To say the season for Philadelphia as been a mess is an understatement. First they fire Hextall as GM, then the mess last week of Hakstol being fired as coach, only to still be the coach for a couple days as new GM Chuck Fletcher said no decision has been made, only for Hakstol to be fired anyways. They were in last place in the Eastern Conference on Monday when Fletcher decided to recall Carter Hart. The 20 year old is arguably the best goaltending prospect in the league, and he received his first NHL start on Tuesday. Hart saved 20 of 22 shots against the Red Wings getting his first career win by a score of 3-2. Look, I’m not saying Hart is a future superstar. Goaltending is extremely unpredictable and it seems like Philadelphia has been cursed in net for a while. However, he has as good of a chance as any young goaltender to be a starter for years to come. For that alone, he’s worth grabbing in all formats, especially dynasties. Who knows how long that Fletcher keeps Hart on the big squad, but it seems like he should be up going forward. Either he plays so well they have to roll Hart, or they fall out of it completely and want to get him more playing time. There’s no guarantee it’s good now either, but I doubt another goalie with more upside will show up on the waiver wire later on in the season. Let’s take a look at what else happened over the last two nights:
Ryan Getzlaf – Goal and an assist with four shots. It’s not flashy but come the end of the season, we know Getzlaf is going to be hovering around a point per game with solid PIM.
Adam Henrique – Goal and an assist with two shots. Henrique has settled into being a bottom end streamer in Anaheim.
Sergei Bobrovsky – 26 save shutout in the 1-0 win over the Golden Knights. The next four games for CBus: Philly, Devils twice, and Rangers. Bob will sit one of the games on a back to back, but the schedule is set up nicely for him to get back into form.
Malcolm Subban – 30 saves on 31 shots getting the tough luck loss. Subban has been awful this season. In fact, this was his first good start of the season. He’s an easy pass until he puts together a few more quality games.
Jaroslav Halak – 22 save shutout in the 4-0 win over Montreal. Halak has been struggling for two weeks before this game. Rask has been much better so expect Rask to get about 2/3rds of the starts going forward.
David Pastrnak – Two assists with three shots and two PIM. It’s a shame for Pastrnak that he became RFA a year early, because he’d be getting 10+ million a season now.
Colby Cave – Goal and an assist with two shots. Congrats on the first career goal and entering the Razzball Database, but nothing to see here for now.
Roman Josi – Two goals and an assist with eight shots and two PIM over two games. Do as the Roman does! He had a tough start, and the plus-minus is surprisingly average, but Josi has still been solid on the whole.
Ryan Johansen – Four assists with a shot over two games. He’s inching closer to pure assist value but it’s still decent overall value.
Mark Stone – Two assists with a shot and two PIM. So damn good and doesn’t get the credit for it.
Ryan Dzingel – Goal and an assist with two PIM. Dzingel is decent enough across the board that he’s right on the fringe. I still lean towards super elite streamer, but I would not blame anyone for holding him.
Thomas Greiss – 30 saves on 31 shots in the 4-1 win over the Avalanche. Easy hold given his overall numbers.
Jordan Eberle – Goal and two assists with five shots over two games. This snapped a ten game goal-less drought for Eberle, who is only a bottom end streamer at this point.
Anders Lee – Goal and an assist with four shots and two PIM over two games. Really good season for ‘Ders after the concern his 74 goals over the past two seasons were a fluke. His assists will certainly be a career high, the shot rate is strong, the PIM are great, etc.
Ryan Pulock – Four assists with three shots and two PIM over two games. Pulock is starting to play like I thought he would to open the season. I lean towards leaving him on the wire, but if you want to take a shot if your blueline is bad, I don’t mind it.
Evgenii Dadonov – Two goals and an assist with eight shots. Didn’t seem like Dadonov was doing much in this game (I was there) and then the team exploded in the third period. Nice to see such a big game from him being off the first line. It’s been an excellent season for Dadonov with three shots per game and 16+17 in 32 games.
Aleksander Barkov – Goal and an assist with four shots. Barkov left the game for a few minutes after being tripped, so he caught a break and only played 21 minutes. Cyborg.
Jeff Skinner – Goal and an assist with five shots and two PIM. This has been simply a remarkable season by Skinner in every way imaginable.
Sam Reinhart – Two assists with a shot. My years of affection for Reinhart’s game has finally paid off. More on Reinhart in Monday’s notes here.
