The 18^th annual Fantasy Guide was last updated on Saturday, putting in plus/minus projections and UFA notes. This week you can expect Band-Aid Boy info and projected offense by team. But the big news last week was the release of my Goalie Post app. Oh yes, it's here. And it's a beauty. Besides a facelift in the look, I have also put in calculations for probable win projections – a bar that goes right or left towards the team the calculation favors…goes further, the more of a favorite that team is. I use back-to-back info, home/road info, recent performance and longer-term performance. There is also a projected save bar for each starting goalie, based on how the opposition has been shooting lately (and long-term) and how his own team has been preventing shots lately (and long-term) to help you make the decision! The app is free. And yes, this will be on Android hopefully within two weeks, but it's on Apple now.

Get it on your iPhone here. And I have a request: after you download it, give it a day or two, and then please rate five stars and comment. My programmers, without my knowledge, added a comment. And to me, the comments look fake! So if you could please give a 'real' comment from a hockey fan, and bury those two, that would be a huge help. They are unable to remove them LOL.

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Tom Collins touches on this a bit in his Top 10 column Monday, but it never fails to leave me shaking my head when I see the fantasy hockey masses all gung-ho for the latest shiny new toy in net. I see it every year, and when I 'dare' have that shiny new toy low in my rankings I hear it from them on Twitter or in the comments. Pay attention: a general manager of a billion-dollar company is not going to hand the keys to the castle to an unproven kid. That general manager will never do this. I don't care how great the kid is and how terrible the current goaltender is, it's simply not going to happen. My goodness, I still haven’t recovered from the Spencer Knight vitriol I received three years ago…and two years ago…and last year…

Devon Levi is not Buffalo's starter – and if he ends up there by the playoffs, it won't be because he jumped out of training camp as the No.1 guy. Ukko-Pekka Luukkonen will likely be the starter as a 1A, with Eric Comrie as the 1B. Normally I would say Luukkonen, at 24, is too young. But he just started 33 games last year and has 46 NHL games under his belt overall. So we can say he's been 'eased in'. Comrie is signed for the most money of all the Buffalo goalies, and his overall numbers were very similar to Luukkonen's. Levi's numbers were the best of the group in his seven games, but he's only 21. He'll make his pro transition with Rochester. Buffalo is a team that will be top three league-wide in offense, so the hot dog vendor could get wins with this team. If you want a pick in the final round (or off the waiver wire), Luukkonen is your guy and, failing that, Comrie. Levi should not be drafted in one-year leagues, come on!

You'll see Levi this year for sure, however, because Luukkonen gets hurt a lot. And Comrie is coming off of an injury-riddled season. Levi is the next in line. So we'll see him. And he'll probably be great behind this powerhouse offense. But whether we see him for six games or 36 games will depend on the health of the other two. If they spend much of the season on the IR, then yes – Levi will be worth drafting. But without that, he's only a top own in keeper leagues.

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Tom also touches upon Pyotr Kochetkov. People are actually drafting Kochetkov in one-year leagues! There are literally two proven goalies NHL goalies ahead of him, same as last year. And just like with Levi, Kochetkov is exempt from waivers. We'll see Kochetkov because the goalies ahead of him get hurt a lot, but that's what the waiver wire is for. When I see that fantasy hockey owners are making decisions such as drafting Kochetkov and Levi in re-draft leagues, I am saddened to realize that so many people do not read DobberHockey. Ah well, their loss is your gain.

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Pittsburgh, Buffalo and Ottawa each fell short of a playoff spot last season. It would seem that all three are likely to get in this time around. But it won’t be easy, because…who would be out?

The Penguins fell short by one point last year (91 to Florida's 92 points). Their biggest weakness, when studying the analytics, was their lack of a pure checking line. Because they didn't have a real checking line, they decided that Jeff Carter should be a checker. Such an odd decision. But Carter, Ryan Poehling or Drew O'Connor (!) and Josh Archibald (!) made up the checking line. Now they have Lars Eller, Noel Acciari and Matt Nieto. They needed a shutdown defenseman to replace and improve on Dmitry Kulikov. Now they have Ryan Graves. They needed depth NHL options – now they have Vinnie Hinostroza and Andreas Johnsson at forward, and Magnus Hellberg in net as a No.3. Kyle Dubas addressed all of Pittsburgh's needs – and then he added Erik Karlsson. And while I know that Karlsson and Brent Burns didn't work out very well when they played together with the Sharks, there is reason for optimism with the Penguins that it works with Karlsson and Kris Letang. The Sharks didn't have Sidney Crosby and Evgeni Malkin. The plan for the Penguins is to have 20 minutes of Crosby and Karlsson out there every game… and 20 minutes of Malkin and Letang. Can you imagine? If everyone stays healthy, it's hard to imagine this team not getting a few more points to squeak into the playoffs.

