Speaker 1: Welcome to Fantasy Hockey Life, presented by fan Tracks. Here's
your source of information and analysis to help you win
your fantasy hockey league.
Speaker 2: Block off hot a step hit on, stay lock.
Speaker 1: Here's your hosts, Jesse Souvier and Victor Nuno.
Speaker 2: Yessy Hockey Live back once again. Jesse Severe, Fan Tracks,
and that guy over there, Yes, that one is Victor Nuno,
a VP ring side. Victor. How you doing.
Speaker 3: I'm doing great, Jesse. Super excited for the season. I
almost be here, finished with most of the drafts and
just can't wait to start watching some actual hockey, how
about you.
Speaker 2: That's yeah, that's right. It is for us dynasty players,
draft season has been going on for many months. But
I think for a lot of people listening to fantasy
hockey podcasts right now, they're in the thick of draft season,
redraft season. I know I've got one. I'm only in
one redraft this year, I think, and that's going to
be kicking off practically opening nights, So that's not too
long after this episode, will are Yeah, Victor, and I
know you're doing slow drafts right now for your redrafts.
Speaker 3: Right indeed, you just help me with making some decisions
on one of mine that I was struggling with. So
it's nice to it's nice to be able to phone
a friend. And yeah, slow drafts are fun. I do
actually have one that's like the night before the season starts,
so that'll be fun to wait till the very last minute.
And that's just like a content creator one. It should
be fun. Yeah, most of them are already done, but yeah,
doing the slow drafts is always fun. I like when
you on one and one in the kokup Fall. I'm
actually drafting on the turn, which is a really interesting
exercise because you wait forever and then you get two
picks in a row. But I found that there's no
point in setting a queue because the whole thing's gone
by the time it gets back to me.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I hate I hate drafting on the I'd much
rather pick in the middle. But I know a lot
of people swear by the turn. I think you're just yeah, anyway,
I could talk all day instead. I will invite you
all to talk all day and night, because you can
for free on our discord, and all you need to
do to get in there and chat it up with ourselves,
but primarily with a whole bunch of hockey. Fantasy hockey
crazies who congregate in that space is to get us
get a link from us Fantasy hockeyl Life at gmail
dot com. We'll get you the link to get in there,
or hit us up on x at Fanhockey Life at
Victor Nuno twelve and if you're interested in going to
the next level with some stuff, Victor tell them what
they could win. Yeah.
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Fantasyhockeylife dot com Jesse.
Speaker 2: Yes, indeed, we're gonna take a break, come back and
talk Eastern Conference, just to catch you up on the
catchup and the mustard. Here's what we're doing, folks. I
hope you listened last week as we talked about the
Western Conference, but if you didn't, what we're going to
do now is go back to the very beginning of
our thirty two team previews that started off in shoot
may something like that, I feel like twenty twenty two
or something that started. It's been a long time anyway,
and we're going to give you a briefing on any
changes that happened since our preview episode. That's the catch up.
Then the mustard is our spice. See hot takes, Victor
or myself, we're gonna alternate. Are gonna give two hot takes,
and the other of us will decide which one of
them they will be held to and at the end
of the season we'll have fun with these again. So Victor,
you got the first team, what do you got?
Speaker 3: I do? I have the Boston Bruins. We talked about
them on July thirtieth. Not a whole lot of news
came out of them, but I guess it was news
that I guess, no major signings. Tyler Johnson on a PTO.
I guess the biggest news was that Brad Marshand had
surgeries in the offseason, three different surgeries, and that was
surprising to everyone. But it shouldn't be a big deal.
It sounds like he's gonna be ready for the season,
so he shouldn't miss any time. Case you're wondering about Marshan,
that wasn't really where I was gonna go in terms
of my hot take, but here they are. I'm gonna
go with Charlie McAvoy and Elias Lennholm. These are two
guys that I think are going to be essential to
their success this year. McAvoy has been obviously a cornerstone
of their team for for a while. Now he's getting paid.
They want, they need him to be their everything guy,
and he does a lot and even strength he isn't
always the best in fantasy, but he's an excellent real
life defender. When we talked to Fluto, they talked, He
talked about how they really need him. They need more
out of him, They need more scoring out of him,
they need more of what he can bring and I
think he can do it. So this past season, he
had a good season, but it wasn't as good as
it had been the previous two. So he had fifty
two point pace previously sixty four and fifty nine, and
I think he gets back to a seventy it gets
up to a seventy point pace. I think he's going
to get all the power play time. We know that
he had a pretty low number of power play points
for all of his time on ice, just thirteen and
I think he could easily get back into twenty plus
and with a little bit more variance in terms of
his secondary assists, I think he can get there seventy
point pace. Charlie McAvoy's number one. The second one is
that Elias lin Holm. I know people are really big
on alcelind Home and I do think he's going to
be good. I do think he's a better player than
pavl Zaka, who wasn't really a first line center, and
I think is going to be slotted in a little
bit better on the wing or potentially a second line.
But I think people that think Linholm is just gonna
bust out for what he did in his top years
in Calgary. I think that's a little over index, so
I think he's going to fail to pass a sixty
five point pace. He's only passed a sixty five point
pace a few times, and that was generally when he
had elite wingers, and the rest of the time he
was around a sixty foy point pace. He had sixty six,
sixty nine, sixty three point paces and just a couple
of other outliers that were above that. What do you think, Jesse,
stock up on McAvoy or stock down on lindel Holme.
