Every Sunday, we share 21 Fantasy Rambles from our writers at DobberHockey. These thoughts are curated from the past week’s 'Daily Ramblings'.

Writers/Editors: Ian Gooding, Michael Clifford, Alexander MacLean, Puneet Sharma, and Dobber

—

1. Each week on Fridays, Caleb Desjardins writes about the upcoming fantasy week in his ‘Looking Ahead’ column. Be sure to check out his write-ups for week-to-week coverage on good/bad upcoming schedules, players to trade for/trade away, and a whole lot more.

Today’s Ramblings are going to be a type of look-ahead, only we’re going to look at the rest of the season from the holiday break onward. Which teams have good schedules? Which teams have tough schedules? Who has an easy head-to-head playoff schedule? Those are the kinds of things we are going to look at.

Scheduling data comes from the Frozen Tools Schedule Planner at time of writing.

Light Work for Anaheim and Ottawa

To start, the Anaheim Ducks have 45 games left in the season (no team has more than 47). The important part here is the Ducks have 21 games on ‘light’ days, using the cutoff of 7 total games in a day (less than half the league). Anaheim doesn’t have the most volume for total games remaining, but anyone looking to stream secondary options like Mikael Granlund or Olen Zellweger will have the chance to do so frequently because the Ducks have a lot of games on those light days.

On top of the light-day scheduling, the Ducks have one of the easiest schedules remaining by opponent points percentage. Not only are there going to be a lot of days where the Ducks’ depth options are stream-able, but a lot of games against teams in the bottom-half of the league on top of that. With the offensive upside their roster has, the Ducks are going to be one of the most important lineups for fantasy players in the second half.

While Ottawa only has 16 games on light days – third-most of any team remaining but far behind Anaheim’s 21 – another factor here is that they have 46 total games (tied for fourth-most) and 10 of those games are back-to-back situations (tied with several other teams for most in the league). Of all the teams with at least 10 B2Bs left, Ottawa is tied for the most total games remaining (46) and has the most games on light days (16).

Of note is what this means for Leevi Merilainen. Assuming he stays as Linus Ullmark‘s backup, it should give Merilainen at least 10 more starts this season, and perhaps more if Ullmark’s play isn’t up to the level Ottawa needs him. All those light-day games mean there could be some streaming value for guys like David Perron, Claude Giroux, and Ridly Greig. (dec26)

2. Shark Attack

While San Jose doesn’t have close to the most games remaining (45), they do have 10 games on back-to-backs, so there are going to be two goalies with fantasy value in the second half for the Sharks.

Importantly for San Jose is that, according to the Schedule Planner, the teams remaining on San Jose’s schedule are giving up the most goals against per game, and they have one of the easiest schedules overall when looking at opponent points percentage. Maybe the Sharks still decide to trade some of their UFA veterans at the Trade Deadline, but if that is the case, guys like Collin Graf, Igor Chernyshov, Shakir Mukhamadullin, and Sam Dickinson could have some solid fantasy value down the stretch (Graf and Chernyshov have some fantasy value right now, to be honest). Either way, San Jose’s remaining games are a favourable stretch for them and that’s something to keep in mind when looking to make trades for a top option like Macklin Celebrini or streaming the depth options. (dec26)

3. Unloading Leafs

Toronto has 46 games remaining on the schedule, which is a healthy amount, but 26 of those 46 games are on the road, only 13 of them are on light days (about league average), and their remaining opponents are tied for the fewest goals against per game this season. Overall, that isn’t a great schedule for fantasy managers hoping for a big second half from the likes of Auston Matthews and William Nylander. (dec26)

[Follow the link for more…]

4. For an in-depth breakdown of the second half of the fantasy season, be sure to pre-order the 2026 Dobber Midseason Guide! It will have second-half projections, trends, prospects to keep an eye on, and a whole lot more. Head on over to the Dobber Shop to pre-order a copy today. 

5. The World Juniors kicked off on Boxing Day, just as they do every year. For at least a day, they don’t need to compete with the NHL, which is on the last day of its three-day holiday break. I’ll share some of my observations of the WJC games played on Friday, day 1 of the tourney.

In the first game, 2026 draft prospect Ivar Stenberg made a lasting first impression, scoring the game-winning goal for Sweden late in the game. The Swede that I was really impressed with was Anton Frondell, who scored a goal and an assist (both on the power play). Frondell had a certain presence in this game with his skating ability and his shot, which seemed noticeable enough for him to be named Sweden’s player of the game. Blackhawks fans should be excited about the third overall pick from the most recent draft, while his fantasy value seems to be trending upward.

