Week Three Newsletter

At last, we've had our first full week of hockey and boy, oh boy... was it ever entertaining. The season is in full swing and you know what that means?!? Trades in the Sheet pool. Yes, it's true, we're three weeks into the pool season and we're already seeing our first trade of the year. Neil, currently sitting in 20th spot in the Sheet standings, has made the first trade of the year. He has decided to drop Henrik Zetterberg in Box 2, who has sat out the last few games for Detroit with a groin problem and he picked up Paul Statsny in Colorado to replace him. Statsny has been playing quite well to start the season with the Avalanche, but eyebrows will be raised, wondering if this is a good long-term move. Sure, Statsny will make his Box 2 selection a little more unique, but will he have staying power over one of Detroit's top scorers? I suppose time will tell, but we can easily scoff at how silly this move is right now.

Will this early move spark some other moves? Remember, if you want to make a trade on your Sheet team, please send an e-mail to me to request the move. You do have seven trades through the year, so be sure to maximize your points potential. All trades for the upcoming week need to be in by puck drop on the Monday of the new week to be eligible for that week's points. Be sure to check out the injury page to see if you need to make any moves.

Poll Question
Last week, I asked you of the top five players in pool scoring, who would be making the biggest push for the best season in pool scoring. Well, it was a little bit of a loaded question, as only two of the five players were really qualified to do it all year. It was those same two players that took home half of the votes each. Both Roberto Luongo and Henrik Lundqvist took 4 of the 8 votes each to lead the poll, which didn't have too much merit on the season anyways. I was just having trouble thinking of a good topic for a poll. It's nice to see that I'm back to the usual amount of votes for a poll now anyways.

This week's question, who has been the biggest surprise with zero points, so far this year. Joffrey Lupul in Philadelphia, Ed Jovanovski in Phoenix, Steven Stamkos in Tampa Bay or Sam Gagner in Edmonton.

This week, we had a tie in the largest amount of points in the week, but only one could be our Mover & Shaker for Week Three. The tie-breaker is this case was the number of positions moved. So, for Week Four, our winner is Larry! His team managed to put up 38 points in the week, moving him up from 12th spot to 4th... just like that. For the weekly win, Larry will come away with a 2009 O-Pee-Chee Mike Green card, which has the retro design of the 1979-1980 OPC set. A very cool looking card, which is part of a rare set found in this year's cases.

Larry is yet to see any action from three of his roster players, so far this year, but the other eleven have been pretty good for him so far. His top players in the week were: Niklas Backstrom (8 points), Patrick Sharp (7), Simon Gagne (4), Nicklas Lidstrom (4) and Dan Ellis (4).

On the Sheet, we had four teams crack the 80-point barrier, all of them should have been moving on up. Our M&S for the Sheet had 85 points in Week Three and managed to move up to third place in the Standings, one of the five paying spots in the pool. Dan W. had a great week from Evgeni Malkin (7 points), Sidney Crosby (6), Alex Semin (6), Martin Brodeur (6) and Michael Nylander (5). Another solid week like that (or 25) will only help his chances at the big money for the year.

Our Basement Dweller in the Draft fell from 10th to last with a week of only 16 points... last year's big money winner, Chris. Chris had six of his 14 players without points in Week Three. If it wasn't for Sidney Crosby picking up 6 points in the week, Chris would have been up the creek without a paddle to start the season. Filip Kuba in Ottawa was the only other notable player on his team, pickin up three more assists.

Dropping big places in the Sheet pool in Week Three was Ernest, who went down from 15th spot in Week Two down to 39th; a pool-high 24 spots dropped. He only managed to pick up 51 points in the week, which wasn't the lowest, but the lowest among all of his peers in the area of the Standings. Thankfully, it's still pretty early in the year and there won't be too much worry about making those spots up. On his team, there were 10 players with zero points, which doesn't help anyone's chances out... except for being the Basement Dweller.

To start the season, we had a pair of goaltenders claim the Player of the Week award, which shouldn't come as a surprise, but when there is two players tied for the honour for Week Three and one is a skater, the other is a goalie... it's usually best to spice things up a bit and go with the skater. That being said, this week's Player of the Week is Thomas Vanek of the Sabres, who finished with 8 points.

Vanek played in four games during the week and was very productive in each one. On Monday on Long Island, Vanek started his week with a pair of goals. Wednesday in the Big Apple, he added yet another two goals. Friday, hosting the Canucks, he had a goal and two assists. Finally, on Saturday in Atlanta, he scored another goal. That's six goals and two assists through the week, which should be unanimous for the selection and should earn him one of the NHL's three stars of the week.

