Morning Player Notes (Jan 4)

On Wednesday night, the San Jose Sharks lost the services of defenseman Marc-Edouard Vlasic in the 3rd period of their game against the Avalanche, citing a possible wrist injury as the cause of his absence.  He missed the last seven minutes of the game, but the Sharks held on for victory.  There hasn't been any injury update on the veteran defenseman's status yet, so he'll be considered day-to-day, if he can't go in the team's next game, Saturday night, at home to Tampa.

The last few minutes, nursing a lead, probably meant that Vlasic wasn't going to get any points, unless he nailed an empty-netter, but if he does miss out on any time, Jesse will be down another player.  His team has been good this week, netting 23 points, through Thursday's action, but his team has been hovering around the middle of the standings all year.

The St. Louis Blues were without forward Vladimir Tarasenko for Thursday night's game against the Washington Capitals, due to a bout of the flu.  He was a game-time decision for the better part of the day, so he was pretty close to playing and I would expect him to be ready for the next game, Saturday night against the Islanders.  The Blues didn't miss him, which seems strange, as they topped the defending champs, 5-2.  Let the trade rumours swirl a bit more.

You can count this as a missed skater game for Eric's team, which also didn't miss Tarasenko much, since it's up in top spot in the weekly standings with 25 points.  Sure, he probably missed him for the sake of the Blues scored a handful of goals and he couldn't collect on it, but his team is doing alright this week, enough to miss one game.

Rookie scoring leader Elias Pettersson suffered another injury, his second this season, last night in Montreal, leaving the game with a lower-body injury after getting tangled up with Jesper Kotkaniemi in the 2nd period.  The team didn't offer too much in the way of updates, but they are keeping the dynamic forward with the team on their road trip and sending him for tests today.  We'll probably know more ahead of their game against the Maple Leafs on Saturday night.

The rookie is Clayton's meal ticket to getting his money back this year, as the rookie pool lead is hinging on how quickly Pettersson can come back from this injury.  There's still time to spare, as Clayton's team has a 21-point lead on Derek B.'s team.