Nazem Kadri – Three assists with a shot. Kadri has been doing just enough to remain a hold.
Connor Brown – Three assists with a shot. He was playing on the fourth line come the end of the game, where he got two assists in garbage time, so Brown is an easy pass right now.
Tyler Ennis – Two goals on four shots. Those garbage time assists by Brown were both on Ennis goals. Another easy pass.
John Tavares – Goal and an assist, as did Auston Matthews. Bad teams have zero chance to stop these two, and good teams almost have no chance.
Alexandar Georgiev – 14 saves on 15 shots in the 3-1 win over Anaheim. 15 shots!? Come on Ducks. Georgiev should only be streamed in the best of spots.
Vladislav Namestnikov – Goal and two assists with three shots and four PIM. He’s worth monitoring because we’ve seen him produce in the past, but I’d leave Names on the wire for now.
James van Riemsdyk – Goal and an assist with three shots and four PIM. Charlie Conway has been disappointing, especially in terms of shot rate. JVR has been a three shot per game player since the third season of his career, yet he’s just below two per game now. I’m still holding for the upside, but it’s become tenuous.
Shayne Gostisbehere – Goal and an assist with three shots. Man, talk about disappointments. -17 and only 4+11 in 32 games. In a shallow league, I could maybe see cutting Ghost Bear, but the upside is so high that it’s hard to pass on him. I wouldn’t blame you for running out of patience though.
Logan Couture – Two goals, both assisted by Tomas Hertl. They’ve quietly been one of the top lines in the league along with Meier.
Radim Simek – Two assists with a shot. He’s had a hot start in the NHL, but he’s 26 years old making his debut and has 3 SOG in 8 games. Pass. Welcome to the Razzball Database!
Lukas Radil – Goal and an assist. Another guy making his debut at 28, Radil has 5 points in 10 games, but only 13 SOG. He’s worth monitoring with 5 points in his last 5 games, but there’s nothing here yet. Welcome to the Razzball Database!
Martin Jones – 26 save shutout in the 4-0 win over the Wild. Naturally Jones gets a shutout two days after making one save on four shots against Chicago. Faith, I don’t have much in Jones. That said, all he has to do is be passable to pile up wins.
Cam Ward – 30 saves on 31 shots in the 2-1 win over the Predators. Shows how crazy hockey is for one game that Ward can shut down Smashville. I still want nothing to do with him.
Jake Allen – 22 saves on 23 shots in the 4-1 win over the Oilers. Allen has been better lately but he still qualifies as desperation.
Brayden Schenn – Three assists with three shots. Tough start to the season for Schenn with injuries and the Blues struggling on the whole, but I still think he’s an easy hold.
Jaden Schwartz – Goal and an assist with five shots. Schwartz is really starting to pick it up with five points in four games since returning from injury, and ten over his last eight going back to pre-injury. He needs to be owned everywhere again.
Ben Bishop – 21 saves on 21 shots in 53 minutes. He left the game late in the second to go into concussion protocol before coming back in the third to close it out. Bishop has been great this season with a 2.35/.922 line. Look for that to continue going forward as the Stars are playing well defensively, partially at the cost of their offense.
Robin Lehner – 36 saves on 37 shots in the 3-1 win over the Coyotes. Nice for Lehner to get back on track in a prime spot. His overall numbers are solid making him a decent streamer most games he starts.
Nikita Kucherov – Goal and an assist with five shots. Kucherov is at 15+35 in 35 games which is just absurd. Sure, the shot rate is down, but nobody can be complaining about him playing at a 117 point pace.
Cedric Paquette – Goal and an assist with seven PIM. Pacquette has scored a surprising amount of goals given his role, but he’s an easy pass in all formats.
Adam Erne – Goal and an assist. Erne is another guy who isn’t getting enough minutes to be fantasy relevant, but there could be something here long term if his role ever does increase.
Austin Wagner – Two goals. Nothing to see here. Another guy I’ve talked about for the first time, seems like a ton of those today. Welcome to the Razzball Database!
Jonathan Quick – 27 saves on 28 shots in the 4-1 win over the Jets. He’s close to a desperation play given the team in front of him (and Quick not being that good himself).
That’s all for now guys. With only two games tonight, simply stream the top guys available, matchups aren’t really important. As always, feel free to ask any questions and give any feedback below. I’ll be back on Friday morning. Thanks for reading, take care!
