Noon Player Notes in the Draft (Nov 29)

It all happened so quickly, it doesn't get it's own post today. On Friday night, Columbus forward Brandon Dubinsky was caught cross-checking Sidney Crosby of the Penguins in the head, which he was penalized in the game for and then called to the carpet for, just before Saturday night's game against the St. Louis Blues. Dubinsky was handed a 1-game suspension for his cross-check and he sat out of Saturday's game in the process. He'll be available when Week Nine kicks off, which is why he doesn't get his own post today.

It's another skater game lost for Dale C., who, for the most part, has stayed relatively healthy all year, unofficially ranking 5th (tied) in skater games played, heading into Sunday's action, only nine game back of the pool leader in the category.  Still, his team needs a bit of a scoring boost next week, as his team sits 28 points out of the money.

The Blackhawks certainly haven't been suffering through this salary cap crunch they've been having this year, but the coaching staff is still trying to squeeze as much offense out of this group as possible, even if that means moving players in and out of the lineup to do so. It looks like Marko Dano was a healthy scratch for the team on Saturday night, in the game against the Kings. Dano was thought to be an off-season steal for the Hawks, but has only picked up 2 points in 11 games, spending some time in the AHL this year.

In my mock draft, I have Dano being dropped by Troy, but there is no guarantee that the mock draft is at all right.  Troy is right there in the mix this year, only 6 points out of the money and any kind of boost to the forwards would likely be appreciated next week.

The Nashville Predators were working on back-to-back nights, which you would have expected the back-up, Carter Hutton, to have played after Pekka Rinne got his start the night before, right? Well, that wasn't at all the case. The Predators surprisingly called up Juuse Saros to take the start, scratching Hutton, and adding a little bit of confusion to the mix. The Predators lost to the Sabres, 4-1, in the process, so maybe there isn't many more questions... who knows?

For John R., he is looking to pick first in this coming week's Waiver Draft and after a healthy scratch like this, I would imagine that Hutton's days are numbered on his side.  John will have his pick of the litter of all the available keepers, if he so chooses.

The St. Louis Blues have been shuffling the deck a little bit, as their lineup continues to get healthy again and on Saturday, against the Blue Jackets, they decided to sit forward Dmitrij Jaskin for the game, as he has only 5 points in 22 games this season.  Jaskin hasn't found a whole lot of consistent offense this year, so the Blues have been wise to look elsewhere at times.  The Central Division remains a difficult decision to play in, so they need all the help they can get.

Jaskin is another drop candidate for Troy, who saw a couple of healthy scratches on Saturday night.  As we've already outlined in this post, Troy is hunting for money, so he'll be busy, I'm thinking, during the Waiver Draft.

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