Thus far in the early going we have tackled surprises, changes in ice time, and cold streaks. In each of these cases we are looking at league wide reports and filtering down to find the notable items to bring to the column. Through the process of filtering though, we have focused mostly on forwards and today it is time to rectify that. The focus for today is solely defensemen. Like with some of the early articles we are going to highlight defensemen who are doing something a little different than expected, for better or worse.

As far as process goes, we are going to take Dobber's preseason expectations, and compare them to our D's current (as of 11/17) results. We will use the Frozen Tool Forensics favorite Big Board to pull the stats to date and then will adjust to put them on a per-game basis so we can compare to the projections. There is also a handy filter on the reports page so the export for the Big Board this time around will contain only D.

To start we let's take a look at our top five high performing D. These are players who are putting up numbers well above their preseason expectations. Being included on this list doesn't necessarily require that these players are going to experience a dramatic regression (though it is unlikely all will remain above point-per-game players), that is what we will dig into and find out.

Honorable mention here goes to Mikhail Sergachev who is putting up excellent numbers in Tampa and scoring 0.37 points above his projected number (and teaser for later – getting top power-play deployment).

Brandon Montour and Hampus Lindholm sort of fit the same mold here. Both ended up in brand new situations because of the general team changes, and then injuries. Lindholm was physically changing teams, and got increased deployment because Matt Grzelcyk and Charlie McAvoy were both out. Montour's team changed around him with offseason shake ups and then Aaron Ekblad was injured. All the injured parties have now returned to the lineup and we are in a bit of a holding pattern until the dust settles. Lindholm saw some second power-play time as of November 13, as Boston was running a five forward first unit for chunks of time. At the end of the day, it is likely Lindholm sticks on a second unit (either with McAvoy if Boston runs five forwards, or as the lone D if McAvoy mans the top unit). While Lindholm is seeing some pretty favorable underlying numbers (especially his personal shooting percentage), hanging on to him is probably the smart move as he still has the potential to be valuable. Montour is also worth a hold. Short term outlook might be a little better as he has more favorable underlying numbers and Florida seems to still be experimenting with a three forward and two D top power-play.

Erik Karlsson and Rasmus Dahlin seem to share a profile as well. Both seem to be breaking out (or re-breaking out in Karlsson's case) with a combination of actually improved underlying numbers and a fair bit of luck. Both are seeing jumps in personal and team five-on-five shooting percentages. Those are unlikely to hold for the entire season. They are both also seeing increases in total time on ice, power-play time, shot rates, and expected goal numbers. Meaning they are seeing more opportunity in better situations, are turning that opportunity into offensive chances, and that those chances are more dangerous than they have been in the past. Taken all together, sure a 100-point pace is unlikely for either, but a 65–70-point pace going forward? That seems entirely plausible.

Honorable mentions in this case go to Kris Letang and Victor Hedman who are producing at 0.3 points per game less than projected. Given that a number of the players listed above here are likely not commonly rostered, I did want to take a brief tangent to address their situations here.

Kris Letang has put up 70-point paces for each of the past two seasons, but is off to just a 44 pace this far. At 35, age-related decline is certainly a concern, and we are definitely seeing the lowest shot rates of essentially his entire career. On the plus side his time on ice isn't suffering too much, both he and his team are due better shooting luck, and he hasn't been getting his usual participation on power-play points. Still, even with some of these things rebounding 60 points might be a high-water mark.

Hedman's underlying numbers are much more in line with his previous seasons, the only glaring exception being his personal shooting percentage, which is quite low. The new concern for Hedman is the fact that he has been rotated off of the top power-play in some games. Mikhail Sergachev saw almost seven minutes of power-play time in Tampa's game on November 15. Most of that time was with the top unit. Hedman on the other hand saw about two and a half minutes with a decidedly second unit. Hedman certainly still has value, and has perhaps earned a bit more than he has gotten thus far, but spending time off of that top power-play is going to significantly hurt is overall production and value.

Back to our list then – Moritz Seider burst onto the scene last year and everyone jumped to grab him early this year, particularly in leagues that count peripheral categories. With only one year of data in the books it is hard to make clean comparisons, but in general his personal and five-on-five shooting percentages, and his overall IPP are lower than we would expect. That indicates we will likely see some sort of positive regression. However, his shot rates, and his expected goal numbers are both down indicating he isn't personally generating as much offense as he did last year. Scoring in general isn't particularly strong for the Red Wings at the moment either ranking 27th overall in total goals for. I don't think this is panic mode as he deserves a bit better, but is worth watching going forward.

Last but not least Roman Josi. Josi was one of the first D men off the board on draft day and it isn't that surprising with a 98-point pace in 2021-22. His current 51-point pace seems then to be a shock. Sure it is low – kind of a low shooting percentage, and overall IPP, but his season seems much more in line with his recent career (six of his last seven seasons have him between a 55 and 62 point pace). There were two main factors in Josi's success in 2021-22. All of his underlying numbers were a bit inflated. Not as dramatically as some of those in the top list, but high. He and the team were playing well (and getting a bit lucky), and that led to an increase in production, production that for him maybe would have matched his previous career high of 77 points. Additionally, Josi put up 37 power-play points. That is 15-20 points more than his career average. Those points came on a power-play that was clicking above 24 percent, significantly above league average (a power-play that had been at the bottom of the league for several straight seasons). So far all of Josi's numbers have deflated to the point where he is a touch unlucky, but a course correction would put him much more in line with career average than even the 77-point season. On top of that he is on a power-play that is currently converting at 15 percent, or way below league average (actually pretty consistent to where they were prior to last season). He is still on a 25 power-play point pace, which is reasonably impressive, and some of these bounces are likely going to improve, but this just does not look like the season of a 90 plus point player. 

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