Which way you're going to go?
Speaker 2: Victor? My brain is tied in a knot right now.
And here's what's happening to me. Philosophically. We have predictions
of people who are going to we're predicting they're going
to do better than something, and predictions where people are
going to do worse than something. Am I a bad
person if I go against a prediction of somebody doing better?
And a worse person if I go for somebody doing work?
Or is it better for me to the opposite of
whatever you did? Because you're predicting the blow, and so
when I do the blow, never mind victory. None of
this makes any sense outside of my brain. But the
point being, I am going to just I think the
Elias Lindholm one is the more likely of the two.
I don't know, even though they're paying him like he's
a superstar right now, or they're paying him a heck
of a lot of money, let's put it that way,
I don't necessarily see that he's going to have the
type of season like a sixty five point pace. So
I will go against Charlie mcklvoy's seventy point pace. Everybody
expects more from him, but he still has to hit it,
and I don't know that is a sure thing. So
I'm morally, I'm ethically I'm compromised because I'm going to
go against Charlie mcklvoy's success. Victor.
Speaker 3: All Right, I think we all understand where you're coming
from from. Maybe we'll see. Yeah.
Speaker 2: Anyway, Buffalo sabers, a few things happened since May when
this came out. They signed UPL for a lot of
money over five years. In fact, Ukapeca Lucanen is tied
for the twentieth largest AAV with the second most remaining
years for any goalie in the NHL, only Jake Ottinger
and Spencer Knight have as many more years under contract
as Uka Pecca Lucanan. Poor Devin Levi, what are we
going to do with him? Signed? The Buffalo Sabers signed
Kyle Klegg, Sam Lefferty, Jason Zucker, Nick Aube Kubel, James Raimer,
Henri Joki Haryu, and they traded away Matthew Savoy for
Brian McLeod. They traded for and then signed Beck Malenstein
from the Washington Capitals. They drafted Consta Helenius and signed
him to an entry level contract. They bought out Jeff Skinner,
who Victor belize is going to score sixty goals as
part of the ton Oilers this year. I'm pretty sure
he promised his seventy goals from Jeff Skinner and signed
it in his blood, So we're gonna see how that goes.
But and then the Sabers lost Zemgis Gurginson's former All
Stars zemguz Kurginson's Was he not? Was he not? The
Latvian All Star they got voted in by the entire
country of Latvia. Victor Olafson also gone. I think he's
with the Knights now and Dustin Torkarski, And so what
is my hot take here? I'm going to go with
a couple of the young guys and do slightly different
predictions with them. Yuri Coolidge, I'm going to say, get
sixty NHL games this year. Jack Quinn, I'm gonna say,
get sixty points this year. Victor I. We've been back
and forth on Jack Quinn a little bit, and Coolidge,
I don't know if he's going to be able to
establish himself this year or not. That's why I thought
sixty was maybe a reasonable number to consider aggressive. What
do you think which of these two is the hotter
thing to stick me with?
Speaker 3: I don't actually think that, but the Quinn take is
hot at all. I think he's pretty good player, and
he's actually he was on a pretty good pace before
he was injured. Yeah, he I think that one is
pretty likely. I think Jack Quinn is pretty much assured
a middle a top six spot there, so I think
that one's a little bit more likely. Maybe some people
don't agree with that, but he was on a fifty
eight point pace last season. I know you're saying sixty
points he'd have to actually play, but I think that's
a little bit more reasonable, sou and he can stay healthy,
which he played seventy five games his first season, had
a forty point pace. I think that one was more likely. Kolick.
I love Yery Kulick. I don't understand why they haven't
played him more, because he has just dominated the AHL
and it seems like he should be good enough to
play in the NHL. But they haven't given him a
lot of opportunity to do that, so that seems a
little less likely for whatever reason. So I'm gonna go
with that one, even though I think both of these
certainly could have happened. But I'll go with the kolick
sixty games. Let's go on to the next one. Detroit
Red Wings. We talked about them in early August. No
major changes since then except for the signings of Raymond
Cider and to a lesser degree, Bergran. I know they
wanted to bring both those guys in less than Dylan Larkin,
which they did just a little bit less for each
of them. The hot takes I have are going to
be between Lucas, Raymond, and the goalies. If you remember,
they have too many goalies. They have whoso they have,
but Talbot I'm doing this for memory, Jesse, but there
are too many to recall Campbell and Lion I believe right,
that's too many. That's too many. So who all is
going to play? I think that they're all going to
eat in each other starts. I think what I'm doing
is just staying away from Detroit goalies in general, because
I don't know who is going to be the one
who emerges. I think they wanted to be Who's so
he's the one that's getting paid the most money, but
he also has been the most injury prone. That's going
to be interesting to see. So one of the takes
is that no Red Wing goalie gets more than thirty
five starts. You might think that one's too easy because
that seems unlikely that someone who played someone probably will,
but we just don't know who. Lucas Raymond is. The
other one has the highest point pace on the Red
Wings is the other take that should be close. He
and Larkin will probably be close. I think that there
may be someone like Patty Kane could rediscover his glory
days and give them a run for their money. Last season,
in case you were wondering, Larkin had a bit more.
