NHL Daily Plays: Thursday, December 4th

Happy Thursday, fellow NHL DFSers! After a slow Thankgiving Day, I am thrilled to be back for your regularly scheduled program.

Following Wednesday’s typically slow 4-game slate, the NHL gives us the usually busy slate on Thursday with 11 games from which we may select players for our lineups. A quick glance at the matchups hints that we have some fairly lopsided matchups so tonight will depend on how accurately you can select your goal scorers from a large slate of games.

As a public service announcement, in doing a survey of the pricing for these “Daily Plays,” as I am sure you all know, each daily site has the players priced rather differently. As such, some of the recommended bargain plays may not be bargain plays on, for example, FantasyAces or DraftDay.

Before we dig into today’s daily plays, let’s examine what the current Vegas lines are telling us. Any astute daily fantasy player must be in tune to Vegas lines and over/unders as “they” always know more than we do. Our job is to interpret what these numbers mean so that we can use them in populating a DFS lineup on your favorite site. In looking at the Vegas lines, the heavy favorites are the Lightning (-300 over the Sabres), the Penguins (-170 over the Canucks), the Red Wings (-170 over the Stars), the Flames (-140 over the Avalanche), and the Panthers (-140 over the Blue Jackets). Of the twenty-two teams in action, only the Blues are playing on back-to-back nights. The Blues took a 470 mile flight south from Chicago to Nashville. Akin to NBA DFS, there will be times when we will make lineup decisions based off of which teams are the most rested.

Good luck! I will online for most of the day to answer questions in the comments section below or on Twitter @TheTonyM.

Goalies

Make sure to check the RotoGrinders Starting Goalies Page to confirm that the goalies listed below are starting prior to puck-drop

ben-bishop-300x200

Ben Bishop – Tampa Bay Lightning – With four straight wins in a row and six in his last seven games, Bishop deserves the nod in net for your cash games tonight. At $9,500 on FD, the Lightning’s top netminder is not cheap, but he has averaged 6.2 FDPPG (or, FanDuel points per game) over his current four game win streak, and while a $1,532 per one point average on FD is not ideal, there is a price you pay to enjoy safety in a win. Sure, the Sabres are no longer a pushover team, but the Lightning will be back on home ice tonight and will look to avenge their 2-1 shootout loss to the Sabres in Buffalo two nights ago.

Roberto Luongo – Florida Panthers – The Panthers seem to be one of those teams that shows up in our nightmares and on nights when the DFS industry hosts the biggest tournaments. This evening the Blue Jackets come to Florida carrying a 3-7-1 road record and a one game winning “streak”. Yes, the Blue Jackets beat the Panthers 2-1 three nights ago and much like Bishop and the Lightning, the Panthers will be looking to split the home and home series. At just $8,100 on FD (but relatively more expensive on DK at $8,400), Luongo is an alternative cash play that you should feel comfortable using if you need to save $1,400 on your netminder to spend it on a top notch defenseman (see below). With two wins in a row and an average of 6.2 FDPPG over his last five starts, Luongo gets you closer to the thousand dollars per point that you may try to reach in your projections. Over their last six games, the Panthers are giving up an average of 35 S/G and the Blue Jackets are averaging 26.7 S/G over that same time span. Against a Columbus team that dropped six straight prior to beating Florida three nights ago, if Columbus can put up 30 shots against Luongo, at $8,100, the goalie should return value assuming he gets the “W”.

Other Goalies To Target (Cash Games) – Karri Ramo

Other Goalies To Target (Tournaments) – Jonathan Bernier, Jonathan Quick

Forwards

Disclaimer – Evgeni Malkin, Sidney Crosby, Steven Stamkos, Tyler Seguin, Jamie Benn, Phil Kessel, Alexander Ovechkin, Steven Stamkos and Joe Pavelski carry a high price tag and may also be used as you see fit.

Nick Spaling – Pittsburgh Penguins – With an injury to Chris Kunitz likely to keep him out a few weeks, Nick Spaling (who is now a LW on FD) has been skating on the Penguins’ first line along with Sidney Crosby and Patric Hornqvist. The Penguins have not looked spectacular over their past three games and a 1-0 win over the Devils did not spark much excitement, but with the Vancouver Canucks in town, the Pens will be skating in a high-paced game that has an over/under of 5.5 and while the Malkin line has been doing most of the scoring recently, with the home ice advantage, look for head coach, Mike Johnston, to free up the less physical Crosby line to face off against the slower Higgins-Bonino-Burrows line. With that thought in mind, Spaling may not get time on the power play, but he provides you with cheap exposure to Crosby and Hornqvist at a fraction of the cost.

