Player Notes in the Draft (Mar 22)

How about we start off with some positive news from Saturday night, as the Edmonton Oilers welcomed back one of their star players, as Taylor Hall returned from an ankle injury, which cost him 20 games this year.  The oft-injured forward has only managed to play in 43 games this season for the Oilers, including last night, and has only managed 31 points in that time.  Last night, he did chip in with an assist in a 5-4 overtime win over the Flyers, so that's good news.

The single point did help Wyllie keep in arm's length of Allan for moving out of the pool basement, but still sits 2 points back, without the tie-breaker in his favour.  Will Hall be enough to help him move out and leave Allan with a couple of shameful bobbleheads, instead of just one.?

A couple of notes from the Boston Bruins on Saturday night, as they played the Florida Panthers in their quest to keep a playoff spot. The Bruins decided to scratch forward Reilly Smith for some pretty cold play of late, no points in his last five games and he was a -3 in the outing before against the Sens.

During the game, defenseman Dougie Hamilton suffered an upper-body injury, believed to be a shoulder injury, and it forced him from the contest earlier than the final buzzer in a 2-1 shootout loss to the Cats.  Hamilton will miss Sunday's contest against the Lightning, but he'll be on the list as out day-to-day, until further notice.

In the pool, Smith belongs to Ryan, who is in the dog fight to stay out of contention for the Olli bobblehead, but with his bad luck, much like his competition, this sort of thing shouldn't come as a surprise.  Hamilton, on the other hand, belongs to Grant S., who, I believe, will coast into through the final days now in 2nd place.  His position was threatened for a while, but since 3rd and 4th place slipped up of late, Grant's team should be safe now.

The Nashville Predators, who are destined for the playoffs, are being cautious with forward Colin Wilson down the stretch, including this weekend, as the pivot is dealing with a lower-body injury.  Wilson was starting to miss out on practices on Thursday and on Saturday, the team opted to sit him out for their game against the Sabres, as it was a match-up with a much lesser team.  There isn't much word on how bad the injury is at the moment, but since the team can afford to be cautious, they will likely continue to be.

This isn't good news for Wes, as he defends his 3rd place position in the white-knuckling time of the last month of the season.  He goes into Sunday's action, 8 points up on Clayton for the spot, losing out on 3 points, thus far in the week.  If the injury is a little more severe than assumed, it would be one less body to defend his spot.

News on Sunday afternoon... the Los Angeles Kings have officially recalled forward Mike Richards from the AHL, bringing him back to the big club after a stint in the minors, trying to regain his confidence. The Kings are in need of some help in their playoff push, by the look of things, so they have added a little bit more depth from a former NHL captain.

You would think that back before the second Waiver Draft of the year, after Richards was demoted, he wouldn't get a note for his return, as you would assume that he would have been dropped and that would be that.  Well, he was dropped, but then Allan decided to pick him up, more a protest move than anything and now he gets a body back in the lineup.  Allan is already destined for the Jordan bobblehead, but he can keep himself away from the Olli with more points.

An updated list of injuries can be found here.