#those are big big petrie flyers

[madonna-of-meridian]

..are those flying things.. DINOSAURS?

[mikejones-rp]

I’m So Sorry (Part III) || POV

Well, hello there! Have you missed me? The last months have been nothing but insane. Between jobs, concerts, recording sections, trips with the band and emotional dramas with unknown girls, I just can’t complain about my life. Lately the whole band has been feeling that we’re closer than ever to actually getting somewhere with our music. It sounds insane to say that two weirdos and one playboy - Noah was always pretty - with a dream may become sucessful musicians. That’s why I felt like it’s time to take you to another little trip down memory lane. 

After I left the asylum, freedom become a very lusty word. I was finally detatched from everything. Literally. No family, no friends, no job, no school, no Leopold. I could be whoever I wanted, live however and wherever I wanted. It was a bit scary, indeed. But beginning again from scratch was more of a dream than a challenge. That’s why throwing my old ID on the trash sounded like the most sane thing to do. Heh, get the joke? 

Anyway.

I decided to fully live the mission of finding out who I was. So, I wandered around a few different cities in the UK over the next years. Met a few memorable people and a bunch of forgetable ones. Until I landed in Manchester to buy a new guitar and the owner of the place - who seemed to know everybody around - asked me if I needed somewhere to sleep, because the blonde guy on the corner building was renting a room. I wasn’t planning on staying in Manchester. London was my goal. But something clicked at that moment. God, fate, a slight unknown attraction to Noah’s doll face... Call it what you want. I ended up knocking on his door. 

We hit if off pretty quickly, just not in a sexual way. After a few hours talking about my new guitar and other things, you couldn’t tell which one of us was more excited about me moving in. Suddenly, London didn’t seem as promissing. Noah’s melodies would eventually echo all over the place. As I was dying to give him a few of my notes, but still didn’t feel like I had the liberty to, I decided to subtly cooperate with his piece. And by subtly I mean getting my bass, sitting right in front of him in the living room and playing the chords with a bit of a lyric on it. At first he looked pissed off, I must admit. But that only lasted one minute. Throw in another three hours and we were playing our first full piece, while drinking a bunch of alcohol and discusing future band names. 

Then it hit our drunk minds that we couldn’t have a band without a drum player. And that’s where Brooklyn comes in to save our lives once again. 

Commonly falling in love with her blue eyes, and believing that she was part of the band in the flyer, at least five of her clients at the tattoo shop showed up to audition. All of them terribly bad. How hard could it be to play I’m So Sorry? Like Noah pointed out, if that was hurting their hands, what would Wicked Stone do? I have to confess, though. When everything starts as flawlessly as it did, there was no way that we could magically find a good drummer on our first try. 

It took us over a month and a half to find him. And thank God we did. When Petri came in, my instant thought was a big no but we couldn’t find anyone nearly as good as him for the rest of our research. So we gave away the fear that he didn’t look like we wanted and hooked up to the certainty that he played exactly as we dreamed. 

And just like that, the band was full, the name from Noah’s old project was domained and The Roots was born. Our little baby, as I like to call. I know it sounds cheesy and all, but I swear I never felt prouder of anything in my entire life. At the moment we wrapped our first official rehearsal with Brook and Troye, who were our firsts fans/critics/helpers, I was filled - for the first time - with the feeling that all those tragedies lived before by all of us were worth it, because without them we would never have found each other. 

[winterolympicssports2018-blog]

Antti Niemi makes 31 saves as Habs down Rangers

Click here for More Olympics Updates https://www.winterolympian.com/antti-niemi-makes-31-saves-as-habs-down-rangers/

Antti Niemi makes 31 saves as Habs down Rangers

In spite of Montreal’s tumultuous season, which will likely end without the promise of playoff hockey, Brendan Gallagher says it’s still “nice to win.”

The Canadiens snapped a six-game losing streak on Thursday with a 3-1 victory over the struggling New York Rangers — Montreal’s first win since Feb. 4.

Montreal defeats New York 3-1, Antti Niemi 31 saves. 0:26

‘It’s rewarding’

“Regardless of what happens all year, this is the feeling you play for,” said Gallagher, who earned his team-leading 36th point with an assist. “The more we can do this, the happier we’ll be. It’s rewarding. A lot of guys played a really good hockey game tonight and we got what we deserved.

“For the crowd, it’s been a while since we’ve been able to put smiles on their faces.”

Montreal (23-29-8) began its four-game homestand with a convincing win after dropping six straight. The Canadiens are 11 points out of a playoff spot with the third-worst record in the Eastern Conference.

Antti Niemi, starting in relief of the injured Carey Price, made 31 saves. Tomas Plekanec, Jeff Petry and Phillip Danault, in the empty net, scored for the home team.

“It’s been a frustrating year for everyone,” said Petry, who scored the game-winner in the second period. “It’s about playing a strong game. We have a lot to prove still, whether it be personally or as a team. Nobody wants to give up in here. We want to fight until the end.”

The Canadiens were handed two big blows before puck drop on Thursday.

Injury adversity 

The team announced Price will be sidelined indefinitely with a concussion, and veteran defenceman Shea Weber will miss the rest of the season as he undergoes surgery for a torn tendon in his left foot.

Price took a shot to the mask in Tuesday’s loss to the Philadelphia Flyers. Weber, who was likely injured on opening day, has not played since Dec. 16.

“Those are big losses for us,” said Danault of Price and Weber’s injuries. “We have to learn to play without them. It’s part of the game.”

With Price and Weber out of the lineup, another veteran stepped up for the home side.

Plekanec made it 1-0 for the Canadiens at 6:59 of the first period with his sixth goal of the season. The 35-year-old beat defenceman Rob O’Gara to the puck to bury a no-look feed from Paul Byron.

Petry notches 10th

In the second period, Charles Hudon connected with Petry on a 2-on-1 for Montreal’s second of the game at 3:50. Hudon’s saucer pass narrowly avoided Brady Skjei’s slide and landed right on Petry’s stick at the side of the net. Petry has scored 10 goals for the first time in his career.

The play got started with a big hit by Nicolas Deslauriers in the neutral zone.

Kevin Hayes spoiled Niemi’s shutout bid with exactly three minutes remaining in the third period. The Rangers forward distinctly kicked the puck towards the net, but he deflected it with his stick before it crossed the line.

Danault scored into the empty net from deep in his own zone with 1:17 left on the clock.

Georgiev makes strong debut

Alexandar Georgiev, making his NHL debut, stopped 38-of-40 shots, for the visiting Rangers (27-29-5), who have lost five games in a row.

“I felt great about my game today,” said the 22-year-old Georgiev, who was solid throughout the contest. “The guys played really great in front of me and blocked a lot of shots. It really helped me. I just played my game and it was very fun from the first second of warm-ups.”

Montreal’s Noah Juulsen also made his NHL debut. He finished with two shots, one blocked shot and four hits in 17:14 of ice time.

Forwards Rick Nash and Michael Grabner were healthy scratches for New York, and shortly after post-game the Rangers announced Grabner was traded to New Jersey for a 2018 second-round pick and defenceman Yegor Rykov. Two weeks ago, the Rangers organization, in a letter to fans, strongly suggested a roster overhaul was imminent.

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[thrashermaxey]

Capped: Reviewing Hits and Misses from this Season – Part 1

  With regards to regular season fantasy pools, we are now in the review period, where we look back on the 2018-2019 season, and try to make sense of it all. Let’s quickly run through the list of all 62 players I featured last summer, and then we can try to draw a few conclusions once we complete the review. We’ll cover half this week, and half next week.

I’m going to try to group the recommendations into a hit, a miss, or a pass (generally neutral outcome).

  ****

Winnipeg Jets

Dustin Byfuglien (Buy): Byfuglien may have been a solid buy if he hadn’t been injured for half of the season. Tough to really evaluate as a result. He has looked good in the last two playoff games I have seen though, so maybe there’s a discount to be found this summer. Pass.

  Adam Lowry (Sell): Lowry scored only two points more than he did last season, while playing 33 more games. His power play time and overall minutes were both down. He’s being passed by all the young talent. Hit.

  Washington Capitals

Braden Holtby (Buy): Holtby had a bit of a bounce back over last year, especially if you take out his first quarter. That should have been expected and should be accounted for next year. Late hit.

  John Carlson (Sell): Carlson managed to outpoint last year’s career high by four points, in two less games. His plus 21 offsets the drop of 50 shots. He lived up to the $8 million price tag. Miss.

  Vegas Golden Knights

Alex Tuch (Buy): Despite being shifted down the lineup after the trade deadline, we saw continued growth from Tuch, as he looks to prove his scoring touch is real. He also signed a team-friendly deal during the season. Hit.

  Paul Stastny (Sell): Based on points per game, this was Stastny’s third-best season of his career. A 69-point pace for a $6.5 million AAV is fair value. Pass.

  Vancouver Canucks

Bo Horvat (Buy): Dude is a stud. Continue to buy. Hit.

  Alex Edler (Sell): Edler matched his 34 points from last season, playing in 14 fewer games. Had there been anyone else on the back-end in Vancouver that could have taken over the power play, Edler would not have had the season he did. As they say, someone has to score on a bad team. Next year he may even be making less. Miss.

  Toronto Maple Leafs

Zach Hyman (Buy): Put up career highs in goals, points, penalty minutes, faceoff wins, and would have added shots and hits too had he not missed 11 games. Riding shotgun with Mitch Marner and John Tavares has its upsides. Hit.

  Nazem Kadri (Sell): Goals, points, plus/minus, shots, hits, powerplay points, blocks, faceoff wins, and ice time were all down. The John Tavares addition really did not help everyone. Hit.

  Tampa Bay Lightning

J.T. Miller (Buy): Miller did not end up riding shotgun with Nikita Kucherov and Steven Stamkos all season. Had he, we would be singing a different tune. Miller took a step backwards in most areas. Miss.

  Yanni Gourde (Sell): Recommending a soft-sell on Yanni Gourde, hopefully means you either got a good deal, or just soaked up the slightly reduced (but still awesome production) of 48 points on a $1 million deal. We’ll call that a hit.  

  St. Louis Blues

Jake Allen (Buy): Well, this one flopped. Allen could not hold it together behind what is a very solid group of skaters. He was absolutely shown up by a rookie. Swing and a miss for the big strikeout.

  Alex Pietrangelo (Sell): We make up for the Allen gaff here, as Pietrangelo was definitely a guy to be selling last offseason. Those kids (Pietrangelo had triplets last summer) really do affect NHL players more than we as fantasy GMs expect. Hit.

  San Jose Sharks

Tim Heed (Buy): This was posted before Erik Karlsson was acquired, which really took away what could have been a large chunk of Heed’s ice time. Maybe next year when Karlsson leaves in free-agency. Pass.

  Logan Couture (Sell): Couture put up a slightly better season, but his value goes down due to his new contract, and hitting the age of 30. We’ll call this a pass since it was a good sell, but keeping him for a championship run also could have been a good move.

  Pittsburgh Penguins

Daniel Sprong (Buy): This is a miss, even though he finally did manage to play over half of a season. The trade to Anaheim was not good for his fantasy value. Miss.

  Matt Murray (Sell): I stand by that Murray is a solid sell, and his injury history continues to provide weight to that argument. Murray did however put up good numbers in the second half of the season, so we’ll chalk this one up as a pass.

  Philadelphia Flyers

Nolan Patrick (Buy): Patrick put up an extremely similar campaign to his 2017-2018 season, and again finished with an excellent second half. Better to get in a year too early than a year too late. He’s going to be a buy again this summer, but we’ll grade it a pass for now.

  Claude Giroux (Sell): If you sold him for Mark Stone as was offered up in the article, you’re doing well. If not, you missed out on an 85-point season. Really depends how high you were able to sell. Pass.

  Ottawa Senators

Mark Stone (Buy): Stone is showing everyone that he is better than they gave him credit for. Hit.

  Almost Everyone Else (Sell): Not too far off of predicting what actually happened with everyone being traded away. There were a few bright spots in Ottawa, but generally a hit.  

  New York Rangers

Mika Zibanejad (Buy): Zibanejad had an excellent season. He hit all of the benchmarks we were hoping for in last summer’s article. Near point-per-game, three shots per game, over 100 hits, over 800 faceoff wins. That’s a home-run.

  Kevin Shattenkirk (Sell): Only 28 points in 73 games, going minus 15, and having only seven powerplay points, is a far cry from the production needed to justify an AAV over $6.5 million. The only value remaining here is in his name. Hit.

