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Happy Wednesday, Razzball faithful! Well, yesterday was my final Top 100 Starting Pitchers article and Year in Review. (Click on that link if you want to check it out!). Now, I can officially, and undistractedly, present to you a fully focused MarmosDad who has shifted entirely into hockey gear! Does that mean I’m fully invested in tracking the ins and outs of the preseason rankings that I ran through in September?  You betcha! Will I be ready to answer any questions you throw at me here each week with nothing but my day job, fatherhood, mentoring, planning, coaching in school and winter workouts for our baseball team, and the general ridiculousness of life getting in the way? Absolutely!
Happy Wednesday, Razzball faithful! It’s one final Wednesday write-up from your guy, MarmosDad, and things are starting to get interesting in the first round. Sens and Kings fans are ready to watch a lot more baseball, and a few other teams are headed in the same direction. Today, there will be more updates on the leading scorers from each series, along with notes on some of the names I outlined in the 2026 Fantasy Hockey Playoff Pool Review. That means updates for all the Must Have skaters and any of the Worth the Gamble or Under the Radar guys who need them. Will we get a clearer picture of who we’ll be seeing in Round Two? Did the Bruins copy the Penguins by staving off elimination and forcing a Game 6? Let’s have a look!
Happy Wednesday, Razzball faithful! Are you ready for a Fantasy Hockey Playoff Pool preview? Do you need a primer for drafting your playoff pool roster? Well, I have some good news for you! Welcome to the first annual (maybe) MarmosDad NHL Playoff Preview! I’ll go through some notes on how to strategize when making your picks for the playoff pool, then do a rundown of each playoff team, with names to look out for during your drafts. Let’s get to it!
I've long been a fan of Bobby McMann, but the early returns for Seattle blew my expectations out of the water.  McMann scored two goals and an assist with four shots in his Kraken debut on Saturday against Vancouver, and followed it up with a goal and an assist with four shots against Florida on Sunday.  He played over 18 minutes in both games slotting right onto the first line and second power play unit.  With Seattle in the thick of a playoff race, I see no reason to expect McMann's workload to decrease.  That means a 20-25% boost in playing time compared to what he was getting in Toronto.  Over the last three seasons, McMann is in the top 50 in the league in even strength goals per 60 minutes.  Given that, I think he should be held in all formats for the time being.  Let's take a look at what else happened over the weekend:
Happy Wednesday, Razzball faithful! We’re smack-dab in the middle of Olympic chaos, and Wednesday’s playoff round looks like a doozy. I’m not even sure which game I’m looking forward to watching more: David Pastrnak vs Team Canada or the Swedish berries/fish/meatballs vs Team USA. Luckily, we don’t have to look into too much of that for right now, because it’s time to pair up last week’s trade deadline preview with the other side of the league. If you missed it last week, you can click the link here…
The greatest goal scorer added himself to another list on Thursday: players who scored a hat trick at age 40 or above.  He became the sixth person ever to do that, joining Jagr, Howe, Selanne, Bucyk, and... Lidstrom!  You could have given me 100 guesses, and I'm sure I'd have gotten the first three, and probaly Buyck, but never Lidstrom.  Anyways, Ovechkin scored only two goals in his first 12 games, but since then, he has seven in the past six.  Add in three assists, and we've seen Ovechkin get back on track lately.  An ugly start is now a thing of the past, and while I still think a repeat of last season is too farfetched, a monster season is possible again.  MarmosDad covered the early part of the week here, so please check that out if you haven't.  Now, it's time for me to recap Thursday night after a depressing Bills loss (fire McDermott!):
Today, I'm going to take a look at what has changed for some power plays around the league after the first two weeks of the season.  I am going to focus on personnel changes that involve two players being swapped, not ones caused by injuries, unless the injury is long term.  I'll talk about how it changes the value for each player and whether I expect this to hold going forward, or whether I think it's a matter of time until it changes back.  Let's get to it!
We wrap up my forward rankings by going through the Top 100 today.  As a reminder, there will be a separate post once my rankings are done for my favorite late round targets in 10-12 team leagues, but this post should get us comfortably through round 15 or so when you factor in goalies and defensemen.  If you haven't seen the Top 60, you can check that out here.  Let's get to it!
An injury on opening night took Macklin Celebrini out of the lineup for a while, but otherwise, his entrance in the NHL has gone swimmingly.  Celebrini scored two goals and an assist with four shots, two PIM, two hits, and two blocks in over 20 minutes of ice time in the 7-2 Sharks win over the Kings on Monday.  Celebrini has six goals and four assists in twelve games this season, and surprisingly, he's taking over three shots per game.  I was not expecting this type of shot rate out of the gate for Celebrini, which is a game changer for his fantasy value.  The plus-minus has the potential to be ugly, but you can make a good case for holding Celebrini in all formats now.  Here's to hoping he can maintain this level of play over a long season.  Let's take a look at what else happened over the last two nights:
If you want proof that no NHL coach has job security, look at what's happened over the last week.  Boston is off to a slow start but after setting records two seasons ago and winning a playoff series six months ago, nobody saw him getting fired before American Thanksgiving.  However, the news broke early on Tuesday that Boston was moving on with Joe Sacco as the interim coach.  Then, on Sunday, St. Louis made a quick move to hire Montgomery.  You have to feel bad for Drew Bannister, who only coached 76 games with the Blues and was a shocking 39-31-6 despite a weak roster, even though he was only 9-12-1 this season.