He had sixty nine points in sixty eight games, so
just over point per game. Kane was pretty close to
point per game two with forty seven and fifty Raymond
had seventy two and eighty two. But if you just
look at the last month of the season, it was
really Raymond that was driving the bus on all that.
He was just scoring at will the last few weeks
of the season. So if that continues, then Raymond could
help Jesse. Which one are you sticking with.
Speaker 2: I'm gonna give you the Raymond one. It is close,
but I think it's very reasonable to think there's gonna
be no goalie getting a ton of the starts there.
I do agree there is just too crowded there. And
while you could say somebody's gonna end up taking that
net and by December it'll be a little more settled,
I would agree with your take on that, and Lucas Raymond,
there's a few other guys who could push him out
of that highest point pace. You got Larkin, you've got
to brink it. You've got Patrick Kane. I think there
are a couple of reasonable ways, a couple of reasonable
scenarios where he doesn't end up there. So I'm gonna
say that's the hotter of the two takes. Florida Panthers
not anything to catch up on because we just did
it a few days ago, and so I'm gonna give
two potential hot takes, and it's again, it's hard with
the Panthers because I think they're a well known commodity.
But I'm gonna give Matt Kichuck a career high in points.
I thought that was going to be a less hot
take until I looked at the actual number of points
that he's had a year in his career, one hundred
and ten. It was what it would take for him
to have a career hind points. But I think it's
achievable for Maddi Kuchuk, hopefully not after he's gassed from
a long summer of playing hockey. And then I'm gonna
say the other hot take, Spencer Knight gets himself thirty
two regular season starts, so that would be a little
bit more like Bob in his advanced age, and after
that long summery played, maybe slips under fifty regular season starts.
So Matt Kichuk one hundred and ten points, Spencer Knight's
thirty two regular season starts victor. Which one are you
going to attribute to me?
Speaker 3: This is good because I don't think either of these
are going to happen, So I appreciate it when you
do this for me.
Speaker 2: Get easy.
Speaker 3: Not that I don't think Kachuk can, because he's clearly
talented enough, but I think you saw a different Kuchuk
last season. He basically just wanted to play stronger all
around hockey that helps the team win, and not as
much and before I think he was trying a little
bit harder to score a lot of points. He still
went well over a point per game, but one hundred
and ten is a lot. He had what is what
was that he had one point one points per game,
so that was a close to ninety. I think that's
a big ass to get up to that one hundred
and ten point pace, which I again I think he
can do, but it's just it's a bit, it's a
bit a lot night starting thirty two games. I think
they really want Knight to start at thirty two games.
That's the thing. He should be in the NHL. He
should sounds like he's over a lot of those things.
I know that Bob played a lot of hockey, and
they're gonna want to really see what they have in Night.
I mean, they did invest in him. They haven't really
gotten much back from their investments so far in him,
and I think that they really want to, you know,
see what he can do. Is are is he really
the starter of the future? As Bob sundowns a little bit,
He's thirty six years old, Spencer Night thirty twenty three,
so I think they really want to transition to Night.
So I think that one's a little bit more likely.
So I'm going to give you the Maddie could chuck one,
just because I think he's playing a different type of
hockey that's more to win games and less to score
a bunch of points. Even though I think it very
much well could happen, but I'm not sure that either
super likely, just because Knight hasn't ever done that, and
even though they might want him to, he might struggle
or get injured or who knows. My next team is
the Montreal Canadians. So the catch up. A few things happened.
Patrick Lane got traded to Montreal. That was a big deal,
and two more years at eight point seven million is
a lot in a cap league. I know some people
are losing their mind over how many goals he's going
to score. I'm pretty skeptical about that. I know Line can,
but I also have seen him really struggle at times,
and you know, his brand of hockey is one that
is sometimes disinterested in some of the all around play,
and I just wonder how that's going to fit in
when he wants to.
Speaker 1: Though.
Speaker 3: He certainly can score a lot of goals, and he's
just been through a lot personally, so hopefully it all
works out for him and he turns the corner and
then does really well. They're in Montreal, but I also
think that team is still a bit of ways from
being a contender and having enough goals to go around.
I also don't know that I love his center options.
I don't think he's going to play with Suzuki, and
so who's it going to be with the Worak or
Kirby Doc. I feel like Lane is someone who needs
a cenator to do a lot of work for him,
and I'm not sure he's gonna have that. Soefkowski signed
a big contract seven point six million times eight years.
I think he should have a monster season. Really broke
out last year, that's a great one, and then it
seemed like they were going to be thin on defense
and maybe they'd have Hudson playing, although he seems like
he may make the team. It also seemed like they
might have some other a young d break in, but
then they signed Jacky, Goolei and Baron, so it seems
like they'll be back with a pretty standard crew from
last year. Maybe Hudson makes the team. Who knows. I'm
I'm gonna do my hot take on Patrick Line and
Cole Cawfield though I know that Line has the potential
to score a lot, but he has really failed to
meet expectations on a couple different occasions. Forty one point
pace last season, forty three point pace in that split
season between Winnipeg and Columbus. A lot of unknowns, but
I'm gonna say he fails to clear a sixty sixty
total points is what I'm saying for lin A. And
that does factor in potentially missing time and all that
because he has only he played. Early in his career,
he was pretty regularly hitting almost all his games played
seventy three, eighty two, eighty two, but then the last
six seasons he's the most he's played is sixty eight
and then aside from that, it was fifty six, so
he's really struggled to hit all those games played. The
other one is a little bit more optimistic, and that
is Cole Cawfield. I think Caufield is on the other trajectory.