  New York Islanders

Josh Ho-Sang (Buy): This is a miss since Ho-Sang only got into 10 games, recording two points. All of the depth forwards the Islanders signed really put a damper on any possible growth this year by the young winger.  

  Anders Lee (Sell): Lee went from 40 goals last year to 28 this season, and that can mostly be explained by a drop in shooting percentage from 19.3% down to a more normal 13.7%. Hit.

  New Jersey Devils

Miles Wood (Buy): Wood failed to take the next step this season, however he still provided solid multi-cat coverage. An injury slowed him down in the second half, and a poor shooting percentage didn’t help the stat line either. Miss.

  Sami Vatanen (Sell): Seventeen points in 50 games, with a minus-17 rating? That’s a hit.

  Nashville Predators

Kevin Fiala (Buy): We were a year early for the fourth-year breakout, which should be right on cue next season. Fiala actually took a step backwards this year, had his plus/minus rating drop 43 points from the season before, and then was traded to Minnesota. Miss.

  Kyle Turris (Sell): Turris managed a meager 23 points and was even a healthy scratch on a couple of occasions. Ouch. Hit.

  Montreal Canadiens

Max Pacioretty (Buy): Pacioretty was traded to Vegas soon after the original article was published, and he after a slow first quarter, he put up 35 points in 49 games to close out the year. It wasn’t a full bounce back, but it was still a small step up after falling flat the year before. Pass.  

  Jeff Petry (Sell – In November): I managed to take my own advice, moving Petry (and Kyle Palmieri) for Sidney Crosby in a one-year league at the beginning of November. Perfect timing. Petry put up 29 points in the first half of the season, and only 17 in the second half. That is the difference a healthy Weber has, pushing the rest of the defence core down a rung. Hit.

  ****

For those counting, that was 16 hits, eight passes, and eight misses.

Tune in next week for the second half.

  ****

All salary cap information courtesy of capfriendly, all stats pulled from FrozenTools.

  ****

Previous Capped articles:

____

Playoff Bound Players Needing New Contracts

  ****

  That caps off this week’s article, thanks for reading. As always, you can find me on twitter @alexdmaclean.

from All About Sports https://dobberhockey.com/hockey-home/capped/capped-reviewing-hits-and-misses-from-this-season-part-1/

[flauntpage]

Behind The Beat: Robert Hagg Is Making Shayne Gostisbehere Better, and A Defense of Andrew MacDonald

Each week, Anthony will take you inside the locker room, press box or wherever else he finds himself, with anecdotes, observations, quotes and maybe the occasional barb that he sees or hears while covering the Flyers. I guess you could say, Anthony’s In The Room.

A hockey locker room is always a Petri dish of activity. Different personalities, different routines, and different conversations all collide in one confined space.

It was no different after Flyers practice Monday.

There was Jake Voracek, stroking his Yukon Cornelius beard while cracking up the pool of reporters and cameramen who surrounded his stall.

There was Dale Weiss and Claude Giroux, trying to answer a trivia question posed by Vice President of Public Relations, Zack Hill, about the only teenage hockey players to post 100-point seasons.

(The answer was five by the way – Wayne Gretzky and Mario Lemieux are the obvious ones, then there’s Sidney Crosby, Dale Hawerchuk and Jimmy Carson.)

There was Scott Laughton and Michael Raffl, with their traditional post-practice pow-wow in the far corner of the room, with Raffl proudly donning his Cleveland Indians baseball hat as he has every day since the beginning of training camp, even though they were eliminated from the playoffs a week ago.

And then there was Robert Hagg. Quiet. Unassuming. Slowly removing his equipment, occasionally looking up to take in the activity around him, but otherwise keeping to himself.

Just a moment earlier, his defensive partner, Shayne Gostisbehere, was holding court with the media. It started off as a conversation with Flyers radio play-by-play guy Tim Saunders and me, but soon he was surrounded by every microphone or camera in the room and being asked about his renewed confidence that has led to an eight-assist start to this season in just five games.

And although he did credit his partner (and we’ll get to that in a bit), no one seemed interested in talking to Hagg.

So I decided to stop him for a chat before he disappeared into the Skate Zone inner sanctum completely unnoticed.

What I found was a young athlete who is as relaxed and comfortable in his own skin off the ice as he is on it.

“It doesn’t really matter who you are on the ice,” Hagg said. “You want to be the same guy when you step off it. I want to be the same guy I was five years ago. It shouldn’t change just because you make it to the NHL. You have to be the same person. You can’t let this affect you.

“If you ask any of my friends, they’ll tell you I’m trying not to change at all and that I’m going to continue to be myself, no matter what.”

You may ask, what the hell does this have to do with hockey? I’m sure there are a lot of good guys who were never successful in the NHL.

And that point is quite valid. However, this is a guy with all of six career NHL games under his belt who is playing as sound a defensive game as you will see.

There’s nothing flashy about Hagg. Nothing that screams “Look at me.” And yet, he is quickly becoming one of the Flyers’ more reliable defensemen – and it’s this even-keeled approach to who he is as a person – not a hockey player – that has made the progression into the NHL so smooth for him.

“I guess that is part of it,” he said. “I never thought of it like that, but now that you ask, maybe that is. I just try to stay humble and treat every person the same way I would want them to treat me and I think you can go a long way with that approach.”

Off the ice, it makes him one of the good guys. On the ice, it garners respect. Sometimes, that’s a lost art in a sport like hockey. The game is so fast and so violent at times that players don’t take the time to work on the things that earn respect in the league.

Sure, superior talent alone can garner respect in-game – take Crosby for instance. He became such a hated figure in cities like Philadelphia partly because he is the best player in the sport and plays for the Flyers’ arch rival, but also in part because when he came into the league, he earned his respect through his talent, and not necessarily his personality.

Crosby was perceived as a whiner, a flopper, and, in turn, a dirty player.

There was one point in his rookie season where he and Flyers Center Peter Forsberg had a pretty big run in. Forsberg accused Crosby of diving. Crosby got mouthy. Forsberg told him to respect the game.

The way he plays the game now has certainly changed since he was a rookie in 2005, but that early career reputation followed him. A savvy veteran and a fierce competitor as the game’s best player, it’s hard for Crosby to not step on the ice in Philly, or Washington, or New York without hearing the catcalls.

It’s all because of how he approached the game as a rookie.

Now, Hagg is no Crosby. Not even close. But the difference in which they are viewed as rookies is also quite noticeable.

Hagg is even-keeled. Level-headed. He’s not chirping at officials. He’s not whining at players on the other team. He’s just here to play hockey, play it fairly and competitively, and then he’s going to go back being the same guy he’s always been.

And that guy is bringing out the best in Gostisbehere.

Sure, they’ve only played together for five games, but in those five games they are getting a lot of ice time – more than 20 minutes a game – and they are producing on both ends of the ice.

“He’s made my job a little easier,” Gostisbehere said. “He’s wiped my butt out there a couple times. He’s not a hard guy to play with. He’s so smooth and he’s sneaky strong down low.

“I’m definitely a risk taker out there sometimes and it’s nice to know that you’ve got a guy back there who will always help you if you get into trouble. He’s always calm, cool and collected. He’s a great partner.”

Again, it’s just five games, but this pairing is having an impact. It’s allowing Gostisbehere to play the way he did when he burst onto the scene two seasons ago.

And that bodes well for the Flyers.

In other news:

I got into it on Twitter with some fans the last two days about Andrew MacDonald. No, I don’t think he’s an All-Star. No, I’m, not clouded by his “good guy” status in the locker room. I have no agenda. I’m not covering the team to make friends.

But what I am doing is trying to correct a falsely-penned narrative – and that is that MacDonald is some hideous defenseman who is only playing because the Flyers want to justify his absurd contract.

A couple of things here:

The contract is ridiculous and he is overpaid. That’s not his fault. Imagine being offered an obscene raise to do your job. You’d take it, right? Whether you are worth it or not, you’d take it. Don’t blame him, blame the team for giving it to him.

He is not a hideous defenseman.

It’s that second point where the masses and I differ.

MacDonald is an NHL-quality defenseman. Hands down. He may not be a top pair guy – and he’s receiving top pair minutes with partner Ivan Provorov (who is healthy by the way, the limp scare from Saturday was quelled Monday), but again, is that his fault? Should that put him under the microscope more?

MacDonald is going out there and playing decent hockey. He has had a nice start to the season. That can’t be argued.

And yet, he is crucified for every negative thing that happens if he’s on the ice. Abused for it even. So much so he was booed by the hometown fans during introductions at the home opener.

It’s a ridiculous and uninformed fan obsession.

I know, I know, his advanced statistical numbers are not good – so let’s use that as a reason to crucify him.

Please.

It is that mentality that I pushed back against Saturday.

I tried to explain in No. 5 of my takeaways from the home opener that despite the massive Twitter criticism of MacDonald on the Capitals’ first goal, he wasn’t at fault and that either Giroux or Voracek should have been covering his spot as part of a rotational play since MacDonald was marking Alex Ovechkin.

I was in turn chided with tweets like this:

Terrible writers defending our worst player to death but ripping Giroux who has been phenomenal to start. Tells you alot. https://t.co/cSCfsUiK3Y

— Not Famous Jason (@JasonAAV) October 16, 2017

I read 1 flyers writer and it's charlie, the others are awful and I'm glad the industry is dying

— Not Famous Jason (@JasonAAV) October 16, 2017

So that aforementioned writer that Jason only reads, Charlie O’Connor, who covers the team for The Athletic Philly and does a really nice job breaking down games with advanced statistics, followed up with coach Dave Hakstol after practice Monday. Here’s how it went:

O’Connor: Question regarding the first goal by Washington on Saturday – there’s a turnover along the boards, Ovechkin gets the puck, Mac challenges him up high. Does he have the green light to challenge him up high and a forward has to cycle back down to prevent a 2-on-1 down low, or should the defenseman stay further down and not challenge directly Ovechkin in that case?

Hakstol: Both of our defensemen did exactly what they should do on that play, we missed the coverage with the low forward.

So, let’s see, MacDonald does exactly what he’s supposed to do, a forward doesn’t do his job (as I pointed out Saturday – it was either Voracek or Giroux as they were both on that side), the Capitals score, and in turn MacDonald’s advanced statistics take a hit.

So – he must be terrible, right?

#Capitals tie it. Vrana with the tally. http://pic.twitter.com/tWG87XepDR

— Chris Jastrzembski (@CFJastrzembski) October 14, 2017

This isn’t an argument about the eye test vs. advanced statistics. This isn’t some witch hunt to make the Flyers’ best players look bad like others suggest.

All this is on my part, is providing an understanding of hockey systems and how they work and affect everyone on the ice. I used to have coaches take me into their office and sit me down and show video and explain to me how the systems work and what I should be looking for when covering the game so as to report it properly.

I did this with Ken Hitchcock, John Stevens and Craig Berube. I haven’t done it with Hakstol, and I don’t know if I ever will. Having not been on the beat with any regularity since the guy’s been coach until now, I haven’t had that opportunity to get to know him well enough, but I’ll try.

The point is, I’m never going to try to pass off information as part of an agenda. I’m going to give it to you straight and fairly and with an educated view – in other words, using my access for your benefit, not my own.

Analytics in hockey are a useful tool. But some people read them as gospel, and that’s just wrong. They definitely serve a purpose. They finally bring an ability to quantify actions in hockey that have been taking place since the dawn of the sport.

I’ll take you back to that first video session with Hitchcock.

I sat in his office for an hour watching tape with him. At one point, he said, “Anth, Here’s what you need to understand. The game is the puck. You can’t win unless you have the puck in your possession. The more you possess the puck, the more chances you have, the better your odds are of winning the game.”

This, friends, was in 2003.  Sure sounds a hell of a lot like Corsi, doesn’t it?

We may not have had the statistical measurement of it yet, but it was definitely how coaches viewed the sport and coached it with puck possession in mind.

All that said, yes, MacDonald will make mistakes – and when he does, I’ll point them out. But, I’m just as quickly going to point them out if its Giroux, Voracek, Provorov, Sanheim, Hakstol – I’m an equal opportunity analyst!

I just want to offer you perspective – and although I’ll never connect with everyone, I hope it’s illuminating for at least some of you.

