OK fellas, I have selected a league. Pasted below are the stats.

I am the green-est of the green. Zero experience with Fan hockey. I dont really know all the teams and cities...let alone players..(I know, for shame; but joining this league will change that entirely!)

so to the goods.
How do I apply this scoring to current stats, so I can amass a quality list of players?
Suggestions for Draft-Strategy??

Is there anything you may have done differently from your recent draft?
I would appreciate some Monday night QB; hind sight 20/20 vision insights.

-also-

Consider this a Shout out thread, drop me some names of good players and their positions/team that I should be looking to draft..or surprizing sleepers or rookies or the like...


and finally, there are several roster spots for forwards and defensivemen; but only two for goalies.. Are there some STUD goal keepers I should know about?

ANY and all help will be appreciated.. I prolly will bump the hell out of this thread till MON when the draft is..

Thanks in advance (and if you posted in my other help thread. I am heeding your guidance)

Time for the AFRO to lace up the skates and (hopefully with you-alls help) CrossCheck some Fools!

Max Teams: 14
Scoring Type: Head-to-Head
Max Moves: No maximum
Max Trades: No maximum
Trade Reject Time: 7
Trade End Date: March 18, 2010
Waiver Time: No waivers
Can't Cut List Provider: None
Trade Review: Commissioner
Post Draft Players: Free Agents
Max Acquisitions per Week: No maximum
Min Games Played: 4
Weekly Deadline: Daily - Tomorrow
Start Scoring on: Week 3
Playoffs: Week 22, 23 and 24 (8 teams)
Divisions: No
Roster Positions: C, C, C, LW, LW, LW, RW, RW, RW, D, D, D, D, D, D, Util, Util, G, G, BN, BN, BN, BN, BN, IR
Forwards/Defensemen Stat Categories: Goals (G), Assists (A), Points (P), Plus/Minus (+/-), Penalty Minutes (PIM), Powerplay Goals (PPG), Powerplay Assists (PPA), Powerplay Points (PPP), Shorthanded Goals (SHG), Shorthanded Assists (SHA), Shorthanded Points (SHP), Game-Winning Goals (GWG), Shots on Goal (SOG)
Goaltenders Stat Categories: Games Started (GS), Wins (W), Losses (L), Goals Against (GA), Goals Against Average (GAA), Saves (SV), Save Percentage (SV%), Shutouts (SHO)

http://www.nhl.com/ice/app?component=compl...;service=direct


from the nhl.com website, top scoring players to date. you can also seperate it by position it the tool bar accross the top.

as far as goalies go dont drink the coyotes or avalance koolaid , this early season success will not keep up. the usual top goalies are, andre fluery from pittsburgh, henrick lundquist from the rangers and for guys that seem to play every game, nabokov in san jose, kiprisoff in calgary and miller in buffalo. and martin brouder in jersey.

hope this helps.

I use TSN for a lot of my info. It is kinda like the ESPN of Canada and they give pretty good attention to the NHL as you might imagine. This first link has some good info and some links on it that you will likely find helpful. I would look at the stat projections and the cheatsheets to get an idea of where players were ranked/valued. Looks like you are in a Yahoo league and within Yahoo you can find some info as well. Look for Draft Central and from that drop down menu you can find some resources like Draft Kit. The Draft Kit has a lot of info(ie rankings, cheatsheets, projections) from Rotowire that are generated based on standard Yahoo scoring which is what you will be using it appears. Other than those resources, I know ESPN and CBSSports do have fantasy hocky stuff but I havent looked at them much if at all.

Since the season has already started, check the scoring leaders and standings to see who is doing well now. Also, go back to last year and maybe beyond and see what that looks like. Some of those names you will notice were listed atop the rankings and cheatsheets and some will not. That is where you will have to dig a little deeper to see if its a case of an average guy is just off to a hot start or if that player is a legit stud. Hockey players are streaky, so there are some guys going good right now that are likely to cool off and regress to their career avgs and there are some guys who have yet to hit stride. Perhaps the most important thing to look at now, though, since the season is underway is injuries. There are a lot of guys who are ranked pretty high that are already out for significant time. For example, just from my own team, I lost Johan Franzen for 4+ months with a torn ACL, I have Sheldon Souray on IR with a concussion, and I just lost both Marc Savard and Sergei Gonchar this week for 4-6 weeks with a broken foot and wrist respectively. Definitely check the injuries and make sure you're not drafting someone that is out for a long time.

