In this week's Eastern Edge, we'll discuss a few veterans that have rebounded from slow starts this season.

Boone Jenner

Heading into the season, Columbus' centers were a popular topic of conversation. Fantasy managers wanted to know who would get a shot between star wingers Johnny Gaudreau and Patrik Laine on the top line, but there were so many intriguing options. If the team wanted a youngster to put up points and build confidence, maybe they gave the spot to Kent Johnson or Cole Sillinger. If they wanted to get more return on investment from their highest-paid center –who still seems to have some untapped offensive potential – then Jack Roslovic would get the gig. Although there were solid arguments for those guys, the frontrunner always seemed to be Boone Jenner, who performed well as the team's top center last season. There was some doubt about him reclaiming the role due to a back injury that ended his 2021-2022 campaign early, but based on the first quarter of this season, Jenner is still the go-to guy in Columbus.

Columbus' captain got off to a slow start this year, tallying four points in 10 appearances during the month of October. He's taken flight since then, posting eight goals and six assists for 14 points over his last 13 outings. We saw him take on an expanded role last season, playing over 20 minutes a night and holding a spot on Columbus' top power-play unit. With the extra opportunity, he was able to score at a career-high 60-point pace. He's scoring at a similar rate this year, again benefitting from a high volume of opportunity.

Being on the ice so much means more chances for Jenner to have an impact on the game, registering production in the categories we track in fantasy hockey leagues. Through the first quarter of this season, he's averaging over 12 faceoff wins per game, which ranks fourth in the NHL. Jenner isn't typically regarded as a high-volume shooter, but his 3.4 shots place him 34^th among league skaters. Although he doesn't put up a huge number of hits and blocks, he averages a little more than one of each per game, so he won't sink you there. The fact that he does all of this while scoring at a 60-point pace makes Jenner quite valuable in multicategory formats, so I'm surprised he's currently rostered in just 44% of Yahoo leagues.

Tomas Tatar

After enjoying a great deal of offensive success during his three years in Montreal, Tatar paced for just 32 points last season – his first with the Devils. Things looked bleak again this year as he went pointless in his first five games of the campaign. However, he's bounced back from that slow start, tallying 15 points in his last 20 appearances.

Tatar's recent resurgence may be explained by consistent deployment beside high-quality line mates. Although he saw some exposure to Nico Hischier last year, he spent even more time in the bottom-six, often with different sets of line mates who lacked offensive talent. During his most productive years in Montreal, Tatar consistently played beside Brendan Gallagher and Phillip Danault – a couple of strong two-way players that he had great chemistry with. He didn't really get a chance to develop that same chemistry with anyone last year in New Jersey.

This season, Tatar has been allowed to play with Hischier on a more consistent basis, displaying chemistry that wasn't given a chance to blossom last year. Hischier has taken his game to a new level this season and Tatar has certainly benefitted. During their 200 minutes together at 5v5 this season, Hischier and Tatar have outclassed their opponents: they own 60.2% of the shot share, a 63.7% share of scoring chances and a 63.2% share of high danger opportunities (via NaturalStatTrick). They aren't just generating good chances; they're converting on them too – outscoring the opposition by a staggering 15 to 3 margin. Fabian Zetterlund has seen the most time as the third member of their line, but Jesper Bratt has also seen significant time in that role. The results have been strong regardless of who rounds out the trio.

Although Tatar's output has been impressive in recent weeks, his offensive ceiling remains limited because he's stuck on New Jersey's second power-play unit. Regardless, he's never been reliant on the man advantage for production, and still has potential to crack the 50-point mark this year. I think he's done enough to maintain a top-six role even when Ondrej Palat returns to the lineup in a few weeks. Rostered in just 13% of Yahoo leagues, Tatar is a solid streaming option in most formats.

Chris Kreider

Entering the 2022-2023 campaign, I don't think anyone expected Kreider to match his 52-goal output from last year. However, there was still an expectation for strong offensive numbers as he was projected to see favourable deployment beside talented players in New York. He got off to a slow start with four points in his first eight games but has bounced back since, posting 18 points in his last 19 outings. He's scoring at a 73-point pace this season – not far behind the 78-point pace he posted last year. Sure, he was scoring more goals then, but it's encouraging to see the offense hasn't completely evaporated.

It's worth noting that his average ice time has increased by a minute since last season (from 18:40 to 19:40). He's also seeing a whopping 78% of New York's power-play time – only six players in the league enjoy a greater share of their team's total time with the man advantage. Although Kreider has spent most of his minutes beside star center Mika Zibanejad this season and in recent years, he was dropped down the lineup during the Rangers' last game. Instead, it was youngsters Alexis Lafreniere and Kaapo Kakko who skated beside Zibanejad. Reports indicate that the newly formed trio looked good together, so it'll be interesting to see what the team's lines look like as the season progresses.