Behind The Beat: Robert Hagg Is Making Shayne Gostisbehere Better, and A Defense of Andrew MacDonald published first on http://ift.tt/2pLTmlv

[footyplusau]

Six banned Essendon Bombers to return, plus top draft pick Andrew McGrath

There will be a mix of the old and the new for Essendon in their captivating round one clash against Hawthorn with No.1 draft pick Andrew McGrath joining six previously banned Bombers in the line-up.

Big ins: Jarryd Roughead with Jaeger O’Meara during the pre-season series. Photo: Quinn Rooney

McGrath will make his debut before what is sure to be a bumper crowd at the MCG on Saturday night. New captain Dyson Heppell, Michael Hurley, Travis Colyer, Cale Hooker, Brent Stanton and Jobe Watson will play against the Hawks after missing the entire 2016 season for their roles in the club’s drugs scandal.

Small forward Josh Green will also play his first match for the new-look Bombers.

Hawthorn will have a distinctly new flavour, too. Of course they will be without veterans Sam Mitchell and Jordan Lewis while fellow premiership star Luke Hodge is out due to suspension.

Instead, the Hawks have named four new faces: Jaeger O’Meara, Tom Mitchell, Ty Vickery and Ricky Henderson. New skipper Jarryd Roughead will also play his first match since 2015.

Collingwood confronts the reigning premiers Western Bulldogs on Friday night but have left out former veteran Docker Chris Mayne, who has been named as an emergency. Will Hoskin-Elliott has been named for the Magpies. Lynden Dunn and Tim Broomhead join Mayne as Magpie emergencies.

Grand final star Tom Boyd has been named in the ruck for the Bulldogs who have been already hard hit with injuries to their big men.

No.1 draft pick Andrew McGrath has been named by the Bombers. Photo: Robert Cianflone

The Dogs are going in with 17 of last year’s premiership stars with Josh Dunkley and Clay Smith among those overlooked. Their team features former Magpies and Essendon spearheads Travis Cloke and Stewart Crameri and popular captain Robert Murphy in his return match after a knee reconstruction.

North Melbourne have a new look after last season’s ruthless cutting of veterans Brent Harvey, Nick Dal Santo, Drew Petrie and Michael Firrito. Marley Williams, Nathan Hrovat and young ruckman Braydon Preuss are among the players included in their 25-man squad for Sunday’s clash against West Coast.

The Eagles have turned to some of their experienced newbies, most notably former premiership Hawk Sam Mitchell who has been named alongside Drew Petrie and Nathan Vardy.

Fremantle host Geelong in a trickly opening round clash at Domain Stadium on Sunday with the Dockers picking premiership Bulldog Joel Hamling, the great goal-kicking hope Cam McCarthy and Shane Kersten.

Geelong have named former Blue Zach Tuohy

Unsurprisingly, there are debutants across the AFL line-ups with up to 19 players to taste AFL footy for the first time this weekend.

Sydney have named teenager Oliver Florent, the son of former Australian Open, French Open and Wimbledon doubles quarter-finalist Andrew Florent.

The GWS Giants have immediately turned to their No.2 draft pick Tim Taranto, the young gun named with Tendai Mzungu and Dawson Simpson as the club’s new faces for the clash against Adelaide on Sunday.

Melbourne fans will be delighted to see the name of Joel Smith, the rookie-listed son of former high-flyer Shaun Smith, who has been picked for his debut.

The 21-year-old former basketballer was elevated to the senior list after ruckman Mitch King was placed on the long-term injury list.

“It’s a shock and I didn’t expect it,” Smith told the club’s Demon TV.

“All the hard work has paid off and I just can’t wait to be out there.”

The post Six banned Essendon Bombers to return, plus top draft pick Andrew McGrath appeared first on Footy Plus.

from Footy Plus http://ift.tt/2nGn0Il via http://footyplus.net

[thrashermaxey]

Ramblings: McDavid Injured, Poehling Hattie In Debut, Autopicking Ain’t That Bad (Apr 7)

With this being the last day of the regular season, this may not be a typical Ramblings in terms of running through all the boxscores. Sure, there were some noteworthy highlights that will be mentioned. However, I’ll also note various end-of-season happenings as well as some notes heading into the playoffs.

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Connor McDavid left his game on Saturday with what was originally feared to be a broken leg, but x-rays on his leg turned out to be negative. He’ll be scheduled for an MRI back in Edmonton.

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We still don’t know the exact severity of his injury or the timeline for recovery, but we at least it sounds as if we don’t have to worry about him not being ready for next season. On the surface, it might not seem like a big deal because the Oilers won’t play games that matter again until October. However, significant injuries will interrupt previously scheduled offseason training plans. Consider Brock Boeser’s slow start this season as an example, after he recovered from a significant back injury and a lingering wrist issue.

McDavid may not have led the league in scoring (he finished second). However, he is the only player not to go two consecutive games without a point, which is remarkably reliable.

McDavid’s unsightly injury overshadowed Leon Draisaitl scoring his 50th goal earlier in the game. We can say he earned that 50 goals, and not just because he plays for the Oilers. Higher-than-normal shooting percentage (21.6%) aside, that 50-goal total is legit because none of Draisaitl’s 50 goals were empty-netters. Even with the shooting percentage that signals favorable luck, Draisaitl also took over 200 shots (231) for the first time in his career.

As for the Oilers themselves, it’s now just one time in the last 13 seasons that they’ve been to the playoffs. The fact that they employ two 100-point scorers and still miss the playoffs is telling of how rough a state this team is in.

Johnny Gaudreau was another player who was flirting with 100 points, yet with an assist on Saturday could only get to 99. Bill Peters tried everything in his power to push him up to 100, gifting him 27 minutes in icetime! Still, his speed and ability to put up points in bunches were a major reason that the Flames were able to take that next step as the Western Conference’s top team in the regular season.

Matthew Tkachuk and Sean Monahan were scratches for the Flames, while Mark Giordano and Elias Lindholm returned to the lineup. I managed to get the latter two back into my lineup, though I wonder if it was worth it with the lack of sense of urgency from the Flames in this game.

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In case you missed it, your playoff matchups are now set:  

#StanleyCup Playoff Matchups#GoBolts v #CBJ #AllCaps v #TakeWarning #Isles v #LetsGoPens #NHLBruins v #LeafsForever #GoAvsGo v #Flames #GoStars v #Preds #VegasBorn v #SJSharks #STLBlues v #GoJetsGo Home Ice advantage TBD

— SiriusXM NHL Network Radio (@SiriusXMNHL) April 7, 2019

The Jets, by the way, secured home ice in their series with St. Louis with a 4-2 win over Arizona.

Look for our Experts Panel coming up soon, where our writers will pick the winners in each first-round series, the Stanley Cup finalists and winner, the Conn Smythe winner, and the top 5 in playoff scoring. Don’t ask me for my picks yet, because you’ll see them in there.

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The interactive playoff draft list is ready for download now! Don’t wait until five minutes before your draft or deadline to purchase it. If you haven’t already preordered it, get yours today! If you have already purchased it, jump right in. It’s available in the Downloads section on the Dobber website (login required for the site, not the forum).

Once you purchase the draft list, please take a moment to get familiar with it before your draft. Read the Instructions tab before you begin using it. The Excel spreadsheet file is interactive (macro-enabled) and not just a “list.” The point total projections depend on which teams you set to advance, or you could go with Dobber’s picks if you’re really not sure. I’m not trying to make it sound super complicated or anything, but it’s better to be prepared. Hey, we just want you to win your league!

Also, please make sure you try logging in, so that our admin team has enough time to take care of any password resets before your draft!

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Auston Matthews and Fabian Brunnstrom are two relatively recent players who posted hat tricks in their NHL debuts. We can add Ryan Poehling to that list, as he scored his three goals plus a shootout goal in the final game of the season, a 6-5 shootout win for the Canadiens. There isn’t much that we can do with that today, aside from remembering his name in keeper leagues for next season. Poehling is a center, which has been a thin position for the Habs in recent seasons, although it seems to be an area that they’re trying to address with Jesperi Kotkaniemi, Nick Suzuki, and Poehling all in the system.

It will be interesting to see whether Poehling makes the Habs in 2019-20 or he further develops his skills in the AHL. The 2017 first-round pick just turned pro after finishing up with St. Cloud State, where he scored 31 points in 36 games in each of his last two seasons. I’ll take a wild guess and assume that he’ll end up with production somewhere between Matthews and Brunnstrom.

You can view Poehling’s Dobber Prospects profile here.

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Nikita Kucherov scored a goal and added an assist to lead the Lightning to a 6-3 win over Boston. Kucherov finishes the season with 128 points, which is the highest single-season total for a Russian-born player. Kucherov will also win the Art Ross Trophy as the league’s leading scorer and should be considered the fantasy MVP in pure points leagues as well as many multicategory formats. Expect him to be the top-ranked player in fantasy playoff drafts as the Lightning should be considered the favorite to win the Stanley Cup. Or to Don Cherry or Brian Burke (can’t remember which one), they’re the easy pick to win.

By the way, the Lightning tied the 1995-96 Red Wings for the most wins in a season (62). Their 128 points are the fourth-most in NHL history. There’s a lot of hockey left to be played, but this could be their year.

The noteworthy “healthy” scratches for this game included Brad Marchand, Patrice Bergeron, Torey Krug, and Brayden Point. Expect all three to be ready for the playoffs. However, these final-day scratches were a recurring theme throughout the day. I’m going to give this shutdown of the final week idea some more thought in one of my leagues this offseason.

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With a goal and an assist on Saturday, Sidney Crosby has reached the 100-point mark for the first time since the 2013-14 season. Crosby had finished with between 80 and 90 points in each of those previous four seasons, so his scoring numbers have been fairly consistent if you factor in the scoring inflation that happened this season.

In the end, there were six 100-point scorers this season. Kucherov, McDavid, Patrick Kane, Draisaitl, Marchand, and Crosby. I mentioned Gaudreau just falling short, as did Nathan MacKinnon (99 points) and Steven Stamkos (98 points). Aleksander Barkov finished with a career high of 96 points, which rounds out the top 10. To compare, the lowest scorer in the top 10 finished with 89 points last season, and all the way down to 75 points and 77 points in the two seasons before that. Further proof that scoring is up.

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Have we seen the last of Roberto Luongo? I was hoping that he would go out with a win on Saturday since we don’t know for sure yet, but it was not meant to be. Lu allowed four goals on 27 shots in the Panthers’ 4-3 overtime loss to New Jersey. It’s sounding more and more like the Panthers will go after an established starting goalie (Sergei Bobrovsky, maybe?) Assuming that the Panthers find a way to part with James Reimer, would Luongo accept a role as a backup in order to keep playing? I keep thinking that the inevitable result is for Luongo to go on LTIR before his contract ends in 2022, which would save both the Panthers and the Canucks (especially the Canucks) on significant cap space known as the cap recapture penalty.

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Erik Karlsson returned for the Sharks on Saturday after missing the past 17 games with a groin injury. He was held without a point but was a plus-3 in 22 minutes. He should be available as normal for playoff pools.

Evander Kane scored his 30th goal of the season, which is the first time since 2011-12 that he has reached that total. The Sharks are now the first team with four 30-goal scorers (Joe Pavelski, Tomas Hertl, Timo Meier, Kane) since the 2008-09 Red Wings and Flyers.

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I competed all the way to the bitter end in my Experts Roto League representing the Dobber brand, but alas I fell just short. Congratulations to David Petrie of The Hockey Writers, who started the day in third place but pulled ahead of both Jan Levine of Rotowire and myself. Levine and I tied for second place. Look how close the results were (type CTRL+ to make your browser text bigger if it's hard to read):

As you can see, fellow Dobber expert Eric Daoust finished in fifth place.

Sometimes victory isn’t quite meant to be, but my biggest weakness turned out to be goals. Yet all I would have need to win was to move up 1.5 points, which with these standings turned out to be three stinking goals. I scored 353 goals all season, but I could have won had I scored just three more goals to get up to 356. In fact, I could have advanced 3 points had I scored just five more goals than I did. A long season can come down to the smallest margin of victory.

The other point that I wanted to make was that I autopicked this team. Yes, autopicked. A word that serious fantasy players want no part of. I wrote about this in a Ramblings in late September, describing how I had prepared for this draft that I would not be present for due to other commitments. I’ll let you read how I did it, but in the end I’ll give a ton of credit to Fantasy Hockey Geek for what turned out to be a successful season. Being able to enter all my stat categories into the Geek, then using Dobber’s projections (tweaked a little to my own likings) to spit out custom rankings for my league is invaluable. I was then able to move players up and down the Yahoo pre-rankings according to how the Geek ranked them. I absolutely recommend the Geek without reservation.

