NHL Daily Plays: Thursday, November 13th
Happy Thursday, fellow NHL DFSers! Welcome again to my favorite day of the week. Tuesday provided us with two large tournaments on each of FanDuel and DraftKings that both filled. Hopefully, the great enthusiasm that us NHL DFS grinders showed each of the sites this week will encourage them to set up more sizable tournaments in the near future.
Following Wednesday’s typically slow two-game slate, the NHL gives us the usually busy slate on Thursday with nine 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 Wild (-350 over the Sabres), the Rangers (-160 over the Avalanche), the Blues (-155 over the Predators), the Lightning (-140 over the Sharks), and the Flames (-140 over the Coyotes). Of the eighteen teams in action, the Bruins and Kings are playing on back-to-back nights. The Bruins travelled from Toronto to Montreal and the Kings took a short bus ride from Anaheim back home to Los Angeles. 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
Darcy Kuemper – Minnesota Wild – As of the writing of this article, the Vegas moneyline for the Minnesota Wild skating on home ice against the awful, Buffalo Sabres, was the highest of the night. With a ML sitting at -350 with an over/under of 5.0 goals, the Wild should take this game with ease over a team that has lost four in a row and scored just 5 goals over that span. Similarly, the Wild have lost four in a row and have scored a total of just 3 goals over that span. Yes, those three wins came on the road and another came at the hands of the Penguins, but the home team is skating on the same ice as the worst team in the NHL from any metric you look at. Kuemper has struggled mightily after a fantastic start to the season and his price tag reflects his poor play, especially considering that he has averaged just 1.33 FD points per game over his last three starts. That said, at $7,800 on FD and just $7,000 on DK, Kuemper should be able to pay off his price tag with a win as well as if the Sabres can match their season average of 21.8 shots per 60 minutes. Also consider that even if the Sabres can get shots off against a Wild team that owns the fourth best FenwickFor60, the Sabres are shooting just 6.19% (worst in the NHL) and they also do not control the puck as seen by their NHL-worst FenwickAgainst60. Just lock in Kuemper
Other goalies I like tonight that are likely to be get the win are Henrik Lundqvist, Jake Allen, and Jonas Hiller.
Forwards
Disclaimer – Steven Stamkos, Tyler Seguin, Jamie Benn, Rick Nash, and Vladimir Tarasenko carry a high price tag and may also be used as you see fit.
Jori Lehtera – St. Louis Blues – With linemate, Vladimir Tarasenko, now part of the “Disclaimer” for the foreseeable future, the first offensive play for Thursday is Lehtera, who centers the Blues’ second line with Jaden Schwartz and Tarasenko, which has been absolutely on fire. Coach Ken Hitchcock has also switched up the Blues’ first and second power play lines given the excellent play of this trio. The first PP unit now consists of Schwartz, Lehtera and Tarasenko. The center is not quite as a minimum price anymore, but he still just (yes, just) $5,100 on FD and $5,000 on DK and he should be a core cash game play that allows you room to start a top notch goaltender and another superstar skater. With four goals and two assists in his past three games and six goals and eight assists on the season to go along with 24 shots on goal, Lehtera’s price remains inexplicably low. What is interesting is that Lehtera finally saw his ice time jump up over the 19:00 minute mark in the win over Buffalo on Tuesday. Prior to that, he ATOI remained steady above the 17:00 mark. The takeaway here is that more ice time is directly correlated with more ice time, which makes sense, so take advantage of the inexpensive price and slot Lehtera into your lineup. Keep in mind that he will not always net a hat trick, but as the third heaviest Vegas favorite of the night, having cheap exposure to the Blues and the white-hot, Tarasenko, is a must.
