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Geek of the Week: Teddy Purcell

In previous articles, I have focused most of my attention on drafts and finding value with your picks.  Now that the season is underway and most drafts are well behind us, I am going to start to turn my attention to the trade market and identifying opportunities to buy low or sell high. Knowing the perfect time to sell a player who is overvalued, or buy a player who is undervalued, will help you to improve your roster and continue your march to a fantasy league championship.  Today, I present a great sell high option: Teddy Purcell.

Teddy Purcell’s value is probably as high now as it has ever been. He finished last season on a tear (38 points in 34 games post ASB) and starting this season, he has picked up right where he left off with nine points in seven games.  Tampa Bay is leading the league in goals for and Teddy is 4^th on the team in average power play ice time.  Yahoo! Currently has him ranked as the 36^th overall player in the league!  Clearly Purcell’s stock is at an all time high but let’s look inside the numbers.

We already know that Purcell has shown an ability to put up points, but looking at the numbers there are a couple of concerning things with Purcell:

• Although he gets a lot of points he isn’t an elite goalscorer, netting only 24 goals last season and just 2 so far this year.  Goals are a more scarce stat than assists, so in a lot of cases a 35-35 guy can have greater value than a 25-45 guy despite having the exact same point total.
• When it comes to hits and PIM, Purcell is virtually a non-contributor… his totals in those categories are simply terrible
• His shot total of 152 last season was 61^st amongst all players who are RW eligible.  Even this season he is on a pace for just less than 200 shots, which wouldn’t have even put him in the top 30 for RW last year
• Aside from PPP and A, Purcell is average or below average in all other categories

To get an idea of the impact that Purcell’s poor output in many categories has on his overall value, I ran his 2011-12 numbers through Fantasy Hockey Geek (for a Yahoo! Standard 12 team league counting G, A, +/-, SOG, PIM, PPP)

You can see above, that although Purcell was tied for 37^th in league scoring last season, his overall value was calculated 169^th.  His lack of contributions in so many other categories really hurts his overall value.  I think it’s quite possible that Purcell will finish 2013 at a pace that is higher than 65 points, but his peripheral stats are not drastically improving so his value is very unlikely to match his Yahoo! Ranking of 36.

Now also consider this:

• Tampa Bay has played 5 home games and only 2 road games so far this year. His early 2013 production has benefited from an easier schedule
• Tampa Bay’s power play is currently converting over 34% of their opportunities. Last season, 21.6% led the league and Tampa Bay came in at 15.2%. It is a safe bet that Tampa’s power play will slow down this season and Purcell’s output will slow along with it

The above factors and previous season’s history would indicate that Purcell will not quite continue to produce at his current rate of 1.29 points per game.  Furthermore his lack of contribution in other key categories further reduces his true value greatly, as shown by the FHG numbers. His perceived value is at an all time high because of his points are sexy and Tampa Bay is a scoring machine right now.  What all this says to me is that it is time to sell high on this guy NOW.  Here are a couple of RW that could be good potential targets if you are dangling Purcell:

• Phil Kessel:  Kessel is another guy who doesn’t produce in all categories, but he does two things much better than Purcell – shoots and scores.  In the same Yahoo! League mentioned above, FHG calculates Kessel as having been the 68^th most valuable player last season, 101 spots ahead of Purcell.  Given that Kessel has 0 goals so far this season, an opposing GM might be happy to unload him
• Dustin Brown:  Brown is another guy who has started slow but has a proven track record of providing solid fantasy value.  FHG calculates that he was the 83^rd most valuable last season and 51^st most valuable two seasons ago.  If you happen to be in a league that counts hits as well, then Dustin is an absolute gem
• Depending on the GMs in your league and your league setup, you may be able to obtain a variety of other RWs that would provide you more value than Purcell.  Iginla and Oshie are a couple of other good options and you may even be lucky enough to score a David Backes if you do a good sell job.

Purcell is a great example of how to cash in on a sell-high to help win your league.  To identify more opportunities like Purcell, sign up for Fantasy Hockey Geek today!  Compare the actual value that FHG calculates with the rankings that are posted in Yahoo! and you can identify some great sell-high opportunities of your own.

Published Sun, Feb 03rd, 2013