A player has cropped up over the past week who has grabbed my attention. He has a decent shot of panning out – and continuing to pan out – for the long term. The player is almost certain to be a great short-term asset. A big part of our love for fantasy hockey is the hope that under-the-radar players bring. We’re dying for the respect and admiration of the other owners in our league for being the first to dig up the latest gem.
With 66 NHL games under his belt, Kyle Turris doesn’t really qualify as an NHL prospect does he? But there he is, toiling away in the AHL with other prospects.
Expect Turris, the No. 4 prospect on Dobber’s latest ranking of the top 215 Fantasy Hockey Prospects, to stay there for more seasoning because he needs it. The Phoenix Coyotes have realized they need to be more patient with their talented first-round draft pick from 2007. If you’re a fantasy GM who owns Turris, you need to be patient, too. Don’t get discouraged that he’s been demoted to the AHL after playing almost a full season in the NHL last year as a 19-year-old.
Welcome once again to “An Expert’s Audit”. This audit will be posted here as well as on my fantasy hockey blog at www.fantasyhockey.hockeyanalysis.com . I also do weekly reviews of teams for people who email in to me for a look-see. These audits will continue to appear here monthly and if you’re interested in having your keeper team “worked over” then you can begin by emailing Dobber (contact link at bottom of website) about it. But send it in by the 15th, as I will be starting on my next one at that point.
Last month we had the first woman step up for an Expert’s Audit in the whatever number of years that I’ve been doing this thing and I thought, that was fun let’s do that again. So along came Leah, a Bruins fan who wanted to step out and show that not only do women play fantasy hockey, they win at it too.
Crazynuck delivers the goods for Week 11 of the NHL season.
My opinion on Eric Fehr has been shared a few times here at DobberHockey. Fehr has been mentioned briefly in past articles as well as in a few of the daily ramblings. However, it is time to expand on why he is such an undervalued fantasy player, with a particular focus on his value in keeper leagues.
This week I’ll take a look at a pair of Steve’s, both sets call the State of Florida home.
Anyone want to hazard a guess who was the number one Yahoo skater over the past month?
Ryan Getzlaf certainly has experienced a nice turnaround in November, and Phil Kessel has made his arrival in Leaf Nation known, but the number one ranked skater for the past 30 days was Mikko Koivu. He is now ranked 18th overall, and is the 9th best centre this season.
First off, an apology to the Dobber faithful. The plan was to provide an update at the end of October, but there was a slight hiccup along the way. While out in Vancouver for work, the memory stick that had my end October standings and write up were stolen along with several other valuable items (good old Van City!). The good news is that some of the property was recovered, including the memory stick. Now, on with the update!
Ryan Ma analyzes past December trends to figure out which players will pop this month
We’re now into the third month of this fantasy campaign and there have certainly been plenty of surprises and disappointments. I’m a big believer in historical numbers, which is why I’m dedicating this week’s column on looking at past performances for predicting the future. Obviously, no one owns a crystal ball, which can gaze into the future, so one logical way to help us plan for the future is to taking a glance at the past. This week we’ll take a look at 12 players who might be in store for a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year.
Goldman uncovers/analyzes a new trend among young puckstoppers
When it comes to uncovering the next great goalie prospect for your keeper team, you always want to seek out those with elite lateral movement. Not only does excellent lateral quickness mean the goalie is better fit to post quality stats because they are squared up for rebounds, but they will also excel at combating traffic in front of the net, tracking the puck on high-speed odd-man rushes and staying upright for the second and third chances.
And since today’s pro goalies need to constantly refine their style and footwork in order to move in the most efficient manner possible, those that possess superior lateral movement (not because of their athleticism, but because of their ability to track pucks effectively and execute) are more primed to become a valuable long-term keeper.
