Rambling about the latest line combos, Grigorenko, Matheson, Zatkoff, Sheary and more …

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Philippe Grubauer gave Brayden Holtby a rest last night and he posted an 18-save shutout – the 18 being the Trotz effect, and why being a goalie in his coaching system is so great. It was the first shutout of Grubauer’s career. Last year, Grubauer played 22 games (16 starts). I’ll be surprised if he doesn’t make it 25 (and 19 starts) this season.

The Caps mostly rolled with four forwards and John Carlson, but when they used another rearguard it was Dmitry Orlov. And center Nicklas Backstrom was relegated to the second PP unit while Evgeny Kuznetsov centered the first unit. Both Kuz and Orlov tallied their first points of the season.

Wow – Orlov labels Duchene, check it out:

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Brett Connolly was hungry to get back into action after being scratched for three games. While prospect Zach Sanford was scratched, Connolly drew in – and he posted four shots, four hits and a blocked shot. In just 11:47 of ice time. Hungry! Washington line combos:

#1           27.1%    KUZNETSOV,EVGENY – OSHIE,T.J. – OVECHKIN,ALEXANDER

#2           21.2%    BACKSTROM,NICKLAS – BURAKOVSKY,ANDRE – JOHANSSON,MARCUS

#3           18.2%    BEAGLE,JAY – WILSON,TOM – WINNIK,DANIEL

#4           15.3%    CONNOLLY,BRETT – ELLER,LARS – WILLIAMS,JUSTIN

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Mikhail Grigorenko was taken off the big line and put with Rene Bourque and Blake Comeau. He took some faceoffs as well, but was pointless and minus-1. His fortunes will rise and fall with who he plays with, he’s not good enough to drive his own line.

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Emerson Etem, whom the Ducks reclaimed off of waivers last week, got into his first game as a ‘rebranded’ Duck, though he played just six minutes. Line combos:

#1           27.9%    GETZLAF,RYAN – PERRY,COREY – RITCHIE,NICK

#2           19.3%    COGLIANO,ANDREW – SORENSEN,NICK – VERMETTE,ANTOINE

#3           15%        GARBUTT,RYAN – KESLER,RYAN – SILFVERBERG,JAKOB

#4           7.9%      ETEM,EMERSON – RAYMOND,MASON – WAGNER,CHRIS

I got those line combinations during the game – actual line combos in-game. You can get that at the bottom of any player page (that’s the fast way – or the slow way is to go to the line combo section and set the drop box to ‘latest game’). Click any name on this page and you can see the player page – Eric Daoust and I hand-designed the player pages to give the best and most information to help our fantasy leagues. Now the only time I ever use any other player pages is when I need to see minor league stats, otherwise DobberHockey has it all!

As you can see, Nick Ritchie is still getting the sweet line partners. But that means that the second line is stuck with Garbutt, and to me that acts as a drag.

The Ducks are now winless in four…

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Taylor Hall scored his first two goals as a Devil and logged 6:23 of PP time. He played with PA Parenteau and Travis Zajac. It was Parenteau’s first game in which he was held without a shot. Could Parenteau be this year’s version of Stempniak? More on Stempniak below.

Interesting to note that Pavel Zacha played just 12:19, with zero PP time (and 1:02 PK time). In his first game, he played 15:28 and had 2:33 of PP time – two games later…opportunity has cooled. I now wonder if he’ll still be here for Game 10…

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As I noted Monday, Jack Capuano is a stickler for his lines (I also noted that I love this – I think line combos need at least a half-dozen games to generate chemistry and should even be revisited later just to see). And sure enough, Andrew Ladd was on the John Tavares line again. Anthony Beauvillier subbed in for Ladd on that line for a shift and BAM he scores his first NHL goal with an assist by Tavares. He’ll get another look there. One day. He played just 8:16 while fellow rookie Mathew Barzal was a scratch. One of these two will for sure be sent to junior before Game 10 and I suspect Beauvillier is ahead.

Tavares’ other linemate Josh Bailey is seeing career minutes and has three points in four games so far. He’s worth a short-term pickup for as long as he stays on that line (I don’t see an end coming soon).

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Al Montoya with a 36-save shutout and an assist to boot.

Alexander Radulov scored his first goal as a Hab. Radulov’s linemate Artturi Lehkonen watched his ice me slip to 12:50, and he’s out there killing penalties rather getting PP time. He still took two shots – he’s had at least two in each of his first three games.

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Three injuries of note in the Pittsburgh – Montreal game. Max Pacioretty left the game with a leg injury and it was a weird one. He was gently held along the boards and I’m guessing his knee hyper-extended a little? Just a guess, but he couldn’t put weight on his leg and could miss some time.

Kris Letang (leg) and Conor Sheary left the game. My concern is more with Sheary here, as he took a nasty stick to the eye and the Penguins didn’t update his status after the game. Sheary had points in each of his first three games.

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Seven Ottawa goals last night – it was enough to chase Mike Smith from the net (Domingue was no better). But apparently not enough for Derrick Brassard or J-G Pageau owners to get a point.

Neither did Ryan Dzingel, and he’s a youngster I’ve been keeping an eye on. The 24-year-old had three points in three games prior to that.

Mike Hoffman had zero goals on eight shots! But he still grabbed three assists

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It’s obviously still early, but finally – finally! – a Dallas goalie has stepped up. Two games in and Kari Lehtonen boasts a 0.951 SV%. Well…a game-and-a-half in. But another game of Niemi getting pulled and Lehtonen posting another quality start or two and he’ll get the ball and run with it. At any point last year did we see one of these goalies do extremely well, even for a short spurt?

