Keller vs Aho
(For the sake of clarity, I'm talking about Carolina's Aho and I'm not talking about trading Aho for Keller, just looking at how the two players compare to each other.)
Who would you rather have ROS and going forward?
I've had Aho for several seasons now, but while he teases us with his potential, he never seems to be able to quite break through and become truly elite. Part of that, I think, is that his value is tied closely to Svechnikov's, who's had trouble staying healthy the last couple seasons. Conversely, Keller seems like a bit more of a play driver. He doesn't have anywhere near the same level of talent around him but he manages to put up similar offensive numbers (obviously, if someone like Cooley or Hayton can develop into a solid centre, then that would help Keller immensely).
A couple of other considerations. We use a salary cap for keepers, so the fact that Keller makes $2.5 million less a season (starting in 2024-25) is a point in his favour. We have discussed potentially replacing +/- with FOW or FO%, which would obviously give centres a boost, but Aho seems to be about average as a faceoff guy, so I'm not seeing that as a change that would give him a huge bump in value.
12-Team Yahoo H2H Keeper League (Salary cap for keepers only)
3C, 3LW, 3RW, 4D, 1 UTIL, 2G (6 BN, 6 IR+, 1 NA)
G, A, +/-, PIM, PPP, SOG, HIT, BLK / W, GAA, SV%, SHO
C - S. Aho, M. Beniers, S. Crosby, B. Jenner, L. Stankoven
LW - C. Caufield, J. Hughes, T. Moore, J. Slafkovsky, O. Tippett
RW - D. Batherson, C. Keller, A. Lafreniere, S. Reinhart
D - E. Bouchard, B. Dillon, M. Roy, M. Seider, C. York
G - J. Binnington, J. Saros, J. Swayman
IR+: T. Demko, T. Hertl, K. Johnson, G. Landeskog, J. Trouba
NA: B. Othmann