NHL DFS Slate Summary: Thursday, January 18th
Welcome to the RotoGrinders NHL DFS Slate Summary. In this article, we’ll concentrate on the key elements of DFS success while delivering analysis on the upcoming slate of NHL games for DraftKings and FanDuel. We’ll discuss today’s NHL DFS player projections, player correlations and NHL stacking, NHL starting lineups, differentiation tactics using NHL projected ownership, and recommendations on ways to create lineup diversity if entering multiple lineups using LineupHQ.
NHL DFS Picks: Slate Summary for Thursday, January 18th
Today’s Games
Slate Overview
Greetings from a snowy Nashville (again). The “Devil’s dandruff” continues to fall from the sky with no end in sight. School has already been canceled for today and tomorrow, meaning it’ll be four consecutive days with everyone at home. Supplies are low, as is morale for everyone except for the six-year-old, who is having the “best week ever.” If this is it for me, I at least hope I can go out with a bang and take down DK’s $555 ($20,000 to first) as my swan song.
I think it’s actually pretty similar to Tuesday’s slate in a lot of ways. There are several excellent real-life matchups between COL/BOS and NYR/VGK, and to a lesser extent, MIN/TB, PHI/DAL, and NSH/LAK. The Oilers, Canucks, Sabres, and Senators check in as the teams with the highest implied team totals, with a decent drop-off after them. The Oilers have underwhelmed lately, so it’ll be interesting to see if people are fed up and move on to the mid-priced options.
Top Skaters
You’ll see by my selections that I’m going to give preference to more of a balanced build tonight. If it appears that this route will be extremely popular, it’s always OK to zig where others zag and go with some of the expensive players/stacks in less-than-perfect matchups.
Tage Thompson
DraftKings $7,700
Yesterday’s CHI/BUF game got canceled, which was a bummer for the previously 3-game slate, but a nice bonus to have it available tonight. Thompson and the Sabres are in a great spot against a lowly (albeit scrappy lately) Blackhawks team. Thompson’s recent game logs paint an accurate picture of what you’re getting with him. He has no points in 3 of 4 games, but in the one game he did, he had 2 goals and picked up the 5+ shot bonus. The boom-or-bust nature isn’t great for cash games but is perfectly fine in tournaments where we’re looking for slate-breaking scores and at less than the price of other elite options.