Fantasy Hockey Forecaster: February 17th – 23rd

Welcome to the Fantasy Hockey Forecaster! In here, you’ll find:

• Each team’s ranking for goalies, forwards, PK and PP against the other teams in the league. These stats are as of 2/13/2020.
• Three players who are on fire (this might not even be points wise, it might be an uptick in play that signals to me they are on the cusp of some point production
• Three players who are cooling off (this will also include players that aren’t materializing the way we expect)
• Three free agent pickups (among all players under 50% owned, preferably some in the single digits and some that are close to 50 to feed all different sizes of leagues
• The schedule which will show each team they play and what the individual rankings are for each matchup, this is more useful in the daily leagues where you are looking at individual matchups

Let’s begin!

3 players who are on fire

1. Mika Zibanejad (92% owned) — Mika has really stepped up his game over the last two seasons. He went from 47 points in 2017-2018 season to 74 last year and he already has 50 this season well on his way to surpassing last season. In his last five games he has four goals and 3 assists including 2 power play points, four blocked shots and 48 face-offs won.
2. Leon Draisaitl (100% owned) — Three games, three goals and four assists including three power play points and 40 face-offs won.
3. Jacob Markstrom (84% owned) — Fresh off a shutout, Jacob now has back to back wins after suffering three straight losses.

3 players who are cooling off

1. Aleksander Barkov (99% owned) — I should not isolate this to just Aleksander but he has just one goal in his last six games and he has more than 3 shots in just one of those games. The Panthers as a whole have lost five of their last six scoring 2 goals or fewer in each loss, a rare feat for this offensively talented team.
2. Alex DeBrincat (88% owned) — It’s been a rough go for Alex who now has 1 point in his last six games to go with a -6 as the Blackhawks are on a five game losing streak.
3. John Gibson (87% owned) — Back to back losses for John who has allowed 3 goals+ in the two games. He lost to Calgary 0-6 after allowing 4 goals on just 12 shots.

3 free agent pickups (under 50%)

1. Conor Garland (14% owned) — I understood the trepidation earlier this year that his strong production would be a “lucky week” but he continues to produce. He now has 33 points including seven points in his last 10 games. He’s on Arizona’s top line with Taylor Hall and if you are in a league deeper than 12 teams, he should be scooped up.
2. Victor Olofsson (51% owned) — Barely over the threshold, pick him up! Back from injury and on his first night back he gets two goals including a game winner.
3. Juuse Saros (12% owned) — With Pekka continuing to struggle, Juuse is getting more usage, he now has three wins in five starts including a shutout and he has allowed two goals or fewer in four of the five starts.