The Sabres also had 91 points. They missed the playoffs by one point and they had no goalie! This team was weak defensively and had zero goaltending, but they scored so many goals that they nearly forced their way into the playoffs. It seems like the entire roster is made up of kids who, theoretically, should only get better. Can they get another two or three points to make the playoffs a reality?

And Ottawa has been building forever. Last year it looked as if they had finally taken that step forward, ultimate falling short of a playoff spot by six points. They have replaced goalie Cam Talbot with Joonas Korpisalo, and forward Alex DeBrincat with Dominik Kubalik and Vladimir Tarasenko. I think, overall, those changes are a wash. However, this is a young team that should see most of the players improve – and Josh Norris is now back and healthy. Healthy and improved enough to get six or seven more points in the standings?

With Detroit and Columbus teams that are much better, wins will be a little harder to come by for everyone. The Wings and Jackets aren't playoff teams yet, but they're not doormats either. But Pittsburgh, Buffalo and Ottawa should get in.

So which three teams bow out?

There's your million-dollar question. I pick the Lightning. An aging core. Tight against the cap. A goalie who seems to be human nowadays. My next pick is Boston. But it's so very hard to pick an NHL-record-breaking team to go from those lofty heights all the way down to a playoff miss. No Patrice Bergeron or David Krejci, and Brad Marchand is starting to lose a step. They also had a new coach last year, and new coaches always seem to have great first seasons. Now Jim Montgomery is in Year 2. Let's see how well he holds the room.

Everyone's first pick is the Islanders. But I'm certainly tired of counting that team out. Each year they are right in the mix for eighth spot. They refuse to rebuild, and want to try to win the 1990's way. That style is good enough to squeak in every year, but not enough to win a Cup. I think the Isles have a shot at getting in.

The final three playoff spots in the East will be a battle to the very end between Tampa Bay, Boston, the Islanders, Florida, Ottawa and Buffalo. Three teams will miss despite still getting 93 or 94 points! But I think Pittsburgh, Carolina, Toronto, the Rangers and New Jersey are safe.

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Brandon Hagel is a young (turns 25 next week) player who is on the rise with the Lightning. He was a 100-point player (102 to be exact) in junior, he made the NHL at 22, steadily improving his numbers in each season that he has played. He capped it off with 64 points last year playing with superstar Nikita Kucherov. He is seeing more and more time on both special teams, becoming a top two-way player. I think, despite the fact that Tampa Bay is aging with a couple of key players (Steven Stamkos and Victor Hedman) possibly looking at the beginning of their decline, Hagel still has another level of production ahead of him. And once Kucherov (and their other linemate Brayden Point) helps Hagel surpass the 70-point plateau, Hagel will be able to get there on his own in future seasons. Hagel is entering his BT year.

Yes, in this slow hockey news cycle I will be randomly picking players from my spreadsheet and talking about them. That was Hagel. Next up, is…

Connor McMichael is a top prospect whom fantasy owners are giving up on in droves. A first-round pick in 2019, McMichael then went onto scored 47 goals and 102 points in junior. He became a near-point-per-game player in the AHL as a rookie in the COVID-shortened season. Then he made Washington as a 20-year-old. At that time, you couldn't peel that guy off of his fantasy owner no matter what you offered. Oh, how things have changed. Today I'm getting criticized for ranking him too high (23^rd in my Top 200 Fantasy Prospect Forwards list), while all these 18-year-olds are "too low". Enough already with the shiny new toys! This is the same player who dazzled you a year and two years ago – except now you don't have to wait as long for him to produce! It's amazing how an owner will sour on a player if he gets sent to the minors and then his production dips. McMichael is still only 22, and because he is waivers-exempt for another year he could well end up back in Hershey. But that doesn't mean you give up on him – he's still likely going to be a top-six NHL player, be it this season or next. That 18-year-old you love so much today? Well, in three years he'll probably be the next McMichael you will criticize me for overrating while you look at the next 18-year-old. And round and round we go…

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See you next Monday.