The U.S. looked like they were going to make quick work of Germany, storming out to a 3-0 lead. However, the Germans scored two goals to get the game to 3-2 and eventually 4-3. The Americans took over from there as the far more dominant team late in the second period to go up 6-3, with the score not changing after that. William Zellers, a Bruins prospect who I assume has no ties to the Canadian department store chain, scored two goals for the Americans.

Canada/Czechia turned out to be the tasty main course for those who tuned in for the quadruple-header on TSN. This was an exciting game with plenty of goals. Although Canada took this game 7-5, Czechia looked like they were never completely out of it.  The story of the game turned out to be Zayne Parekh. Left off last season’s roster, Parekh scored a pair of goals, showcasing an impressive shot and top-level offensive instincts on Canada’s top power play.

Parekh wasn’t quite as outstanding on the defensive side of the game, however. That should not discourage keeper leaguers, as few defensemen possess his level of offensive upside. Just don’t expect immediate dividends when he returns to the NHL, as it may take some time for Flames coach Ryan Huska to trust him to log 20+ minutes per game in all situations. While development takes place on his defensive game, Parekh may be limited to being a power-play specialist with sheltered minutes initially. At least the power-play side of that role could really take shape if potential UFA Rasmus Andersson is traded before the deadline.

For a comprehensive preview of the World Junior Championship and the key players in it, check out last week’s The Journey from Victor Nuno. The article is broken down into two parts: Part 1 on Sweden, United States, and Canada, and Part 2 on the remaining countries. (dec27)

6. With it being the WJC season, there is the annual World Juniors contest over on the DobberHockey forums that anyone was free to make a forum account and take part in.

The basis of the contest is picking 12 forwards, six defencemen, and two goalies who will tally the most points through the tournament. The added wrinkle is that the top 4-5 forwards and the top 3-4 defencemen are in a box from which you can only select one to “captain” your team, and then to fill out the rest of the roster you only have a max of five players per team.

It's a fun balance of needing to try to project the winning teams, stacking the projected top players from those teams, and figuring out how best to balance it all together into one cohesive roster.

I’m not a perfect prospect guru, nor have I had a lot of luck in this contest in previous seasons, but it is still a lot of fun. This year, Canada does seem to have the strongest team, while the usual suspects should bring the main competition. Interestingly, the Czechs have a great record over the last few years, and should provide some of the best competition outside of the usual U.S./Canada/Sweden trio. I have a feeling that being able to project which Czechs are going to finish at the top of the team will have a big impact on the standings in the tournament.

With the top three teams, there is so much fire power to choose from, that it almost hurts you to go too heavy there, as it uses up your forwards slots and forces the goalies and the defencemen to be selected from much weaker groups. It’s a similar theory that you get when drafting in normal leagues, or when acquiring players in cap leagues. The acquisition cost and value-above-replacement are important considerations too. (dec24)

7. This year, I have five players from Canada, Sweden and the Czechs, along with four Americans, two Finns, and one Swiss player to round out the set. My goalies are from the Czechs and Sweden, and I wanted to load up on Canadian skaters, figuring they were maybe a bit more projectable at the top end than some of the European groups.

For the Americans, I had Trevor Connelly in my lineup, as one of the more talented scorers on their team… that is until he was cut on the 23rd. The Americans were already

bringing a team that on paper looks a bit less skilled than previous iterations, and without Connelly I wonder about them looking flat and unable to score like we have seen from the Canadian teams the last few years when their brass overthought roster decisions.

Bottom line: don’t overthink the roster decisions, and bring the best players, figuring the rest out later. Teams are much less likely to lose because they can’t score, rather than something else. A key for fantasy teams too. (dec24)

8. With NHL players still on mandated vacation time, news barely trickles in during the holiday season. However, the Oilers announced on Friday that David Tomasek has been placed on waivers for the purpose of contract termination. Tomasek will reportedly return to Sweden, where he had 57 points in 47 games with Farjestad last season. Tomasek managed just five points in 22 games, getting buried down the lineup after an early-season trial on the McDavid line and the top power play.

