We're back again to unearth some of the waiver wire gems that are likely sitting around waiting to help you in the short term and maybe even turn into long-term assets.

If you’ve read any of my weekly Waiver Wire articles, or realistically, have much experience with fantasy hockey, you already know the importance of working the waiver wire, especially in a season like this one where we’re faced with constant roster upheaval by positive COVID diagnoses and COVID-related travel issues.

Every year we see players who were unheralded, underappreciate, 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 owned in fewer than half of Fantrax leagues at the time of writing but suddenly find themselves in better situations, with a hot hand, or facing an overly generous schedule.

The week of January 24th is a nice one for total games, especially if we can avoid too many postponements. Some top teams like the Boston Bruins, Carolina Hurricanes, New York Rangers, Pittsburgh Penguins, and Colorado Avalanche all have four games. And then there’s a sneaky setup like the Ottawa Senators have with three home games. There are options to grab and stream and we’ll investigate them now.