As if losing Dan Boyle to the dreaded broken finger curse just one game into the season and John Moore to a five-game suspension wasn’t enough for the Rangers, they decided to go the next month or so on hard-mode with both Ryan McDonagh and Kevin Klein falling victim to their own injuries over the weekend. McDonagh suffered a separated shoulder on a hit from Evander Kane and he’s down for three to four weeks, but reports are that the Rangers expect he may be out for longer than a month. The big issue here is the injured shoulder in question is the same shoulder that Mac injured late last season, so this could turn out to be pretty bad for Mac and the Rangers. Klein suffered a foot contusion that will cost him at least a few games, but he should be back within a week or so. Regardless of how quickly Klein gets back the situation is dire on the Rangers blue line with four of their top-six defenseman now injured. How does this affect your fantasy fortunes? Well, obviously if you own McDonagh this is a fairly substantial blow. He wasn’t exactly lighting it up with just three helpers in 10 games so far, but given his ADP most of his owners were holding out hope that the points would start to flow sooner than later. The real problem here is for Henrik Lundqvist owners, who might be in a bit of trouble now too. Hank hasn’t been his normal stellar self to start the season but he’s largely been solid. Now that the Rangers defense is even more depleted it’s going to test Hank and I fear there’s going to be some ugly games in there. If you own Lundqvist all you can do is start him, but brace yourself, it could get nasty. Anyway, here’s what else I saw in the world o’ fantasy hockey last night:
There was just one game on the NHL docket last night and it impacted the world of fantasy in a major way.
Tampa Bay Lightning center Steven Stamkos broke his tibia when he was backchecking in the second period. Please, blog, may I have some more?
Mason Raymond scored twice and Cory Schneider turned aside 30 shots as Vancouver blanked Anaheim 5-0 last night. The Canucks got revenge on the Ducks for a 7-3 drubbing to open the season. Please, blog, may I have some more?
We continue our look at the Top 40 rookies in the NHL this up coming season. Here’s Part 1 if you need to catch up.
Top 40 NHL Rooks -PART2 – #21-30
(Accompanied by their 2012-13 stats prediction & Razzball Recommendation for drafting)
#21 Justin Schultz – (EDM D) (76gp/6g/18a/24pts) Edmonton won the battle for Justin Schultz as he ended up heading to Oil Country to play this season, and his presence will be known when he hits the ice in Alberta. Please, blog, may I have some more?
But he certainly has been scoring alot lately. 2 Goals and 3 Assists against the mighty Pen’s and all of a sudden Josh Bailey is playing like the guy New York thought they were getting when they drafted him 9th overall in 2008. Please, blog, may I have some more?
Heading into Friday there were a lot of Matt Duchene owners growing anxious about his so-so production so far this year. Then he went all hat-trick on the Stars and now has 5 Points in the Avalanche’ last 2 games. Please, blog, may I have some more?