Rambling about Marchessault, Kesler, the Wild; and our awesome new hot/cold player tool…

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I will kick things off with what I believe to be a huge announcement. Frozen Pool and web development manager Eric Daoust has done it again! The Hot/Cold feature has now been launched! This is perfect for quickly identifying hot players to look for on the waiver wire. And it’s also an amazing tool if you’re a hockey writer who writes, say…I don’t know…a daily Ramblings. Yes, I’ll be using this tool every night. Check it out here. You can filter by position, by “hot” or by “cold”.

As an added bonus, Eric slapped a “hot” or “cold” identifier onto relevant player profiles. For example, see Kyle Turris. Immediately upon clicking his name you’ll know that he’s ice cold and pointless in 12 games. You’ll see his fancy stats aren’t out of whack (not too high, not too low). You’ll also see that he was discussed here in three recent Ramblings, a Capped article, an Injury Ward article, plus his “pace” for end of season, his game log, and his linemates. Etc. etc. etc.

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Speaking of Turris, he had 13 points in the first 12 games. So…that means he’s managed just 17 points in 42 games since. In a typical 42 games, Turris should have 28-30 points. Or if he’s had a rough 42 games then maybe he manages just 24 or 25. But 17? If he had 27 points in that span, just another 10 points, how many more wins would that translate to for Ottawa?

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In the outdoor game the Blackhawks got their asses handed to them. It looks like Minnesota has finally found their mojo. Actually…it doesn’t “look like” it. It’s happened. Six goals Sunday makes it 21 goals in four games for the Wild. This is after winning just one game in 14. I wonder what happened to change their fortunes four games ago? (hint: rhymes with "shmoaching shmange")

I love it when a team I have two or more players on suddenly gets hot. Unfortunately, I don’t have any Wild players in any of my leagues except Jason Zucker in one. And that’s the guy who got knocked out of the game pretty hard:

This is pretty serious and I suspect we won’t see Zucker for a couple of weeks if at all before April.

But as long as the Wild are on fire, they make for a wise investment. Lots of good waiver options here.

Erik Haula – Three points Sunday and 12 in his last 14.

Matt Dumba – Nine points in 10 games, including a goal Sunday. He also had 30 shots in that span.

Nino Niederreiter – with two points Sunday he has five in his last four games and is plus-7.

Jason Pominville – A player who definitely should have been dropped long ago now needs to be picked back up again. He has six points in three games (plus-6 in his last four games).

And as far as non-waiver options go, Mikko Koivu has seven points in seven games while Zach Parise has eight in eight. Here are the magical line combos that seem to working for the Wild now:

#1           23.5%    CARTER,RYAN – FONTAINE,JUSTIN – STOLL,JARRET

#2           21.4%    COYLE,CHARLIE – KOIVU,MIKKO – PARISE,ZACH

#3           12.3%    HAULA,ERIK – NIEDERREITER,NINO – POMINVILLE,JASON

#4           10.7%    GRANLUND,MIKAEL – VANEK,THOMAS – ZUCKER,JASON

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Chicago is just 5-4-1 in the last 10 yet Patrick Kane’s production hasn’t noticed – he has points in nine of those 10 games. Even when his team isn’t dominating, he still is.

Corey Crawford, last five games:

1-3-1, 3.74 GAA, 0.897 SV%

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Sidney Crosby has been shut out of four of his last six games since his run of 12 points in four games. This is the slump that Sid gets from time to time. We’ve seen it. We don’t panic. It’s a normal slump for him. That 30-game garbage to start the season was one for the ages. All Crosby owners want is for him to never return to that.

With three points Sunday, Kris Letang is up to 45 in 48 games. His 0.94 points-per-game average is second to Erik Karlsson among defensemen.

In looking at the same list, Shayne Gostisbehere is fourth with 0.85 having passed the fella we’re all comparing his numbers/impact to – John Klingberg (0.80).

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Trevor Daley has played 29 games for Pittsburgh after playing 29 for Chicago. He has 12 points for Pittsburgh, six for Chicago.

Still no word on Evgeni Malkin’s return from a suspected knee injury, but he was skating on Sunday morning. Also skating – Beau Bennett and Nick Bonino.

Carl Hagelin has just three points in the nine games that Malkin has missed. He has four points in six games with Malkin.

