A couple days ago, the New York Rangers locked up their current (and future) first-line centre, Mika Zibanejad, for five years with an AAV of $5.35 million. With Derek Stepan now in Arizona, Zibanejad will undoubtedly be given top-line minutes – as far as goes for the Rangers – though his deployment remains to be seen.

Last week, I touched on Zibanejad’s season with the Rangers last year, including the injuries. For further thoughts on him, check that out.

The 24-year old’s fantasy owners have to be thrilled. If he’s healthy, he should be the most-used centre the team has, including prime power-play time. It is about fair value in cap leagues for owners that are looking for 20 goals and 55 points, though I’m not sure you can rely on much more than that in a full season. Regardless, he will be given every opportunity to succeed, it’s up to him to make the best of it.

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Earlier this month, the Sabres signed Chad Johnson to a one-year deal. They recently signed Robin Lehner as well, also to a one-year deal worth $4 million. Lehner will be a restricted free agent at the end of the contract.

It’s really hard what to make of the Swedish netminder. He’s been in the NHL for seven years, but has just 155 career starts. The 2016-17 campaign was the first time in his career he managed more than 30 starts in a season. Since entering the NHL, however, he has the same save percentage in all situations as guys like Corey Crawford and Jonathan Quick. He’s also been excellent for the Sabres in a small sample.

In a 60-start season, with an improved defence (and team) in front of him, 30 wins with solid ratios seems like a good baseline. He does have a lengthy injury history, however. His ADP last year across ESPN, Yahoo, and CBS was just outside the top-25 goalies. It seems fair to think he’ll be just inside the top-25 this year. That means in a 12-team league, he’ll be someone’s second goalie. Given his injury history and the uncertainty of the quality of the team in front of him, I can’t argue with avoiding him. But it seems like he could be worth the risk at that ADP. What say you, Dobber fans?

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Throughout the summer, I’ve been going team by team to discuss the relevant 2016-17 fantasy performances. Next on the list in alphabetical order is the Pittsburgh Penguins.

Sidney Crosby

This will probably be remembered as the season that this became Connor McDavid’s NHL rather than Sidney Crosby’s. For once, it wasn’t a ridiculous notion that we’ve seen before:

"Is Ovechkin better than Crosby?"
"Is Toews better than Crosby?"
"Is Kopitar better than Crosby?"

I see a common theme.

— Michael Clifford (@SlimCliffy) March 27, 2016

Like Nelly Furtado told us, all good things come to an end.

Despite McJesus taking the mantle from Crosby, the Kid (can we still call him that?) managed 44 goals (second-highest mark of his career), 89 points (a three-year high), 255 shots on goal (also a three-year high), and was one of the most valuable players in the fantasy game.

What is interesting to note is the shift from playmaker to goalscorer. Of course, a player of his calibre was always capable of both, and has multiple 30-goal seasons (and one 50-goal campaign). But he set a four-year high in shots per 60 minutes at five-on-five, and shot attempts per 60 as well. Now, the team also had a four-year high in shot attempts at five-on-five with Crosby on the ice, so his shooting more is at least partially a function of the team shooting more overall, but it’s nice to see he didn’t simply start deferring more, and took his shots.

It should be highlighted that his 17.3 shooting percentage at all strengths was a six-year high going back to 2010-11. His 15.12 percent shooting at five-on-five was also a six-year high, and he had shot under 11.1 percent over the three previous seasons. He also managed his highest power-play goal total (14) since his rookie season way back in 2005-06 (16). I think it’s reasonable that his goals pull back under 40. Given a full season, they won’t crater so long as he keeps up this shot rate, so expecting 35 or so is fine, but a repeat performance of what he did this year seems unlikely.

Every player eventually hits a decline, and Crosby will be 30 years old when the season starts. He hasn’t shown any sign of really slowing down yet, though, either through straight production or on-ice metrics. He might not be the top option in the fantasy game anymore, but he’s still near the very top of the list.

Evgeni Malkin

I don’t think it’s worth wasting too many words here. At this point, we know who he is. Malkin is one of the greatest talents of this generation, but he cannot stay healthy for the life of him; he missed four games in the first three seasons of his career, and in the eight years since, he’s played about three-quarters of possible regular season games (464 out of 622). When you have an eight-year sample of a player averaging about 61 games every 82, it’s no longer unlucky and simply the status quo. Just keep that in mind when draft season rolls around.

Jake Guentzel

Between the playoffs and the regular season, Guentzel scored 29 goals in 65 games playing mostly second/third line minutes. That’s good! He also did so shooting over 20 percent. That’s high!

He is a guy who can get himself into good shooting situations. In a good read over at the Players’ Tribune, Guentzel discusses briefly how he was told to “stick to his game” and that he trusts his teammates to find him. Seeing as he’s often playing with either Crosby or Malkin, that seems like a good idea. It shows in his shot map, too, from Hockey Viz. He’s frequently tight to the net and in a shooting position for a left-handed shot:

In this sense, he reminds of when James Neal was playing in Pittsburgh’s top-six. A good player, absolutely, but he knew how to put himself in a situation at the right time for one of those elite centres. Before you laugh, remember that from 2011-14, he scored 88 goals in 179 regular season games, nearly a 40-goal/82 pace. I am not saying Guentzel is a 40-goal player in the making, but the way he carries himself on the ice is reminiscent of Neal, to me. Aside from the whole “kneeing players in the head” and things of that nature.

I am generally very wary of players that require a certain roster slotting to succeed. However, if you look at the left-wing depth on the roster, well, there’s not much of it. I can’t imagine Guentzel spending time in the bottom-six unless his season is catastrophic. The question is if you’re willing to out-bid your league mates at the table. He won’t come cheap in drafts.

Phil Kessel

I feel that one of the more under-reported fantasy seasons from the past year is that Kessel cracked the 70-point mark for the first time in three years, finishing in the top-20 in scoring. Now, this was in conjunction with his lowest goal total (23) since 2007-08, so that’s the obvious red flag.

The fact that he got to 70 points is kind of unlikely. He finished with his lowest TOI per game since leaving Boston, coming in just under 18 minutes. He also finished with his lowest shot rate at five-on-five of his career. A dip in minutes and shots usually means less production, but he made up for all this with 30 power-play points, by far a career-high (career-best before was 25 in 2014-15). He had the most total ice time with the man advantage of any Penguins forward (thanks to playing all 82 games), and the Penguins scored the second-most PP goals last year, so it’s not a huge surprise he finished with all those PP points. However, the difference between 2015-16 and 2016-17 for him, production-wise, was largely all on the power play. It’s great if he can keep it up, but the question is if he can keep it up.

Pittsburgh’s power-play forward core are all returning, so Kessel seeing about the same amount of ice time would only make sense. Does he repeat 30 power-play points? Probably not. Can he get to 25-ish again? That would help mitigate the (apparent) five-on-five decline.

Kessel is mostly locked into a role alongside either Malkin or Crosby, and is locked into the top power-play unit with the same players. He might not crack 70 points again, but he should be a 60-point guy with regularity in this lineup.

Kris Letang and Justin Schultz

I wrote just a few days ago on the situations of Letang and Schultz so there’s not much need to dive further again. I did find it interesting that in a comment on the Ramblings, a reader weighed in that Letang was drafted in a recent draft he did just outside the top-50, and Schultz just outside the top-100. That honestly feels right for about both players, though I’m not sure I’d personally take either at such a position. Assuming a non-healthy season for Letang and a regression for Schultz, you’re probably drafting them at their upside this year at those positions.