Boston's David Pastrnak is expected to play the role of passer next season while sportsbooks expect him to continue shooting.

The NHL season is right around the corner, and it’s time to dive into regular season player props once again. Last offseason, we found strong value by digging deeper than just last year’s stats and taking advantage of sportsbooks that overlooked key context and player trends. We’re aiming to do the same this year, uncovering smart plays where the lines don’t quite match the full picture.

We did this to sportsbooks last season with their player prop for his goal total that showed they know nothing about Connor McDavid and that he's not a goal scorer. We easily hit the under last season, which was at a shocking 51.5 when he scored more than 44 goals just once in his nine prior NHL seasons. We also hit on nearly all of our other player prop picks like Mitch Marner, Mark Scheifele, Wyatt Johnston, Rasmus Dahlin, Teuvo Teravainen and Connor Hellebuyck to his over in wins plus take home the Vezina trophy.

David Pastrnak of the Boston Bruins is the next player we aim to profit from but not in the way you may think. The Czech winger is known as being a prolific goal scorer with 191 goals over the last four seasons but we are instead taking his under for goals at 43.5 (-115 on BetMGM) for next season. 

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It's hard to go against such a talented goal scorer but his support team has been dwindling since they traded away his longtime teammate Brad Marchand to the Florida Panthers. Pastrnak did finish his season quite well with 11 goals and 17 assists for 28 points over his last 18 games of the season without Marchand. This pace would have him finishing with 50 goals if he was to play a full 82-game season, which he has been able to do in three straight seasons. 

The biggest advantage to Pastrnak is his ability to stay in the lineup, not missing a game since the 2021-22 season. However, he barely managed to score 43 goals last season that included 61 games with Marchand still on his line before being dealt. An argument could be that following the trade, the offensive burden was on Pastrnak and that he will continue to carry the load and hit his over thus season. 

An alternative to this thought process Pastrnak’s often-overlooked playmaking ability. Rather than shouldering all the scoring, Pastrnak has shown he can elevate his linemates, and no one benefited more from that down the stretch than Bruins winger Morgan Geekie.

Over the final 14 games of the season, Geekie was on fire, recording 11 goals and 11 assists for 22 points. He finished the year with a career-high 33 goals and 24 assists for 57 points. It was a breakout campaign that turned heads and raised the question of has Geekie become a new focal point in the Bruins' offense?

That late-season surge highlighted a shift in roles as Geekie emerged as a primary goal scorer, while Pastrnak stepped into a playmaking role, putting up surprising 15 assists along with nine goals during the same 14-game span.

Pastrnak remains one of the most dangerous shooters in the league, but the Bruins need more than just his scoring to be successful. He can’t carry the team by himself, and helping make his linemates more productive is just as valuable. That approach clearly paid off, as Geekie boosted his point total from 39 the previous season to 57 thanks to Pastrnak. 

The Bruins are expected to be bad once again with one of the only pending bright spots being the emergence of a new elite duo with Geekie taking over the Marchand role. If you want to take Pastrnak in Fantasy, you certainly can as he will still put up points with likely 35-40 goals while setting a new career-high in assists. 

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All betting lines are from BetMGM Sportsbook and are subject to change. Hockey is a difficult sport to predict so please gamble responsibly. 

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