Bizarro World lives on! A world in which the Pittsburgh Penguins score one goal on their last 79 shots, the Anaheim Ducks score one on their last 76 shots, and the Columbus Blue Jackets score seven on 21 and the Coyotes tally on five of their last 32 shots.
Let’s try to navigate these crazy waters.
The following is a selection of questions that you tweeted @Sportsnet after we put the call out. And the fantasy hockey gold doesn’t end here – follow me on Twitter @DobberHockey for even more insight.
What a great position to be in, Eli.
Goaltending is such a difficult and unpredictable position to cover off in fantasy hockey and you’ve done a great job with it. You have six goalies with one on IR.
Right now you should be shopping John Gibson. His value is very high and yet I think in the end Frederik Andersen will have the net.
Jeff Zatkoff won’t get you anything in a trade, but he makes a great kicker in a bigger trade. Set up a deal that you want to get done and when you need that extra incentive to get your opponent to agree to it, add Zatkoff. Failing that, you have to drop him.
James Reimer is on IR right now so there is no rush, but he should be shopped as well. An ideal three goaltenders for you is Roberto Luongo – Ben Bishop – Frederik Andersen.
Kopitar is too consistent year over year for me to ever drop him. I’d have to drop the promising young Monahan. Kopitar has 13 points in his last 13 games.
St. Louis is angling towards trying establish one of their two goalies as a true No.1. The shared situation does not work in the playoffs. And ideally for them they would prefer the younger home-grown guy. So Jake Allen will have every opportunity to run with it. His value is legit right now, even if your fellow managers don’t recognize it yet. Probably not the time to trade him.
Brad Marchand is a steady 50-to-55-point player who is on pace for 62 points (see Marchand’s pace data here). I think he’ll fade to 55 or 57, so you might get a slightly inflated value for him in a trade. I wonder if you could acquire Tyler Johnson for him when he returns from injury (again), or maybe a Sean Monahan-type.
John Klingberg is a stud. Similar to Erik Karlsson, I’d be hard-pressed to ever trade him. Will he get 79 points (his current pace)? Probably not. But I think he gets 70-plus, and how many defencemen can you say that about?
Derrick Brassard for me. I don’t trust Tomas Plekanec’s pace right now, whereas I think Brassard has more to give.
You would be better off keeping Price, the best goaltender to own in fantasy hockey. Another five weeks without him, and then you get all that fantasy goodness.
Right now, your best play is to suffer through whatever your waiver replacement brings you since you’ve already been sitting on Price for three weeks.
As always, this one depends on the other options available on the waiver wire. Maatta should get 30 points this year, while being a solid plus/minus guy. If that helps, you keep.
This question is easily replaced by: “What’s the deal with (insert Pittsburgh player name here) this year?”
Not to shift the overall blame from the players here, because that’s the overall issue given the talent with this team. But I wouldn’t single out Patric Hornqvist.
If the team ever gets going – be it next game, next month, or next year – then Hornqvist will get going. He’s a proven and fairly steady 50-point option who can do even better on a scoring line with this team (provided that the line is actually scoring).
Ah the passion of fantasy owners. “Hell hath no fury like a poolie scorned”. I’m guessing you’re a Ryan Johansen owner?
In a keeper so limited it would depend on how your fellow managers handle goaltenders.
I don’t like dropping proven starters. However, if you find that in every draft a ton of quality goalies are available, then I wouldn’t have a problem dropping Sergei Bobrovsky.
If your fellow owners tend to keep their goalies, then I would drop Corey Perry in a points-only league and Phil Kessel in a multi-category league.
I don’t know what +y means, but I suspect it’s a reference to multi-year or keeper league. In which case, you have an awesome core and a lot of bad luck.
Pittsburgh and Anaheim as two of the three lowest-scoring teams in the NHL? No way. Not one single person on earth figured either of those teams would be out of the Top 10, let alone out of the Top 27! If you want to take a charge at winning this year then you’ll have to accept the fact that you are going to get well below value for these guys.
In the one league that I’m in where I have a lot of Anaheim and Pittsburgh players, I’ve pretty much conceded the year. I’m not trading those studs for below value just so I can “maybe” surge up to second place. I’ll sit tight and hope those teams turn it around so that I can move the players for their proper value – or else let them carry me back up the standings. But at this point in the year, our fate is in their hands.
If there is someone in your league who will pay you properly for Getzlaf, I would move him.
Steve? Is that you Mr. Yzerman?
As with some of the players listed above, Stamkos is hugely undervalued. But if you’re in a one-year league and he is your only weak point, then you’ll need to undersell him in order to get production from that spot. I’d key in on proven 70-point players if possible, such as a Joe Pavelski. I’d even take a shot at someone not as proven, but scoring at a great clip (such as Johnny Gaudreau).
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