I think he's on the trajectory up. And he's scored
twenty three, twenty six, twenty eight goals the last few seasons,
and a couple of those was in limited action. So
the twenty eight goal season was actually in the most
games played. The other two were much far fewer games played.
So I'm gonna say Cole Coffield clears a thirty five
goal pace this season. So, Jesse, which one of those
do you like?
Speaker 1: For me?
Speaker 2: Nice, I love Cole cow Field finally getting there. I
feel like I've had so many bullish predictions on Cole
cow Field, and he's quiet, he's down low, doing it
when he can stay healthy. But I am going to
say that, boy, that's hard. I will say line A
surpasses sixty points. Your scenario is extremely realistic that he's
going to have these problems. I'm just going to say,
my goodness, that talent has to figure out a way
to play in Montreal. So I will say that it
is taught for him to not get to sixty points.
But really either of these are extremely realistic. They're good,
good picks because certainly the XPEC, I think the general
expectations the line he's going to surpass that will I
will go with that one. Ottawa Senators did a lot
of business later in the year. Traded Jonas Corposalo for
Lenis Ulmark, traded Jacob Chickeran for Nick Jensen. They traded
away Matthew Joseph. They signed David Pern, Michael Imadio, signed
Klein Addison, Nick Cousins, and re signed Matt Sogard. They
signed Noah Gregor, drafted and signed Carteri Kempchuk. They traded
Yob Jarventi for Xavier Borgo and Jake Chiasson. And they
achieved peace in our time with Shane Pinto. Bless it all,
and here are my hot takes. First, the Senators have
their first one hundred point scorer since Danny Heatley in
two thousand and six, two thousand and seven. I think
there are several candidates. One of them is going to
do it. We're going to have one hundred point scorer
in Ottawa and The second is that Brady Kachuck not
only leads all the senators and hits, but he does
it by at least one hundred and thirty hits. I
looked at last year's numbers. That would be a bit more,
I believe than last year, but not completely as outlined
dish as it might sound on its face. So, Victor,
which one of these two do you think ought to
count against me?
Speaker 3: Yeah, that's a good one. One hundred point pay that's
a lot. Yeah, that's definitely. It's always hard when you
pick these like bash numbers, because I would have to
look at them all. It's hard to know exactly, So
I don't know if you're just trying to pull the
wool over on me, Jesse, or whether this is actually spicy.
Speaker 2: I'm too slick, Victor, I am too slick. You're never
gonna catch me.
Speaker 3: That must be true. Yeah, the Yeah, there's a lot
of good there's some good options here. I think no
one has been particularly close to that one hundred point
Pacer Stutes could bounce back. You could see Kuchuk doing it,
but I think Kuchuk is just more of that seventy
to eighty point guy with lots of Bash, So I
think that's funk. I think for all those guys that's
a little unlikely. Feel like betting against the hits is
a bad idea though, because he could always just get
on a main streak and put up ten hit games.
He's done that before. So I'm gonna go with one
hundred point pace. No, one hundred point pace, guy, That's
what I'm gonna do, all right, And let's go with
the next team for me, that's the Tampa Bay Lightning.
We talked about them in early August. No major changes
from them, but there were changes on the show that
we talked about, namely bringing in Jake Gonseil. Obviously they
lost Sergachev, and that's where my two takes are going
to center around. One of them being that Jake Gentzil
finishes second in total points on the Lightning and is
over a ninety one point pace. That would put him
at the second highest pace of his career, and that's
a pretty high number because he hasn't last year he
had Kutrov had one hundred and forty four point pace
on a forty six point pace. Then we had point
at ninety one stampcost who's gone now at eighty four
Edmond at eighty, so it seems unlikely that he's going
to catch Coach. I don't know who could, but passing
point would be a challenge. Obviously, he'd have to really
cook on the power play, which I think he can.
I totally think he can, but that might be a
little rich for some people. So that's the first one
with Denzil. I do really like I'm super high and
I think he could have one of the best seasons
of his career. I think it's a great situation he's
going in. He did have a ninety four point pace
last season. He has had ninety one and ninety point
paces previously, so I'm saying over a ninety one point
pace so second best and would be pretty high for him.
The other one goes to headman, and that is that
Victor Hedman puts up a point per game pace again,
which he has done, but their context of the team
around him is a little bit worse. I think potentially
they've lost some key contributors since he did that. Again.
He hasn't put up a point per game pay since
twenty one twenty two last season. He was at an
eighty point pace this season in between though he was
at fifty three and he's basically been in the sixties
for many of the seasons before that, so point per
game pace would be a big bump up. I do
think he gets indexed up because of not having Sergachev.
So what do you think, Jesse, You're going to take
the Gensil one or the Cergchev or the headman.