I probably could have used the waiver wire more (Petrie made 73 moves, while I made just 22). However, I kept my first 13 picks for the entire season, only dropping the 14th pick (Chris Kreider) late in the season when he was battling an injury and I needed to maximize my games played. The funny thing is that earlier in that Ramblings, I suggested that Elias Lindholm’s ownership needed to be higher (just 18 percent at the time) because he would be a more ideal linemate for Gaudreau and Sean Monahan than James Neal. Lindholm was my 15th pick and was just 18 percent owned in Yahoo leagues at the time. Now I’m deciding whether he should be one of my four keepers for next season. Funny how that worked out.

I’m not suggesting that I prefer autopicking over live drafting. Although there’s that feeling of control with picking your own players, autopicking might not turn out as bad as you might think. I’ll try to attend next season’s draft, since I may not want to pick my second goalie in the 15th round (I can keep four players before the draft, including one goalie). But at least I know that I might be fine if I can’t make it and moving the date/time is impossible.

This league can be viewed publicly, so you can take a closer look here.

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Like many of you, Bob Cole has been calling hockey games longer than I’ve been watching them. That familiar voice will be missed. I used to hate seeing him get criticized on Twitter, knowing that calling play-by-play is not an easy job, so I sure hope this isn’t Sportsnet putting him out to pasture. Here’s another solid HNIC montage on some of his great calls. Mr. Cole is a Canadian treasure.  

"The truth is you have to sell the song with your sincerity. That's Bob's magic. He sings the game." – @RonMacLeanHTH

Tonight the voice of Saturday night, Bob Cole, calls his last #HockeyNight in Canada. pic.twitter.com/F6TctTw2qn

— Sportsnet (@Sportsnet) April 6, 2019

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Today, we remember the players, families, friends, and entire Humboldt Broncos community affected by the bus crash a year ago #HumboldtStrong pic.twitter.com/uXA6U0ZkTK

— TSN (@TSN_Sports) April 6, 2019

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For more fantasy hockey information, or to reach out to me directly, you can follow me on Twitter @Ian_Gooding.

from All About Sports https://dobberhockey.com/hockey-rambling/ramblings-mcdavid-injured-poehling-hattie-in-debut-autopicking-aint-that-bad-apr-7/

[thrashermaxey]

Ramblings: Vasilevskiy Returns; Pietrangelo Update; Christmas Wish List – December 14

  Just over a month after fracturing his foot, Andrei Vasilevskiy returned to game action on Thursday night at home to the Leafs. Those that rostered Louis Domingue, as I’ve stated earlier, should hold on to him for the time being. The chance for re-injury is always present and my hope is they back off Vasilevskiy’s workload a bit. Just hang on for a week or so.

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Kyle Turris returned for the Nashville Predators on Thursday, skating on the second line with Craig Smith and Calle Jarnkrok. The result of Turris returning was Eeli Tolvanen returning to the AHL. Presumably, Tolvanen is available for the World Juniors but whether they release him to play remains to be seen.

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Joe Thornton was a game-time decision for the Sharks on Thursday night. This is likely something that will persist all season.

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We got an update on Alex Pietrangelo: hand surgery. The report from Jeremy Rutherford says he’ll be evaluated in a couple weeks. Fantasy owners will have to make do until then (double-check that Colton Parayko is not available in your leagues).

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The listless Kings lost again, being on the wrong end of seven of their last nine games, falling 4-1 to Columbus. Artemi Panarin had a pair of goals (one on the power play) to help lead the charge. Josh Anderson also scored, his 13th of the season, just a couple nights after that cross-check from behind. He’s quietly turning into one of the top scorers in the league, at least on a per-minute pace at five-on-five.

Drew Doughty played after leaving the game Tuesday night against Buffalo. Seems like he’s ok.

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Jeff Skinner scored his 22nd goal of the season to help lead the Sabres 3-1 over Arizona. Casey Mittelstadt scored less than a minute into the game, his fifth of the year. With six shots on goal, Skinner is now averaging over three per game on the year. He has been over three shots per game every season of his career since his rookie 2010-11 campaign.

I will say one thing: I was very high on Clayton Keller coming into the year and it’s not quite panning out. I mean, it’s all relative, right. He’s on a 57-point pace after failing to register one on Thursday night. Realistically, for a 20-year old, that’s a good season. I thought it’d be a lot higher, though. I guess he’s only one hot streak away from being a 70-point pace player, just unfortunate we haven’t really seen it yet.

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Andrei Vasilevskiy made a triumphant return to the Tampa Bay net as the Bolts took a 4-1 win on the back of a 48-save performance from the young netminder. Tampa’s (very good) third line chipped in a pair of goals with both Anthony Cirelly (SHG) and Alex Killorn marking tallies. Tyler Johnson and Nikita Kucherov scored the others.

Kasperi Kapanen scored the lone goal for Toronto.

The Marner-Tavares-Brown line combined for 16 shots themselves.

With a pair of assists, J.T. Miller is now up to 25 points in 33 games, 11 of those coming on the power play. It sure seemed at times earlier this year fantasy owners weren’t content with his production but he’s doing just fine.

It was nice to see Vasy come back and look like himself. I’m sure Leafs fans weren’t too pleased but it’s hard not to root for a guy coming off an injury like that.

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Jeff Petry had a pair of goals in the Canadiens’ 6-4 home win over Carolina.

Even in a losing cause, the story of the game was Andrei Svechnikov. He scored a pair of goals, one of them of the highlight variety:

  That's just filthy, @ASvechnikov_37 pic.twitter.com/6gUiTy09Vs

— Carolina Hurricanes (@NHLCanes) December 14, 2018

  That’s Shea Weber he roasted. Svechnikov looked dangerous all game and he seemed poised to finish off the hat trick but time just ran out. It was just a glimpse of the player he will become. This is a superstar in the making.

Phillip Danault had a pair of assists in the win. Believe it or not, even playing with Tomas Tatar and Brendan Gallagher, that’s just the second multi-point game of Danault’s season, and the first in over a month. Can he surpass 40 points for the first time in his career? We’ll see.

It also appears the ‘Canes will be calling up Alex Nedeljkovic, possibly to start Friday night.

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Minnesota walked all over Florida by a 5-1 margin. Nino Niederreiter scored a pair of goals, giving him back-to-back multi-point games. He added an assist for good measure, which now puts him at 16 points in his last 20 games. The top-6 for Minnesota is absolutely humming right now.

Part of that top-6 is Zach Parise. He had a goal and an assist, which pushed him to 15 goals and 29 points on the year. He has 30 goals in his last 72 games. It sure feels like Parise’s resurgence is something not often getting discussed.

Devan Dubnyk stopped 30 of 31 in the win.

Ryan Suter had three assists in the win. He is now sitting with 26 points in 31 games to start the year. If he can maintain this pace he’ll smash his previous career-best of 51. That’s a big if, though.

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Ryan Hartman had one goal on five shots in Nashville’s 4-3 overtime win over Vancouver. He should get to 20 goals this year, which is a quietly nice season for a middle-six winger. For fantasy, though, he’s not hitting nearly as much as he has in previous seasons, being credited with just one in that game he’s at 23 in 32 games. Each of his first two seasons saw him cruise past 110 hits. That doesn’t seem feasible now. Though, if the trade-off is more scoring, I’m sure fantasy owners will take it.

The Canucks scored a pair of late goals to tie it up. Brock Boeser scored a power play goal, his first of the season. Perfect timing!

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We had a predictably high-scoring affair in Winnipeg, with the Jets winning 5-4 in overtime.

The top line for Edmonton did their thing, combining for one goal and five assists. Darnell Nurse also scored for Edmonton and played over 30 minutes. Expect these sort of minutes to continue for the d-man as long as Oscar Klefbom is out of the lineup.

Nikolaj Ehlers scored his just his 10th of the season, but it’s his ninth goal and 17th point in his last 19 games. He played over 20 minutes skating on the top line. Playing with Mark Scheifele and Blake Wheeler continues to do wonders for his fantasy value.

Josh Morrissey scored the overtime winner adding an assist as well. That gives him 17 points in 29 games. He had just 26 points all of last year. With his peripherals, a 40-point season would be a monster roto performance, especially considering his ADP.

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With fewer than two weeks until Christmas, I thought today would be a good day to have a bit of fun. In the holiday spirit, here’s my wish list for the unofficial second half of the season.

  More ice time for Sanheim

Oddly enough, on a team with Shayne Gostisbehere and Ivan Provorov, it’s not those two blue liners who’ve stood out for me for the Flyers this year. Rather, it’s Robert Hagg and Travis Sanheim who’ve been very impressive basically from the start of the season. As far as the latter is concerned, there is reason to believe that he’s turning into a bona fide top-four defenceman:

  PHI's best three pairing options are: Sanheim-Gudas Sanheim-Gostisbehere Sanheim-Folin

So, clone Sanheim. pic.twitter.com/Nz4pm0nG8s

— Sean Tierney (@ChartingHockey) December 10, 2018

  This point was hammered into my brain on Wednesday night as we watched the Flyers blow a late two-goal lead. In that game, Sanheim (8:49) had about half the five-on-five minutes of Andrew MacDonald (16:21). Remember, MacDonald has been so bad in recent seasons that they sent him to the AHL despite his $5-million cap hit. I get a coach’s hesitation to use a 22-year old defenceman heavily, but as Micah Blake McCurdy once said, it’ll be a glorious day when coaches start playing young players who *might* be bad rather than veteran players who are *definitely* bad. Sanheim/MacDonald fit this to a tee. Let the kid play some bigger minutes.

  Rakell-Getzlaf-Kase

All I’ve wanted from Anaheim for basically a year now is a line of Rickard Rakell, Ryan Getzlaf, and Ondrej Kase. They wouldn’t do it (much) last year with Corey Perry around, and this year’s been difficult on the team injury-wise. Kase started the season out of the lineup and lately it’s been Rakell. We have no firm timeline on Rakell’s return, but when he does, I would like to see these three together.

Over the last few seasons, when those three have skated together, they’ve been utterly dominant, putting up an expected goal share near 60 percent (per Corsica). For reference on how good that is, over the same span, the line of Guentzel-Crosby-Hornqvist is ahead of them by 0.01%. Having those three together would allow the checking line of Cogliano-Kesler-Silfverberg to stay together while giving Adam Henrique a scoring winger when Perry returns. Something like this:

Rakell-Getzlaf-Kase

Aberg-Henrique-Perry

Cogliano-Kesler-Silfverberg

Not bad?

Of course, I say all this as a greedy owner of Kase in all my leagues. Please, Santa.

  Hurricanes trade for Tarasenko

It came out a couple days ago that basically everyone in St. Louis could be on the trading block, Vladimir Tarasenko included. Now, trading Tarasenko, arguably a top-5 winger on the planet on a team-friendly deal at the age of 27, would be a bad decision by St. Louis. On the other hand, we’ve seen GMs do way, way dumber things so I don’t want to dismiss this out of hand.

The natural fit for me would be Carolina. They were linked to William Nylander and their owner has made it clear he wants more scoring on the team. Were Tarasenko made available, I’d assume that Carolina would be one of the teams interested.

The Blues would likely, and rightly, be asking for Andrei Svechnikov in return. That would be a non-starter for Carolina, but just about everyone and everything not on the current roster should be available. A package of Martin Necas, Jake Bean, and draft picks could be their starting point.

Carolina desperately needs more scoring, and the sooner the better. Maybe Tarasenko is available, maybe he isn’t. But Carolina being able to run a top-6 of Teravainen-Aho-Ferland and Svechnikov-Staal-Tarasenko for the foreseeable future, with that blue line, is very dangerous. If there’s even a chance that Tank is on the block, I hope the Hurricanes are moving Heaven and Earth to get him on the roster.

  Charles Hudon earns some games

It’s a small thing, but I hope Charles Hudon gets another crack with the Canadiens. He’s been sitting in the press box an awful lot for them lately. I’ve reached the point with him where I’ve accepted that he probably won’t be more than a third/fourth-line winger, but I think he’s a better third/fourth line winger than some of the players the Habs trot out regularly. Maybe he doesn’t have the punchiness of Nicolas Deslauriers, but Hudon could be a guy you can get 10-15 goals from on the fourth line with secondary power play time. That has value. More value than, say, 10 fights.

