NHL & Fantasy Hockey Week 2 Consensus Rankings Update
Week Two of the NHL season is upon us and that means it’s time to update our Fantasy Hockey rankings!.
These rankings reflect a standard ESPN.com league that uses “Goals, Assists, Plus/Minus, Average Time on Ice, Penalty Minutes, Power-play points, Shots on Goal, Wins, Save Percentage, and Goals Against Average.
*Note Goalies will be ranked on Friday’s, in our “Five-Hole Friday Column”
Forwards:
Josh Kay’s take:
Moving Up:
Martin St. Louis– Tampa Bay Lightning: The 5’8 veteran speedster was named the Lightning’s ninth captain in team history after the departure of Vincent Lecavalier during the off-season. Whether that honor improves the 38-year-old winger’s play is unknown; what is known, is that he has improved his shooting percentage for five consecutive seasons. St. Louis’s value will come in the form of incredible point per game numbers as well as 21+ minutes of ice time. If he can contribute in plus/minus as well, St. Louis is a bona-fide Top-10 forward.
Steve Downie- Colorado Avalanche: Downie is coming off injury shortened seasons each of the past two years and three of the past four. In his best season at age 22, Downie posted 46 points in 79 games along with 208 penalty minutes with the Tampa Bay Lightning. Downie is capable of a repeat of those numbers in this, his age 26 season. Downie is currently skating on the first line with Matt Duchene and Ryan O’Reilly.
Moving Down:
Taylor Hall- Edmonton Oilers: The 21-year-old former number one overall pick, affectionately known as “Hallsy”, by the Edmonton faithful, is in line for a career season in terms of points and ice-time. He started the season at center which was not a good fit. Filling in for Ryan Nugent-Hopkins, Hall was decent on face-off’s, going 9-for18 (50%) in the first game and 10-for-16 (63%) in the second game (including a 8-for-12 effort against Ryan Kesler and Henrik Sedin), however he struggled mightily with the defensive responsibilities of the position. Hall has a minus-five rating through two games so far and looks like he will be an absolute black hole for that stat this season. If he can turn that back around, he’ll move back up.
James Neal- Pittsburgh Penguins: Neal, a bona-fide super-star, will be out for quite some time as he is listed as “week-to-week” without a timetable for his return. He is nursing an upper-body injury.
Just Missed the Cut:
Cory Conacher– Ottawa Senators: Conacher was excellent for the Lightning last season before being traded to the Senators. Conacher struggled originally with his new team but clicked in the play-offs, notching three goals in eight games. Conacher has already gotten off to a hot start this year, scoring a goal already. The issue for Conacher is that while he is seeing power-play time, he isn’t seeing enough ice-time to be worth starting in a standard sized roster 10-team league. Conacher is averaging just 14:01 per game, which is more than he did with the Lightning, but still needs to be improved.
Jeff Hicks’ take
Moving Up:
Nathan MacKinnon- Colorado Avalanche: The first overall pick of the 2013 NHL Entry Draft made his presence felt during the first week. MacKinnon has earned the trust of veterans such as P.A. Parenteau and Ryan O’Reilly, as witnessed by some fancy passes for assists. He has yet to face any adversity and it will be interesting to see how he adjusts. Fans and owners have to love the early return on the rookie.
Brendan Gallagher- Montreal Canadiens: The sophomore did not make my initial ‘Top 100,’ which is on me. There are a lot of mouths to feed in Montreal on offense, so enjoy watching the forwards fight to get on the score sheet. Gallagher and fellow second-year forward Alex Galchenyuk have great chemistry playing together.
Moving Down:
Jonathan Huberdeau- Florida Panthers: The goose egg the Panthers put up against St. Louis may be an extreme on the loss spectrum, but a handful of losses by four or five goals will kill the plus/minus of talented players like Huberdeau. He is also facing the top lines of other opponents regularly. Huberdeau’s value takes a hit until Florida gets some sort of offensive identity.
Ryan Nugent-Hopkins- Edmonton Oilers: RNH will be returning as early as this week, but I expect to see some rust for a few games. Toss in the potential for a Jekyll and Hyde plus/minus, and Nugent-Hopkins looks a little less appealing.
Just Missed the Cut:
Marcus Johansson- Washington Capitals: Three of Johansson’s four assists came in a 5-4 shootout win over a bad Calgary Flames team. Playing on the top line with Alex Ovechkin and Nicklas Backstrom should help Johansson’s stat line, but I want to see more before he makes the list.
