4 NHL FanDuel Studs to Target on Thursday 12/16/21
In any daily fantasy lineup, spending up in any daily fantasy lineup is how to get the superstars and the highest upside players in your lineup.
In NHL DFS, it’s different from paying up in sports like NBA or NFL. Someone can be one of the highest salaried players at his position and put up a total dud of a performance, and paying that much for him would be a huge mistake. Let’s make sure we are paying up in the right spots when building our lineups tonight.
Thursday night gives us ten more games. Let's see what studs are out there.
Josh Norris, Center, Ottawa Senators
FanDuel Salary: $7,200
The Ottawa Senators now have a new stud that they have unleashed on the world. His name is Josh Norris.
Thursday night offers some studs that are not super high-salaried like Nathan MacKinnon, Connor McDavid, and Leon Draisaitl.
Norris now has 14 goals on the season and six in his last six games. It may not seem that the Tampa Bay Lightning are the most ideal matchup, and yet, that gives it a little more value.
Ottawa is a team that has a dangerous top-six (18 power-play goals; 10th in the NHL). That may lend itself to some tremendous chances to stack Sens on Thursday night.
Max Pacioretty, Wing, Vegas Golden Knights
FanDuel Salary: $10,600
Max Pacioretty is well past the $10,000 mark on FanDuel. Simply, that is quite amazing -- but deserved. Pacioretty has gotten at least one real-world point in every single game this season.
Pacioretty enjoys another good matchup in New Jersey -- a team who is a disaster defensively and allows more than three goals a game at home.
Additionally, the Devils are battling COVID and non-COVID illnesses. Even Mackenzie Blackwood was playing sick on Tuesday against the Philadelphia Flyers.
Fortunately for Vegas, the winger has 12 goals in 11 games as the Vegas Golden Knights continue to average right around 3.5 goals per game.
The Golden Knights could be one of the best plays on Thursday night. Stacking Zach Whitecloud or even Chandler Stephenson with Pacioretty could be a solid move.
Drew Doughty, Defenseman, Los Angeles Kings
FanDuel Salary: $6,900
Drew Doughty could benefit from facing a slightly banged-up Florida Panthers' team. Florida allowed eight goals at home to the Ottawa Senators, and Doughty has five real-world points in his last five games. The Los Angeles Kings played well in Tampa Bay earlier in the week.
Doughty provides a nice floor as well; he has two or more blocked shots in seven of his past eight appearances. Doughty also has 13 shots on goal and 15 scoring chances during the past three games.
Doughty is positioned well to sneak at least a bunch of scoring chances. He averages the third-most FanDuel points per game for a blue-liner (16.78), and he is poised to be a safe investment.
Cam Talbot, Goalie, Minnesota Wild
Cam Talbot got a respite on Tuesday when the Wild and Hurricanes game was postponed.
Talbot gave up five goals on 35 shots in the loss to the Vegas Golden Knights. Now, Minnesota gets to play at home against the Buffalo Sabres on Thursday night.
Buffalo's offense is certainly capable of scoring a few goals. but the Minnesota Wild enjoy a 71.4% chance of winning on Thursday -- highest on the slate.
His salary is not as high as it could be given the matchup.
Chris Wassel is not a FanDuel employee. In addition to providing DFS gameplay advice, Chris Wassel also participates in DFS contests on FanDuel using his personal account, username chriswassel. While the strategies and player selections recommended in his articles are his/her personal views, he/she may deploy different strategies and player selections when entering contests with his/her personal account. The views expressed in his/her articles are the author’s alone and do not necessarily reflect the views of FanDuel.