As far as strategy, you want a mix of players that are going to be as consistent as possible across as many categories as possible. In most cases, the better offensive players will see a lot of Power Play time, too, so getting the premier scorers is always a high priority. Its also crucial to get stud goalies since you only have two and they score in 8 categories. Depending on where you pick(out of the 14 teams) you could make a strong case for grabbing the best goalie with your first pick. Guys like Luongo, Nabokov, Lundquist, Kiprusoff get a lot of starts and usually finish with good stats. Brodeur may be the best goalie ever so dont forget him, either, even though he's getting up there a little bit. Since you only start two, its really important to get two workhorse guys, IMO, and I think I'd make sure to grab a 3rd one and stash him on my bench, too.

Hope this helps a little bit. If you want, I can show you what my team looked like after the draft and what it looks like now if you think that would be useful.

Good luck and have fun!

Gentz!
Muchas Gracias!!

I have to Rank these guys and my hoops league this weekend!!

I will post my hard-work's rewards so yous can comment, and critique.

OK, I am setting off to sea, thanks again for the compass, and map so for.
Props to Darkside, and esp Delicious Bass. good looking out!

Do not wait to grab your LWs. There are very few decent options at LW and you can quickly find yourself starting substandard players if you neglect the position.

Good info here^

Just like in fantasy football, value/worth at a position is often determined by scarcity/wealth of talent. For example, in fantasy football, there are a lot of WRs but only a few really good ones. The drop off is typically rather pronounced between the top group and the next tier. Similarly, in hockey, there are positions were there is more/less talent. Just for argument's sake, looking at the projections from TSN, you'll see there are 10 centers projected to score 80 or more points but only 4 LW and 3 RW. With that in mind, if you get a chance to secure a premium wing(either side), you may want to do that and you'll likely have a nice competitve advantage at that position. I ended up with the #8 pick(of 12) this year and I took Kovalchuk who is a LW that typically scores a lot and gets a lot of PP points. You may be able to wait a round or two on a center and still get a guy who scores a lot whereas if you wait on a wing you might end up with a guy who doesnt help you quite as much. As far as defense, there are a ton of d-men but only so many that score consistently and/or a lot. Look for guys who get a lot of time on the Power Play and play on teams with a lot of skilled forwards. I'm talking guys like Green(Wash), Lidstrom(Det), Gonchar(Pit), Chara(Bos), Phanuef(Cal), etc. Gonchar is out injured right now but under normal circumstances he fits the bill. These are guys who will get you points 5 on 5 and really shine with the man advantage which is when a lot of the scoring takes place.

Again, best of luck and if there's any more info I can help with, go ahead and shout.

Besides Ovechkin and guys like Malkin Crosby and such; How soon do you guys see any goal keepers going?
I read somewhere that its a regular 1st Round position taken. how do I need to measure their value vs my fielding team of skating starters?

Ideally I would like to get Three quality Gs as they could be a position may warrent possibly reserving an extra bench spot for..

(I would like to try and get 1or2 Upper tier, and a quality guy I can spot start or fill in if need be.)

since its a 14 team league, I pretty much guess there will be pleanty of quality talent off the board right away, and those with out deep analysis (um me) may suffer without any real concrete know how..

So if you can advise me on a scheme for draft..
um I guess a;
first round, target these guys,
2nd-3rd rounds, get this group,
4-5 get sleepers or rookies
etc.etc..

Ill try my luck with mock drafts and try to pick up on the tendancies meantime.. thanks again me bruddas.

Like QBs in FF, somebody always seems to bite in the second round, if not, likely the third round.

