Ramblings: Cooley Extension; Dvorsky Recalled; Declining Fantasy Production from Defencemen – October 30

The Utah Mammoth have extended centre Logan Cooley for eight years, the team announced. The value is $10-million per season and will start in the 2026-27 campaign after Cooley finishes his entry-level deal.

Since November 1st of 2024, a span of 75 games, Cooley has posted 32 goals and 37 assists for 69 points. The caveat there being those 32 goals were on 163 shots, or a 19.6% conversion rate. That is probably a little high, but he doesn’t turn 22 years old until May and won’t cross the 200-game threshold until January (provided he stays healthy). It seems likely that as he matures, his shot volume will increase, and concerns about shooting percentage will subside.

Of course, he has to show that increased peripheral value, first. Over those same 75 games, Cooley has posted 66 hits and 32 blocks. At $10-million per season, even in an elevated salary cap era, fantasy players in multi-cat salary cap leagues will want more than a centre who is far from a lock to reach 200 shots and posts under 1.0 hits and 0.5 blocks per game. If he truly elevates his production and can approach Clayton Keller levels (and he can), it probably won’t matter much, and Keller provides a nice template for a player who can be valuable in cap formats even without much in the way of hits or blocks.

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The St. Louis Blues have called up prospect Dalibor Dvorsky:

The Blues recalled Dalibor Dvorský from Springfield.

— Matthew DeFranks (@MDeFranks) October 29, 2025

St. Louis is 1-5-1 in their last seven games and, as of Wednesday afternoon, are one of two teams with a goal share under 40% on the season (the Calgary Flames are the other). I do not think the Blues are near as bad as their record and goal differential indicate, but it’s clear the team wants to shake things up. Let’s see how Dvorsky gets used because he was off to a nice start in the AHL with three goals and five points in six games.

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Update on a pair of Colorado Avalanche players:

On @AltitudeSR, Jared Bednar says Sam Girard and Logan O’Connor will come on the road trip this weekend but won’t play. Thinking early November for a return.

— Evan Rawal (@evanrawal) October 29, 2025

Not that either is a huge deal for fantasy purposes, but they could supplant players who have a meaningful role right now like Victor Olofsson and Brent Burns.  

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Robert Tiffin reported that Dallas Stars forward Matt Duchene is traveling with the team as they head to Florida for a pair of games against the Panthers and the Tampa Bay Lightning. Duchene has missed five games with an upper-body injury and had two points in four games to start the season. Whether he’s ready for Thursday or for Saturday, it sure seems as if he’ll be back in the lineup before the end of the week.

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The Columbus Blue Jackets hosted the Toronto Maple Leafs for the only NHL game on Wednesday night, and the Columbus third line had a gigantic game: Cole Sillinger had two goals, an assist, and four shots, Mathieu Olivier had a goal, three assists, and two hits, and Charlie Coyle had four assists as the Blue Jackets crushed the Leafs 6-3. The final score made the game seem moderately closer than it actually was because this was a 6-1 game with 4:30 left in the third period.

Those four assists push Coyle to eight points in 10 games to start the season, a great October for him. Last season, he didn’t register his eighth point until December.

Zach Werenski had a goal, an assist, two shots, and two blocks while both Ivan Provorov and Dante Fabbro also scored. That is Werenski’s second multi-point game in a row, so after a tough stretch that saw him post one point in six games, he seems to be back on track.

Elvis Merzlikins was solid in net again for the Jackets, stopping 33 of 36 shots in the win. He has a .915 save percentage on the season and has made at least 32 saves in three of his five starts.

Nick Robertson, Sammy Blais, and John Tavares all scored for Toronto. That was Tavares’ 500th goal of his career as he became the 49th player in NHL history to ever reach 500 goals. He is up to six goals, eight assists, and 33 shots in 11 games to start the season.

This was Blais’ first game since April of 2024, and he finished with a goal, an assist, three shots, a block, and five hits. It is hard to see him not being in the lineup when Toronto visits Philadelphia on Saturday.

Cayden Primeau was in net for all six goals against on 24 shots faced. He now has an .838 save percentage in his three starts this season.  

William Nylander was not in the lineup for the Leafs on this second game of a back-to-back as he continues to deal with a lower-body injury. He isn’t shooting the puck much when he’s in the lineup and now there is a risk of missing games because of whatever is bothering him. It isn’t an ideal situation.

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In evaluating the early portions of the season, one thing that seemed to be occurring was that defencemen were not as productive as most of us expect. When looking at a similar point of last season – 332 team games by the end of October of 2024 compared to 328 team games as of Wednesday afternoon for this season – that does seem to be the case.