Here are our consensus rankings:
Alternate Stats for Forwards
Not all leagues use these categories for judging players, therefore, in order to provide you with the most comprehensive analysis possible, we will be tracking other offensive category leaders and some possible sleepers for those categories.
First number listed is the rank of that player for the particular category, second number (in parenthesis is the number accumulated for that stat).
Hits:
(1). Justin Abdelkader (15)- Detroit- 3.6% ownership
(4). Tommy Wingels (11)- San Jose- 0.3% ownership
(5). Tanner Glass (10)- Pittsburgh- 0.1% ownership
(6). Martin Hanzal (10)- Phoenix- 1.4% ownership
(7). Lauri Korpikoski (10)- Phoenix- 1.6% ownership
Blocked Shots:
(1) Boyd Gordon (7)- Edmonton- 0.0% ownership
(2) Tommy Wingels (7)- San Jose
(3) Curtis Glencross (6)- Calgary- 6.3% ownership
(4) Tyler Bozak (6)- Toronto- 13.9% ownership
(5) Marcus Kruger (5)- Chicago- 0.3% ownership
Face-off Percentage: (must have > 17% of tm face-offs taken)
(1) Paul Gaustad (28-for-36, 77.8%)- Nashville- 0.0% ownership
(2) Kyle Brodziak (21-for-30, 70%)- Minnesota- 0.1% ownership
(3) Casey Cizikas (19-for-28, 67.8%)- NYI- 0.1% ownership
(5) Eric Fehr (21-for-32, 65.6%)- Washington- 6.0% ownership
(6) Antoine Vermette (31-for-48, 64.6%)- Phoenix- 0.4% ownership
Short Handed Points:
(1) Tyler Bozak (1)- Toronto
(3) Chris Kelly (1)- Boston- 1.8% ownership
(4) Vernon Fiddler (1)- Dallas- 10.1% ownership
(5) Brad Richardson (1)- Vancouver- 0.1% ownership
(6) Antoine Roussel (1)- Dallas- 0.0% ownership
Defense:
Moving Up:
Lubomir Visnovsky- New York Islanders: Mark Streit is now a Flyer, so the puck-moving defenseman role is Visnovky’s. The top power play unit on Long Island is absolutely loaded, and 20 points on the man advantage are a lock.
Jason Garrison- Vancouver Canucks: I will happily buy in to the goal-scoring side of Garrison. New coach John Tortorella likes to incorporate his defensemen into the offense, and Garrison is the early benefactor.
Moving Down:
Justin Schultz- Edmonton Oilers: Bad first impression for the young rear-guard. It appears as if Schultz may be the top challenger to Florida Panthers defenseman Brian Campbell for best offensive defenseman with a horrible plus/minus.
Dmitry Kulikov- Florida Panthers: Hockey purgatory claims another victim. Owners of Kulikov should be happy that the 7-0 drubbing at the hands of the Blues did not cause more damage to his plus/minus. It is tough to own a Panther blue-liner that is not named Brian Campbell. He is a game-to-game play going forward.
Just Missed the Cut:
Connor Carrick- Washington Capitals: Carrick surprised by making the big club one year after being drafted in the fifth round. The Illinois-native had a shaking -2 plus/minus against the Chicago Blackhawks in his first game, but has played even hockey since in two contests. His average ice time is a major reason why he is on the outside looking in.
Our consensus rankings:
Alternate Stats for Defenseman:
Not all leagues use these categories for judging players, therefore, in order to provide you with the most comprehensive analysis possible, we will be tracking other offensive category leaders and some possible sleepers for those categories.
First number listed is the rank of that player for the particular category, second number (in parenthesis is the number accumulated for that stat).
Hits:
(1) Ladislav Smid (12)- Edmonton- 0.1% owned
(2) Mike Weber (11)- Buffalo- 0.0% owned
(4) Nicklas Grossman (10)- Philadelphia – 0.1% owned
(5) Radko Gudas (9)- Tampa Bay- 0.4% owned
(6) Luke Schenn (9)- Philadelphia- 0.9% owned
Blocked Shots:
(1) Chris Butler (11)- Calgary- 0.0% owned
(3) Nicklas Grossman (10)- Philadelphia
(4) Carl Gunnarsson- (10)- Toronto- 0.2% owned
(5) Andrew MacDonald (10) NYI- 0.8% owned
(6) Roman Polak (9)- STL- 0.1% owned
The Author