  Dallas trade for Jeff Carter

It probably won’t be long until the fire sale in Los Angeles begins and Jeff Carter’s name is floated constantly. I know he’s off to a bad start this year but the same could be said about his entire team. He’s getting to the latter stages of his NHL career but his cap hit is very reasonable at just over $5.2-million and the Stars have both Jason Spezza and Marc Methot coming off the books after this season. It would give them a very good second-line centre that the team hasn’t really had in three years. They could then justifiably move one of Jamie Benn or Alex Radulov to the second line, giving them a balanced top-6 for the first time in, well, a really long time.

from All About Sports https://dobberhockey.com/hockey-rambling/ramblings-vasilevskiy-returns-pietrangelo-update-christmas-wish-list-december-14/

[thrashermaxey]

Ramblings: Pacioretty in Vegas; Rankings by Position – September 11

  Training camps officially start this week which means the march to the start of the season is officially on. If you haven’t snagged your copy of the 2018-19 Dobber Hockey fantasy guide, what are you waiting for? Head to the Dobber Shop and grab yours now!

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In the wee hours of Monday morning, the Canadiens finally traded Max Pacioretty after months (years?) of speculation. That he would be traded was only a matter of if, not when, so the return was all that mattered. Pacioretty was shipped to Vegas for Tomas Tatar, a second-round pick, and prospect Nick Suzuki.

Dobber had a pretty accurate take on the trade’s fantasy impact and most of his thoughts mirror my own.

I don’t have too much to add on top of what Dobber wrote other than this: Pacioretty was due to rebound regardless. For the last several years, Pacioretty was a top-end scorer, and one of the most consistent ones at that; from 2011-17, Pacioretty and Alex Ovechkin were the only two players to score at least 30 goals in every 82-game season. The Habs’ captain had one bad season and now he’s gone.

This is just to get out in front of the Vegas Rejuvenated Pacioretty’s Career narrative. He was always going to rebound. My projection, which weights the most recent season heaviest and thus wouldn’t be kind to a person in Pacioretty’s position, was 25 goals and 57 points with the Habs. If he posts those totals (or better), it’s not because of rejuvenation in Vegas. It’s because he wasn’t going to repeat a bad year like 2017-18. At least not for a few years yet.

That isn’t to say this isn’t a beneficial move for him regardless. A quote from Marc Bergevin stated that the 29-year old requested to be traded last year, and that’s no surprise. (Agent Allen Walsh said a week ago that a trade was never requested, so believe what you want to believe.) It’s a surprise that more Habs players aren’t requesting trades considering Bergevin has handled that roster with the deft touch of someone coming off a seven-day bender handling a live grenade. That kind of situation is bad for any player. With the trade and subsequent extension (four years, $28-million), Pacioretty gets essentially a fresh start and a good situation in which to re-establish himself as one of the elite goal scorers in the league.

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This does give the Habs the potential to run Kotkaniemi-Suzuki-Poehling down the middle in the not-too-distant future, and that’s if Jonathan Drouin doesn’t work out as a centre. This team went from desperately needing help down the middle to having three prospects that could all project as middle-six centres, plus Drouin (who should be on the wing anyway).

The issue here is that none of Kotkaniemi, Suzuki, and Poehling are what we would deem as a generational centre. A sure thing. A lock like Eichel or Matthews. Sure, Kotkaniemi could be the next Pierre-Luc Dubois; or he could be the next Tyson Jost. Suzuki could be the next Clayton Keller; or he could be the next Luke Kunin. Each of those four ‘centres’ mentioned were taken in the top half of the 2016 draft. Kunin was injured last year but the fact remains the same: the future is still uncertain for each of the next generation of Montreal centres. They’re lottery tickets, and for this team to be good in 2-3 years, they need at least 2/3 of them to pay off in a big way.

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By the by, the Pacioretty trade should lock Artturi Lehkonen to the top PP unit for Montreal. With the former captain around, Lehkonen looked to be on the outside looking in. But now, they can run the top unit with Brendan Gallgher in front, Max Domi in the bumper, Drouin on one half-wall and Lehkonen on the other, or something along those lines. The PP unit needs a trigger-man now and Lehkonen is best-suited for that role.

They could also just replace Pacioretty with Tatar, in which case I will be one sad panda.

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Last week I got into my projections and they still had some tinkering left. I still have to add most of the true rookies like Svechnikov and Zadina, but I am now mostly done. Let’s dig into some of them.

Here are the parameters for these projections:

Standard 12-team Yahoo! league without plus/minus. That means goals, assists, PPPs, hits, and shots on goal.

Based off rosters with three left wingers, three right wingers, three centres, five defencemen, and a utility skater. Everybody is projected for 82 games and they are age-adjusted (finally).

Goals are based on Corsica’s expected goals model. They will generally be lower on goal scoring in general; these projections only have three players cracking 30 goals. Clearly, that will not be the case. Until I’m smart enough to develop my own goals model (read: never), I will use those from people smarter than me.

Value is based off Standings Gained Points (SGP). This is a concept I got from Tanner Bell for fantasy baseball but the applications for fantasy hockey are the same. The essence is this: How much value does [Player A] provide over a replacement player in a given category? A replacement player is defined as a player just on the outside of being a starter. For example, in this case, in a 12-team league, we’ll have 36 starting centres total. SGP is determined by how much value in a certain category a given centre provides above the 37th centre according to projections (it’s actually an average of a handful of players arounds the 37th starting centre so as to not weight one category of one player too heavily). So, if [Centre A] is projected to score 26 goals, how much value does that provide over the replacement centre? That process is repeated for each skater, in each category, with the SGP of each category tallied to give total value.

Plus/minus not being included will change rankings. They are not included because most of plus/minus is largely random. What we know about plus/minus is this: heavily-used defencemen on bad teams are the ones who often get crushed. There were 20 players who finished -25 or worse last year, and nine of them were defencemen. These were the defencemen: Nick Leddy, Alex Goligoski, Jeff Petry, Duncan Keith, Oliver Ekman-Larsson, Brady Skjei, Justin Faulk, Rasmus Ristolainen, and Erik Karlsson. All heavily-used defencemen on teams who couldn’t score, couldn’t get a save, or both. As for the forwards, there were forwards from bad teams like Montreal and Buffalo, but there was also Devin Shore from Dallas and JT Compher from Colorado. For this reason, I’ve decided to exclude plus/minus, though you can figure out which defencemen are going to have their plus/minus murdered this year.

With all those caveats out of the way, here are my top-20 at each position. Once I add the rookies and do some other minor tweaks, I will have these projections ready for download in their entirety, likely by the weekend.

(note: these are positions from Corsica. I adjusted a lot of them but dual eligibility is not represented.)

  Centres

  Some notes:

Yahoo! moving from PIMs to hits as standard helps Tyler Seguin a lot. He’s averaged 74.4 hits per 82 games over the last three years. For reference, Nathan MacKinnon has never cracked 60, John Tavares has 72 total hits over the last two years, and Sean Monahan has gone four straight seasons without breaking 40. Last year was the first time Seguin exceed 30 PIMs in a season so the move to hits is beneficial for him.

Two seasons ago, Mark Scheifele posted 32 goals and 82 points. Great season, right? In this format, those totals didn’t even make him a top-10 centre or top-30 player. If he can post Seguin-like hits, he might be a top-25 player. If he doesn’t, think more top-50.

In the same vein as Scheifele, consider this: Mathew Barzal finished 2017-18 as the 60th overall player. He did that with 85 points. He’s currently being drafted inside the top-50. I think Barzal is a great player, but banking on a 90-point season with at least a break-even plus/minus just to return value is a lot.

Speaking of 2017-18 hit totals, if Eichel can extrapolate his 52 hits in 67 games into a full season, it’ll go a long way to helping him be a top-25 player.

I think Joe Pavelski’s ADP is about fair right now. If Joe Thornton can come back and be the Joe Thornton of a couple years ago (which should help get Pavelski back to 30 goals), then Pavelski can be a value at his ADP this year. If Thornton is not that guy, then Pavelski is probably being drafted at his ceiling right now.   

Brayden Schenn’s ADP on Yahoo! right now is 96th. His Yahoo! ranking is 78th. Even when accounting for his centre-only designation, he’s my 53rd overall skater. And that’s with non-elite PP numbers. If that power play, with all that talent, can be one of the best in the league, Schenn has legitimate top-10 upside in this format.

  Left Wing

  Notes:

Don’t get too caught up with Taylor Hall over Alex Ovechkin. As mentioned earlier, expected goals downplay goal scoring and if Ovechkin pops near 50 again, he’s the top left winger.

Also mentioned earlier, this is all based on an 82-game season. Evander Kane won’t play 82 games. This does show the upside he has, though.

Does anyone realize Max Pacioretty has triple-digit hit totals in three of the last four years? If he can get back to his 30-30 level with those types of hit numbers and a bevy of shot totals, he can be a top-5 left winger.

James van Riemsdyk’s value here is reflected on a full season on the top unit for the Flyers. If they leave Wayne Simmonds there, JvR’s value plummets.

As I mentioned last week, the move of standard leagues from PIMs to hits is a big ding to the value of Brad Marchand.

One guy that finished much further down the list than some might expect is Ryan Nugent-Hopkins. For now, I still have him listed as the 2C in Edmonton. If he does skate with Connor McDavid at camp when they start this week, he’ll be in the Rakell/Keller tier.

  Right Wing

  Notes:

Don’t get up in arms over Patrik Laine’s rankings. He’s a guy the expected goals model is not a fan of, and his PP projection isn’t kind for that reason as well. He’s in the Tarasenko/Pastrnak tier.

Mitch Marner’s value here is significantly tied to power play production. The Leafs lost two guys with whom Marner had great success on the power play. If that PP success doesn’t continue, his value takes a big hit.

Just draft Kyle Palmieri in all your standard leagues. Though ADP data right now is still a little unreliable, his ADP on Yahoo! is currently lower than Conor Sheary. Come on.

Patric Hornqvist finished as the 55th player last year. He’s being drafted outside the top-100. There aren’t many guys who can give you 25 goals, 50 points, 3+ shots per game, 15-20 PPPs, and at least two hits per game.

Tyler Toffoli can provide 25 goals, 45 points, 75 hits, and three shots per game. Even without PP time, that’s not bad. He’s a good value right now.

Mikko Rantanen just missed the top-20 RWs (21st) but he’s still a seventh-round value for me.

  Defence

  Notes:

Ristolainen is overvalued here by a lot because his plus/minus isn’t considered. Even with a bad plus/minus though, he can be a top-100 player (he was 110 last year even at -25).

Ditto Erik Karlsson.

For now, I still have Justin Faulk on Carolina’s PP1. Carolina ran a four-forward top PP unit last year but that was under a different coach. If we get an indication in training camp that they will indeed keep a four-forward top PP unit, Faulk’s value will take a big hit.

Alex Edler is like Evander Kane in that he has a lot of upside in this format if he plays 82 games, but we know he won’t play 82 games. This does give some insight into his upside, though, and you can probably draft him as a fifth defenceman. That means low waiver wire replacement value.

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That’s it for today. Any questions?

from All About Sports https://dobberhockey.com/hockey-rambling/ramblings-pacioretty-in-vegas-rankings-by-position-september-11/

[thrashermaxey]

Ramblings: Wennberg Showing Signs of Life (Dec 21)

  The Blue Jackets were without Zach Werenski due to an injury described as day-to-day. I guess we wait and see. Seth Jones stepped up in his absence with a goal and an assist, including a power-play point.

Don’t look now, but the Blue Jackets have scored a power-play marker in three of the last four games going 3/13 in that stretch. This isn’t yet a trend, but any signs of life are worth getting excited about.

Alexander Wennberg is streaking with points in four straight games. Amazingly this scoring streak has come without getting in on any of those recent PP goals. Check out his snipe:

{source} <blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-lang="en"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">Do my eyes deceive me or did Wennberg just shoot the puck? <a href="https://t.co/aLmsZn23ko">pic.twitter.com/aLmsZn23ko</a></p>— Stephen Laidlaw (@SteveLaidlaw) <a href="https://twitter.com/SteveLaidlaw/status/943676594484326400?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">December 21, 2017</a></blockquote>

<script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>{/source}

More of that, please.

