FanHouse NHL Fantasy Focus

Jason Blake is a player I have a lot of respect for and one that I enjoy watching. The dude plays like a border collie, bouncing around the ice with boundless energy. It's hard not to like a player that works so hard and seems to enjoy the game as much as he does.

Blake is also a very adept 2-way player, and is the type of guy a coach can feel comfortable about playing in any situation. Blake's hustle makes him a great penalty killer as well as a team picker-upper. Just look at the way he battled back from his cancer!

What Blake is NOT, however, is a big offensive producer. Yes, he once scored 40 goals for the lowly New York Islanders, but one need only look at his career history to see what an outlier that was.

Here are the numbers ...

Jason Blake is a player I have a lot of respect for and one that I enjoy watching. The dude plays like a border collie, bouncing around the ice with boundless energy. It's hard not to like a player that works so hard and seems to enjoy the game as much as he does.

Blake is also a very adept 2-way player, and is the type of guy a coach can feel comfortable about playing in any situation. Blake's hustle makes him a great penalty killer as well as a team picker-upper. Just look at the way he battled back from his cancer!

What Blake is NOT, however, is a big offensive producer. Yes, he once scored 40 goals for the lowly New York Islanders, but one need only look at his career history to see what an outlier that was.

Here are the numbers ...

Looking for a potential Fantasy League steal next season? How about Andrew Hutchinson, the ultimate power play specialist "defenseman" that the Tampa Bay Lightning just signed to a two-year free agent deal.

With Dan Boyle traded to the Sharks, the Lightning are woefully short of blue-line talent that can produce offensively. Filip Kuba led all Bolts' d-men with a whopping 31 points last season. That ain't gonna cut it, sister!

Hutchinson is clearly going to be given a chance to quarterback the Tampa power play, and after spending last season in the AHL (64 points in 67 games), he'll be a very cheap pick-up in any fantasy league you're in.

In 95 career NHL games, Hutchinson has put up 33 points, with 20 of those being on the ice during mad-advantage situations. Consider the fact that Hutchinson averaged just 12:13 of ice time per game, and you realize that the boy knows how to put points up on the board at an efficient and effective rate.

Yes, Hutchinson has many warts in his game, but Tampa has loaded up their forward corps with many offensive talents to feed the puck to. A team that features Vincent Lecavalier, Martin St. Louis, Ryan Malone, Mark Recchi, and Vaclav Prospal front is going to, potentially, do a lot of damage on the Power Play.

Jump on this guy while you can.