Speaker 2: I am going to give you the I'm gonna stick
you with the Ginsel. Victor. Gensel has been excellent over
the years, but I think going to Tampa, we just
can't assume that he's going to keep up the same
magic that he's always been able to show in Pittsburgh.
He's not been a passenger by any means, but second
and total points on the Lightning is a pretty high
bar to clear. I think probably bradon point would finish
over him. That is what I'd be counted on there,
because presumably kouchure Off would be first on the team
end points. Victor of the Toronto Maple Leafs, we are
to them again. They recovered them fairly recently. They traded
for They signed Chris Tannef, who a six year deal.
They signed Oel Yannie HOCKINPA and Anthony Stolars, who you
were telling me earlier some are projecting to lead the
team in goalie starts, which is wild to me. Tyler
Bertuzzi left them in free agency and they just signed
Max Patch. You're ready to a tryout who we just
very recently talked about on The Capitol's episode of could
he possibly return to be Capital?
Speaker 3: Again?
Speaker 2: My hot take, my spicy mustard here once again, no
goalie starts the majority of the games into the Toronto
regular season. So I'm saying neither still Lars nor Wall.
And I think if you ask me what I think
is going to happen when I think is most likely,
I would say it was wal Joseph Wall will have
the majority of the starts. But I think it's a
little more. It is a reasonably within spicy arrange thing
to say that no goalie is going to start the
majority of the starts, and then Matthew Nees outscores one
of the corps for five on this team, breaks into
the top five in scoring on the Toronto Maple Leafs.
He's finally going to come into his own this year
and pay off that talent. There's certainly some pretty pretty
talented offensive guys. He would have to surpass to get
that high, but I think maybe it could happen. So, Victor,
which one of those two do you think? I think
I know which one you're gonna make me do, But
go ahead and tell me.
Speaker 3: I was wondering why you were talking about the Unicorn
of the sea the Narwal, but then it hit me
you were talking about no Wall. I think both of
these are pretty unlikely. Nice is a good all around player,
but I don't know he's going to score that much.
I really don't want the first one to be true
because I just drafted Joseph Wall in the Cup Fule.
That's who I decided on, and I want him to
play a lot and score a lot. I'm gonna go
with the nis one outscoring one of the top five.
I think that it's possible, but unlikely.
Speaker 2: And this closure. I consulted with Victor on the Wall pick,
and I'm saying, I think the while getting the majority
that starts. That is what I am believing in a way.
But the hot take is nobody gets the majority. All right,
let's take a break, come back one board division to go.
Speaker 3: This lead two excellence more serious injury.
Speaker 2: When back for the Metropolitan Division victory. You have the
first team up for discussion.
Speaker 3: I sure do. That's the Carolina Hurricanes, which we talked
about at the end of July. No major updates on
them since, and there's some interesting things going on. I
think that one of the interesting storylines to me is
that one or more of their rookies could make the team.
We were just I was just following some of the
Beat writers talking about Felix Hungersorm who we've talked about,
Jackson Blake, who we've talked about, both looking really good.
But I'm Bradley Nadeau man, and I really want him
to be the guy. I think he's the guy who
people have talked about being able to make the team,
and I'm excited for him. I think he can do it.
I'm going to say Bradley Nadeau makes the team, plays
twenty NHL games, and scores ten goals, which I wanted
to be more optimistic than that, but I think that's
already pretty spicy, considering he's only played one NHL game
and probably spends most of not all, the season in
the AHL. So that's one of them. The other one
is Andre Swechnikoff, and I think I'm done predicting that
Andres Spechnikoff can do more than what we've seen him
do unless Rod Brandomore is not the coach there. I
don't know that he can score over a seventy five
point pace. We've seen him score just under, We've seen
him score way under, and it doesn't seem to matter
if he gets more time on ice, power play time,
all of that hasn't really seemed to move the needle
too much. So I'm gonna say, Andre, if special Cough
once again fails to go over seventy five point pace, Jesse,
I think I know which one you're gonna pick.
Speaker 2: Oh, Victor, it's a hater prediction, a hater addiction that
you've got on under his Fetchnikoff, and I won't stand
for it. My guy is I'm I think he'll surpass
that once again. Bradley Nidau, he was definitely in our
common in the Diesel four Sport League. He was available
in the rookie draft this year, and I thought I
was going to be all sneaky and taking when he
fell to me and dangle Empire, Evil Empire. Dave snatched
him right up in front of us, so that was no,
that was no possibility. But I think Bradley Nadeau scoring
ten goals this year, I don't see it happening. So
I'm go to give you that one, Victor. I figured
onto the Columbus Blue Jackets to catch up. I you know,
Johnny Gudroau, what is there to say there. I don't
believe we've actually recorded since that all went down, And
of course our thoughts are with the Control family. Crazy
times out there in Philadelphia, the back into reality. The
Blue Jackets traded Patrick Cline we just talked about him
for Jordan Harris. They drafted Caden Lindstrom, they re signed
all the kids, a bunch of young players re signed
and extended for Columbus, and they signed James Van Riemsdyke.
For some reason, things are looking rough in Columbus. They're
they're reveilt has been set back, but they do have
a lot of young talented players. The hot take on
our episode where we were talking about Columbus, our guests
said Cole Cillinger was up for a good year and
I'm going to hot take him all the way into
top five and forward power play time on ice. That
be pretty hot. But if he started to take a
significant offensive role. I think that would be achievable. And
then my other hot take, Boone Jenner leads the team
in points. That's not as hot as you think, especially
with Patrick Lione and some of these other guys.
Speaker 1: Gone.
Speaker 2: Jenner has been there in that type of conversation before.
Not somebody usually think of his team's leading scorer, though,
So Cole Cylinger top five forward, power play talman ice
or Boone Jenner leading the team in points victor.
Speaker 3: Another good one, since I don't think either are terribly likely.
So I like that. Whatever happened to Cole Senator Cylinder,
such a strange story. He was made the team played
a bunch of minutes right off the bat as a
D plus one and then and then just sunk back
into oblivion, barely scoring eleven points in sixty four games.
It was so confusing. He got a little bit back
last year to where he needed to be. His ice
time came up to sixteen minutes, so I could see
where that's coming from. I still am not sure that
he can get that time on ice. Did you say
for forwards? You did? Okay, so that makes a little
bit more sense. Yeah, I think that's still gonna be
a bit tough. They have so many new players that
makes it a little bit harder to track. We'll have
to see. I think that one's a little bit more likely,
just because he's been there longer and has a little
bit more leash in bandwidth than some of the new
guys who are there. Boone Jenner leading the team in
points certainly seems like it could happen. I don't know
that it should happen, obviously, with some other players who
aren't there anymore. I think both of these are unlikely,
but they could happen. So I'm gonna say the Boone
Jenner one is a little less likely, just because I
think some other people with their power play points and
their progression from previous years, might be able to pass him.
So we'll go with that one. But I don't really
feel great about either of them, so I guess that's
decent Jesse. Let's move over to the New Jersey Devils.
I love how we found doubt about the Luke Hughes injury.
Just spotted on the sideline of a Michigan football game
in a sling and everybody lost their mind, Like, what's
going on with Luke? Cues and then the Devils were like,
oh yeah, basically we were going to tell you about that,
but I guess we'll just tell you now. He's going
to miss the first month of the season or so
offseason training. Got to be careful with that. Apparently, that's the.
Speaker 2: Same thing could be said about the Michigan team. He
was on the sidelines for.
Speaker 3: Not as good of a season as last season. So
let's talk about the hot takes. It's going to involve
Luke Hughes. But I think Dougie Hamilton scores the most
points of any double defender, and part of that is
baked into this the fact that Hughes is going to
miss a little bit of time. But I also think
that Hamilton has a lot to prove. He basically missed
almost He missed so much of last season with that
terrible injury that was really difficult. Twenty games and Hughes
that really helps you in terms of playing more and
getting his feet under him. But also he didn't he
was out there without as much help. And Hamilton is
a really strong, even strength defender, so I think that
that's going to really help him. I think the Devils
look better overall. I think Meyer was injured last season
and didn't want to talk about it. So I think
you know him and healthy Hughes and he's share and
Brad everybody. I think they're going to score a lot
of goals, and I think that Hamilton's going to be
out there for a lot of the even strength stuff
and probably even the power play. So I think he's
gonna score more points than Hughes, which might be a
little hot. He did have a forty seven point He
was at a forty seven point paints last year, and
I do think he's probably going to get back on
the power play, and so that's probably a bit spicy
because it's going to be harder for Hamilton to pass
him if Hughes is on the power play with his brother.
The other one revolves teamer Meyer, and I just really
don't believe that Timo Meyer is as bad as he
showed so far in New Jersey. I think that he's
been injured, he also had hasn't been given all the
best deployment, but he and I know that maybe he
was a little over index in that last season in
San Jose, being a point at a point per game,
But I think he's better than a sixty point pace
is what he had last season, So I think he's
going to be above seventy five point pace. Above seventy
five would be his second best statistical pace season, and
I think he can get there. Christy talked about on
the show he was dealing with some injuries. It was
also when Hughes was out. It was he was ended
up playing third line with was it no sick or somebody?
I think Hughes. I think Meyer is going to be
much better, and I think he cleared the seventy five
point pace. So which one do you want to hold? Me?
Speaker 1: Too?
Speaker 2: Very interesting? I am a huge Doug Eat defender, so
despite the arrival of Luke Hughes in his early success,
I am too sympathetic with the idea that he will
score the most points of any double defender to go
against that one. So I'm going to give you the
tiamo Meyer. I agree it seems like he should be
better than he has been, but I don't know. I
guess I'm going to make you stick with that one.
It's not impossible. It's a good it's a good hot
take because it would be nice to see him get
back in that range, and it's possible but I think
the smart money right now is on he won't, So
that's why he has to be your hot take. New
York Islanders. We're gonna get the catch up there, Yo,
Yas rokn had some surgery. Apparently he's gonna be all right.
Maxim Ziplikoff is over here from Russia. Anthony Declara, Mike
Riley signed for the team. The Cole. The Ales drafted
the famous and controversial Cole Isserman, and alliterative obliterators Matt
Martin and Cal Clutterbuck are mostly gone. It sounds like
Clutterbuck might be on some kind of a tryout contract.
Casey suzekis unaffected by the change, and the hot take.
