Morning Player Notes (Jan 16)

New Jersey Devils forward Miles Wood missed Tuesday night's game against the Columbus Blue Jackets with a lower-body injury and is currently listed as out day-to-day.  He wasn't able to complete Monday night's game in Chicago, due to the injury and now the team is somewhat unclear as to whether or not he'll be able to return before the All-Star break or not.  The Devils will have an extended break around the All-Star festivities, so it might be a good time to just rest up and have him ready for the stretch run.

Wood has been somewhat disappointing this season, only picking up 5 goals and 16 points in 45 games, not quite the season he had previous, which was the basis on Ryan's selection this year.  Ryan's team has been managing okay with a sub-par Wood, still in 10th place, 33 points out of the money.

Speaking of the All-Star break, the New York Rangers have now ruled out defenseman Neal Pionk until after the break, due to a lower-body injury of his own, one that caused him to miss a game last week, as it seems to have re aggravated and the team has deemed it worth shutting him down over.  This would mean the first possible game that he returns will be on the 29th, at home to the Flyers and he'll only miss two games in between now and then, already having missed Tuesday night's game against the Hurricanes.

The situation could be much worse for Troy's team, as missing a few games isn't so bad, especially given the timeframe before he could possibly return.  Troy's team currently sits in 6th place, 20 points out of the money and we're quickly coming up on the second Waiver Draft of the year, so there will be one more tinker time to get more competitive, if need be.

The Anaheim Ducks lost the services of forward Jakob Silfverberg on Tuesday night against the Red Wings, as he fell awkwardly with defenseman Mike Green on top of him, possibly injuring his knee or ankle in the process.  The injury occurred in the 1st period and he didn't return to the game, likely to be reevaluated in the next day or two.

More injury problems for Benson's team, which can't seem to catch a break this year.  Silfverberg has been somewhat disappointing at the same time, 19 points in 42 games, and an injury will only make things worse at this point.  We'll wait and see what the news brings on this injury, but Benson's 21st place team can't handle much more bad news.