The forum has been closed. A temporary hiatus that I hope will last just six hours, but could last beyond a day. I will keep you posted here. But I’d rather this, than keep it open and put everything through such a headache to login. This is best, and it’s Priority #1 for me right now. Thanks for understanding.

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Gustav Nyquist has been added to Team Sweden. He will replace Johan Franzen.

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Erik Erlendsson reports that Steven Stamkos is targeting Saturday for a return.

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Paul Stastny (ankle) and Alex Tanguay will not play tonight, though both were on the four-game road trip. Per Adrian Dater.

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Karri Ramo is out until after the Olympics with a torn MCL, per TSN. This puts Reto Berra in the spotlight and perhaps Joey MacDonald. I wouldn’t expect too much for either, but I’m curious as to how Berra handles it. He has upside.

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The Habs have traded Raphael Diaz to the Canucks for Dale Weise. I will have analysis on that posted later today.

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Isn’t it a little too neat and tidy of Daniel Sedin to go pointless while his brother Henrik is sidelined? I mean, we already know they’re joined at the hip. But now they’re getting carried away. Daniel is pointless in five games, Henrik has been sidelined for six.

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So Mike Santorelli is done for the season. Such a shame, because his NHL career is in jeopardy. He had such a hard time staying in an NHL lineup and finally found his way in Vancouver, enjoying his best season. Now he’s out until training camp. And will there be a job for him? What if Vancouver makes a deadline deal and brings in a slightly better Santorelli-type, who is signed for next season? Then Santorelli will start off in an unfamiliar depth role in October, possibly falter, and things spiral from there. You see it happen a lot. Careers are launched from the opportunities that these injuries create – but careers are also lost.

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I get asked this a lot. What do we have in Steve Mason? And man, I wish I knew. I was shopping him like crazy a week ago. He signed the big contract and then proceeded to shit the bed. I’ll admit it – I panicked. We know his track record and three months of good goaltending can’t erase that. But with that contract? I have to think he’ll get every opportunity he can to thrive. And then some.  In the last four games, he’s given up four goals twice and yanked once. But he’s also picked up two shutouts! Short answer – he’s not a Top 10 elite goalie, but we can’t write him off as a backup or minor leaguer. Potentially he’s an 11th to 15th type, but right now I’d put him 16th to 20th and trade/acquire him accordingly.

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Dobber buddy Gustav Nyquist with four points Sunday. Wish I saw that game, but I was at the Oshawa Generals game. It was 12 games ago when he first started seeing first-line ice time, pretty much in that 18- to 20-minute range. He didn’t do much with it in the first two games, but in his last 10 he has 12 points (eight goals). He’s getting all the ice time because Franzen and Datsyuk are out (and occasionally Zetterberg). But he’s taking full advantage of it and has established himself as a fixture on one of the scoring lines for years to come. His like finish of 42 points (current pace) will be misleading in the summer when you review the final stats, because he’s arrived. And I get the feeling that he and Zetterberg will be joined at the hip until Zetterberg retires. Line combos yesterday:

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It would be one thing if the Alex Ovechkin line was hot and Jimmy Howard gave up six goals, but the Jason Chimera line was the cause of his woes? Howard is in rougher shape than I thought. At least he has another five-plus years with Detroit to try to turn things around…

Actually, all jokes aside, I think he’s a serious ‘buy low’ guy right now. Value can’t get lower, and I’m guessing Datsyuk will be back after the Olympics (considering he plans to play in them as Team Russia’s captain).

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Mike Green (concussion) missed Sunday’s game but should be back very soon. In the meantime, John Carlson played eight minutes on the power play and teased us with another two points. We’re not falling for it this time, Johnny. You go ahead and have your 10-game slump without us.

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After a good game Friday, Michal Neuvirth followed it up with a five-goals-allowed win. Neuvirth is signed through next season at a $2.5 million cap hit. Holtby is also signed through next year, but at a $1.8 million cap hit.

