Hey everyone, hope you all have managed to keep your fantasy teams afloat amidst another week of turbulent COVID-protocol plagued waters. Though it's been rough the past while, it does seem like we are through the worst of it in the NHL at least. There's still a ton of players sitting out from it, but I think once we are through this week and maybe next week, things could be back on the up and up. For now, we will continue to do our best to navigate through it and optimize our lineups accordingly! This week I decided to overview some potential adds and drops to keep your fantasy team moving in the right direction.

Adds

Evander Kane

As I am sure many of you have heard, Kane had his contract with the Sharks terminated earlier in the week. That made him an unrestricted free agent and free to sign with any team that will take him. Obviously, he has had a ton of bad press over the past year. Whether it was his degenerative gambling habits (been there!) or counterfeiting his COVID vaccine passport (not so much), he certainly has a lot of reparation to do in the PR department.

But we aren't here to judge his off-ice mishaps. If we are talking purely about what he can bring to your fantasy team with his on-ice play, this could be a massive potential pick-up. The rumors of Kane going to the Edmonton Oilers are particularly exciting because putting him with the likes of Leon Draisaitl or Connor McDavid could yield incredible results. Kane is a multi-category monster when he is going strong. 

He is a high-volume shooter, averaging 3.5 shots per game throughout his career and he has been known to rack up points at a pretty decent rate as well. He's also a huge pest and isn't afraid to get physical. He will definitely help you in the hits department, and getting the combination of hits, shots and points is pretty hard to come by. I've always viewed him kind of as "Ovi-lite". Granted, this would come with some risks. 

First off, we don't know when or even if he signs with anyone. It seems like we are on the verge of seeing him sign soon, but you never know with Kane. Secondly, the last time he played an NHL game was last year on May 12.  There certainly could be some rust there and it wouldn't be unreasonable for him to need a couple weeks to get re-acclimated to the speed of NHL play. A lot of owners have been jumping on adding Kane this past week. In Yahoo leagues he is up to 47% rostered, while in Fantrax he is at 57%. If you have room on your bench to stash him for the time being, I definitely recommend taking a chance on him.

Lawson Crouse

It feels like ages ago when I was watching Crouse win a gold medal way back in the 2015 World Juniors, but now he is 24 years old and it's already his sixth NHL season with the Arizona Coyotes. While he never broke out into superstardom, he still is on the right side of his 20s and has room to mature. So far this season he has nine goals and nine assists for 18 points. This puts him on pace for a 43-point season, which would be a career best.

One thing attributing to his success this year is a decent uptick in his shot rate. This season we are seeing him shoot 2.4 shots per game, which is up over one full shot from last year. Additionally, he is getting a nice boost in deployment this season. He's playing just over 18 minutes a game, which is more than four minutes extra per game compared to last season, and even more when compared to his career averages. He's been getting looks on the team's first power play unit as of late too, so that should help his offensive stats even more.

While you can't be sold on his offense alone, he does add some value with his hitting numbers. He's racked up 92 hits through 34 games, which is almost three hits per game which is a great number for a forward. Crouse is pretty widely available across all platforms. In Yahoo he is 15% rostered, 38% on Fantrax, and 6% on ESPN. There's also the outside possibility Crouse gets dealt by the Coyotes at some point this season since they are in full tank-mode, but regardless, Crouse can be a decent pickup, especially in the short-term since the Coyotes have four games this upcoming week!

Drops

Conor Garland

The honeymoon seems to be over in Vancouver, as the Canucks just dropped their third straight contest this week, although they've had some very tough competition after not playing for a few weeks, so that's important to consider. But during this unsuccessful road trip, and even beyond that if you go back to when Bruce Boudreau was first hired, Garland has seemed more and more invisible. It's not like he hasn't had chances to succeed. Boudreau has been putting Garland with captain Bo Horvat and the other slumping Canuck Elias Pettersson. 

Over the past 10 contests, Garland has just two goals and three assists, all of which came at even strength. He is still on pace for a 50-point season, but I had very high hopes for Garland this season. I thought he would be a perfect fit into the core of the Canucks forward group, and at the start of the season it seemed like that could definitely be the case. The team started struggling pretty quickly and that led to the eventual firing of head coach Travis Green. Boudreau came in and the team went on a nice winning streak before COVID reared its ugly head again. Unfortunately though, Garland's ice time has been dwindling down a lot lately. 

To his credit, he is still shooting a great volume, averaging just under three shots per game It's tough to say if Garland is struggling or if he is just a byproduct of his team's recent woes. This might be more of a "bench" than an all-out drop situation for now, but if Garland continues to struggle, it might be worth searching for alternatives. He doesn't rack up a ton of hits or blocks, so you really need to rely on his offense to make him worthwhile. Monitor his results closely, but it might be time to cut your losses soon.

Brayden Schenn

While the St. Louis Blues remain strong in the uber-competitive Central division out West, they certainly haven't gotten much from veteran forward Schenn. The 30-year-old winger has been plagued with injuries this season and currently is out thanks to COVID protocol. Schenn has only dressed for 22 contests this season so far, and in those games he hasn't looked great. He only has five goals and seven assists for 12 points. 

He is still getting decent deployment when he is healthy and playing as he still averages over 17 minutes a night, however, he doesn't seem to be doing much with his time. His shot rate is down to 1.5 per game which is the lowest mark since his rookie season in Los Angeles all the way back in 2009 (man I'm feeling old right now).  It could be that father time is catching up to him, or that he's not at 100 percent health-wise. 

In prior years Schenn provides supplemental value via hits and decent faceoff wins. His totals may climb if he can get back in the lineup and stick, but for now I feel like there are better options out there to be had. Like Garland, this might be a situation you want to monitor, but it feels like Schenn is a player you can move on from. With the re-emergence of Vladimir Tarasenko, the Blues have done pretty well without Schenn so far this year, but don't completely rule out the chance he comes back and finds his game again.

Well that's all for this week. Hopefully this was helpful advice for some of you. We are still a long way from the finish line for this season, so make sure you don't wane or falter in keeping your team optimized to be the best it can possibly be! Until next week, I'll catch you all later!