Player Notes in the Draft (Jan 11)

It was a busy night in the NHL on Saturday and the news from last night will keep me busy for a few days, it would seem.

One injury that we're keeping an eye on is the status of Detroit number one goalie Jimmy Howard, who had to leave the game between the Red Wings and Capitals, not even two minutes into the game. Howard appeared to have suffered a substantial injury, when he had to be carted of on a stretcher and later on in the game, the team confirmed that it was a groin injury that Howard had suffered.  Test will have to be done and we may be a day or two from final word, but this is thought to be considerable.

Terrible news for Dale B., who had been seeing a slight upswing in his team's performance of late, moving up to 14th over the last couple weeks, from his season-low 18th after Week Twelve.  If this injury is long-term, there could be a slight drop-off again in the standings.

On another note for Dale B., this is an injury to his only All-Star representative, which would leave him with no one, assuming Tuukka Rask doesn't replace him as a roster player in the game.

The youth of the Los Angeles Kings took a significant hit on Saturday, as Tyler Toffoli has reportedly come down with mono and was a scratch from their game against the Jets, while Tanner Pearson left the game with a lower-body injury, which we're monitoring for more news.

First, for Toffoli, the Kings are only listing him as out day-to-day, but the last player that I have on the blog to have suffered mono was Mike Comrie, back in 2010, and my posts say he missed 30 games before being dealt from Edmonton to Pittsburgh.  If this happens to be the case, it could be a significant loss.  Toffoli has been one of the Kings' better players this year, scoring 12 goals and 15 assists in 41 games, so losing out on that kind of offense could be deadly.

The initial word on Pearson is that he may have a broken bone in his leg after colliding awkwardly into the boards on Saturday night.  There has been no confirmation from the team, so it is taken with a dash of salt, but we all know how guarded the Kings are with their injuries, so finding out for sure will be a task all of its own.  Pearson will be listed as day-to-day until otherwise noted.  Pearson has been having a decent year, as a rookie, selected to the All-Star festivities on Saturday after scoring 12 goals and 16 points in 42 games.

The pool's leading goal scoring team, Grant K.'s, will now be without Toffoli for a while, it would seem, which hurts his chances of climbing back into the top 10 any time soon.  Grant's team fell further behind, now 16 points back of 10th, in 13th place.  And for Tony, it has already been a rough week, the pool leader for the Basement Dweller, going into Sunday's quiet schedule, as he awaits word on a loss of a body, possibly for a few weeks.  Tony has dropped from 3rd to 6th this week, illustrating how close that group was going into the week.

Little has been made about the lower-body injury that Mikhail Grabovski has suffered, but a note here should suffice, it would seem. Grabovski was reportedly hurt in Friday night's game between the Islanders and the Devils, which forced him from Saturday's game in Columbus.  From what I've seen so far, there isn't much for how he was injured or how long they expect him to be out, but he is currently listed as out day-to-day, so we'll leave it at that until something else is mentioned.

Grabovski hasn't been great for Allan or the Islanders this year, only picking up 14 points in 38 games this season.  Unofficially, I have Grabovski ranked 301st in pool scoring overall, which isn't too far from where he was selected, 295th, down in the 13th round.

Another injury will put Allan on the verge of last place, as he sits there already, going into Sunday's action in 22nd place, only 1 point up on 23rd (last).

It has been a couple weeks since Patrick Wiercioch was on the blog site (I think), but he has made a return to the press box as a healthy scratch, which means he gets another note here.  In some regular action, Wiercioch didn't really endear himself to his NHL team, failing to register anything offensive, which is one of the big reasons he's put into games.  In 24 games played, the 24-year old only has 1 goal and 4 points this year, way below expectations.

Unfortunately for Dale C., he felt he had some bigger fish to fry in the Waiver Draft, so Wiercioch wasn't dropped in Week Nine, but he remains a strong candidate for the boot in Week Eighteen, which is only a month away now.

Finally, in one of the early games on Saturday, Flyers goalie Steve Mason had to exit the crease against the Bruins with, what is described as a knee injury, and he was unable to return.  Mason was dealing with some injury problems all week at practice, but he did manage to suit up for a full game earlier in the week, but it just looked like something popped and that was it for Mason.  Currently, he's listed as day-to-day, but that's likely before a battery of tests that need to be done on his knee.  We'll await what the final prognosis is.

Did I mention that Allan was having a tough year yet?  Well, this is one of his goalies and as of Sunday morning, he now has six players on the injury list, three on the Injured Reserve, one came back last night (Tobias Enstrom of the Jets) and there are two now on with no official prognosis.  Tomorrow, we'll highlight where he stands in the trophy race, so I won't spoil it for you now.

An updated list of injuries can be found here.