One regular feature in the Midseason Guide (available for download January 8) lists and describes players who are not signed to NHL contracts succeeding in European leagues. Many of these players were never drafted (like Tomasek) and could be legitimate late bloomers. As long as these players haven’t already reached 30, they may generate interest from NHL teams and become available for signing once their seasons ends. I listed Tomasek in this article last season, citing his success over multiple seasons in the SHL. Now that Tomasek is 29, his NHL window has very likely shut.

This particular path is not an easy one the NHL, as hockey development focuses on players meeting a certain curve – hitting during their draft year at 18, then being developed under the watchful eye of a team’s system. Results have shown that the European league free agent route is more of a shot in the dark than anything for NHL teams. However, the upside to this path occurred in 2015, when the Blackhawks signed an undrafted 23-year-old KHL scoring star named Artemi Panarin. (dec27)

9. With the NHL on its holiday break, it's time for my annual Christmas wish list. Today, we’re sending Santa our wishes for the second half of the NHL season. Whether it’s teams to keep performing the way they are, specific players continuing to provide solid fantasy value, or just players being able to stay on the ice, here are the fantasy hockey wishes I’m making this Christmas.

Just Stay Healthy

Starting with preseason injuries to top names like Matthew Tkachuk and Aleksander Barkov, up until now, injuries have been a massive storyline so far this season. It isn’t just your imagination as NHL Injury Viz highlighted last week how the 2025-26 season (black line) is far ahead of 2024-25 (yellow line) in terms of Man Games Lost through each team’s first 32 games, and far ahead of the 24-year average from 2000-2025 (red line):

10. Carolina’s Top Stars Find the Next Gear

It isn’t as if the Hurricanes are a poor offensive team – easily inside the top-10 by goals-for per 60 minutes this season – but none of their top forwards are at the point-per-game mark and only Seth Jarvis looks to be a reasonable lock for a 30-goal season (Sebastian Aho is around that pace, so he might get there, too). Aho was over a point per game in both 2021-22 and 2023-24, he had 36 goals in 2022-23, and Martin Necas was over a point per game before he was traded last season. That Carolina is scoring well but only Jarvis is providing good fantasy value among their forwards is a concern.

A big reason for this is the power play. From 2023-2025, Aho averaged over one PP point every three games but he’s averaging fewer than one every four games so far in 2025-26. As a team, the Hurricanes are in the bottom-half of the league in power play goals after finishing eighth in the league from 2023-2025. As good as they are at even strength, if the Carolina power play doesn’t get going, their top forwards are not going to have high-end fantasy seasons. As someone who is heavily invested in the fantasy success of Jarvis, Svechnikov, and Nikolaj Ehlers, a better power play would be a welcome sight.

11. San Jose Are Deadline Buyers and Not Deadline Sellers

One team I was frequently stacking players from in fantasy drafts was the San Jose Sharks. I drafted a lot of Macklin Celebrini early and then grabbed at least one of Tyler Toffoli, Will Smith, or William Eklund outside the top-125 picks.  So far, so good, and heading into the holiday break, the Sharks are still in the thick of the playoff race.

Very few people really expected the Sharks to push for a playoff spot this year and the next six weeks – leading up to the Olympic break – will likely determine what they do as March, and the Trade Deadline, roll around. The team has a number of veterans in the final year of their current contracts – Alex Wennberg, John Klingberg, Mario Ferraro, and Timothy Liljegren, to name a few, per PuckPedia –  and if the team decides to be sellers at the Deadline, it could have a big impact on their ability to be successful offensively down the stretch. Again, as someone who has a lot of San Jose stacks on his fantasy rosters, this is not the desired outcome.

It would be great to see San Jose play at least .500 hockey over the next month or so and make management’s decision to trade away players much harder, and maybe even entice them to acquire depth options to help bolster some holes on the roster. Maybe the Sharks run out of steam and that becomes unlikely, but this is a wish list, not a will-happen list.

12. Anaheim Keeps Pace

Another team I was high on for fantasy purposes, considering their low draft cost, was the Anaheim Ducks. I even wrote in the preseason about how the 2025-26 Anaheim roster could be what the 2024-25 Columbus Blue Jackets were – a team that made a huge leap offensively and provided a lot of fantasy value to those who invested in the roster. It led me to grab a lot of shares of Cutter Gauthier, Leo Carlsson, Mason McTavish (ehhh), Chris Kreider, and Jackson LaCombe. With the Ducks being a top-5 team this season by goals per 60 minutes, so far, so good.