Using data from Natural Stat Trick, I went and looked at goals, assists, points, shot attempts, shots on goal, and individual expected goals across the league so far this year, at this point of the season last year, and what share of those stats were coming from defencemen. Rather than looking at raw totals, we are looking at what percentage of those stats are being produced by defencemen only. The decline is across-the-board:

The purple bars are the percentage of each of those six stats that have come from defencemen this year, and the blue part at the top of each bar shows how much extra came from rearguards at this time last year. Whether goals and assists, or the stats related to shooting, defencemen are responsible for a lower percentage in each category compared to October of 2024. When looking at the top of the leaderboards, the problem for fantasy managers becomes obvious:

• Seven defencemen with at least three goals so far in 2025 compared to 14 defencemen at the same time in 2024.
• Three defencemen with double-digit points so far in 2025 compared to six defencemen at the same time in 2024.
• Twenty-four defencemen with at least 20 shots on goal so far in 2025 compared to 37 defencemen at the same time in 2024.
• Five defencemen with at least 2.0 individual expected goals so far in 2025 compared to eight defencemen at the same time in 2024.

This is both a bit of a surprise but also not.

The reason why it’s a bit of a surprise is that defencemen have become increasingly involved in their teams’ offensive attack over the last decade. That is especially true for the top-end guys as since the start of the salary cap era in 2005, there have been eight instances of a defenceman reaching at least 85 points in the regular season. All eight of those instances have come in the last four years (Cale Makar x3, Roman Josi x2, Quinn Hughes in 2023-24, Erik Karlsson in 2022-23, and Victor Hedman in 2021-22). Seeing an across-the-board decline when production from defencemen had become such a lynchpin of the NHL over the last 10 years does stand out.

The reason why it’s not a huge surprise is this continues a trend we saw from last season. Back in May, I wrote about how the 2024-25 season saw declines in goal and assist totals from top-end defencemen, how there was an overall decline in assist rate from defencemen, and how a good chunk of this was driven by a drop in power-play production due to fewer power-play opportunities. That article also shows a decline in goal-scoring came from the top-end defencemen while the lower-end defencemen actually scored more often than they had previously. In other words, the declining production from defencemen was hurting the top guys, not the depth guys.

This will be interesting to follow because it seems as if that trend is continuing. Why this is happening, I’m not sure. My guess is that it’s some combination of changing defensive strategies combined with a higher skill floor among forwards, but that’s just a guess. If anyone has a better idea, feel free to let me know, but this is crucial for fantasy managers to keep in mind because if the top defencemen are less productive by share of all goals, assists, and shots, it lowers their value and raises the value of the tiers below them. Something to keep in mind before rushing out to trade for Quinn Hughes or Adam Fox.

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While thinking about top-end defencemen, here is a bit about Jackson LaCombe’s production that I mentioned on Twitter:

and I know fantasy managers are freaking out about LaCombe, but he’s fourth among defencemen in TOI/game and has a point on less than 19% of goals scored with him on the ice. That number was 52.3% across the prior two seasons. He’ll be fine.

— Michael Clifford (@SlimCliffy) October 29, 2025

LaCombe has been on the ice for 16 Anaheim Ducks goals so far this season. If he participated on just 45% of those goals, he’d have seven points in nine games. Instead, that 18.8% participation rate has him with three points in nine games. His goal participation rate will rise significantly over the course of the season, and his production along with it.

Just be a bit careful here. The Ducks are shooting over 12% with him on the ice. Last year, of the 164 defencemen to skate at least 1000 minutes, just 29 of them of them reached 12%. It isn’t to say he can’t do it – especially as a top power-play defenceman – just that it’s not a guarantee he stays there. A drop in this regard would mitigate a bit of the rebound in goal participation.

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At the other end of the spectrum, Thomas Harley is currently figuring in on 80% of Dallas Stars goals scored with him on the ice, helping him to eight points in 10 games. That is a good start, but no defenceman with at least 1000 minutes played last season figured in on two-thirds of their team’s goals, and only 4/164 of those defencemen even reached 60%. To make matters worse, with Dallas currently converting over 31% of their power-play opportunities, it is unlikely that top PP minutes will be a part of his fantasy profile anytime soon. Once that goal participation rate drops for Harley, he’ll be closer to a 40-point defenceman than the 50-point defenceman he was last year, or the 60-point defenceman he’s pacing to be so far this year. If he can ever get back to the top PP unit, then the equation changes, but until then, there’s a sizeable production decline on the horizon.