Player Notes in the Draft (Dec 27)

On Monday, the Dallas Stars were without one of their young sensations, as Alex Chiasson had sat out against the Los Angeles Kings with a bout of the flu. Chiasson has been decent for the Stars already this season, scoring 8 goals and 11 assists in his first 35 games this year. I would expect to see Chiasson back in the line-up, Friday night at home to Nashville.

Chiasson belongs to Wilton in this year's draft and he'll start the post-Christmas season in 11th place, 1 point out of the top 10.

The Los Angles Kings were also without a key player in the pool with an illness on Monday night, as their captain, Dustin Brown.  Brown hasn't been too dominant on the scoresheet this year, only scoring 7 goals and 6 assists in 37 games with the Kings, but missing out on a game is still doing just that.  The Kings do not play until Saturday, in Nashville, where I would think it's expected that Brown will return to the line-up.

Brown belongs to the pool's duo, Kristy & Don, who fell right out of the sky after the first Waiver Draft.  They open the post-Christmas schedule in 15th place, 10 points out of the top 10.

It sounds like a foot injury will keep Minnesota Wild forward Zach Parise out of the line-up for at least tonight's game in Winnipeg and likely more.  Parise reportedly re-aggravated a previous foot injury, which he suffered at the end of November and the team won't rush him back, risking any more injury.  Parise has 27 points in 37 games for the Wild this year, ranking in the top 100 in pool scoring, so it will be a deep loss without him.

23rd place, Doug, has Parise this year and could really use him in the line-up, if he was going to get out of the basement any time soon.  This week, he's lost ground to 24th place and hasn't gained any ground on the teams ahead of him.  This is not good news.

The St. Louis Blues suffered a big blow to their line-up, just before the Christmas break, as forward Alex Steen suffered an upper-body injury and some are believing that he may have suffered a concussion.  The concussion reports have not been confirmed, rather he has been listed by the team as day-to-day with an upper-body injury, which we have seen already this season, as being a possible concussion.  If that is the case, Steen won't have much more time to wait for the protocol to finish, unless the injury is much worse than initially thought.

Steen has been one of the cornerstone players for Grant, who comes out of the Christmas break in 1st place, 3 points up on 2nd.  Steen leads his team in scoring with 38 points in 35 games.

The Pittsburgh Penguins are now looking at life without forward Pascal Dupuis for an extended period of time, as the veteran will have to undergo surgery to repair the ACL in one of his knees.  This may, in fact, cost him the rest of the regular season, some reports are saying.  Dupuis has registered 7 goals and 13 assists to this point in the season, where he has played in 39 games.  A huge blow to the team's top six, as Dupuis has been a regular fixture with Sidney Crosby.

After climbing into the top 10 in Week Twelve, Benson is now facing the next three weeks without one of his key forwards, as he tries to work closer to the prize positions.  Benson goes into Friday in 10th spot, only 10 points out of 8th.