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Zach Bogosian had three points for the Sabres Sunday but fantasy owners didn’t benefit from it because they’ve long since dropped him or they had him on their bench because of his one point in the 10 games prior. Overall, Bogosian is doing what’s expected of him for this season – his production hasn’t changed at all over the last four years. He has 19 points in 64 games with Buffalo. We thought he’d be something special when he was drafted and made the jump too quickly, but we were wrong. I was asked about him as recently as two months ago, so some out there still hold out hope.

Speaking of letdowns, Matt Moulson had 175 points in his last 225 games with the Islanders. He’s had 98 points in 200 games since then. Kudos to the Islanders for giving a minor leaguer an opportunity, putting him on a prime spot, driving his value up, them shipping him off for great return.

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Mark Giordano has 29 points in his last 33 games. I think I said this before, but I traded him about 34 games ago. D’oh.

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Ryan Kesler had three points on Sunday and now has 21 points in his last 22 games. Just what the doctor ordered. I’m stuck with him in two leagues and was quite happy with that due to his part in handing me last year’s playoff trophy. But he was untradeable. Now I don’t need to trade him because his production is helping me climb quickly.

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After going 0-5-3 in his last eight decisions…Jimmy Howard lost again. But he didn’t allow a goal in regulation, so there’s that. But giving up a goal in OT still means that he hasn’t seen a nice W on his stats page since December 3.

Six points in six games for Kevin Hayes. Remember last season he ended with 29 points in 36 games. Not saying he’ll repeat that second-half surge, but over this small sample size it seems to indicate that he does pick things up come February.

Hayes actually scored another one but it was overturned due to interference. You tell me…

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I don’t know if it’s just Jon Cooper remembering that Jonathan Marchessault can put points on the board, or what it is. But he’s actually getting into games now and Sunday he saw 14 minutes of ice time for the first time in 2016 (his TOI was 17:30). Points in three straight and it’s all thanks to Vladislav Namestnikov being sick the first two games, and Nikita Kucherov out Sunday with an LBI. So Ryan Callahan is on the Steven Stamkos line while Marchessault becomes the newest Triplet. As long as Kucherov is out, Marchessault will put up the points.

Kucherov is day to day with an LBI and when asked if he’ll be out long, Jon Cooper said he’s hopeful of a return Tuesday.

Callahan has eight points in his last nine games, which is nearly half of his total points on the season. The monkey’s off his back, methinks. So back to regular 50-point type production.

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Jordan Staal has 22 points in his last 20 games. Last week in one league (limited keeper, Keep 12) I traded Claude Giroux for the first time since I joined the league seven years ago. I needed to shore up my defensemen and I needed to shore up some of my early picks, and I got Staal in the deal to replace Giroux’s spot. That could end up being the trade that helped me win my fourth title in five years (lost by six points last year).

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Alex Steen is out for a month. Upper-body injury. So the Blues will be fully healthy come playoff time and Steen will be well-rested. Jaden Schwartz, Patrik Berglund, Paul Stastny, Jake Allen and Kevin Shattenkirk will also be well-rested thanks to their injury stints. This many injuries really suck during the regular season for NHL teams (for fantasy owners, this obviously sucks even more). But for the postseason I think it can be a blessing. Provided Brian Elliott stays in the zone, maybe the Blues will finally get things all lined up.

Last game, Jaden Schwartz’s PP time suddenly jumped. That’s directly due to Steen’s absence. So Schwartz owners rejoice.

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My bi-weekly Sportsnet mailbag from Friday can be found here.

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Trade Deadline Day is just one week away and for the 11^th year in a row I will have you covered for fantasy analysis. Steve Laidlaw is helping out this year as are Ian Gooding and Mario Prata. Deadline Day. Come by often to get the full impact! We’re also looking into getting a live chat started up again.

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And finally I want to give another plug, this one to the All-Sports Market app. These guys have an amazing and very in-depth/high-tech thing going. Bernie Nicholls is one of the partners. They have created a market which trades shares of all the pro teams in the world, all the sports. You can buy and sell shares and they go up and down based on demand and they pay dividends based on team performance. Own a piece of the Blue Jays, the Islanders, the Ravens, the Celtics, Rory McIlroy and Manchester United! Get the app here. They sponsored the DobberHockey pool this year (via Office Pools) by donating an autographed Bernie Nicholls hockey stick.