Daily Fantasy Hockey DFS Value Update – March 7

I generally do not pick two players playing against each other in the same game for a daily fantasy hockey lineup. The same applies for a goalie and a player from opposite teams. You might see two players among the “value picks” from opposite teams, but that doesn’t mean you should take them both. No matter the value, you’re also likely cannibalizing points, so any gains made below a certain price point – the point where production and cost intersect – can be lost if production declines overall as well.

There are many things that determine value: The player’s history (both short and long-term), the price, recent production, opponent, line matching at even-strength, power play time and injuries are just some of the factors to consider. The “Top Value” doesn’t necessarily mean the cheapest player, either.

Finally, as far as goalies go, it’s the one position I’ll pay through the nose for if I really like the match-up. The same applies for back-ups with good match-ups. In a given night, with a full slate of games, I won’t have more than three different goalies across all my lineups, usually two. I’ll name the goalies I like specifically in the match-ups they appear in.

Here is today’s slate of games (and DraftStreet values). Reminder: check Left Wing Lock for up-to-the-minute information on starting goalies.

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Games are color-coded as follows:

Green means stack for GPPs. Yellow means targets for cash games. Red means value plays only.

New York Rangers at Carolina Hurricanes

The Rangers lost Martin St. Louis’ debut with the team 3-2 in overtime to Toronto on Wednesday. As it has gone all year, the Rangers outshot the opponent but couldn’t score enough to win. The bright side to that game was it seemed that St. Louis and Brad Richards hadn’t missed a beat since their days in Tampa Bay. That’s also very good news for Carl Hagelin, the bottom six forward who was put alongside Richards not long ago. There is a ton of speed on that line and seemingly instant chemistry. Not a bad stack target.

Carolina won their first game off the break in San Jose their last time out 3-2 in overtime. The Hurricanes are going through a real rough stretch of shooting lately as the team is shooting just 5.6-percent combined through their first five games following the Sochi Olympics. A lot of this has to do with their power play that has gone 0-for-21 in those five games. They’ve also given up 20 power plays in return in those five games (though just allowed two goals against).

The only game these two teams played this year was a 5-1 win for the Rangers. It might not be that big of a blowout but a 4-2 Rangers win sounds about right for tonight. I am definitely interested in stacking the Richards line in GPPs. Also, Raphael Diaz should be in the lineup tonight and he could be an interesting value pick depending on what his usage projects to be.

Michael Clifford

Michael Clifford was born and raised in Fredericton, New Brunswick, Canada and is a graduate of the Unviersity of New Brunswick. He writes about fantasy hockey and baseball for XNSports and FantasyTrade411.com. He can be reached on Twitter @SlimCliffy for any fantasy hockey questions. Follow @SlimCliffy !function(d,s,id){var js,fjs=d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0],p=/^http:/.test(d.location)?'http':'https';if(!d.getElementById(id)){js=d.createElement(s);js.id=id;js.src=p+'://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js';fjs.parentNode.insertBefore(js,fjs);}}(document, 'script', 'twitter-wjs');

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