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Mitch Marner appears to be heating up with goals in back-to-back games including this gem:

{source}<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-lang="en"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">Mitch Marner may be heating up: <a href="https://t.co/bZQtYURjbc">pic.twitter.com/bZQtYURjbc</a></p>— Stephen Laidlaw (@SteveLaidlaw) <a href="https://twitter.com/SteveLaidlaw/status/943679099561762817?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">December 21, 2017</a></blockquote>

<script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>{/source}

Talk about having the puck on a string.

Marner was all over the place with seven SOG. James van Riemsdyk matched him with seven SOG of his own. That line along with Tyler Bozak is flying high this week.

Nazem Kadri has gone nine straight games without a point. It could be a good time to make a pitch for his services. He remains a high-end shot producer with 29 SOG in this scoreless stretch and he surely won’t stay quiet forever. It is worth mentioning that his PIM production is way down after being an elite PIM producer the past couple of seasons, so some of his peripheral fantasy value is down.

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The Flyers’ power play hasn’t been quite as effective as in past seasons, but they’ve still got some magic in them:

{source} <blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-lang="en"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">Giroux-Voracek-Simmonds on the PP, I've seen this before, but it never stops being BEAUTIFUL <a href="https://t.co/Ji7mAiRikb">pic.twitter.com/Ji7mAiRikb</a></p>— Stephen Laidlaw (@SteveLaidlaw) <a href="https://twitter.com/SteveLaidlaw/status/943671905357361154?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">December 21, 2017</a></blockquote>

<script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>{/source}

I was recently offered Sean Couturier for Vladislav Namestnikov. I wasn’t willing to do the deal straight up. Namestnikov is more valuable if for no other reason than his winger eligibility. Both players have slowed down of late, each with 10 points in the last 15 games, and are the least accomplished fantasy options on their lines so I wouldn’t be shocked if either one slowed down entirely. I think Namestnikov is safer, however. The Lightning are simply more prolific, especially on the power play.

I remain unconvinced that Couturier’s spot on the Flyer power play is safe. He has NEVER been a big-time producer in this phase and has not matched what Brayden Schenn offered as a bumper option. Maybe he’ll grow more comfortable with added reps, but I could see him losing out.

While I didn’t like the one-for-one swap, I am never one to back away from an opportunity and asked for a goalie upgrade to be included with Cam Talbot coming my way in exchange for Scott Darling.

I know that you are thinking, “Aren’t you Mr. Scott Darling?”

Yes, and I remain a true believer, but I also had Talbot ranked ahead of Darling pre-season, so this still fits the bill. I am notoriously slow to change my take on goalies, so what you won’t see me do is sell Darling for a goalie I ranked lower like Tuukka Rask, Brian Elliott or Mike Smith, especially not while downgrading at another position.

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Henrik Zetterberg is back in the hot zone with eight points in his last five games. That’s nice, use him if you can, especially in daily fantasy, but I’ll remain interested in only Dylan Larkin and Anthony Mantha for season-long value. Mike Green too, I suppose.

Green has three points in the last two games after just one point in the previous 13, but defensemen are going to be more volatile. With Green producing at least 2.0 SOG per game you can afford to be a bit more patient with him.

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The Flames busted out a brand-new power play look last night rolling out the following for their top unit:

Johnny Gaudreau – Sean Monahan – Matthew Tkachuk – Mark Jankowski – Mark Giordano

I have already ragged on TJ Brodie a few times over the past couple of weeks and for good reason. He is mired in a stretch where he has scored just three points in 16 games, including going scoreless in eight games before grabbing a secondary assist last night. If that cold stretch wasn’t the nail in the coffin surely getting dumped to the second power play unit will be. He remains owned in 49% of Yahoo leagues, but I think that could be pushed down to 25%, considering some highly intrigued low ownership options like Shea Theodore, Jeff Petry, and Alex Edler are all sitting below 20% ownership.

None of those four may be valuable for the entirety of the season, but dropping Brodie won’t hurt too many fantasy teams, and the alternatives listed should help in the short-term.

Micheal Ferland has been trending downward over the past few weeks. He’ll still get you exposure to Gaudreau and Monahan at even strength, but dropping to PP2 will eat away at some of his fantasy value. My comp for him has always been Patrick Maroon so your expectations shouldn’t have been sky high.

I expect Ferland will get back on that top PP unit at some point, because the Flames don’t have much in the way of net-front options, although Tkachuk may have a future there. Brodie has obvious replacements in both Giordano and Dougie Hamilton, which is why I have no issue burying Brodie after one game off the top unit.

Giordano has picked up a little steam with six points in the last nine games. He also has 31 SOG in that stretch. More top unit PP time will only help his cause. Of course, he is near universal ownership, but it could be the time to buy before his stock rises and I’m not just saying that because I am trying to sell him in a keeper league. A healthy Giordano should get you at least 40 points.

The Flames lost Travis Hamonic to a lower-body injury. He isn’t of particular fantasy relevance, but his play had improved of late. Foisting Michael Stone into his slot to play 20+ minutes a night isn’t ideal for Mike Smith or the Flames.

With Hamonic out I hope we get to see Rasmus Andersson given a shot at the NHL level. Perhaps he won’t get the PP time necessary to be fantasy relevant, but he has done quite well in the AHL with 16 points in 22 games.  

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Alex Pietrangelo is trending in the wrong direction. He has just three points in the last 10 games, missed a couple of games due to injury and has lost his spot on the top power play unit to the capable Colton Parayko.

We’ll see how long this run on the top PP unit lasts for Parayko. The Blues have been experimenting with combinations over the past month in which they have gone 7/48 with the man-advantage. They have some tent-pole options in Vladimir Tarasenko and Brayden Schenn so they should be fine, but there is opportunity for fantasy value to swing depending on who is in that lone defenseman role once they do start having success again.

We also have to consider that the Blues are missing Jaden Schwartz and will continue to be for the next month, which lowers their offensive ceiling. Since Schwartz went down they have scored seven goals in six games.

Carter Hutton took the loss, but was solid stopping 31 of 33. I scooped him off the waiver wire for a spot start as soon as he was announced. After Andrei Vasilevskiy got beat up in Vegas I needed someone who could turn the goalie categories in my direction. His career numbers don’t suggest that you should have much faith, but he has been outstanding this season. With the Flames’ offense struggling, this was a good spot to take a swing.  

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Time to get giddy about a return for Ryan Ellis:

{source} <blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-lang="en"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">As others have mentioned, Ryan Ellis is practicing again today, but doing so without the “non-contact” jersey he had been wearing for the past couple weeks.</p>— Adam Vingan (@AdamVingan) <a href="https://twitter.com/AdamVingan/status/943543365236387850?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">December 20, 2017</a></blockquote>

<script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>{/source}

The Preds have torched teams without Ellis, so it will be interesting to see where he slots in. Roman Josi and PK Subban are locked in as fantasy relevant options, but Mattias Ekholm has continued momentum from his playoff breakout. However, there is only room for three defensemen to get power play time in Nashville. Could Ellis be iced upon his return or will Ekholm get bounced?

Nashville has surprised boasting an elite PP after struggling last season. They currently rank second in the league in efficiency clicking on 26.8% of their chances. It would be awfully hard to cut down on Ekholm’s PP time given how he has produced four PP goals and 10 PP points already. Why mess with success?

I fear Ellis may have missed the boat.

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It sounds like Patric Hornqvist will be back in the lineup for the Penguins.

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The gang at DobberProspects has done a bang-up job of previewing the upcoming World Junior Hockey Championships. Here’s a look at some of Sweden’s top prospects heading into the tournament. The latest prospect ramblings offer up some more goodies. Here are a few “lesser-known” prospects to target in keeper leagues prior to the tournament with links to their DobberProspects profiles:

  Adam Fox

Fox should already be on the radar after putting up four points in seven games at this tournament last year, as well as putting up 49 points in 45 games through his first two college seasons. He forecasts to be the top offensive defenseman for the US in this tournament, which sets him up nicely for a star-making performance. The Flames boast three of Dobber’s top-50 defensemen prospects, but Fox is not yet among them. I bet Fox gives them a fourth come January. He has the highest fantasy upside of Calgary’s talented blueline prospects.

  Joseph Woll

There’s a decent chance that a Leaf fan in your pool has already snapped up this prospect and is touting him as a future hall-of-famer. I don’t find much appealing about his numbers at the college level, including a save percentage below .900, but he showed flashes of brilliance at this tournament last year.

Jake Oettinger is the man expected to carry the US in goal, but the first-rounder has had struggles of his own. Goalies are unpredictable in short samples. If Oettinger falters and Woll steals the starting gig, his stock will soar.

  Aleksi Heponiemi

The Finns are loaded with talented scores, which sets up pretty nicely for Heponiemi who leads the WHL in assists (52) and points (71) in just 29 games. He’ll probably lose those leads while away at this tournament, but this is a chance to get some big stage exposure for a player eviscerating junior hockey.

  Jesper Boqvist

Most of Sweden’s big names are either former first-rounders, or pending first-rounders. As a second-rounder, Boqvist comes in with a little less hype, but I am intrigued by any prospect who can put up points in Sweden’s top league as a 17-year-old. He should fit somewhere into Sweden’s top-six forwards, which would provide an excellent opportunity to raise his stock.

  Uuko-Pekka Luukkonen

Finland is known as a goalie factory, but the position is arguably the weakest spot in this tournament. Luukkonen should be the starter for a team heavily in the mix to win it all. A strong showing behind a loaded squad would create some hype around the Sabres’ prospect.

  Vitali Abramov

Size is no longer a concern, so get the 5’9” prospect on your radar. He has torched the QMJHL for three years running and even flashed in a four-game cameo in the AHL last spring scoring four points. Most of Russia’s top prospects in this tournament are 17 or 18, so the 19-year-old is in a prime spot to be a leader for the perennial contender.

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Thanks for reading! You can follow me on Twitter @SteveLaidlaw.

from All About Sports http://www.dobberhockey.com/hockey-rambling/ramblings-wennberg-showing-signs-of-life-dec-21/

[thrashermaxey]

Ramblings: Habs Put Up 10, Lightning and Blues Mixing Up Their Lines and more (Dec 3)

  Laidlaw filling in for Ian after a loaded Saturday of action. Let’s get to it.

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The Montreal Canadiens obliterated the Red Wings 10-1, extending Carey Price’s winning streak to four games. Why does Price get the lead billing? Because the score sheet was dominated by Montreal’s third and fourth lines, which simply won’t help many fantasy owners.

Paul Byron led the way with a hat-trick, while Alex Galchenyuk notched four assists. They have heated up of late. Galchenyuk has eight points in the last five games, while Byron has six in the same stretch. I’m not sure Byron is seeing quite enough ice time to be relevant outside of deep leagues, but perhaps there’s a flyer to be taken here. Galchenyuk is interesting as regression seems to finally be setting in.

No Jonathan Drouin for the second straight game, but he is not expected to miss much time. He had been skating with Galchenyuk and Byron before getting hurt, so he may be coming back to good comfortable surroundings.

Some frustration to be had for Max Pacioretty owners as the top forward was somehow shutout despite the barrage of goals. Use it as buy-low fuel.

Shea Weber returned skating over 22 minutes, notching an assist. That spells the end of our flirtation with Jeff Petry.

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Jimmy Howard didn’t even start, but still got hung up for five goals on nine shots. He has been awful over the past couple of weeks as the Red Wings have lost seven in a row, falling towards what we expected of them. Don’t even ask about Petr Mrazek, he’s dead to me.

Check out Detroit’s scoring since November 1:

MANTHA,ANTHONY

14

12

LARKIN,DYLAN

14

11

ABDELKADER,JUSTIN

13

10

NIELSEN,FRANS

14

7

TATAR,TOMAS

14

7

GREEN,MIKE

14

7

ATHANASIOU,ANDREAS

14

6

ZETTERBERG,HENRIK

14

6

KRONVALL,NIKLAS

14

5

NYQUIST,GUSTAV

14

5

FRK,MARTIN

6

4

HELM,DARREN

13

4

OUELLET,XAVIER

14

4

GLENDENING,LUKE

14

4

BOOTH,DAVID

4

3

JENSEN,NICK

14

2

ERICSSON,JONATHAN

14

1

WILSON,SCOTT

12

0

LASHOFF,BRIAN

1

0

DALEY,TREVOR

12

0

WITKOWSKI,LUKE

2

0

DEKEYSER,DANNY

7

0

  The Red Wings have only two games over the next eight days. Use this opportunity to divest yourself of all Detroit players not named Mantha, Larkin or Green.