Weird seeing Dan Hamhuis get 2:12 of PP time while Esa Lindell got 0:00. Coaches are pretty anal about the ‘force the rookie to earn it’ mentality. Makes fantasy hockey much harder to predict, too.

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One of my favorite dark horses at the draft was Calle Jarnkrok. I was unable to get him late in two of my leagues, and the third league wasn’t deep enough to warrant more than watching him. Glad someone else took a shot at him. His percentage of shifts playing with Ryan Johansen so far this year? Eight percent. Last night he was playing with Cody Bass and Colton Sissons. This is why we wait until the end of the draft to play our hunches, and not get upset if someone else grabs him on you. Bass and Sissons? Reminds of the Leafs in the 90s when they kept playing Steve Sullivan with Kris King and Tie Domi – and then getting upset when he didn’t score, placing him on waivers.

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So…looks like the Kings are going to make a trade, eh? No insider information, just using my brain. Jeff Zatkoff is getting torn apart. In fact, Petr Budaj came on in relief and stopped all nine shots he faced, and I suspect he’ll get the next start. If he does well there, then perhaps he steals the fantasy spotlight for awhile. But if not, consider a deal done. I can’t believe they won’t try harder to get something done now. Yes, the other NHL teams have them over a barrel right now. But swallow your pride and get the deal done or you’ll be out of the playoffs before December.

You know who I’d target? Reto Berra. An underrated goalie if he can stay healthy, could be had for peanuts. Ondrej Pavelec also did well in his AHL start, stopping 35 of 37.

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Devin Setoguchi picked up his first NHL point since early 2014 with an assist on Tanner Pearson’s goal.

Why is Dustin Brown still getting PP time (4:07)? Is Darryl Sutter feeling nostalgic?

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While I’m in the AHL website I noticed that Anton Forsberg has allowed just two goals on 52 shots, picking up where he left off in the AHL playoffs. I think he’s taken the lead over Korpisalo on the depth chart.

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The Senators scored seven goals with seven different goal scorers. Well, the Wild did something similar – six goals with six different goal scorers. Makes for a very spread out night in fantasy leagues. As I write this, if I take out the two highest and two lowest teams, the other 11 teams in my league had between 8.0 and 13.0 points.

Teemu Pulkkinen scored his first goal with the Wild. He’s still on seeing seven or eight minutes a game though and needs linemate help to produce, generally speaking.

Nice to see Erik Haula put up two points. Last year he couldn’t get a point if his life depended on it – until Christmas (after that he took off). I was worried it was a ‘start of season’ thing for him, had this continued.

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The Artemi Panarin – Patrick Kane – Artem Anisimov line struck with a vengeance last night. Combined for 11 points! I liked the second line of Tyler Motte – Jonathan Toews – Richard Panik, although they were held off the score sheet. I’d like to see them stick for a few more games.

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Michal Neuvirth got the hook five minutes into the second when he gave up the fourth goal on 16 shots. Steve Mason wasn’t much better though – and if he wants to take back the top job he needs to be. I still think, based on contract amount, that he’s the better bet for this season. Though both are UFA next summer, so the contract is not the nice indicator that it usually is.

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Cam Talbot’s wife is scheduled to have their twins at 7:45am Wednesday morning. Despite that, he got the start Tuesday night. And he played a great game, though he gave up two early third period goals. All in all, it was easily his best game. And he’s 3-1-0 now.

Oscar Klefbom and Andrej Sekera keep getting all the PP time and they keep posting zero points. Assuming no changes are made to the defense corps, I wonder how long this can last before another Swedish defenseman gets a chance?

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What is it with Lee Stempniak these days signing with teams that need him? The guy really thrives when his team is short a top sixer. Last year with New Jersey he was the second coming. Off he goes to a deep Boston team and he’s practically press box fodder. Signs with Carolina – back to being Lee Gretzkiak. Anyway, I’m going to use New Jersey as my new template for Stempniak expectations and I think he’d make a savvy acquisition because fantasy owners – let’s face it – don’t think much of him.

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FYI, Goalie Post’s Weekly Schedule feature is now fixed.

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Despite no PP time, Florida rearguard Michael Matheson has two points in three games. It’s only a matter of time before they start using him here and there on the second unit – and then lean on him more from there. As for who would get some PP time cannibalized – well that’s Aaron Ekblad. And I say this and cite Alex Pietrangelo as an example. He’s so good and dependable defensively versus the alternative (Shattenkirk in AP’s case, Yandle in AE’s case) so he’ll log more ES and PK minutes while the less-experienced or one-dimensional types get PP time. But Matheson is on the fast track to stardom.

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Dobbernomics added a slew of rookies last night, including:

Travis Konecny, PHI – $1.1

Brandon Carlo, BOS – $0.7

Anthony Beauvillier, NYI – $0.8

Brayden Point, TBL – $0.8

Denis Malgin, FLA – $0.8

Gregg McKegg, FLA – $0.6

Josh Morrissey, WPG – $0.7

Gustav Forsling, CHI – $0.7

Sign up and put in your team under the cap – try to grow the value! We’re just two games into an 82-game season so lots of time to build something and compete with your peers. We are focusing on a few minor glitches and improving navigation now. The offseason was spent turning this from a weekly roster setting to a daily one, in case you were wondering.

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Elliott Friedman’s 30 thoughts are always interesting. The latest one is here. Interesting stuff on the reasoning behind Carolina coach Bill Peters and his usage of the young future stars. Also Point 13 on players hanging a leg over the boards.

Friedman also noted that despite Brad Marchand’s early success playing with David Backes, he will still be playing with Patrice Bergeron when the latter returns.

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