Josh Norris and Evander Kane suddenly returning to action only a few days after Max Pacioretty returned ahead of schedule again underscores how much these athletes and their medical support pushes the limits of usual recovery timelines. When you have the ability to sit on an injured asset that you can buy-low on, it's often worth your while as those players return earlier than anticipated a good portion, if not a majority of the time. Anthony Duclair, Gabriel Landeskog, and Vladimir Tarasenko are the next major names to watch out for.

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I've read through the entire Midseason Guide, and is it ever just an encyclopedia of info. Ian and Dobber outdid themselves this year, and hats off to the rest of the team too. It's a pleasure to contribute to the guide and make it what it is. A ton of hard work compressed into a very short time-frame goes into it every year.

Maybe it's just me, but it feels like I got even more out of it this year than years past. It's extremely relevant for a short period of time, and then by the end of January you're too far behind your league mates to catch up anyways. Get in on it today over at the Dobber Shop now.

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With Mark Stone out of the Vegas lineup the last 2.5 games, we saw a bump in ice time from Jonathan Marchessault and Michael Amadio as they were each tried on the top-line with Jack Eichel and Chandler Stephenson. Both put up a minus rating and not much to show for it, so it's possible that we see someone else get a shot to try and fill in for what could be a lengthy absence from Stone. Keep an eye on Phil Kessel, Reilly Smith, and Nicolas Roy as intriguing options if they get any extended time with the top line. Roy and Paul Cotter have been seeing some time with the top PP unit, so maybe Roy gets the next shot.

Check in this afternoon for Brennan De Souza's Injury Ward update, he'll have the latest news there.

Cotter is a name that you probably haven't heard much of this year in fantasy circles, but he's worth getting on your radar, especially in leagues that count PIMs. His minutes, shots, scoring rate, and especially his hit rate have risen from the start of the year. He had four minors in his first eight games, and it has been zeros since in the PIM column, but he does have a history of high PIM numbers at the lower levels, so there may be an explosion with a fight/misconduct very soon. All of his power play time has come in Q2, which does say that he is getting a bigger look offensively. As a fourth-round pick back in 2018, Cotter is on a good development curve, and may still have some growing to do.

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Philadelphia Flyers defenceman Rasmus Ristolainen infamously took until game 27 to record his first point this year, and last night in game 38, scored his first goal – on a shorthanded two-on-one no less. That is point number three on the season for Risto, and his numbers are slowly looing up as the season goes on.

Generally, John Tortorella's presence behind the bench has not been good for the big man. Risto's ice time has dipped this year to his lowest of his 10-year career. His shot rate has also plummeted, though his peripherals are still solid. It's partially just that Philadelphia is such a mess as a team this year, and Risto has seen some bad luck on top of that. Unless we see a coaching change, then I think it's likely to get worse and not better. The hit rate is also dropping as the year goes on, and there hasn't been a multi-shot game since December. At least the blcks will stay high because that's what he does best: get in the way of things.

Kevin Hayes added a hat-trick on six shot for the Flyers, who still have three games left this week. Hayes is on pace for career highs in points and shots, and has already topped his career-high in power play points. Still available in 70% of Yahoo leagues and 38% of Fantrax leagues.

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The Capitals have struggled over the last week to keep the puck out of their own net, losing twice to Philadelphia, and giving up at least three goals in each of their last four. They are missing John Carlson on the back-end, and I think they might actually be missing Aliaksei Protas in the lineup as well. Protas was sent down to the minors with the return of Nicklas Backstrom and Tom Wilson, but that swap put a lot of offence into the lineup while taking out a lot of defensive zone starts and defensive consciousness. Overall, that shift to a more offence heavy lineup means that some of the scoring forwards need to take a bit more responsibility in their own end (and it won't be Ovechkin's line).

The Capitals had a very clear division of who the offensive and defensive specialists are, and they have been deployed as such. Protas, along with Garnett Hathaway and Nic Dowd, have been taking on those heavy assignments, and have actually been driving play in spite of it. Without Protas in the lineup, and with the added offensive minutes from Backstrom and Wilson, it seems that the goalie values are going to take a hit. In the short term though, it looks like Dowd may hit the IR, and Protas has been called back up.

This lineup balance is likely also why Mantha is the odd one out here as opposed to names like Nicolas Aube-Kubel, and Marcus Johansson. I'm expecting a trade very soon where we see a forward swapped for a defenceman.

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The starting goalies in the Florida/Toronto game tried to match their combined GAA in the game to their combined cap hit of over $16 million. They didn't quite make it, but Sergei Bobrovsky and Matt Murray sure gave it a good run and did come within one. Murray was pulled for Ilya Samsonov early in the second period, and left the game with a GAA of 11 having stopped four of eight shots. Overall, he's putting up his best season since 2018-19, though he has been inconsistent as his "Really-Bad Start" (RBS) percentage is a little elevated. It is always tough for goalies playing in front of new defences though, so I would expect Murray (and Samsonov for that matter) to settle down and be a little more reliable in the second-half.

That's a fair thing to note about a lot of goalies. Alexandar Georgiev, Jack Campbell, Darcy Kuemper, Cam Talbot, etc. Look for them to at least level out a little in the second half.

Over on the Panthers' end of things last night, Sergei Bobrovsky doesn't have that excuse. By save percentage, he's having his worst season of his career, though it has gotten a little better from Q1 to Q2. His RBS% is elevated as well compared to previous seasons, but it's still below 20%, which is a good sign. However, while Samsonov hasn't done enough to steal the crease from Murray, Spenser Knight has been the better goalie all around in Florida. Expect him to see a larger workload in the second half, as contract politics play less of a role, and the team gets more desperate for wins (because they don't have their first-round pick).

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Mike Hoffman and Evgenii Dadonov (twice) both scored last night, incrementally upping their trade deadline value. As both wingers will likely be gone by the deadline, that should free up a lot of sheltered minutes for youngsters like Cole Caufield, Juraj Slafkovsky, and others. The team may not win a lot down the stretch, but there will still be someone scoring, and it may start to get more concentrated on just one or two lines.

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A game against the Chicago Blackhawks is just what Tage Thompson needed to bust his "slump" of five games without a goal. That's his longest stretch without a goal. I would be surprised if he had another five game stretch all season without a goal.

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Cody Glass scored for Nashville last night, putting him up to 10 points in the last 15 games. He has been centering the top line recently, between Filip Forsberg, and Matt Duchene. A plum assignment if he can keep it, though the Nashville lines have fluctuated all year. Maybe worth a short-term pickup, and he could be a solid fantasy contributor in the coming years, but don't expect any consistency for the rest of this campaign.

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I'm a little late to the game on this one, as the PHF season is half over, but there's a new fantasy platform out there for the best women's league around for those of you that feel like you need a new challenge. You can check out the "She Plays" app on most platforms.

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There were two contracts signed in the last week, with the Bruins extending Pavel Zacha at a $4.75 million cap hit for four years, and the Wild extending Matt Boldy at a $7.0 million cap hit for five years. Both are very reasonable deals, and are close to my current projections for them as well. With the

My numbers do need some updating though, and that will happen over the next week as I update the cap league rankings for the skaters (publishing Jan 25^th) and the goalies (publishing Jan 26^th). With those done, then I will publish the upcoming 2023 free agent class salary projections as well around the end of January, as all of this work is part of one cohesive system.

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See you next Wednesday!

In the meantime, you can find me on Twitter @alexdmaclean if you have any fantasy hockey questions or comments.