December and early January is one of my favourite times of year.  Sure it’s the turkey and the beverages, but it also marks a prime opportunity to make some significant (albeit under-the-radar) moves to continue to build my dynasty teams.  In this week’s segment of Hockey Stock, I touch on a few buy and sell candidates for single-year and dynasty leagues, as well as reveal my trading strategy for the holiday season.

Cody Hodgson, VAN – Once considered the future captain and leader of the Canucks, Hodgson has suffered a myriad of injuries (most notably a wonky back) that has curtailed his pro-career.  He is now playing well in the AHL, scoring 13 points in his past 10 games.  The Canucks released forward Peter Schaefer this past week and Rick Rypien is out indefinitely due to personal reasons.  If and when the club decides to promote their top prospect to the NHL (and that day may come sooner rather than later), it is unlikely he will get the call to play on the 4^th line.  As with most rookies, expect the production to come slowly, but Hodgson remains one of the leagues top-shelf talents as far as prospects go. Check to see if the Hodgson owner in your keeper or dynasty league is getting impatient.   BUY LOW

Tomas Fleischmann, COL – With Chris Stewart expected to miss 4-6 weeks with a broken hand, it probably wasn’t a coincidence that the Avs acquired the talented Fleischmann when they did.  Owners in single year leagues might want to look to ‘Flash’ as it is expected that he will see top-6 minutes and a bigger role in Colorado than he had in Washington. How this plays out long term remains to be seen   but for the short-term Fleischmann is a solid investment. BUY LOW

Milan Lucic, BOS – For some, Lucic is a player with tremendous upside and potential to be a premier power forward in the NHL.  While I won’t question that possibility, my belief is that he lacks the offensive skillset to continue the pace that he has set for himself thus far in 2010-11.  Lucic has burst out of the gates with 10 goals and 19 points in 22 games.  He’s certainly a player I would hold onto in leagues that count penalty minutes as a stat category, but in those that don’t consider shopping him.  SELL HIGH

WJC Players – This is one of my favourite strategies when buying and selling prospects in my dynasty leagues.  Right around now, the beginning of December, I drop any dead weight on my farm club and pick up a handful of guys who I think could be top producers at the WJC’s.  Consider it a penny stock.  If you hit right on one (or maybe more!) you suddenly have a player who might be relatively unknown become a valuable commodity come early January.  The hype on some of these kids after the tournament can be unrealistically huge, setting up a perfect sell-high scenario.  So many fantasy owners wait until during or after to act on some of these kids.  In one deeper dynasty league I’m in I have made initial buys on Ryan Howse, Linden Vey, Brad Ross, and Tim Erixon and might make more moves depending on who makes their junior teams and who doesn’t. Every league is different and the talent pool will vary, but these are guys I had a bit of a hunch on.  Fingers are crossed.  BUY LOW