NHL DFS Advice for 3/30/2018
NHL Hockey is a volatile game in real life and DFS. I’ve found that DFS hockey is the most like baseball. You need correlation in both cash and GPP, pay up for the most reliable production (Goalie, Pitcher) when you can, and everyone’s floor is zero. Sidney Crosby can get you a goose egg, and Mike Trout can go 0-4 with three strike outs and kill your line-up. It can happen, and it will happen. Just ride it out with me and you’ll have success. For more nuggets follow me on Twitter @rflynndfs and follow along in Slack. The goal of this article is to highlight a few stacks, defensemen and goalies for you and add a few honorable mentions. My picks are almost exclusively taken from this player pool, unless I find some value as the day goes on. Those notes are for VIP’s only though. I am very active in Slack and I will answer anyone’s questions or help you finalize your lineup.
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I play more classic on FanDuel, and still play some Pick ‘Em on DK, so when I talk stacks I will focus more on FD. The scoring is similar as far as points being weighted. DK favors activity (ie shots and blocks more so than FD), while on FanDuel goals and assists are king. For cash, you can mix and match pieces from my stacks to create your lineup. For cash I generally only do two forwards and maybe a defenseman for a 3-man stack, but that’s it. In cash, you want pieces of a lot of good scoring options; in GPP, you live and die by your line stacks.
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You hear a lot of people say “don’t play that guy, he’ll be too high owned.” Forget that nonsense, it is very overrated. Yes, you need some lower owned guy to go off. But if you build a solid team, you’ll have success. It’s highly unlikely that someone will have the exact same team as you. That’s true in all sports!
Without any further ado. Let’s break down tonight’s 6-game slate.
Forwards
For forwards, I focus on higher projected games, generally the top-2 lines on those teams – there will be times when line 3 will be in play it’s rare. Then I look at Corsi numbers, both for and against for that line and the line they will be matched up with for most of the game.
COL 1: Rantanen, MacKinnon, Landeskog – Nate at home and they’ve scored 11 goals in the last 10 games. Just play them in GPP and some combo of this group in cash.
NYR 1: Zibanejad, Fast, Kreider – They have six goals in the last ten games and are going against a TB team that’s on a B2B and their top line has given up 5 goals in the last ten games. All three guys are cash viable as well.
Game stack of NYI-TOR – This will be popular because it is the highest projected game on the slate. My preference for GPP is to use NYI 1 (Tavares, Lee, Bailey) and TOR 2 (Kadri, Marner, Marleau). Marner might be the safest for cash in this game but Tavares and Lee and viable as well
Honorable Mentions: TB 1, ANA 1, LAK 1, TOR 3, CAR 2, VGK 1, STL 1, WSH 2
More big wins ho hum
Defense
For defense, I look for floor. The main scoring is going to come from the forwards. By floor, I mean: shots on goal, blocks, points (those are harder to predict) and I want a defense man that gets a lot of ice time on the PP too. Just like in any other sport, you can’t score points if you’re on the bench.
Gustafsson: The best value play on the slate and I think he goes overlooked with CHI being terrible and the masses flocking to Varly in net. He has 9 points and 47 BSSOG over the last 11 games.
Rielly: 11 points and 35 BSSOG over the last nine games and makes a great cash mini stack with Marner.
Barrie: 9 points, 45 BSSOG over the last 11 games. He is in a great spot and makes a great addition to the COL 1 stack.
Honorable Mentions: Seabrook, Pionk, Slavin, Pulock, Hedman, Niskanen, Carlson – value all over in the defense section tonight
Goalies
Goalies are not the easiest to predict. Just like a pitcher in baseball, they can come out flat. And once they get off to a rough start some don’t recover. I lean heavily on Vegas when choosing a goalie. Look at the money line and implied team total (ITT). Generally, it is a pay up spot. (This article is coming out before all goalies are confirmed. ALWAYS confirm starters before locking one in)
Varlamov: 5-3-1/2.39/0.935. He is probably the safest goalie on the slate. CHI is struggling and mostly trying out their young guys to see what they have as a preparation for the off season. COL is a different animal at home and they are still alive in the Wild Card hunt.
Fluery: 6-3-1/2 shutouts/1.70/0.946. I think both goalies in this game are viable. Allen is hot, Fleury is much better at home and has the -155 Vegas support. Both teams are battling for playoff positioning so it could either way. I see it being lower scoring though.
Holtby: 3-0-0/2.66/0.910 He is the largest Vegas favorite on the slate but I do not trust him in cash, especially against a team that shoots as much as Carolina. He’s viable for GPP but I’m not playing him. I wrote him up more as a warning than a usable goalie.
Honorable Mentions: Gibson, Quick (sneaky cash viable even though he is an underdog right now), Allen