In four games since being sent down to the AHL, Philipp Grubauer is 3-1 with a shutout and six goals allowed. The Caps will make room for him next year, be it before the trade deadline next month, or in the offseason.

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Interesting to note that Winnipeg forward Michael Frolik has gone five consecutive games in which he has posted at least four shots on goal. He has 37 shots in 10 games that Paul Maurice has coached (uh, 3.7 shots per game, for the math-deficient). He had 92 shots in 46 games before that (more tough math here – that’s, uh, 2.0 shots per game). He only has five points in those 10 games, but you’d think that if he keeps shooting at this clip the numbers will start to rise.

Al Montoya has allowed just two goals on 66 shots faced over the two games that he’s started under Maurice.

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Look at the rough time that Brendan Gallagher has here:

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Cam Ward was recalled from his letting Khudobin get a couple more wins in before ruining everything conditioning stint. Kirk Muller was very political with this statement, regarding upcoming games:

“I'll get a report on how he did down there,” Hurricanes coach Kirk Muller told The News & Observer in Raleigh, N.C. “It was great he went down. The reason he went down was more physical, to see him get through games similar to Khudobin when he went down. Now we’ve got to look at it. It comes down to who is the guy who gives us the best chance to win the next game. That’s how we're going to approach it.”

Translation: “I wish Ward’s huge contract didn't pressure me to play him, when Khudobin is clearly our best shot at making the playoffs.”

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For both of you owners who still have Linus Omark on your team, the Sabres are expected to play him tonight against the Oilers. He practiced on a line with Stafford and Ennis, so that’s as good as can be expected. The report also hints at Ville Leino and Marcus Foligno being benched.

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Also, if you missed it – DobberHockey is running a free Olympics fantasy pool – just pick your players from boxes and the most points win (in a nutshell). Top three get free Ultimate Fantasy Packs as well as a free playoff manager from Office Pools. I picked my team last night – was amazed at how simple it is. Great set up. Ignore the giant “guest access restricted” title when you go there, just follow the link to create your team.

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The ‘Beta’ version of my forum upgrade has been in place for three months now. It’s been painful for all of us, but the forum is still open in case you have any fantasy questions, I personally answer most of the ones that don’t get answers within minutes. I will let you all know when the real upgraded forum launches (of course), but until then, if it’s going to frustrate you and/or get you angry with me, please don’t use it until it’s ready. I get emails/Private Messages/Tweets like this one from different people almost every day:

Hey Dobber,

This is probably my 5th e-mail to you about the new site and likely my last.

Since you have switched over I have not been able to log onto the forum or post properly for more than a day or two at a time.

I hate it.

If you have some final guidance, I would gladly take it, but as a long time user and loyal follower, I feel like I got screwed.

If you have anyone who has any ability to allow me to actually post without logging off and on the site multiple times that would be great, but I can tell you I am the last holdout of a group of my friends who no longer use the forum.

 Sad but true.

This stuff takes a toll. I can feel the frustration from each of you and I hate putting you guys/gals through it. All I can do is recruit programmers, pay them, hope they see the job through. I don’t mean to ‘screw’ or annoy anybody. I had to upgrade the forum because of security reasons that caused the ‘Crash of October 2’ (as I’ve endearingly labeled it). The plan was not for this to linger for three months – I figured it would be about five or six weeks. But the end is in sight and the forum will be the best it’s ever been, both in ease of use as well as all the great features.

One thing that will happen is that the forum will have its own login and registration system. All currently registered users have nothing to worry about, other than having to login on the forum for forum stuff and login on the site for shop/article comment stuff. New users would need to register for the forum separately from registering for the shop. Anyway, be assured that 101% of my focus is getting this thing up to snuff.

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Honestly. You know where Ovechkin is on the power play. Yet he still gets to wire his famous shot from his famous spot, unmolested.