Each week I dive into the numbers and offer some insights that should help when it comes time to make fantasy hockey decisions.
This week, look West, where the Seattle Kraken have won seven straight games and are chock full of productive players that are still widely available for fantasy hockey managers. From rookie Matty Beniers to veteran defenseman Justin Schultz and several points in between, the Kraken are a team to target.
#1 Calder Trophy front-runner Matty Beniers is stepping up as the No. 1 center for the Seattle Kraken. The second pick in the 2020 Draft, Beniers has 12 points (5 G, 7 A) during a six-game point streak. He is not a huge shot generator, with two shots or fewer in 20 of 23 games, so that is an area that might need some work if he is going to maintain his current goal-scoring pace of 10 goals in 23 games. Otherwise, Beniers will need to keep scoring on 23.3% of his shots and that is not a reasonable expectation.
#2 Veteran Seattle Kraken right winger Jordan Eberle had a slow start to the season, managing no goals and four assists through his first eight games, but he has put up 17 points (6 G, 11 A) in his past 15 games. Eberle has not had a 50-point season since 2017-2018, but he has found a good fit on a line with Beniers and Jared McCann.
#3 In his past 15 games, Seattle Kraken left winger Jared McCann has produced 13 points (9 G, 4 A). He has scored 37 goals in 94 games since joining the Kraken in the expansion draft. While McCann, like Beniers, is not likely to keep scoring on 23.3% of his shots, as he has this season, this line is helping the Kraken generate significantly more offense than they did last season. The Kraken have 3.75 goals per 60 minutes this season, which ranks third. Last season, they ranked 28th with 2.58 goals per 60 minutes.
#4 It is hard to put too many expectations on a forward who is playing 10 minutes per game, but Seattle seems to have found right way to deploy Daniel Sprong. Even in limited ice time, Sprong has produced 14 points (5 G, 9 A) in 16 games. He does contribute on the power play, but he is also generating even-strength offense. The leaders in points per 60 minutes during five-on-five play (minimum 100 minutes): Morgan Geekie (3.78), Matthew Tkachuk (3.72), Nico Hischier (3.68), Sprong (3.65), and Sidney Crosby (3.64).
#5 Seattle Kraken defenseman Justin Schultz last scored more than 27 points in a season in 2016-2017. He has always had good puck skills but has tended to fill a supporting role on the blueline for most of his teams. With the Kraken, Schultz runs the second power play unit, but he has quickly produced 10 points (2 G, 8 A) in his past seven games. Vince Dunn is still the Kraken defenseman on the No. 1 power play unit, but Schultz now leads the Kraken with seven power play assists.
#6 Vancouver Canucks goaltender Thatcher Demko left Thursday’s loss to Florida with what looked like it could be a groin injury. It remains to be seen how long Demko will be out of the lineup, but Spencer Martin should be poised to play a more significant role with Demko out. Martin has a .900 save percentage in 10 games this season. That is a little below league average, but Martin’s 10 games played in the NHL this season already counts as a career high. The Canucks may be about to find out just how ready Martin is for NHL action.
#7 An old rookie making the transition from the KHL, Vancouver Canucks winger Andrei Kuzmenko is 26 years old. He has also been on a tear in recent weeks, putting up 10 points (4 G, 6 A) in the past seven games. He has scored on 22.0% of his shots this season, so Kuzmenko could use more shots to make his offense more sustainable, but he is establishing his value as a quality complementary piece on a line with Elias Pettersson and Ilya Mikheyev.
#8 Winnipeg Jets rookie winger Cole Perfetti is climbing in the rookie scoring race, with six points (1 G, 5 A) in the past five games giving him 14 points (4 G, 10 A) on the season. He is now skating on Winnipeg’s top line, with Mark Scheifele and Blake Wheeler, and has upped his shot rate, generating 15 shots on goal in the past five games. He has tended to be a pass-first player, but if Perfetti can maintain the higher shot rate, there is a better chance for his goal totals to climb, too.
#9 The combination has worked for 36-year-old Jets right winger Blake Wheeler, who has put up 10 points (3 G, 7 A) in the past five games. Wheeler’s all-around game is not to the level that he displayed during his peak years, but he remains a productive offensive player. Since the start of the 2020-2021 season, Wheeler has 126 points (39 G, 87 A) in 136 games, so even if this is the decline phase of his career, it is a very productive decline phase.
#10 Returning to the Boston Bruins after spending last season in Czechia, David Krejci has nine points (6 G, 3 A) during a six-game point streak. That gives him 18 points (8 G, 10 A) in 19 games, and it is worth noting that, for as successful as his career has been, the 36-year-old has never scored at a point-per-game clip for a full NHL season.
#11 Toronto Maple Leafs defenseman Morgan Rielly is going to be out until at least mid-December due to a knee injury which opens up more ice time, including on Toronto’s top power play, for Rasmus Sandin. Sandin has just two points (1 G, 1 A) in the past five games, but he has also averaged 21:26 of ice time per game in those five games, a major increase from the 16:42 per game that he was averaging previously.
#12 Pucks are not going in for him the way that they did last season, when he scored 23 goals in 79 games, but Toronto Maple Leafs left winger Michael Bunting is still contributing to Toronto’s top line. Bunting has nine points (2 G, 7 A) in the past nine games and, after trying out some other combinations, the Maple Leafs seem to have figured out that Bunting still fits in a complementary role on that No. 1 line alongside Auston Matthews.
#13 Columbus Blue Jackets goaltender Elvis Merzlikins struggled to a .864 save percentage in nine games before he landed on the injured list with a lower-body injury. Rookie netminder Daniil Tarasov has received a better opportunity with Merzlikins out and 23-year-old Tarasov has delivered a .912 save percentage in seven games. For fantasy managers, wins are not going to come easily in Columbus, but Tarasov is getting a chance to prove that he is ready for the NHL and is making the most of that opportunity.
#14 Usually, it seems like a dicey proposition when a team needs to turn to its third-string goaltender but that is not always the case. When the Toronto Maple Leafs had injuries to goaltenders Ilya Samsonov and Matt Murray, Erik Kallgren stepped in to give the Maple Leafs solid play between the pipes. Even though Kallgren has a .898 save percentage in 10 games, in his last six starts, he had a 3-1-2 record with a .907 save percentage, which is entirely fine from a third-string goaltender.
#15 What is interesting is that coming into the season, Toronto’s goaltending was one of the major question marks and the tandem of Ilya Samsonov and Matt Murray has been better than advertised. Perhaps it should be no surprise that they have missed time with injuries, but Samsonov has a .924 save percentage in nine games and Murray has a .927 save percentage in seven games. They have combined for a 12-3-1 record. While neither one is ideal for fantasy purposes, because they have not established that they can handle the workload of a true starting goaltender, both are entirely useful to plug in when they are healthy.
#16 He does not tend to score enough to be more than a banger league consideration, but Vegas Golden Knights left winger William Carrier is creating more offensively. In his past eight games, Carrier has scored five goals and recorded 22 hits, giving him 11 points (8 G, 3 A) and 64 hits in 24 games. Carrier has 1.76 goals per 60 minutes during 5-on-5 play. Among players with at least 100 five-on-five minutes, these are the five players with a higher rate of goals per 60 minutes: Jason Robertson (2.11), Jared McCann (2.02), Elias Pettersson (1.88), Andrei Svechnikov (1.84), and Sidney Crosby (1.82).
#17 Pittsburgh Penguins defenseman Kris Letang is out indefinitely after suffering the second stroke of his career. While this stroke is reportedly not as severe as the one that Letang suffered in 2014, it is understandable that the Penguins are going to be cautious with their long-time star blueliner before he has a chance to return to the ice. In the meantime, Jeff Petry will take over the point on Pittsburgh’s No. 1 power play unit. Petry has three assists in his past four games and has 11 points (3 G, 8 A) in 24 games for the season. Combined with his big hit and blocked shot totals, Petry remains a valuable, yet frequently underrated, defenseman for fantasy purposes.
#18 The leader in shot attempts per 60 minutes during five-on-four play (minimum 30 minutes) is Los Angeles Kings right winger Arthur Kaliyev, who has 49.1 shot attempts per 60. That puts him ahead of Jason Robertson (48.0), Timo Meier (41.5), David Pastrnak (41.2), and Alex Ovechkin (39.3). Kaliyev pulling the trigger 25% more than Ovechkin on the power play is certainly a strategy. Kaliyev has 16 points (8 G, 8 A) in 25 games, and half of those points have come on the power play.
#19 While the spotlight does not shine brightly in Arizona, veteran defensemen Shayne Gostisbehere and Jakob Chychrun are the Coyotes blueliners that draw the most attention. Don’t sleep on J.J. Moser, the second-year defenseman who has put up eight points (2 G, 6 A) while logging more than 23 minutes per game in the past 10 games.
#20 When the Montreal Canadiens acquired veteran center Sean Monahan in the offseason, there was naturally some concern about Monahan’s health. He had hip surgery and was coming off a season in which he had just eight goals and 23 points in 65 games. Those concerns were misplaced, apparently, because Monahan has been a solid contributor for the Habs. After assisting on both goals in Montreal’s 2-1 win at Calgary on Thursday, Monahan has 10 points (3 G, 7 A) in the past 10 games and has most recently found a fit in the middle of a pair of power forwards, rookie Juraj Slafkovsky and veteran winger Josh Anderson. For a Montreal team that depends heavily on scoring from Nick Suzuki and Cole Caufield, they can appreciate the secondary scoring that Monahan provides.
*Advanced stats via Natural Stat Trick.