My advice to you in the Goalie department is to resist temptation to take a goalie too early. Likely you'll see Nabokov, Fleury, Brodeur, Luongo and Kiprusoff go early, I'd be ok taking Ryan Miller, Nikolai Khabibulin and a flier guy like Jon Quick or Ilya Bryzgalov. Meanwhile, your front line will be better than the guys biting on goalies early.

Man the further I dig, the more I get sucked into more and more stats, and stat categorys!!

So now being as how this is a fun league and experience, is there any FREE ADP tools out there I can get on, before I draft within the next 24 hrs? I really dont wanna shell out (although I knowit will help my expierence with necessary tools, I am goiing to see if increased coverage of the sport, and study of the statitistics can get me where I need to be later in the year. for this first year.)

TFord, thanks for the 411; I had that feeling, looking at some of the rankings they have per position..But a few "top 100"have some goalies up there..this is why I am trying to find some space between Smart team balance, and Smart values toward the start of my Maiden Voage draft..it would be nice to be a contender out of the gate.

going to try a few mocks before I hit the bed tonight, and spend most of the day tomorrow Ranking, Printing and Praying I can get the jump on some fellas in thiis draft!

Assuming you 1) dont know your exact draft slot yet, and 2) dont know the tendancies of the other owners in your league, its tough to tell you exactly how to go about it, IMO. I mean, if you pick in the top 3 spots, I think its pretty safe to say go AO, EM, SC. Outside the top 3, depending on where you pick and who is available, I would find it difficult to tell ya exactly what to do . Best advice I can give is to not be too rigid on a set "strategy" other than to get the best player you can. Definitely have a plan of what you want to achieve, but be willing to alter/ammend the plan on the fly as necessary. I guess what I am mainly trying to say is be careful not to get too set on grabbing a player(LW, for example) with your first pick without first seeing who is available to you.


I am going to go the other way than Tford a little bit(not saying he's not right...) and advocate getting at least one stud goalie fairly soon. In a 14 team league, depending on where you are in the order, you could have a lot of picks to wait between yours and if you dont plan it right, you could be watching helplessly as there is a run on good goalies. Given you have a lot of categories that goalies "score" in(including Games Started) but you only start two actual goalies, I think its vitally important that you get some good ones. Keep in mind you need to have your goalies play a minimum of 4 games(combined) during the week or you lose all goaltending categories and that would almost certainly spell doom for that week. You are able to change your lineup each day which means you'd be able to get around it better than someone like me who plays in a league where we can only change our lineup once a week, but you dont want to find yourself in a postion where you're having to pick up/drop goalies a lot to make sure you're getting enough good goaltending. 4 games is not usually a problem, but if you wait too long on a goalie and you end up with guy(s) who dont get as many starts, you could find yourself flirting with it more than you'd like. Something to keep in mind, anyway.

Given Afro is an admitted novice when it comes to hockey, might be easier for him to build solid goaltending and work out from there rather than try too hard to evaluate wing vs center vs def which can be more difficult. That's just one thought I would have but, again, be careful not to get too caught up in getting one position or player without first seeing who is available.

Hope that helps

D-Bass, I appreciate your insights, I am getting nervous as the deadline is looming (and I wanna Watch MNF tonight too! gaff)

So far as I know, the draft order is random; and I have no clue how runs will go, and who has "Homer favs" and who the actual KILLER NHL gurus are..

my battle plan so far is;
I have a check list for some Projected stats for C,LW,RW,D skaters 50deep in each (have yet to compare to INJ list though)
I have an updated INJ list,
and I have a top 250 projected scrores (but it seems that list does not have goalies onit.. so I will opt for the Gs options on the leader board page...)

I will get a Rookie report soon and try to nab some sleepers later in the rounds..

I still have not found a quality ADP tool that is free, I am not sure one exists..

I am going to try a book store and hope they have a FanHockey book I can get some last min info out of.. maybe they have some deeper analysis I am over looking..


The biggest problem I have (other hten all the foreign names) is not knowing which stats are in the most demand, and how they will help my team..

What are some big Defender Stats?

oh yeah what is Plus-Minus ?

couple more hours to cram, an then I am off!!
and will post my team so you see how I did.. I hope I can get a copy of all the teams too so you all can compare
D_Bass; Thanks again bro..

P.S.
that Ava change is cracking me up!!

As a 2 time HotP winner I'll give you my advice on drafting.

As mentioned earlier, try to get a top quality LW early. This season I drafted in the middle of the 1st round and took Kovalchuk, and followed him on on the turn with Nash for 2 of the better LWs out there. Without giving away to much to any other HotP members here, there are ulterior motives to drafting that way as well. Of course it's been pretty apparent why I do that if you look back over the last couple of seasons.

Don't sleep too long on a goalie either. You may be OK in a pre-season draft letting guys like Bryzgalov and Quick slide, but now that the season is underway they have already established a base for their stats and could be rated higher than goalies who would have gone earlier like Steve Mason or Carey Price. While you don't necessarily need a stud goalie, having one solid one is comforting, and then hope that you can get another decent one later. Avoid all goalies who play for Toronto right now. Also, make sure you get 2 number one goalies for thier respective teams. This is important especially if you have a minimum goalie start requirement. There is nothing worse than having only 2 starts in a week with solid numbers from your #1 goalie and you can't get a 3rd because your second goalie is a backup who might get in every 4th or 5th game.

RWs tend to be a little deeper than LW, but don't let them slide too far either. I snagged my first one in about the 3rd or 4th round this year (I honestly can't remember and can't look up my draft at work), but I managed to get Semin as my best RW, with guys like Hemsky, Brian Little, and Kotalik backing him up. Granted Little is having a slow start, but Hemsky has come around and Kotalik is playing great for the Rangers.

I don't put a lot of stock in stud defensemen. If you can get someone like Lidstrom or Green early, go for it. Just don't have your heart set on it because likely some other guy will see the gaudy numbers they posted last season (or what they've done already this season) and snatch them up right away. Odds are when those top D-men are taken, you can get a much higher point per game player at the forward positions at that time, so don't panic and think you need to grab a defensemen in a run. I grabbed my first D-man in about the 6th round - Andrei Markov - who is a decent scorer although he's out with a sliced tendon until about February. I usually rotate D-men from the free agent pool during the year. My drafted D-men this year were Markov, Brent Burns, Tom Gilbert, Matt Niskanen, and Eric Johnson. My D-men now are Markov (on IR), Johnson, Grebeshkov, Del Zotto, Robidas, and Marc-Andre Bergeron. The last 4 guys were all claimed from the free agent list. So, to sum it up, don't panic if you don't get a stud D-man early and don't over reach for one either.

I think centers tend to be about a dime a dozen, much like defensemen. However I would grab a couple or three solid centers before I concentrate on my blue line players. There's nothing wrong with taking a stud center either, but I'm just saying there is a lot of scoring balance at the second or third tier centers as well. My centers this year are Henrik Sedin, Brad Richards, and Mikko Koivu, and I can't really complain. There will always be serviceable centers among the free agent list as well. They tend to rotate in and out almost as often as defensemen.

So that's about it. Have fun and good luck. Don't everthink your draft, and go with your gut. It's a long season in fantasy hockey and there's always time to make up for a mistake or two. Don't be afraid to take chances late in the draft either. You might miss out on some real nice sleepers (Del Zotto agan). And if they don't pan out, there's a slew of FA players to make up for it. Let us know how it turned out and we'll be happy to tell you how lousy of a job drafting you did.

That is when teams are at even strength. Players on the ice (excluding goalies) when their team scores get a +, players on the ice when their team is scored on get a -.

On power plays, if the shorthanded team scores they also get a +, while the team on the power play gets a -. No plus/minus is awarded when the team on the power play scores.

Good info from Seductive as usual

Couple last things I will say to try to answer a couple of Afro's questions...