Chris Drury, usually quite the offensive force, only has 1 point in 8 games so far this season. Thankfully, he does bring a very sound defensive game to the team, so he won't be punished by sitting out, because he is valuable in both ends of the ice. Drury was picked by Don in the seventh round of the Draft, which isn't too high, so he isn't being a big anchor for Don in Standings.

Other News and Notes

Received in the trade from Atlanta, Ken Klee was going to be a good fifth or sixth defenseman for the Ducks, but on Friday night, he was in the press box for a game. Klee is in Box 29, in the East, as he was moved after the Sheet was released.

The Hurricanes have missed Tuomo Ruutu through the weekend with a bit of a groin problem. He missed out on Friday night's game with the injury and WHAT ABOUT SUNDAY.

The Blue Jackets ran into some injury trouble this past week. Both defenseman Christian Backman and goaltender Pascal Leclaire missed out on the action on Saturday night with injuries. Backman, a pick of Ryan in the Draft, was kept out of the line-up thanks to a lower body injury. Leclaire, a pick of Derek in the Draft, suffered a hand injury in his last start in the week and was kept out of the line-up on Saturday because of it.

The Blackhawks scratched Box 7 forward Craig Adams from the line-up on Saturday night and Sunday evening. New coach, Joel Quennville, hasn't found a spot for Adams in his first couple games of his season.

The Red Wings are running into some minor injury troubles these days as well. Brad Stuart, a pick of Clayton in the Draft, was kept out of the game against the Rangers, thanks to a knee injury, that will keep him out on a day-to-day basis.

The Oilers beat the Flames twice in a weekend set and they did it without Sheldon Souray and Sam Gagner in the second game. Souray was out with a knee injury and Gagner's injury was not disclosed, but was still out. Souray is a pick of Dale C. in the Draft and Dennis has pool ownership on Gagner.

In one of the more brutal hits of this early season, Andrei Kostitsyn took the worst of a collision with Coyotes defenseman Kurt Sauer. The early diagnosis was that Kostitsyn has suffered a head injury and his return to the line-up is still uncertain. It looks like a long-term injury, so Ryan shouldn't be holding his breath here.

Box 29 defenseman, Lasse Kukkonen, was a scratch for the Flyers on Saturday night. He wasn't a very popular selection on the Sheet, but it just should be known... just in case someone wants to take a chance on him.

The Sharks were without stand-out forward, Milan Michalek, through their weekend games with an upper body injury. Michalek's presence is usually felt offensively, but the team didn't do too badly without him. Michalek was picked by John P. in the Draft, who is currently running in the top section of the Standings.

Blues' rookie prospect, Patrik Berglund, was scratched from the St. Louis line-up on the weekend, because of an apparent shoulder injury that he suffered on Thursday night against Chicago. Berglund is considered to be out day-to-day. Berglund has had a good start to the season, scoring 3 points in 4 games.

As Chris got back one Lightning player in Paul Ranger, he lost another one in Radim Vrbata to the press box. Vrbata was not inserted into the line-up on Saturday night against the Wild. Vrbata has struggled this season, not registering a point in his first four games of the season.

A little bit of musical chairs going on in Toronto on the blueline, as Mike Van Ryn was a healthy scratch against the Penguins on Saturday night. The Leafs' coaching staff has not been terribly impressed with some of the veteran talent on the team and it looks like Van Ryn could be one of those guys. Since he's a Leaf, he wasn't too valuable for the Draft and he's just a Sheet player this year.

News on Kyle Wellwood... he has been sent to the minors after clearing waivers this weekend. If Wellwood can get his health back up to snuff, he could very well make his way back to the Canucks and still make somewhat of an impact. He is also only a Sheet player this year, as there wasn't enough buzz around him for the Draft.

The Canucks could escape the injury bug on Sunday, losing three players to injury against the Blackhawks. Pavol Demitra (ribs), Darcy Hordichuk (lower body) and Sami Salo (groin) all left the game and didn't return. The team did have Kevin Bieksa return to the line-up, but it wasn't enough to earn the win.

Missing from the Capitals' line-up on the weekend was defenseman Tom Poti, who hasn't been listed with an injury, so he'll be listed as a healthy scratch. Poti has 2 assists in the team's 4 games this year, so it does look as though it could be an injury keeping him out of the line-up. A status update will come when there is one.

Click here to see an updated injury page.

Hockey Night in Canada

An all-Canadian Hockey Night in Canada sees the Battle of Ontario in the first half of the doubleheader, while Vancouver will host Edmonton in the second half. The first half should be a pretty tight affair, if the Leafs can hang on to their defensive positioning against a very offensive powerhouse from Ottawa. The Canucks will finally return home from their six game road trip to host the young Oilers team that gets more exciting as the weeks go by.