The Fantasy Guide can be picked up online in pdf form for the small price of $9.99 – and it comes with an updated spreadsheet, free. Updates are all free, download as often as you’d like. Last update was Monday the 19th. I put in an updated spreadsheet Saturday, but that was just fixes on some missing information (the lookup formulas weren’t pulling properly on a handful of players). The Grabovski signing will be in the next update (by Tuesday, latest).

*

Drance is away on vacation so he’ll be back on September 15.

*

Teuvo Teräväinen is in a tough spot, but it’s not as bad as it seems. Granted, he’s a prospect forward in Chicago’s deep system. But he’s the best prospect – by a wide margin. Nonetheless, the Hawks have eight proven NHL forwards looking good for a top-six job and another forward – Brandon Pirri – who just led the AHL in scoring and has nothing more to prove at that level. While Michal Handzus is hardly second-line-center material, the team seems comfortable with him there as a stopgap, with perhaps Pirri earning that job by January. And that’s where Teräväinen can strike. It’s a small window, but second-line center job can be his with an eye-popping training camp. And isn’t that the start of so many superstar NHL careers? Coming in and seizing opportunity?

Teräväinen, who signed an ELC last week, was arguably the best performer in the WJC mini-camp and is looking more and more like that star. In fact, he would be a lock for the Blackhawks if he weighed 190 pounds instead of 169. But I have this hunch that come training camp, he’ll be moved up a lot of lists. In the Fantasy Guide I have him at 45% to make the team, but my feelings on the situation there are very much undecided. And he’s making them cloudier by the moment.

Check out Teuvo Teräväinen’s fantasy profile here.

*

Well, as a Mikhail Grabovski owner in two of my keeper leagues I remember being disappointed when he re-signed with Toronto. And then I was thrilled when they bought him out. Then disappointed that six weeks later he didn’t sign with a new team. I’ll give him three of those weeks because he got married. Completely understandable. But I was a little jittery about it by mid-August. I had a list of preferred teams that he would flourish on (find it here). Bingo! My No.1 team for him to land on was Washington. Needless to say, I’m rubbing my hands with glee.

I’ll definitely trade him in one league, keep him in the other. I need to take advantage of the buzz, yet at the same time benefit from the move. So I think one of each (trade, keep) covers me off. No, I don’t think he’ll Mike Ribeiro his way to a 75-point season. I don’t think he has that upside unless he plays with Ovechkin from start to finish. But I think he can set career highs and barring injury he probably will. Think low-60s.

*

So Martin Havlat was skating around and lighting it up in a charity hockey game and I asked his agent Allan Walsh how his health is. I figured that, with the seriousness of his abdominal surgery and the way the Sharks GM Doug Wilson was talking, that Havlat was questionable even just to play again. Walsh told me that the surgery was in May and that he’s “100% and flying out on the ice”. Take that for what it’s worth (with a grain of salt, since he is after all Havlat’s agent), but I have some work to do in the Fantasy Guide. I had him pegged for 15 games and now I think 50 is a safe bet. Changes such as that one would have a domino effect in the Guide, on the likes of Tomas Hertl, Tyler Kennedy and James Sheppard. Aren’t you glad the Guide gets updated?

*

The Carolina Hurricanes and 29 NHL teams had a chance to draft Sergei Tolchinsky two months ago. Nobody did, but the ‘Canes invited him to their camp and afterwards signed him to a contract. Here is what we had to say about Tolchinsky in the Fantasy Prospects Report:

Sergey Tolchinsky – RW (Sault Ste. Marie, OHL)

Size and strength deficiencies aside, Greyhounds' skilled forward Sergey Tolchinsky definitely owns Top 60 offensive skills. He is a quick-skating, east-west style of player who owns exceptionally crafty puck skills…the kind that can lift fans from their seats. Tolchinsky is a tenacious attacker and at times, it appears he forgets that he is competing in a sub-5-8 frame. Unfortunately, his draft position will likely fall because he just doesn't own the strength to win puck battles. Defenders have no difficulty knocking him off the puck which nullifies his overall impressive offensive game. Tolchinsky has been successful on the power play with more time and space available but his lack of success against bigger and stronger players makes him a boom-bust entry for this draft class.

Upside: Diminutive dynamic offensive winger (Maxim Afinogenov), 25-25-50+

*

Bordeleau vs. McGrattan – heavyweights!: