This article is part of our The Goalie Report series.
The All-Star Weekend was supposed to be a chance for teams to relax before the playoff races heat up. It was anything but leading up to it, however, with the Canucks making a splashy trade for Elias Lindholm, taking arguably the top player off the trade board, while the Jets acquired veteran center Sean Monahan and the Kings fired head coach Todd McLellan.
Even though no games were played from Thursday to Sunday, the three moves sent ripples across the fantasy hockey landscape.
Here's this week's Goalie Report.
Trending Up
Cam Talbot, Kings (14-13-5, 2.59 GAA, .911 Sv%)
Talbot was on the "Trending Down" portion of last week's list, but that was prior to McLellan's firing. Usually, when a new coach comes in, the incumbent starter gets a chance to show his new coach what he can do. David Rittich is not the answer, despite his strong play at times this season, and the Kings have yet to acquire another goaltender, though that remains a distinct possibility.
The caveat: their new head coach, on an interim basis, is Jim Hiller, who was promoted from his assistant position. That means he's seen up-close how much Talbot has struggled lately and their four most recent wins were all with Rittich in net. The immediate test will be tough against the Oilers on Saturday, and perhaps Hiller will start Talbot against his former team. If Talbot plays well — well enough, anyway, considering he's facing the league's hottest team —
The All-Star Weekend was supposed to be a chance for teams to relax before the playoff races heat up. It was anything but leading up to it, however, with the Canucks making a splashy trade for Elias Lindholm, taking arguably the top player off the trade board, while the Jets acquired veteran center Sean Monahan and the Kings fired head coach Todd McLellan.
Even though no games were played from Thursday to Sunday, the three moves sent ripples across the fantasy hockey landscape.
Here's this week's Goalie Report.
Trending Up
Cam Talbot, Kings (14-13-5, 2.59 GAA, .911 Sv%)
Talbot was on the "Trending Down" portion of last week's list, but that was prior to McLellan's firing. Usually, when a new coach comes in, the incumbent starter gets a chance to show his new coach what he can do. David Rittich is not the answer, despite his strong play at times this season, and the Kings have yet to acquire another goaltender, though that remains a distinct possibility.
The caveat: their new head coach, on an interim basis, is Jim Hiller, who was promoted from his assistant position. That means he's seen up-close how much Talbot has struggled lately and their four most recent wins were all with Rittich in net. The immediate test will be tough against the Oilers on Saturday, and perhaps Hiller will start Talbot against his former team. If Talbot plays well — well enough, anyway, considering he's facing the league's hottest team — he might just take back the net. Talbot's fantasy value is trending just ever so slightly upwards with a second chance to prove his worth.
Justus Annunen, Avalanche (AHL: 14-5-4, 2.65 GAA, .908 Sv%)
The Avs waived Ivan Prosvetov on Sunday following two lackluster performances, as he allowed four goals on 13 shots in an 8-4 loss to the Panthers and five goals on 24 shots in a 6-2 loss to the Jets. This may spell the end of his tenure with the Avs for Prosvetov, who was claimed off waivers at the beginning of the season and will become an RFA in the summer.
In steps Annunen, who ranked eighth in wins and 16th in saves in the AHL at the time of his call-up to serve as a backup to Alexandar Georgiev. We saw Annunen earlier this season on Jan. 16, when he stopped 36 of 40 shots in a 7-4 win. A third-round pick in 2018, Annunen is seen as a piece of the future, and we will likely see him very soon with the Avs playing back-to-back Monday and Tuesday. There are concerns the workload for Georgiev, who has already played 41 games this season, is more than what the Avs are comfortable with, especially with a long Cup run ahead of them. Georgiev hasn't been that sharp this season with a .898 Sv%, and if Annunen plays well, he could see as many as 10-15 starts, with a good chance of winning the majority of them thanks to the Avs' impressive goal support.
Annunen could be a strong streaming option and also worth rostering if you have Georgiev to get the full tandem.
Trending Down
Jacob Markstrom, Flames (14-13-2, 2.60 GAA, .912 Sv%)
The bad news is the Flames traded their best center in Lindholm to a division rival. The worse news is that this is not the first player the Flames will ship out before the end of the deadline. They had already traded defenseman Nikita Zadorov (also to the Canucks) earlier this season, and their waiver claim for Knights defenseman Brayden Pachal is a signal that veteran defender Chris Tanev may be on the move soon.
Though Markstrom has been fantastic over the past two months following a tough start to the season, the road is only going to get tougher from here with a roster that's going to be gutted, at least in the short term. The one reprieve may be a trade for Markstrom himself, but at this point that does not seem likely. Markstrom will retain fantasy value due to the volume of starts, but the wins will be even harder to come by than before.