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The Edmonton Oilers are trying to take years off my life, nearly blowing a 6-1 lead, allowing it to get to 6-5, before a TJ Brodie own-goal iced it. After Kris Russell’s own-goal on Thursday against the Leafs, this couldn’t have ended more karmically.

Jesse Puljujarvi was elevated to the top line alongside Connor McDavid and scored a pair of goals. He still isn’t close to demanding universal ownership. He skated only 14:35 and is only seeing use on the second power play unit. Give me a couple more games of production on the top line before I jump on board.

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The Lightning did some line shuffling before last night’s action:

#1           32.1%    JOHNSON,TYLER – NAMESTNIKOV,VLADISLAV – STAMKOS,STEVEN

#2           21.9%    KUCHEROV,NIKITA – PALAT,ONDREJ – POINT,BRAYDEN

#3           21.5%    BROWN,J.T. – CALLAHAN,RYAN – KUNITZ,CHRIS

#4           14.3%    CONACHER,CORY – GOURDE,YANNI – KILLORN,ALEX

The big winner was Tyler Johnson who scored a pair of goals to end a 15-game goalless drought. He’s been mostly irrelevant this season, drowning on the third line, so some time with the Stamkov group is a major boost.

I cannot help, but think that Ondrej Palat and Brayden Point also see small boosts getting time with Nikita Kucherov, although this duo has been fine on their own. Indeed, Palat and Point each notched assists.

No changes were made to the power play groupings, so there are no major changes in player value. If you have to have a loser, it’s Yanni Gourde who dropped onto the third line, but he still managed an assist last night. Bottom line, this team is loaded.

Fringe NHLer Cory Conacher has gotten into two games and has goals in each of them. I’m not ready to throw my lot in with him, but there could be room for him with a couple of injuries.

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The Blues, also did some line juggling splitting up one of the league’s best lines:

#1           24.7%    SCHENN,BRAYDEN – SCHWARTZ,JADEN – STEEN,ALEXANDER

#2           23.1%    SOBOTKA,VLADIMIR – STASTNY,PAUL – TARASENKO,VLADIMIR

#3           18.7%    BERGLUND,PATRIK – BLAIS,SAMMY – PAAJARVI,MAGNUS

#4           14.8%    BRODZIAK,KYLE – JASKIN,DMITRIJ – UPSHALL,SCOTTIE

They have gone through some offensive struggles over the past week, or as I like to call it, regression.

Brayden Schenn has been hit hardest with no points in the last five games. Getting split off from Vladimir Tarasenko at even strength will hurt a little, but much like with Tampa Bay there is enough offensive talent that a little juggling doesn’t hurt much. This is especially true because the power play formations were not messed with much. This is certainly not panic time. The Blues continue run over opponents on the shot counter, especially with their top forwards. Schenn just wasn’t going to produce at a 100-point pace all year.

The only big change for St. Louis was using Tarasenko on both power play units, giving him the full two minutes. It worked for Tarasenko as he notched an assist with the second unit for St. Louis’ only goal of the game.

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It’s been a yo-yo season for Devan Dubnyk, but he now has now won seven of his last nine games. I’m not confident in him yet. He has had some ludicrous bounces go against him this year, and another one could send his confidence spiralling, but things are trending positively.

Matt Dumba continues to be your go-to direct replacement for Jared Spurgeon. Back-to-back games with 26+ minutes for the defenseman, and points in three of the last four games.

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The Flyers were shutout by Tuukka Rask and the Bruins in the matinee. That’s 10 consecutive losses. You can smell the inevitable coaching change in the air. As I always say, things must hit unsustainable lows for a coach to get fired. I’d say we are in range:

{source} <blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-lang="en"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">Jake Voracek as <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/Flyers?src=hash&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#Flyers</a> inch closer to matching franchise record 12-game winless skid: "Everything we touch right now turns to shit."</p>— Frank Seravalli (@frank_seravalli) <a href="https://twitter.com/frank_seravalli/status/937079929203806209?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">December 2, 2017</a></blockquote>

<script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>{/source}

Take the firing of Jack Capuano last season. The Islanders got off to a horrible start, but had played better for him for a month before they made the switch to Doug Weight. Weight may have helped, but the tide was already turning through sheer regression.

Philadelphia is a tricky situation because they are riding a PDO high of 1014 almost entirely driven by the success of their top line. The goaltending has been near average with a 0.904 save percentage (league average is 0.907), so you wouldn’t expect much change.

Where regression could set in for the Flyers is success in one-goal games where their record is 2-4-7, particularly in overtime and shootouts where their record is 1-7. They should finish closer to .500 in one-goal outings, which would help their goaltenders’ win totals the most.

Whether Dave Hakstol is fired or not, I am waiting for the Flyers to experiment with breaking up the top line to try and spread out the scoring. They are getting next to nothing from their other nine forwards despite boasting gifted players like Wayne Simmonds, Travis Konecny and Nolan Patrick. Most would like to see more minutes for Konecny who is averaging just over 14 minutes per game for the second consecutive season, but I am not certain that Konecny has yet reached the level of play-driving that warrants expanded usage on a nightly basis.

Simmonds is the easy guy to target as a buy-low option. He is on pace for 44 points, but could do more if he got anything going at 5-on-5. He remains one of the league’s best net-front men and offers a ton of multi-category value.

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Brad Marchand was briefly forced from yesterday’s game after a hit to the head from Ivan Provorov, but returned to score a goal and an assist. A few folks noted that Marchand has been taking big hits this season, something to watch for from a player who has already missed time.

David Krejci returned to the lineup skating 15:45 alongside Ryan Spooner and Anders Bjork, who was himself returning to the lineup. There’s potential for some genuine depth scoring on this second line, especially with Spooner also operation on the Bruins’ top PP unit. We’re talking like 50-point upside for Spooner though so don’t get crazy with it.

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On American Thanksgiving I discussed Sidney Crosby’s no-brainer bounce-back potential:

I’m not so bold as to put a ceiling on Crosby’s production. There will no doubt be a two-week period where he eviscerates the league, reminding everyone just how dominant he can be. I am simply tempering my expectations for the degree to which his scoring will recover.

A week and a half later and Crosby has strung together five straight multi-point games, good for 12 points in five games. My only regret is tempering expectations.

While I am back-patting, how about that Tristan Jarry? If anything, his performance this weekend was a disappointment for allowing the moribund Sabres to break their shutout streak. It will never get easier than that slate for Jarry, who is now staring down games against the Rangers, Islanders and Leafs (all top six offensive teams,) but this weekend was a huge confidence builder for a talented netminder playing behind one of the league’s scariest teams.

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Speaking of those Sabres, their power play is inching towards Blue Jacket levels of ineptitude at 11.4%. How Phil Housley took a power play from the top of the league to the bottom if beyond me, but it is sinking some typically stalwart fantasy options.

Jack Eichel has entered buy-low territory with 20 points in 27 games, a “mere” 61-point pace. In this season of jacked power plays and boosted scoring paces, he should be busting out for 80+ points. Instead, he has one PPP. His pace is still fantasy relevant in all formats, so NO ONE should be complaining and if anyone is, they are begging to have him poached off their team.

Also in buy-low territory: Rasmus Ristolainen, although his case is weaker. I know everyone is scared off. He has missed games, is minus-nine and doesn’t have a goal. Well, his plus/minus is always going to be bad, but I encourage punting that category in favour of dominance elsewhere. Despite missing nine games Ristolainen is still on pace for 200 SOG. He won’t continue to go without a goal. The power play should improve some.

What am I talking about for buy low on Ristolainen? I’m talking about offering up a way-too-fast starter. Assuming you aren’t in a league where points carry over, what has happened is no longer of relevance. Looking forward, Ristolainen should score roughly 0.5-points-per-game with lots of shot volume. Offer up someone you are projecting forward to be of less value. I’ve been floating Will Butcher for Ristolainen offers for the past month. No bites yet, but that’s the range you should be pushing for.

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Speaking of Butcher, Sami Vatanen hasn’t yet usurped the youngster, nor do I expect him to. The Devils are splitting PP time pretty evenly between their two units, but Butcher is skating on the unit with Taylor Hall that sees slight preference.

No points for Vatanen through two games with the Devils, a continuation of his offensive woes with Anaheim. He deserves a longer shake before passing judgement, though I am not expecting fantasy relevance in standard leagues.

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The other half of this week’s big trade, Adam Henrique, is making the expected immediate impact with two points in two games skating alongside Corey Perry.

I won’t post the line combos for Anaheim because it is truly horrific. Jakob Silfverberg is now out with an upper-body injury. No timeline for him.

Cam Fowler has points in three straight games. He and Brandon Montour are solidly the top fantasy options on the Ducks’ blue line and should both be in the mix for 40-point paces the rest of the way.

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Dylan Strome scores his first career NHL goal:

{source}<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-lang="en"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">Another first for the Strome family. All smiles for <a href="https://twitter.com/stromer19?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@stromer19</a>. <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/NHLFirsts?src=hash&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#NHLFirsts</a> <a href="https://t.co/8mkUlcgvIC">pic.twitter.com/8mkUlcgvIC</a></p>— NHL (@NHL) <a href="https://twitter.com/NHL/status/937166959896121344?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">December 3, 2017</a></blockquote>

<script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>{/source}

We may see Jakob Chychrun return for the Coyotes today. Stay tuned.

I wrote off Derek Stepan after a couple of weeks this season deeming him too slow to be a consistent producer at this stage. He continues to see huge minutes for Arizona (over 20 per game) and is starting to come around. He has 10 points in his last 11 games. I took a flyer on him in one league, banking on a dense schedule. Not sure he’ll stick on the roster past today, but I am happy with the short-term boost.

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Here’s an update on Corey Crawford:

{source} <blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-conversation="none" data-lang="en"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">Crawford will be reevaluated after the three games. Something that had been bothering him a while. You could see it last game, slow to get up a few times, unable to get across in the Janmark wraparound.</p>— Mark Lazerus (@MarkLazerus) <a href="https://twitter.com/MarkLazerus/status/937018630818226181?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">December 2, 2017</a></blockquote>

<script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>{/source}

Anton Forsberg started yesterday, but I am not certain he is all that appealing an option. Plus, this looks like more of a short-term situation.

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Radek Faksa has goals in three straight games, with six points and 14 SOG in this run. He has been up over 15 minutes in each of these three games and has even seen some marginal use on the second PP unit. I’m a fan of the talent, but he needs more usage, specifically PP time to have ubiquitous relevance.

Jamie Benn ended his five-game scoreless drought, so we are back on the horse!

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The Sharks put Tim Heed and Joonas Donskoi on IR yesterday. Heed’s production has fallen off over the past month with just two points in nine November games. Between missing time with injury and some healthy scratches, he hasn’t been nearly as valuable to fantasy owners.

Still, Heed is on pace for 10+ goals, 30+ points and 150 SOG. That doesn’t meet my benchmarks for 82-game usage in standard leagues, but keep him in mind. He definitely has the talent to be worthy of usage when on hot streaks.

Martin Jones returned from a brief injury and got lit up by the Lightning, though we cannot necessarily hold this against him.

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The latest guy to take a spin on the top line with Aleksander Barkov and Jonathan Huberdeau is Nick Bjugstad. He scored a goal last night. Were the upcoming schedule for Florida more intriguing I’d definitely advocate a pick up. Bjugstad is also seeing top unit PP time. He is a serious shot-volume producer on pace for 231 SOG.

Radim Vrbata has been back in the lineup for two straight games skating an average of 13:45. I’m not sure I can support his ownership beyond super deep leagues. No exposure to Barkov, no value.

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Columbus’ top line continues to thump opponents on the shot-counter:

{source}<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-lang="en"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">Yes the game wasn’t the overall outcome CBJ wants. But, French Bread. Doing OK. <a href="https://t.co/lY9hw1RJZ9">pic.twitter.com/lY9hw1RJZ9</a></p>— Alison (@AlisonL) <a href="https://twitter.com/AlisonL/status/937151585867698176?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">December 3, 2017</a></blockquote>

<script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>{/source}

Pierre-Luc Dubois is gaining confidence and relevance. He now has points in four straight games. It’s still tough to buy Blue Jacket players with the power play performing so awfully, but the chemistry between Dubois, Artemi Panarin and Josh Anderson is real. Points will flow accordingly.