Victor Rask – Carolina Hurricanes – My top minimum price special play of the night is Victor Rask, who skated on the Hurricane’s first line with Jiri Tlusty and Eric Staal at practice on Wednesday morning. With Staal back in action, coach Bill Peters, shuffled up the lines and stuck Jeff Skinner and Alexander Semin on the Hurricanes’ second line with Jay McClement. Rask should have plenty of ice time to enjoy with two rejuvenated linemates. In 14 games, Rask has just two goals and two assists, but all four of his points have come in the past five games. Over that time span, Rask has recorded 0.8, 4.1, 7.7, 3.5 and 5.2 fantasy points on FD. At $3,300, Rask should reach value quickly, especially on FD if he can earn a +1 and reach his average of 3.4 shots per game. This selection is more of a salary cap saver and a GPP play as Vegas has the Hurricanes as just -115 ML favorites on home ice with a 5.0 O/U. Each team is fairly similar in all puck possession metrics (with the Hurricanes slightly better), but with the ‘Canes at home and the Jets in the middle of a lengthy road trip, look for a 3-2 victory by the home team with the ‘Canes first line doing the damage.
Valterri Filppula – Tampa Bay Lightning – When Alex Killorn went down with an upper-body injury, coach Jon Cooper shifted Filppula to skate with Steven Stamkos and Ryan Callahan on the Lightning’s first even strength line and with the same duo on the team’s first power play unit. At just $5,300 on FD and a steal at $4,900 on DK, Filppula should be in line at least a few helpers tonight against the Sharks, who have dropped two in a row and have been outshot 67-56 and outscored 9-3 in those games. The Sharks do play at a quick pace (6.37 TG/60 minutes), but the Lightning skate a blistering 7.25 TG/60 minute pace, which is good for 1st in the NHL. When the Lightning are on home ice, where the Lightning are 6-1 and have averaged over 4.1 goals per game, a smart DFS player knows to get exposure to Steven Stamkos. Filppula had an off game in Chicago two nights ago, but prior to that, the LW had points in three straight games with seven total points (2 goals, 5 assists) in his previous 6 games. If you cannot afford to pay up for Stamkos tonight, grab one of his linemates. As a side note, my Nils model projects this game out as the highest-event game of the night with a total of 7 goals between the two teams. The next highest projected game total is the Avalanche at Rangers matchup.
Other forwards that I like tonight are Mikael Granlund, David Jones, Derick Brassard, Benoit Pouliot, Sean Monahan, and Thomas Vanek.
Defensemen
Disclaimer: Mark Giordano, Erik Karlsson and P.K. Subban are elite fantasy defensemen and can be used with confidence.
Kevin Shattenkirk – St. Louis Blues – At just $5,300 on FD (and comparably less expensive at $5,000 on DK), Shattenkirk feels like a must play on Thursday. He is priced at the 10th most expensive defenseman on FD and the 9th most expensive defenseman on DK, which seems a few hundred dollars below what would have been expected after Tuesday’s win over the Sabres. With eight points (1 goal, 7 assists) in his last ten games, Shattenkirk has also seen his price tag rise just $500 over the Blues’ past four games. This was due to earning just one point in three games prior to recording two assists the last game out on home ice against the Sabres, but he is in play tonight against the Predators, who have the 2nd worst penalty kill potential ranking in the NHL. This metric was developed by Neil Parker over at TheFakeHockey. Meanwhile, Shattenkirk is paired with Alex Pietrangelo on the Blues’ top power play unit, which is 13th best according to Mr. Parker’s offensive power play potential rankings and has scored seven power play goals in the Blues last five games.
T.J. Brodie – Calgary Flames – Once a minimum-priced play, the D-man has been skating with Mark Giordano on the Flames’ first even strength defensive pairing and with Giordano on the team’s first power play unit. Brodie has struggled in his past two games against subpar teams (Hurricanes and Panthers), but those two teams have been playing better hockey as of late with the Hurricanes starting to get healthy and with the Panthers playing tight, defensive hockey. Prior to those two games, Brodie had registered at least one point in five straight games. During that time span, the D-man logged one goal and six assists. Moreover, the Flames are the 4th biggest favorite on the night according to Vegas and the Flames have the 8th best PPPP (according to Mr. Parker) and are hosting the Coyotes who have the 5th worst penalty kill in the NHL. With 7.5 power play goals per 60 minutes of PP time, look for the Flames to control the game in a matchup of evenly-paced teams as the Coyotes should not be able to keep up with the more efficient Flames.
Other defensemen I like tonight are Justin Faulk, Jason Garrison, Dan Girardi, and Kevin Klein.