Article Image

Tyler Bozak – Toronto Maple Leafs – Tonight you will want at least some exposure to the Maple Leafs in your cash games. With the New Jersey Devils flying north across the border, the Leafs, who have won two in a row and four of their last five games, should dominate tonight in a lop-sided affair. According to the Nils Model, when two teams with distinct paces face-off, the home team and their style of play appears to dictate the game flow. That said, the Leafs have skated in the top five in the NHL in terms of pace thus far into the season while the Devils have continually skated in the bottom ten. With at least one point in each of his last five games, Bozak, who centers the Leafs’ first line and first PP unit with James van Riemsdyk and Phil Kessel as his wingers, actually has five goals and three assists over that game span. With 5.9 FDPPG since November 20, at just $6,000, Bozak provides you exposure to Kessel and Riemsdyk, who each have a goal and two assists in their past two games, at a fraction of the cost.

Josh Jooris – Calgary Flames – After netting his first career hat trick two nights ago against the visiting Arizona Coyotes, Jooris and the Flames get to face off against the Colorado Avalanche in the Saddledome this evening. With both teams above average in pace-per-game according to the Nils Model (with the Avalanche as a slightly “quicker” team by that metric), the Flames have the edge as they have looked significantly better on home ice as evidenced by their 7-3-2 home record. Jooris now has twelve points on the season (8 Gs, 4 As) and he has been skating on the Flames’ second even strength line with Johnny Gaudreau and Jiri Hudler and with Curtis Glencross and Paul Byron on the team’s second power play unit, although it appeared as if Jooris actually spent most of the PP against the Coyotes with Gaudreau and Hudler. Season long numbers indicate that the Avalanche own a stout PK unit, but they have given up three power play goals over their past three games to teams with similar game-styles of play compared to the Flames. With PP goals in three straight games, look for Jooris and his linemates to strike again tonight. The play here is more about the extreme salary cap savings, but exposure to the Flames tonight provides you with a safe floor.

Other Forwards To Target (Cash Games) – Pavel Datsyuk, Johnny Gaudreau, Ondrej Palat, Nazem Kadri

Other Forwards To Target (Tournaments) – Tomas Jurco, Ondrej Palat, Sean Bergenheim

Defensemen

Disclaimer: Mark Giordano, Shea Weber, Erik Karlsson and Brent Burns are elite fantasy defensemen and can be used with confidence.

Article Image

Olli Maatta – Pittsburgh Penguins – Much like the Nick Spaling play, rostering Maatta tonight at just $3,700 on FD (and $3,700 on DK), gives you exposure to the top power play unit in the NHL. With superstar defenseman, Kris Letang, on IR with a groin injury, it appears as if Coach Johnston will look to Maatta to step into Letang’s skates as evidenced by Maatta’s presence on the Pens’ power play (2:07 minutes last game). Comparably, Christian Ehrhoff did log 2:22 minutes of PP time on Tuesday, but it was Maatta who handled the puck more and served as the primary point man. As the new first PP line (Malkin-Crosby-Hornqvist-Maatta-Ehrhoff) gets accustomed to each other, the team should register a few goals against the Canucks, who have surrendered two shorthanded goals on their current road trip.

Victor Hedman – Tampa Bay Lightning – With three games under his belt after coming off injured reserve, Hedman looks as if he never left the Lightning. With an ATOI of 23 minutes per game, and a team high of 24:42 minutes three nights ago, Hedman shows no signs of lethargy. In fact, the first even strength and first power play unit defenseman has looked superb since his return as shown by his three assists, 5 SOG, +5 rating and 4.5 FDPPG average. At $5,900 on FD (and $5,700 on DK), Hedman is not inexpensive, but with the visiting Sabres surrendering four PP goals in their last six games, they find themselves in a tough spot against the Lightning, who have the 4th best power play percentage in the NHL. Look for Hedman to register at least two points tonight in what should be a high-paced, but one-sided game as the Lightning should win their fifth game in their last six outings.

Other Defensemen To Target (Cash Games) – Christian Ehrhoff, Cody Franson, Niklas Kronwall, Aaron Ekblad

Other Defensemen To Target (Tournaments) – Anton Stralman, John Carlson, T.J. Brodie, Marc-Edouard Vlasic

About the Author

TheTonyM
Tony Mauriello (TheTonyM)

A 25-year fantasy sports veteran and a California and New York licensed corporate transactional attorney by day, Tony has been a part of the daily fantasy sports world for four years and joined the RotoGrinders team prior to the 2013-2014 NHL season. A Duke law graduate and Boston sports (and Eagles) fan, he is also a member of the Fantasy Sports Writers Association and contributes to Rotoworld, FantasyPros, and ProjectRoto. Please feel free to contact him at any time on twitter @TheTonyM with your fantasy sports questions.