Wednesday, March 07, 2012

Separated Shoulder for Lupul

The Toronto Maple Leafs announced that scoring forward Joffrey Lupul will miss the next 3-to-4 weeks with a separated shoulder, which he suffered getting checked from behind by Bruins forward David Krejci on the weekend.  The Leafs are in the middle of a playoff spot chase and losing their second-leading scorer to injury, possibly for the remainder of the regular season comes as a huge hit to the team.

Frankly, unless you have been hiding under a rock that doesn't get any hockey on its cable package, you probably know how good of a season that Lupul has had, despite cooling down over the last few weeks.  Going into Wednesday's action, which includes his Leafs' team, Lupul was ranked 13th in pool scoring with 67 points (25 goals and 42 assists) in 66 games with the club.  Lupul earned an All-Star selection this year in the process and the respect of many around the league.

ImplicationsNo one saw Lupul coming at the beginning of the year, which meant that he was a waiver draft pick this year, given to Darren S., who had the 1st overall selection in the first waiver draft.  Darren has collected 37 of Lupuls 67 points this season, so he turned out to be a pretty good pick-up in the draft.  Now, with the gap growing again between himself and 21st, this could effectively end his season in last place.

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