Yesterday on Twitter, I asked a simple poll question: of the four players named, which would you not have as a top-3 for the Hart finalist? The names listed were Leon Draisaitl, Artemi Panarin, Connor Hellebuyck, and Nathan MacKinnon. There were two purposes to my question: determine whether Hellebuyck has any support (he does not), and which of the front-runners is the biggest front-runner. (My theory here being that whichever player got identified least often as the one left out is the one most in the forefront of fans' minds for the Hart, meaning more support.)

The three skaters finished somewhat close together so I don't think I gleaned what I wanted to in that regard. I do find it fascinating that Hellebuyck has almost no support, and lends credence to a theory I floated on Steve Laidlaw's podcast: the general consensus among hockey fans is that Winnipeg is still a good team, or close to the team that went to the Conference Final a couple years ago. That is not the case whatsoever, as they were among the worst defensive teams in the league.

(Steve's podcast can be listened to here.)

Regardless, narratives drive a lot of the momentum here and it does seem like it'll be a close race.

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When doing that Twitter poll, I had a couple people reply or message me saying that they don't think a goalie should win the Hart Trophy. That, effectively, the Vezina is a good proxy for them and that the position is too random to have them among the skaters.

I understand this argument but will dismiss this argument. When it comes to trophies and awards, I don't care whatsoever how something happened, I only care that it actually happened. If someone were to have scored 60 goals in 68 games this year because they shot 24 percent, I wouldn't really care and would have them as a Hart nominee. Same thing applies to goalies.

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The All-Star selections are something else entirely. At least at that point, we can simply worry about each position rather than having to compare across positions. No giving goalies the short end of the stick here.

I think my two teams would look something like this:

Panarin – MacKinnon – Draisaitl                         Marchand – Pettersson – Pastrnak

Josi – Pietrangelo                                                     Hedman – Carlson

Hellebuyck                                                                         Rask

Here's something I've noticed: all the best teams are in the East (or at least more of them), but it seems a lot of my trophy selections are coming from the Western Conference. I wonder what that means. Is there truly more high-end talent in the West, or is there a lack of it so upper-end guys so the truly elite do stand out more? Something to think about.

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One argument I've been having with myself – that happens all the time – is what to do with the postseason from a fantasy perspective. This year will allow a lot of unique setups as far as fantasy leagues go. The reason for the struggle is this: were I to have advance knowledge that one of the play-in teams would get to the Cup Final, I would undoubtedly load up on that team in drafts. However, winning five series is much more difficult than winning four, meaning those play-in teams are at an inherent disadvantage.

That's something I talked about with Laidlaw on the pod linked above: do I want the team with a play-in series to knock months of rust off, or do I want the team that does not have to play an extra round in the postseason. Those kinds of decisions are what is going to make the this postseason drafting a lot of fun.

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When I was looking through stats for my Ramblings on the major awards, something stood out: just how good of a season Ryan Ellis had. I don't mean, like, "yeah he was pretty good!" I mean that he had one of the best seasons in recent memory, he just didn't play enough games (49) to be considered for any kind of award.

From Evolving Hockey's WAR metric, Ellis led all blue liners at 4.1, and no other defenceman was 3.5 or higher. Per their WAR metric, Ellis was over 20 percent valuable than the next-best defenceman in nearly 20 fewer games played. That is beyond absurd.

Now, WAR isn't everything, obviously. But Ellis finished with a higher points/60 at 5-on-5 than names like Hamilton, Karlsson, and Hedman, he was sixth in both actual goal share and expected goal share, and he was even Nashville's defenceman on the ice for the fewest shots and goals against per 60 while short-handed. In other words, there were many areas in which Ellis excelled, which is why he had such a strong WAR rating.

The kicker to this story: Ellis has two of the three best seasons by a defenceman since 2007 by WAR/60, with the other coming in 2013-14. All told, among the 263 defencemen with at least 5000 minutes played since 2007, Ellis is first (number one; at the top; the big Kahuna Burger) in WAR/60, and by a considerable margin. What I'm saying is there's an argument that he's been the best defenceman in the post-lockout era.

Now, I don't actually believe he's the best defenceman in the league since 2007. But I think this highlights just how good he is and how underappreciated he is. Without consistent top PP minutes, he will never reach his ceiling, but it's worth noting his 82-game pace over the last three seasons – two of them cut short – is over 50 points. He may not be the best defenceman in the league since 2007, but we can probably say he's the most underappreciated.

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While on the topic of defencemen, I wonder what to do about Keith Yandle? He absolutely had a great year with 45 points (21 on the power play) in 69 games. But he took a significant hit to his TOI, falling to 19:42 in 2019-20, his lowest mark per game since 2009.

What do we do with a guy who will be 34 years old for the next season and is seeing his ice time get slashed? He lost over two and a half minutes this year and two minutes the year before. He went from nearly 24:30 a game in 2017-18 to under 20 minutes in 2019-20. Is that closer to 18-19 minutes next year? Does he earn a bit more?

I'm worried. He hasn't been a guy to put up huge shot totals since his Arizona days and had the 2019-20 season finished, he may not have reached 25 hits. That's abysmal. There may be points here, but with the TOI decline, they could be a lot of empty points. I'll probably be out on him for 2020-21.

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One thing I've seen from fantasy hockey analysts (here and elsewhere) since the shutdown is their expectation that the Dallas Stars as a whole will be better offensively next year. I agree they have a lot of nice pieces, but it's a matter of getting those pieces playing together in a way conducive to fantasy value. Here's what I mean.

Jim Montgomery was fired on December 10^th. Up to that point, Dallas was 16^th in the league in shot attempts generated per 60 minutes at 5-on-5 and eighth in expected goals. After that point, once Rick Bowness took over, they fell to 23^rd in shot attempts generated and tied for 18^th by expected goals. Their actual goals scored fell from 2.12 per 60 to 1.85 per 60 in those two windows of time, the latter number being the second-worst in the league (only Detroit was lower). In other words, a low-scoring team became an even lower-scoring team because of a sacrifice at the altar of team defence.

Now, Dallas has a playoff bye, so who are we to argue that this approach is bad for the team in the real world? Let's say they make a little run and get to the Conference Finals. Does the coaching approach change next year? I doubt it unless they replace Rick Bowness.

That's the reason I'm much more tepid on a Dallas offensive bounce back. The team just doesn't play a style that lends itself to scoring a lot. Maybe they go on a percentage bender, but I would hate to rely on that to recoup fantasy value. We'll see what the ADPs look like, I guess.