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Ryan Johansen was forced from last night’s game and he did not return. No update on his status. If he misses any time Kyle Turris jumps into that #1C role, while Nick Bonino might gain some relevance as the secondary guy. Stay tuned.

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Alexander Edler scored his first goal of the season continuing his hot run with five points in the last seven games. He’s the top defenseman on the Canucks for the time being, and with how they are currently rolling there is value to be mined.

The Sedins are also banking points with Daniel Sedin boasting eight in the last seven games and Henrik Sedin up to nine in the same stretch. Ever since they loaded up their top power play unit, with Brock Boeser and Bo Horvat joining the trio of Swedes it’s been a throwback. I’ve been making bank riding these undervalued options in daily fantasy.

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Tyler Bozak was out sick for the Leafs last night. After four points in the first three games of the season Bozak has scored just seven in the following 24. He hasn’t been remotely relevant in this stretch and is skating his fewest minutes in over five years at just 14:55 per game. He’s still a top unit PP guy and will no doubt see his shooting percentage climb up, but it likely won’t be enough to elevate him back onto fantasy teams for more than a flyer.

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Thanks for reading! You can follow me on Twitter @SteveLaidlaw.

from All About Sports http://www.dobberhockey.com/hockey-rambling/ramblings-habs-put-up-10-lightning-and-blues-mixing-up-their-lines-and-more-dec-3/

[thrashermaxey]

Ramblings: The Brock Boes Monster Surfaces (Dec 1)

If you are looking for it, I broke down the Adam Henrique/Sami Vatanen swap here and here.

Any anticipated Henrique boost may not be as long-lasting as initially expected:

{source} <blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-lang="en"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">Bob Murray anticipates that Getzlaf and Kesler will be on the Ducks' next big road trip (Dec 14)</p>— Greg Wyshynski (@wyshynski) <a href="https://twitter.com/wyshynski/status/936296669905326080?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">November 30, 2017</a></blockquote>

<script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>{/source}

Take note, this means the clock is ticking on the buy low window for John Gibson.

There were also some notes that perhaps Henrique’s absence will help Pavel Zacha. Perhaps long term it will, but in the short term he doesn’t seem ready to consistently contribute. I remain firmly in the Zacha to the AHL camp.

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Cam Talbot has been placed on injured reserve for what Todd McLellan is calling a minimum of two weeks. As we have seen with Carey Price, time off to rehab an injury can be a positive. Talbot has been banged up for at least a week now, and clearly has been off his game. Some time away could ultimately be positive. On the other hand, Price also offers an example of how a goalie injury can linger all season. Ultimately, this is a negative, but you can try and spin some positive.

Unlike with Tristan Jarry in Pittsburgh, I am not advocating a pickup of Laurent Brossoit in Edmonton, but as I always say, any goalie is capable of going on a run. In a deep enough setup, you could find room to take a flyer on Brossoit, but I’d only advise it if dropping an already terrible non-starting goalie option like Scott Wedgewood for instance.

More importantly, Jarry remains widely available. He represents a better goalie scoop than Brossoit.

Brossoit’s tenure as the Oilers’ starter got off to a roaring start:

{source} <blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-lang="en"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">Kris Russell with an unbelievable snipe to put the Leafs up 5-4 in the dying moments of the third period. I swear to god that I'm not joking. Just watch. <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/HereComeTheOilers?src=hash&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#HereComeTheOilers</a> <a href="https://t.co/bxwVUSmHaa">pic.twitter.com/bxwVUSmHaa</a></p>— Jeff Veillette (@JeffVeillette) <a href="https://twitter.com/JeffVeillette/status/936455386676301824?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">December 1, 2017</a></blockquote>

<script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>{/source}

Indeed, that was Kris Russell slamming the game-winner through Brossoit’s legs late in the third period. This came just minutes after Russell had tied it for the Oilers. This isn’t rock bottom, but oh brother is it low.

Adam Larsson isn’t of much fantasy relevance, however he missed last night’s game due to an upper-body injury. Life isn’t getting any easier for the Oilers’ goaltenders.

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Just as folks were complaining about William Nylander’s production he rattled off a three-point game, extending his scoring streak to four games. He’s just fine.

Also fine, Mitch Marner, who has been held off the score sheet in five straight, but will score in bunches once again.

Jake Gardiner has run up five points in the last four games. I was excited for him this season, but Morgan Rielly has clearly jumped ahead. Gardiner’s still a threat for 40 points with how much the team scores, and his second unit PP deployment, but he just isn’t meeting my criteria for full-82 ownership. Grab him while he’s hot, however.

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Jonathan Drouin is officially listed as day-to-day. He did not travel to Detroit, nor did he play last night, but the Canadiens return home on the weekend, so he could be back in short order.

The Canadiens fared well without him, getting six goals on 25 shots, including one from Max Pacioretty who was due. Pacioretty has now wrung up a three-game scoring streak, but most importantly he ended an eight-game goal-scoring drought. He is on pace for 24 goals and 46 points, but as I have continued to preach, Pacioretty is a 30-goal/60-point guy.

Brendan Gallagher should be in the same realm, but cannot get enough minutes. He remains an efficient per-minute scorer, but does not skate enough power play time to sustain scoring runs. Still, he’s on pace for 55 points and 246 SOG. That’s relevant in a lot of leagues.

Shea Weber was retroactively placed on the IR, dating it back to November 18. This is mostly a paper move opening up a roster spot to fill in with Drouin out. Weber could still come back at any point. Jeff Petry is up to four points in six games filling in for Weber.

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The Wild have been without Jared Spurgeon the past couple of games, and the prognosis keeps getting worse:

{source} <blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-lang="en"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">Boudreau and players in room are sounding like Spurgeon is out for awhile. I reported in my Prosser story this could potentially be a 4-6 week injury. Boudreau won’t say other than he’s out at least two weeks <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/mnwild?src=hash&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#mnwild</a></p>— Michael Russo (@RussoHockey) <a href="https://twitter.com/RussoHockey/status/936445413728641031?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">December 1, 2017</a></blockquote>

<script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>{/source}

Spurgeon was on track for a 45-point breakout season. That has effectively been derailed.

A couple of games ago Jonas Brodin stepped into Spurgeon’s top PP minutes, but last night it was Matt Dumba. We can all agree Dumba is the more talented option. Dumba notched an assist and six SOG in over 26 minutes of action. This could be the cure to what has been a slow start. Don’t be shocked if you get a 45-point pace from Dumba over the next few weeks, but this is also going to be a small sample situation, so his production could go any direction. Point being, the opportunity is there for improved results.

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The Flames’ top line has cooled off a tad. Johnny Gaudreau has gone three straight games without a point, while Micheal Ferland and Sean Monahan have been held off the board in each of the last two games. Ferland has been hit hardest with just two points in his last six games. He’s also the only one to be concerned about as Gaudreau and Monahan are plug and play options.

Depending on your settings Ferland may still be relevant. As I have said since he got hot, Ferland is Patrick Maroon 2.0. We aren’t sitting on a superstar. 45-55 points is the range to expect with some nice peripherals. I could see Ferland being dropped in a good number of leagues, although the Flames do have a juicy upcoming schedule.

It probably isn’t helping the top line that Kris Versteeg has missed action with a lower-body injury. The latest update suggests that he may be lost for the season. Versteeg isn’t crazy impactful, nor has he been particularly fantasy relevant, but he has fit similar to how Sam Gagner fit with the Blue Jackets last season. Now they need to find a new option as a power-play specialist.

They have experimented with Mark Jankowski and Jaromir Jagr in Versteeg’s spot in practice, but in last night’s game it was Troy Brouwer in those minutes. No one wants to see this experiment again. Jankowski scored a pair of goals last night, and would be intriguing in this spot.

Folks really want to see Dougie Hamilton elevated to the top PP unit. I don’t see it happening. He’s probably going to score 45 points anyway.

Mikael Backlund continues to roll, he’s up to 11 points in the last 12 games. Getting Backlund and that second line going will do wonders for Hamilton and Mark Giordano.

Mike Smith continues to be a top-five fantasy goalie.

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Through two games since being recalled Dylan Strome has no points and has averaged 12:42 per game with secondary PP time. Not exactly optimal usage. Strome might still be a top prospect, he crushed the AHL, but he’s not a prospect I am buying. The hype doesn’t seem like it matches the value.

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The Brock Boes monster has climbed into a tie with Alex Ovechkin, Sidney Crosby, Jonathan Huberdeau and Anders Lee for 24th in league scoring with 25 points. His recent run of scoring has seen eight goals and 11 points in the last nine games, including five power-play points.

At one point there were concerns that Boeser and Bo Horvat weren’t getting enough power play time. Now that they have teamed up with the Sedin twins and Alex Edler on a stacked top unit, they are scoring goals in bunches.

Daniel Sedin has scored seven points in the last six games, and eclipsed the 1,000-point mark last night. Meanwhile, Henrik Sedin has eight points in the last six games. Boeser’s greatest feat might be dragging the Sedins out of the twilight and back to relevance. It probably won’t last for the Sedins, but Boeser is for real.

Nikolay Goldobin jumped onto the off wing with Boeser and Horvat replacing Sven Baertschi, he made this slick dish to Boeser for his first point in his first game of the season:

{source} <blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-lang="en"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">Beauty pass by Goldobin<br><br>Beauty goal by Boeser (his second of the night)<a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/Canucks?src=hash&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#Canucks</a> now up 4-3 <a href="https://t.co/JH4OUYEBtS">pic.twitter.com/JH4OUYEBtS</a></p>— Ryan Biech (@ryanbiech) <a href="https://twitter.com/ryanbiech/status/936437520954302465?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">December 1, 2017</a></blockquote>

<script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>{/source}

I’m not sure I can get behind Goldobin in most settings. He skated only 13:02 with no power play time. He is an intriguing prospect, however. More important is that bumping Baertschi eliminates him from relevance in most leagues. Lines shuffle all the time and I’d expect Baertschi to get back on that top line at some point.

Derek Dorsett has been forced into retirement due to spinal issues. He had been one of the early surprises racking up ridiculous numbers in multi-category leagues. It’s doubtful you’ll find any meaningful replacements for the production he provided if in these sorts of leagues, however the return of David Backes may offer one good option.

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Radek Faksa is on a killer run with four goals and five points in the last two games. The Stars have desperately needed some depth scoring and Faksa is providing some. It’ll be hard for Faksa to sustain much fantasy relevance seeing no power play time, however.

Jamie Benn has gone five straight games without a point. He had been split off from Alexander Radulov and Tyler Seguin at even strength, but that line was reunited last night. Still no results for the power forward. I’m annoyed as a Benn owner, but not concerned. He is still on track for a nice season.

Martin Hanzal might be done as anything relevant in any sort of league. He was out due to injury AGAIN last night. The big centerman has missed six games due to injury already, is skating under 15 minutes per game, and hasn’t come close to anything resembling quality offensive production.

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Alex DeBrincat wound up with 10 goals in the month of November, a damn impressive total for a rookie skating under 15 minutes per game. He has 12 points in the last nine games and represents a strong option to take a flyer on. I still don’t buy into his staying power at his current deployment, but he is obviously an awesome option in keeper leagues.

I’ll keep beating the drum that Nick Schmaltz is a more intriguing option than DeBrincat because he sees more minutes overall, but especially more time with Patrick Kane. Schmaltz has 11 points in the last eight games.

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After a hot start to the season Jimmy Howard has given up four goals or more in four of his last five starts. Tread careful if using him in the short-term. 

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After scoring a pair of goals Marian Gaborik has four points in four games since returning from injury. He is skating 16:10 per game, with time on the top power play unit alongside Anze Kopitar and Dustin Brown.

The Kings have a nice Friday-Sunday run on the road this weekend, which just might make Gaborik an intriguing streaming option, if you can believe it. However, I am not certain that Gaborik has been cleared to skate in back-to-back situations, so make sure he’ll be in the lineup before making the desperation move.

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Injury update on Mika Zibanejad, the Rangers’ top center is out with a concussion, which could derail a breakout season. Every head injury is different so there is no timeline here. David Desharnais skated in his spot on the top line and top power play unit, and had a big night earlier this week.

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Thanks for reading! You can follow me on Twitter @SteveLaidlaw.

from All About Sports http://www.dobberhockey.com/hockey-rambling/ramblings-the-brock-boes-monster-surfaces-dec-1/