The mustard is Noah Dobson point per game, two hundred block,
one hundred hit season upcoming. The second one is Maxim
Ziplokoff fifty five points come in and just Breadmandon all
over at the NHL victor. Which one of those you
think is the hotter?
Speaker 3: I definitely think that simple Coff is the hotter of
the two. I think that we just don't know. We
have no idea what he's going to do. We saw
a huge season from Dobson. I certainly think it's possible
we see some regression from him. We saw a lot
of that under the previous coach, and is that all
going to continue now with why? We don't really know.
I think Dobson has all the talent in the world,
and I think he can get there. He wasn't that
far off. It would be a step up though in
terms of the blocks, and that would be a bit tough.
But I think that they need him to be They
need him to do everything, and hopefully while sees that,
I'm gonna take simplicoff at fifty five, just because we
have no idea what he's going to do, and it's
possible that he just does nothing, ends up going back
to the KHL or goes to the AHL, or just
gets benched or whatever. That one seems like the more
likely win for me. So I'll older that one New
York Rangers is the next team. And the Rangers we
talked about early September and just a couple of weeks ago,
not much as not really anything has changed, so we'll
do the hot takes just from them. I'm really excited
about Vincent Trocheck this year. I'm really excited about a
lot of the top line forwards here. I think paneren
is going to have another great season, maybe not score
quite as many goals as he did. I do think
that Lafrenier is going to continue to break out and
be good. But I'm gonna say that Vincent Trocheck has
more points than Lafrenier, which he certainly did last year,
and this would be a big step up for Lafrenier
to be able to pass him. And we've also talked
about Trocheck kind of having that one up, one down
kind of season and bouncing back and forth. Last season,
he had a twenty point twenty twenty point pace better
than Lafarnier, and a lot of people are predicting that
Lafnier is really going to step up this year. But
I think Vinni t is the man. He's going to
continue to be in that seventy five point range, and
I think it's going to take a lot for Lafarnier
to get there, so I'm gonna say that for him.
I wanted to say something about Panarin regressing. I don't
think he's going to score forty five goals again, but
instead I went with a positive thing in ca Andre Miller.
I think Caandre Miller is such an awesome defenseman, and
he did have a forty five point pace last season,
sorry the previous season, but he progressed hard this year
and there are some other options there. So I'm gonna
just say that he gets back to a forty point pace.
So Jesse, that one's maybe not as spicy. Which one
are you going to give me?
Speaker 2: I'm going to give you the ca Andre Miller. I
like ca Andre Miller, but I think Vencent Trochick very
I think you will have a better than Alexis Lafrenier.
I think he's shown us that in the past, despite
the improvement of the former number one overall pick. So
I will say that cay Andry Miller has himself a
very nice season, but doesn't quite make it to a
forty point pace. Is the thing I would I would
like to predict, or I would like to make you
predict that he'll have the forty point pace rather. Philadelphia
Flyers a lot of catching up to do there, Matt
Vay mitchkopp Is comment is the biggest news for the
Flyers that happened since our show. Travis Connectney signed a
huge extension eight years, seventy million dollars they drafted Jet
Luchenko and then things got nutty. Ryan Johansson was basically fired.
There's gonna be some kind of grievance to decide how
much money he gets out of that. But he's gone
and Cam Atkinson was bought out. So the forwards on
this team are dropping like flies, those long timers, and
Carter Hart is officially gone at those point again, another
guy who was caught up in the Hockey Canada stuff.
My hot takes your Victor Drysdale. I'm going to have
fifty four point Jamie Drysdale and I'm going to have
fifty four start Yvonne fetetav Which one of those two
do you think is going to be the hotter take?
Speaker 3: I like it. I think neither is going to happen.
I like that, but they both could happen certainly, and
I like that as well. Good job on hitting that
sweet spot. Yeah, dry Stale is such a big unknown, right.
I know a lot of people are super high on
him and they just keep saying, Oh, it's going to
be him. We also said the same thing about Cam
York and it definitely wasn't him all season. They just
rotated around. I know that it should be Drysdale. I
know that it makes a lot of sense is he
does have that pedigree, but he also had a hard
time staying healthy and he certainly has to learn the system.
He didn't have that many games with the new club
when he came over, so that's a bit of an issue.
I think he's gonna have some adjustment times, and I'm
just not sure that he gets there, and I'm not
sure that spot is guaranteed his. I think it might
be Yorks. They've also liked to rotate other defensemen on there,
like Zamula, but they also had sign him up there.
I just don't think that they're going to hand it
to him and say, you know, score a bunch, so
that one seems unlikely. Also, Fedotov I think is the
better goalie, but they seem pretty committed to Erson, and
so that's the one that I think. I'm probably gonna
hold you too, just because they seem to like Ersen
a heck of a lot. And even though I want
to see Fido tav in more games and I think
he's the better goalie, goalies are just more wild and unknown,
So we'll hold you to that one.
Speaker 2: He's minus Victor and I think he'll end up winning Fedotov.
He's just too big. He'll scare towards That's what's gonna happen.
Speaker 3: There you go. My last one is the Pittsburgh Penguins.
