at eight or nine. It feels like a steal getting Draisaitl at seven, but none of the picks before him are bad selections, and Auston Matthews at eight looks like just as much of a bargain.

Matthews is going to be an interesting case study after a difficult year. Does he turn it around this year because he’s healthy, because his percentages improve, or maybe because Mitch Marner moving on means Matthews ends up with the puck even more? Or, have we seen the best from Matthews already, and this past year’s 40-goal pace will be the new norm instead of pushing 60?

I think we’ll be able to harbor a great guess after just the preseason and maybe the first week of the regular season, looking at how dynamic he appears to be on the ice, as well as the shot rate. If it’s below 4.0 per game again, then we may be in for another year with sub-40 goals, and some missed games along the way. (aug6)

19. Looking at the goaltenders and defensemen, there were three of each gone in the first 18 picks. Cale Makar, Quinn Hughes, and Rasmus Dahlin were the defensemen, and Connor Hellebuyck, Andrei Vasilevskiy, and Jake Oettinger made up the initial goalie group. No big surprises with the top names. Makar is the best defenseman, no question. Hughes has the next-highest scoring upside, while Dahlin brings excellent peripherals without sacrificing the scoring (more on him in Rick’s article today as well).

Hellebuyck is the first goalie off the board, and in the top-10 no-less. Despite the fantastic results, I’m still not a full believer in Winnipeg, who doesn’t have a superstar player, has lost some depth, and is going to again be relying on some fantastic goalie play, which is always a dangerous wager. While I may be willing to spend a top-30 pick on a goalie in certain setups, I would rather take Oettinger ten picks later, or better yet, grab someone like Jacob Markstrom or Filip Gustavsson just outside the top-50. We’ll see how long those names slide, but taking the high-end skaters yields much more consistent and high-end results, rather than trying to shore up the most volatile position first. (aug6)

20. With the picks at the beginning of the second round, I’m realizing that there’s a very wide tier here of players who I like and recognize as very good players, but also who I am not excited about possibly spending such a high pick to acquire. The Filip Forsbergs, the Sam Reinharts, and the William Nylanders are all very good and safe picks, but there’s a big tier here of at least a dozen players I would be just as happy to pick, and I expect a couple of those names I would list will be around 20 or 30 picks later.

I’m not sure there’s much to be done about it in most drafts when you can’t choose where you’re picking, but it just means you probably have to plan out a list at least to get through the top-50 if you’re possibly going to be under any kind of time pressure, because a mistake there could be killer. (aug6)

You can find the mock draft results here:
https://forums.dobbersports.com/showthread.php?269212-NHL-Mock-Draft-2025-2026-Picks

21. In July, I started a series about how to go about fantasy hockey projections. Last Tuesday, we looked at goaltenders and team effects. The week before, an important topic we covered was the difference between projecting ice time for players who stay put and players who change teams. I want to return to that and briefly discuss players who move to a new roster.

If players who change teams need to be approached differently, the question is which stats to consider? I went and looked at forwards who changed teams in any of the 2022, 2023, or 2024 offseasons, which of those forwards saw an increase in even-strength ice time per game on the new roster, and how they performed the year before. So, which stats with their old team helped explain the increased ice time with their new team? (aug5)

[Follow the link for the complete analysis…]

Have a good week, folks!

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