Draft Player News (Nov. 12)

With the return of Jeff Carter to the line-up for the Blue Jackets, it means that someone has to come out of the line-up and it isn't going to be the newly-acquired Mark Letestu, who showed some value in his first game for the club. No, it will be Derrick Brassard, who gets the assignment of testing out the popcorn in the press box on Saturday night, as he is reported to be the healthy scratch.

In 15 games with the Blue Jackets, Brassard has been very disappointing (but who hasn't on that team?), with 2 goals and 2 assists in the opening span of the season.  It really is no wonder that he was chosen to be the healthy scratch in the game, but even still, I don't imagine that he will be on the shelf very long, unless he quickly gets sucked into trade rumours for the evening.

This is not good news for John P. in the draft, who is already without Jacob Josefson and Andy McDonald for the long-term, and is trying to climb out of the bottom half of the standings.  John currently sits in 18th spot with 106 points, 16 points out of the top 10, which should now be a goal for his team at this point.

The Kings have announced that forward Dustin Penner has now suffered a hand injury, which occurred on Thursday night against the Canucks, which will likely have him out of the line-up for over a week. The team is saying that the injury is not exactly minor and will not be a day-to-day thing, rather it will be longer, but an exact timetable has not been diagnosed as of yet.

The injury couldn't have come at a worse time for Penner, who has been starting to find his way around the Kings line-up, picking up a couple more points here and there, but he'll still leave with a pretty poor scoring rate, 3 assists in 14 games.  There's no question that Penner should have been better this season, but he just hasn't found his touch yet this year, much to the chagrin of the Kings.

Also, Stuart G. is finding a lot of chagrin from Penner, as he exclaimed at the draft, he didn't really want to pick him up any way.  Stuart's team has been good in spite of the pick of Penner, sitting up in 3rd spot with 143 points, 4 points back of 2nd and 9 back of 1st, in line for the Mover and Shaker this week, so I don't think he'll necessarily miss Penner, as the big winger hasn't done much for his success yet.

On the night that Mike Green returns from a nagging ankle injury, he finds a knee-on-knee collision with the Devils' Ryan Carter, forcing him out of the game against the Devils, early into the 2nd period.  As of early on Saturday afternoon, there was no update on Green's status, but we should be seeing something like an update before they play again, Saturday evening, in the second half of their home-and-home against the Devils.

Green is a member of the injury prone list and rightfully so, but his production does leave that nagging gamble that makes him somewhat worth the risk.  In eight appearances this season, Green has 3 goals and 3 assists, which is pretty good, but it is a shame that the Capitals have nearly played twice that many games in total.  Sure, he's putting up points, but he certainly isn't playing enough.

In the draft, this is a real concern for Leon G., who took the risk on Green and is struggling to hit the top 10 without him.  Leon now sits in 15th spot, 12 points out of the top 10 and he could really use a boost, something like Green's injury is not that serious and he is able to go on Saturday night.