Morning Player Notes in the Draft (Nov 30)

The Arizona Coyotes are likely holding their breath with the upper-body injury to defenseman Oliver Ekman-Larsson, as he left the game against the San Jose Sharks on Tuesday night.  There were reports that Ekman-Larsson was seen with his left hand wrapped up after the game, but there has been nothing official given by the team, as of Wednesday morning.  The Coyotes will host the Kings on Thursday night and it seems doubtful that the cornerstone of their blueline will play.

This is Stacey M.'s best defenseman now going down, which certainly has to be a concern.  His 10 points might be a bit of a disappointment to this point in the year, but he's only going to improve on that, if he's playing.

The Boston Bruins have been dealing with some blueline issues of their own and they have been piling on.  On Tuesday night, John-Michael Liles was not in the lineup for the Bruins/Flyers games, thanks to a concussion, which will now keep him on the shelf for at least a week.  Liles suffered the head injury on Sunday against Tampa Bay and the team has now listed him out indefinitely, likely with a trip to the Injured Reserve before too long.

Now Ryan only has two healthy defensemen on his team and there isn't a lot in the way of quality defensemen in the Waiver Draft to choose from.  There's no real indication about when Liles could be back, so if it is a long-term thing, he might be wise to swap him out for anyone who is healthy.

Buffalo Sabres number one goalie Robin Lehner only played in 17+ minutes in last night's game against the Ottawa Senators, before getting lifted due to a hip injury.  There's no word on whether or not this is related to his problem he had last season, but it isn't a good sign, when a goalie is dealing with a hip injury.  The Sabres are suggesting that this is a day-to-day injury, so we'll see how that works out for them.  Their struggles offensively, don't need a goaltending component to them.

Jeremy's goalie survivor status is only a fraction less certain, especially since Lehner is his number two guy and hasn't really been relying on him too heavily.  Nevertheless, that isn't the only game in town and his overall points total isn't giving him much confidence, down in 21st, 30 points out of the money.

The Dallas Stars defensive woes continue and the scratching of John Klingberg, for the second time this season, is a sure sign that things are not very good in Dallas.  Sure, Klingberg is only scoring at half a point per game, not quite where he was thought to be, but it could be a lot more about his defensive game, where his plus/minus rating was well below par, as of Monday's audit.  The Stars dropped another game in Detroit last night, so I would imagine there are going to be more changes.

This is more bad news for Jeremy, who seems to have run out of luck in recent weeks.  His team was in 17th for a few weeks, but this week, with only 1 point, so far, it has dropped down even further.  Maybe all he has to hope for is the goaltending survival.

The hand injury that Bobby Ryan was dealing with earlier this season, has reared its ugly head again.  Last night against Buffalo, Ryan left the game in the 1st period, after he re-aggravated the injury.  The Senators have already come out and said that the scoring forward would not be available for Thursday night's game, at home to the Flyers, but there was no further indication about things being much worse.  It's going to be a lot of wait-and-see.

Wes' team is off to a good start in Week Eight, already posting 8 points through the first couple nights of action, but this injury won't be too pleasing.  Wes' team is one of the few to have already made a pick in the Waiver Draft and it looks like he's going to try and work his team out of the basement, as best he can.