Fantasy Focus: Mining the waiver wire on October 31

We are back again to sniff out some potential value pickups ahead of Monday’s slate of games and the official start to another Fantasy Hockey matchup.

If you’ve read any of my weekly waiver wire articles or have much experience with fantasy hockey, you already know the importance of working the waiver wire – especially during a season like this one where we’re faced with a constant stream of players sitting out for Covid or another injury.

Every year we see players who were unheralded, underappreciate, and underrepresented on draft day come out of the shoot hot and pay dividends for those who were fast enough to scoop them up. Some of those players fall back down to earth and end up back in the heap for anyone to take a stab at. Others continue to defy preseason expectations and turn into tangible pieces capable of helping your team charge toward the fantasy playoffs.

As we do every week, I'll explore some candidates that are rostered in fewer than half of Fantrax leagues at the time of writing but suddenly find themselves in better situations, are working with a hot hand, or facing an overly generous schedule.

This week, there are seven clubs with four games including the Panthers who are facing an entire buffet of unlikely playoff squads. Additionally, we have five clubs with just two games, so right off the bat, we’ll be hedging away from the Colorado Avalanche, Columbus Blue Jackets, Minnesota Wild, St Louis Blues, and Winnipeg Jets.