The question is whether they can keep up the pace. Just over the last few weeks, the team’s scoring rate has slid from one of the best in the league to the middle of the pack. Here is the good news: from the holiday break to the end of the regular season, the Frozen Tools schedule planner has the Ducks with the fourth-easiest schedule by opponent points percentage. Now, their recent schedule hasn’t been overly difficult, either, so it’s no guarantee of success, but it does provide some hope that they keep up their offensive pace.

We will see how the next month-or-so goes, but it would be nice to see Anaheim bolster their blue line a bit and add players rather than subtract them. Maybe they’re not a top-3 offensive team in the second half, but if they can just be a top-10 team, then they’re going to finish the season with their top players being among the best values in fantasy this season, and potential league-winners.

[Follow the link for more…]

13. Some injury notes: Seth Jarvis and Jaccob Slavin are both week-to-week with upper-body injuries, per Stephen Whyno. It is not great for Slavin that he missed a couple of months with an injury, returned for three games, and is now back on the shelf. Hopefully this isn’t something that lingers all season because he’s one of the most important pieces of that Hurricanes roster. With Jarvis injured, expect more top PP time for either (or both) of Nikolaj Ehlers and Jackson Blake, depending on what they do with Jordan Staal. (dec23)

As well, the Seattle Kraken announced that defenceman Brandon Montour underwent surgery on his hand and he will be out four weeks. Moreover, Vince Dunn took a hard hit in the third period of last Monday's matchup, left the game, and did not return. With Montour already out, the Kraken cannot afford to have Dunn miss much time. Any time he does miss should mean a lot more PP time for Ryker Evans. (dec23)

14. Last Tuesday was the last day for NHL hockey before the holiday break, which means it was a good time to look back on the unofficial first half of the season to see where some preseason predictions are going wrong. Some of my preseason Ramblings included:

• Why the top Montreal Canadiens fantasy picks are overvalued
• Why the top Dallas Stars fantasy picks are overvalued
• Targeting Joey Daccord in net
• Drafting Robert Thomas over Nick Suzuki (oh man)

Let’s go over those one by one. Player data is from Evolving Hockey and current as of the morning of Monday, December 22^nd. (dec23)

15. Overvalued Canadiens

The basic premise here is that Nick Suzuki was going around the 50^th pick almost regardless of the site/format/league and he typically doesn’t have strong peripherals, Cole Caufield was being drafted even earlier despite ice time concerns, and Lane Hutson was going a bit later even with very modest peripherals. It wasn’t that the productions concerns were high, it’s just that the shot, hit, block, or ice-time categories were a big concern.

So far this season, that hasn’t really been a problem for any of the three:

• Suzuki is a top-20 forward in standard ESPN leagues and top-20 skater in standard Yahoo! Leagues.
• Caufield is a top-30 forward in standard ESPN leagues and a top-40 skater in standard Yahoo! leagues.
• Hutson is a top-20 defenceman in standard ESPN leagues and a top-12 defenceman in standard Yahoo! leagues

Montreal had three skaters going somewhere in the top-75 picks (give or take), and all three are paying off in ESPN and Yahoo! leagues thus far.

As for Suzuki, a big reason why he’s been such a great option is his power-play production. With 19 PP points, Suzuki is tied for 5^th in the league and has the most of any forward outside of Dallas and Edmonton. It does help when you’re seeing 76% of the team’s power-play time (a career-high mark) and you also have the fifth-highest increase in team shooting percentage when you’re on the ice for the power play compared to the prior two seasons:

We will see if Suzuki (and Caufield and Hutson) can keep this up after the holiday break, but anyone that drafted any of the three must be happy with what they’ve received so far. (dec23)

16. Overvalued Stars

This is the one that really hurts because while the Canadiens’ skaters have been good, they’re only a bit better than their draft slotting (that will vary by format, of course). Dallas, though, has blown their preseason draft positions out of the water:

• Jason Robertson is a top-12 player in standard ESPN leagues and a top-5 player in standard Yahoo! leagues
• Mikko Rantanen is a top-3 player in standard ESPN leagues and a top-10 player in standard Yahoo! leagues
• Miro Heiskanen is a top-5 defenceman in both standard ESPN and Yahoo! leagues

Those three aren’t just surpassing their preseason draft value – they’re among (or just straight up are) the most valuable players in the league at their positions. Missing out on that value hurts.

