October 27, 2014
Dobber
2014-10-27
Rambling on the Islanders, Kopitar/ Foligno hurt, a new goalie making waves, more Voynov thoughts and more …
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Olli Maatta has undergone will undergo surgery to remove a tumor in his neck. Word is that there will be no long-term impact (per Dave Molinari), but he will be sidelined for four weeks. Edit: Surgery is scheduled for next week and he will be in the lineup for each of the next three games until then. Sorry for the earlier, inaccurate report – I did the update and then picked up the kids, not seeing the newer information.
Brendan Ross has another gem of a Prospects Ramblings over at DobberProspects. Read them here…
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I don’t know if it’s too little, too late or what. But it was interesting to see each of Sam Gagner and Tomas Fleischmann get his first (!!) point of the season Saturday, and Cory Conacher picked up his second point of the season.
In the case of Conacher, it was a measly secondary assist – and he was playing with John Tavares for the eighth full game in row. Two points after eight games, you have to think that his time has fully wound down. But I said this last Wednesday too and he still got two more games there. The Isles are flying high with just two losses on the season and they now have their best lineup together – now that Mikhail Grabovski is healthy and Anders Lee is up from the minors, this is your team and it’s pretty awesome:
Conacher – Tavares – Okposo
Lee – Nelson – Strome
Grabovski – Nielsen – Kulemin
Martin – Cizikas – Clutterbuck
Boychuk – Leddy
Visnovsky – Hickey
Strait – de Haan
Given the success of the team and how the offense is spread out, you could see Conacher get a longer opportunity there. So I’m waffling on what I said Wednesday. I still think Lee will eventually get that spot, it just may take longer. And Lee should still produce fairly well on that second line, too.
One thing about the Islanders – many people mocked them as a broken franchise, or figured Garth Snow to be a joke. Their rebuilding took what was a good seven years with no perceived hope of that changing. But that’s how these things go – the Penguins were mocked. The Blackhawks were mocked. Perennial rebuilders, until suddenly (and in each case it is always sudden) they weren’t. Even my patience was tested, because as you know I’ve been backing the Isles and Oilers rebuilding plans for years. So the lesson I learned here yet again – true rebuilding from the ground up in this era doesn’t take three years or five years. More like seven or eight. There are other ways to do things, but if you do them this way you’re looking at seven or eight years.
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In the case of both Gagner and Flash, those are two players who tend to be streaky. Is this enough to wake them up? It’s early enough in the season where a five-game hot streak would pull each of their point totals up to where they should be. As good as anything else that may be out there on the waiver wire – and on the plus side, you’ll know after next game if it is indeed the start of a hot run. And if not, you just drop them.
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Just four days left to do this!
I’m refunding your Fantasy Guide, or your Keeper Pack, or your Ultimate Pack.
Details here. But ask any of the 500 people who have taken advantage of this – I refunded their money, gave them a free Playoff List/Midseason Guide within a couple of days. I went through the required process myself – granted, I knew what I was doing, but the entire process still took me less than 90 seconds.
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That 70s line is getting ridiculous – four points for Tyler Toffoli, four points for Jeff Carter, two goals for Tanner Pearson. Anze Kopitar may as well become a full-time checker because, um – they’ve got this.
Oh man. Nick Foligno was having an awesome start to his season (he’s even our latest Geek of the Week) and now this. This had to be whiplash and possibly a concussion here:
He reportedly has full movement of his limbs and is apparently okay as far as long-term effects in that sense, but concussion issues we won’t know about for several days.
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So rather than start Antti Raanta in back-to-back games, the Hawks elected to go with Scott Darling on Sunday and he won his first NHL start (32 saves, 33 shots). He’s 25 years old and at 6-6 he continues the trend of big goaltenders seeing success at the pro level. He’s really beaten the odds – Phoenix drafted him late in 2007 but didn’t sign him when he turned pro. He spent a couple of years just fighting his way out of the ECHL, including last season when he impressed at the AHL level and finally made the ECHL a thing of the past. The Hawks didn’t even know what they were getting as recently as the summer as they signed Michael Leighton and acquired Anders Nilsson. But he’s pulled through and looked great this year for both Rockford and now Chicago. Suddenly, Raanta needs to look over his shoulder. Between the AHL and NHL over the last 13 months, Darling is 16-6-2 with a SV% of over .940.
I get the sense that Corey Crawford will be back by the end of the week, but perhaps we see Darling one more time before he goes back down. He’s certainly made an impression though.
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It’s looking like Slava Voynov‘s wife does not want to press charges. If that happens, and the chargers are dropped, then I would imagine the NHL drops the suspension right away. He’s still a risk to own, but significantly less of one and I raise my valuation back up to “hold”.
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Interesting article here about Detroit’s struggling power play and how Mike Babcock is looking at some options. Johan Franzen is still not practicing (groin), but you could see Justin Abdelkader get on the PP and/or Stephen Weiss get back into the lineup. He seems reluctant to use Brendan Smith on the power play. But that’s one thing I would like to see. I’d also like to see Nyquist on the top unit.
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Jacob Markstrom is 4-0-0 in the AHL this season and he’s stopped 108 of 109 shots faced. He’s also closing in on the AHL consecutive shutout record. Well that’s an interesting – and unexpected – turn of events, wow…
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Some rough stuff in the SJ-ANA game last night, including John Scott leaving the bench and getting into a fight with Tim Jackman: