October 11, 2014

steve laidlaw

2014-10-11

How to handle today’s loaded schedule, what to do with Boychuk and Nelson, the Hurricanes’ confounding power play rotation and more…

Yuck. One game on a Friday night and it's Hurricanes-Islanders? To be fair, it's early on and both teams have a number of injuries and new players so they had almost no chance of putting together a truly impressive display. Still, it is disappointing that this was my only option after Thursday night where I was constantly scanning between multiple options with two screens constantly on the go. Such is the NHL schedule. Tuesday, Thursdays and Saturdays are always heavy. Fridays and Sundays much less so.

Speaking of the schedule, all 30 teams play today. That's just the sixth time in league history that all 30 teams have played on one day. That is going to make for some DIFFICULT lineup decisions, especially in H2H leagues where the commissioner has inadvertently or knowingly but foolishly started the season with a shortened week.

The NHL always starts mid-week so any veteran commissioner should know better than to have the first matchup be a shortened one. You always go for the extended Week One matchup. ALWAYS.

Am I calling out the commissioners of my H2H leagues because ALL of them decided to go this route? Maybe. Should I maybe have been proactive about this and given them a warning/reminder since I do in fact do this fantasy hockey thing for a living? Possibly. Am I going to act like a child about it if I don't win all of my matchups? Probably. Has this self-interview trope run its course? Absolutely. Can we move on then? Done.

Anyways, with such a jam-packed schedule today you are probably wondering who to start today. My advice, KISS you're problems goodbye. What I mean is: Keep It Simple, Stupid. Just start your big guns. Don't overthink matchups. Don't worry about line chemistry. Play the players you drafted first because they are the ones you trusted the most a week ago when you drafted them. Has anything really changed three days into the season, beyond injuries?

Back to the game last night.

Brock Nelson is the big story. He centered the second line with Mikhail Grabovski and Ryan Strome and was the net-front presence on the top power play unit. He netted two goals in close off the power play and got two assists as well.

The one goal was actually an even-strength marker but occurred literally right after the penalty ended. The Hurricane player hadn't even stepped back onto the ice yet. Nelson's other goal was a point shot that bounced off of him into the net. But you gotta be there to get goals and he clearly has the size and mitts to produce. We could be looking at this year's Wayne Simmonds, net-front presence breakout candidate.

Johnny Boychuk had a huge game as well, scoring one goal on a blast from the point and assist on two others (it was his point shot that bounced off Nelson). He looks like a great fit on the top power play unit. Nick Leddy or a healthy Lubomir Visnovsky might step in but neither has Boychuk's shot and he looked so good that the power play will have to stumble for a while before anyone else gets a crack.

But let's throw a little cold water on this. They were playing the banged-up Hurricanes who were without one of their top penalty killers in Jordan Staal. I have a feeling teams will be lighting them up with the man-advantage all season. Where specifically am I projecting Nelson and Boychuk?

I am treating Nelson as a 20-goal, 45-point guy with upside for 30/60 and slightly above average peripherals in SOG and Hits.

I am treating Boychuk like a 10-goal, 35-point defenseman with upside for 15/50 and a proven track record of above-average SOG and Hits.

If that's better than the guy you are currently rostering then make a swap. If not, then I know it hurts but you'll have to leave him on the waiver wire.

I have to mention John Tavares looking good with three assists in this one. I have a feeling he's going to drop 60 dimes this season, like he was on pace to do last season before his Olympic injury took away the final quarter of his season.

Jaroslav Halak looked solid from what I saw. Obviously, giving up three goals on 24 shots isn't a dream start but two of them came on the power play and all came in the third period of what was ostensibly a blowout.

Oh and checking in on the Cory Conacher watch. He was, meh. The Islanders really didn't do much at even strength and Conacher wasn't playing on that lethal top power play unit so his opportunities were limited. Zero points either way, which isn't how you stick on the top line.

On the other side of the ice… woof. The Hurricanes are bad. They can definitely use injuries as an excuse for a thin forward group but they can't explain away their horrendous group of defensemen. I count two defensemen on that team who I actually like: Andrej Sekera and Justin Faulk. The rest of them should be in rotation as a seventh defenseman at best, instead they are skating four of these guys on the regular. If you've ever heard of the term "replacement level" this is the level below that.

The one area where the Hurricanes had some semblance of solid play was on the power play. That's where they scored two of their three goals. There was actually a funny quote from the Hurricanes' broadcast team about new assistant coach Rod Brind'Amour watching tape of every single power play goal that was scored last season. I don't know if this is fact but I was able to unearth some articles mentioning how much time Brind'Amour spent reviewing power play tape.

Still, I'm a little concerned about the Hurricanes' power play. They had the duo of John-Michael Liles and Jay Harrison playing the point on their top power play unit. That's not going to cut it.

I'm not sure what Brind'Amour could have seen in all of the game tape that he watched that would make him think that Harrison on the top power play unit would be a good idea. I can assure you that he would have only seen one clip of Harrison scoring on the power play and it certainly wasn't from the point.

Watching Harrison playing the point was horrifying. The Islanders COMPLETELY ignored him. They just played four-on-four and left Harrison alone on the right side of the ice. Normally teams kill to get guys that kind of time and space on the power play. But normally they also play skillful players on the power play. This is not Harrison's forte.

Harrison was so out of his element that he looked like a deer in the headlights. He'd receive the puck and scan the ice frantically looking for someone to pass to. Finding no one he'd start thinking, "Should I shoot? No I've been here too long and the defense is set. Why isn't anyone open? Ah crap, just dump it into the corner."

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UPCOMING GAMES

Nov 14 - 19:11	NYR	vs	S.J
Nov 14 - 19:11	T.B	vs	WPG
Nov 14 - 19:11	OTT	vs	PHI
Nov 14 - 19:11	FLA	vs	N.J
Nov 14 - 19:11	BUF	vs	STL
Nov 14 - 20:11	DAL	vs	BOS
Nov 14 - 20:11	MIN	vs	MTL
Nov 14 - 21:11	EDM	vs	NSH
Nov 14 - 22:11	VAN	vs	NYI
Nov 14 - 22:11	SEA	vs	CHI