As with Suzuki and the Canadiens, the power play is a big reason for Dallas’ value as Rantanen sits third in PP points and has the most outside of Edmonton, Robertson is tied with Suzuki for fifth, and Heiskanen is tied with Cale Makar for second among defencemen. Dallas leads the league with 35 PP goals in 37 games and at this rate, Rantanen is on pace to reach 50 PPPs.

Just beware of the second half here. Rantanen skated 21:27 per game in October, 19:24 in November, and is down to 19:08 in December. Similarly, Robertson’s December TOI/game rate is nearly two minutes per game lower than his TOI/game in October. Also, the Stars were over one PP goal per game up to the Thanksgiving break (25 PPG in 24 games) and have 10 PP goals in 13 games since that break as they’ve lost nearly one full power play per game (3.33 to 2.46). With the team getting healthier, the Stars’ top, er, stars are getting less ice time, and the team’s power-play production is dropping as they draw fewer power plays. It will make for an interesting second half in Dallas. (dec23)

17. Joey Daccord

Seattle started the season 11-5-5 but are 2-9-1 over the last month (heading in Monday’s game). Similarly, Daccord started the season 7-3-3 in his first 13 starts, posting a .900 save percentage and a 2.78 goals against average. Not elite numbers, but pretty good for a guy who was drafted around or outside the top-25 goalies. Seattle’s drop in recent weeks has been reflected in Daccord’s numbers as he’s 2-6-1 with an .899 save percentage and 2.97 goals against average over the last month.

Notice in the paragraph above how Daccord’s save percentage has been consistent before and after Seattle’s crash, but the wins have disappeared and the GAA grown. In those two splits, Seattle went from 13^th by shots against per minute to 30^th. They weren’t a high-scoring team at any point, but even their goal rate declined from 27^th to 31^st in the league.

After the holiday break, the Kraken have the ninth-easiest schedule in the next five weeks by opponent points percentage, per the Frozen Tools schedule planner. Things should get better soon, but Seattle’s last month has really hurt the solid value Daccord was providing early on. (dec23)

18. Draft Robert Thomas

Thomas and the St. Louis Blues certainly aren’t performing up to expectations. While the problem has a lot of facets (Cam Fowler has had a massive drop off compared to his time with the Blues last year, for example), one thing I noticed going through the tracking data from AllThreeZones is that Thomas is responsible for a lot fewer zone entries at 5-on-5 than he normally is. In fact, here are some forwards who typically have a high rate of zone entries and are seeing a big drop this season:

Sebastian Aho has his lowest points/game rate since 2017-18, Travis Konecny has a four-year-low points/game rate, Kirill Kaprizov‘s points/game rate is a three-year low, Dylan Holloway was nowhere near the same player he was last year (before his injury), and Andrei Svechnikov‘s points/game mark is his lowest since his rookie season. Again, these problems are multi-faceted, but the puck should be on the stick of the best players as much as possible, and it’s not happening for a lot of key names this season. (dec23)

19. Axel Sandin-Pellikka creeping in on Mo Seider‘s ice time, specifically on the man-advantage, has not fully taken form yet. Heading into the break, Seider was still managing the top powerplay unit for the Red Wings with an average PP TOI of 3.08 minutes. Sandin-Pellikka is clearly next in line, but for now, he is sitting closer to half that usage. Seider was having a career year with 29 points in 38 games, putting him right at a 63-point pace, which would comfortably be the best season of his career. (dec22)

20. If you were hanging on by a thread in fantasy or just waiting for some life out of New Jersey, Jack Hughes finally being back in the lineup felt like a jolt of energy last week. He missed 18 games with that hand injury and the timing couldn’t have been better as the Devils have been spinning their wheels trying to find any sort of rhythm. (dec22)

21. Last but definitely not least, Sidney Crosby's point against Montreal last Sunday carried more weight than a routine goal, as he officially passed Mario Lemieux to become the Penguins’ all-time leader in points, a milestone that lands somewhere between historic and surreal given the name he surpassed. (dec22)

—

From all of us here at Dobber Hockey and Dobber Prospects, a very happy holidays to all of you out there reading. We could not do what we do without the support of the people perusing the articles and buying the fantasy guides, so we are very thankful for the dedicated readership. We hope that you have league-winners on your roster and that your trades work out in your favour. All the best to you and yours.

Have a good week, folks!

Thanks for continuing to support the website and if you’re bored and need a fantasy hockey fix – visit the gang in the forum here.