We just talked about them very end of August and
nothing much has happened since then. So the hot takes
are gonna surround Michael Bunting and Eric Carlson. So Bunting,
he came over and looked really good last season in
his limited time. That was part of the return for
Jake Gunsel. And he's a really strong player. We've seen
him do really well with top players before. He knows
how to do that. He knows how to play with
really good players, and so I think he can do
that again. He certainly seems like he has pretty much
a guaranteed top top six spot. He was playing a
lot with Malkin when he came over. That's the biggest
concern is that Malkin has really slowed down a bit.
Maybe he'll be good at the start of season, maybe
he'll continue that, but I'm a little concerned. But I
do think that Bunting probably should be on the top
power play. That's a little bit of a concern whether
he'll get there or not. So I'm going to say
Michael Bunting hits a career high in point pace, so
that would be a good season for him, obviously, if
he had a career year. We've seen him in Toronto
have really excellent production seasons, but we haven't really seen
that in a while from him, even with pretty decent
deployment that hopefully makes that a little bit spicy. But
I like him. I like the spot that he's in.
I think he should be in the top six spot
either with Malkin, maybe even with Crosby. Hopefully he's not
relegated to the third line, as Daily Face Off seems
to suggest right now. But yeah, so that would be
over a sixty five point pace, which is what he
had in twenty twenty one twenty two in Toronto. The
other one is going to surround Eric Carlson, and I
know that they had just an awful power play last season.
I don't think it could possibly be worse. That's what
everyone seemed to be saying, and they have to figure
that out. And I think, as we talked about on
the show with our guests, how Eric Carlson was being
a little deferential to some of the future Hall of
Famers on the Penguins, and they just want him to
go be Eric Carlson and do his things. So I
think he's going to be unleashed this year, and I
think he gets back over a seventy five point pace.
What do you think, Jesse?
Speaker 2: I guess my choice here is between I did the
map and I think a career high point pace for
Michael Bunning has been about sixty five point pace for
eighty two games. So if we're saying that Michael Bunting
sixty five point pace or Eric Carlson seventy five point pace,
I will stick you with bunding because I think carlson
seventy five point paces wouldn't surprise me as much. I
don't think Bunning is going to be quite as set
up as he was in the peak years in Toronto,
so I think there's a good there's good rationale that
he is going to pick it up from where he's been.
He's actually had very decent years almost every time. But
I don't think I think it's less likely he'll hit
sixty five points than that Carlson hit seventy five last
up the Washington Capitals. That was the last episode we
did and they're also alphabetically last in the East. There's
really no catchup to be done. Nothing much happened with
the Capitals in the last week. The hot take is
going to be the two hot takes. One of them
is Tom Wilson career high in points. That would be
fifty three points. We always used to talk about Tom Wilson.
He can score points too, in addition to getting the Bash,
and he's not done it. He had had better point
pass early in his career. But he's there for the
long run. They're saying he might be the next captain
of the Capitals after Ovechkin finally does move on, and
I think he might have that opportunity. So fifty three
point at least for Tom Wilson and then the other victor.
We talked about it last week and let's just have
some fun alix Selvechkin sets the all time goals record
this year, Victor, which one of these two you want
to give me as the hot take.
Speaker 3: So he had obviously a downturn last season. He had
thirty one goals forty two before that, fifty before that,
and then he had a shortened season of just twenty
four total goals, so that would be thirty five four
would over say you said forty forty three.
Speaker 2: Fifty three, you need fifty three points. I'm sorry, Alexovechkin
needs fifty four more goals. Oh that was in March.
I don't know what the heck is going on here.
Forty one more goals from matching, forty two from surpassing. Okay,
so we'll say matching, we'll say forty one goals.
Speaker 3: So he would need and he did that two years ago,
and obviously he is two years older. A team I
think is maybe even a little bit better this year.
A couple of young guys have matured a little bit.
PLD the big unknown. But I think if nothing else,
he's playing for his NHL career because not many teams
are going to give him more of a shot. Strom
seems like a pretty legit top line center. The power
play should be better. John Carlson still great. Yeah, I
think he does it. I think he does it. Let's
have some fun and I'll just hold you to that.
Speaker 2: One, hold me to the ov one. Okay, all right, Victor,
we have made it through the West, we've made it
through the East. We are the conquerors of all the conferences. Victor,
this has been good times. We'll come right back after this.
We quote upshot before we go. Hey, there's still some
days for you to start a new fantasy league for
the new season. I know we are close, but you
can still do a live draft. You can do a
slow draft. Heck, you can even do a draft that
last after the beginning of the season. Some people do that.
It's not usually my course, but maybe you're so inspired
by this episode that you want to get yourself going
with a league or another league dog on it. You
can do as many as you want start new leagues.
There's even more sports. You're like, well, I'm not gonna
make it here, but heck, basketball seasons only three weeks later.
Do it. Nothing is stopping you. There's the most options
for scoring, salaries, contracts, rookie eligibility, whatever you can think of.
It's probably in there somewhere, or you can hack it.
Fantracks hq has lots of fantasy content. Articles on fantasy hockey,
all the other fantasy sports that stuff's pouring out, preseason
ranks from our writers, all kinds of things. FHL is
a team these days. And we thank our crew crafts.
Ryan Simone and Tim are your commission team with the
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vi Antoni are our lead scouts. Brandon is our website
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