+/- is a stat that is kept for each skater but not goalies. If a skater is on the ice and his team scores a goal at even strength(five on five) or shorthanded(playing with 4 or less skaters due to a penalty), he gets a +1. If he's on the ice when the other team scores under the same conditions, he gets a -1. A score of 10 would mean that player has been on the ice for 10 more goals by his team than goals by the opponent. Some players(ie from Detroit) tend to end up with good +/- numbers each year because they are good two-way players and they play on good teams that score a lot. If you get a chance to get a guy who is historically good/projected as having a good +/-, that's pretty good as it typically indicates a good player and/or good situation although it can be a little deceiving, too, so dont stress out too much if you see a player projected to be negative on the year. I believe guys like Kovalchuk and Kopitar were projected to be negatives on the season in part because the Thrashers and Kings havent been strong teams but these guys are good players who score a lot...

There are no real "big stats" for D-men as they are subject to the same scoring as forwards. The best advice I can give there is to do a quick search to see which ones get a lot of TOI(time on ice) especially on the power play. As Seductive said, you dont necessarily have to go out of your way to grab a Mike Green(Wash) or some other high scoring d-man, but it doesnt hurt to have one. Do your best to grab a couple that score a little bit and add some PIM(penalty mins). There are some guys who are kinda sneaky picks that you can maybe grab later that usually put up some decent stats. He hasnt done much this year, but Marek Zidlicky from the Wild is a guy who gets a lot of PP time and the team runs(or at least did run) a lot of plays to get him chances to shoot. He also takes a lot of dumb penalties which kill the Wild but will help your team. Anyway, there are some guys like him out there that are not neccessarily real big names and you may be able to snag them later on.

I am not sure if you can find an ADP for hockey, but I think Yahoo gives each player a ranking(number) and if you draft tonight using Yahoo's online draft tool, it will present the players in order of that rank. So, it kinda rotates the higher ranked players toward the top of the list for you but the hook is its their ranking and its a function of last years stats too much, IMO. For example, guys like Brendan Morrow(Dal), Danny Briere(Phi), Sergei Gonchar(Pit) are good players who missed large parts of last season with injury so their point totals were low(comparatively) and they never made it to the top of the list in the Draft application. In those cases, you'll just need to know who some of those players are and look for their names whereas some of the other players will cycle right to the top.

Again, have fun with it and(like Seductive said) its a long season and you can likely make up for any blunders you may make tonight over the course of the season so dont sweat it too much.

Good luck!

ETA: I see Seductive answered the +/- question, too, between the time I started replying and submitted. Darn manager came over and wanted to talk about some new files coming in...

ETR: Add Kovalchuk to the list of players I have now lost to injury so far. He's out 4 weeks with a broken bone in his foot. That now makes Franzen(IR), Souray(IR), Gonchar, Savard(IR), Setoguchi(DTD), and now Kovalchuk that are out of my lineup

My issue with this is, and probably always will be, is that a handful of elite goalies will fall short. And with goalies, it is much more noticable that other positions. Stud centers or wingers rarely fall off the face of the earth like some goalies seem to. Jim Carey, JS Giguere, Vesa Toskala, Nikolai Khabibulin, Tomas Vokoun, Jose Theodore, Marty Turco; the list goes on and on. All upper tier goalies at some point, all fell short of lofty expectations in one season or another.

I find it much easier to compensate for bad goaltending if you aren't banking on that goalie being your best player. For example, you could have easily followed stud goalie theory last year and drafted Martin Brodeur and Carey Price. Steve Mason, Jon Quick, Ilya Bryzgalov, Scott Clemmensen are all guys that went undrafted last year (and some this year) that were all good to great during stretches last year. I'd hazard a guess that zero 100 point getters went undrafted last year.

Just my thinking there.

And its very sound thinking, too. As I told Afro, I wasnt suggesting you were not right so I hope I didnt give that impression...

I have generally targeted goalies(well, at least my #1 goalie, anyway) sooner rather than later and had good luck with that approach*knocks on wood* so I guess I am a little biased. Was thinking it may work for Afro, too, to try to lock down some solid goaltending early as he may not be familiar enough with the NHL and the lesser known players to uncover sleepers later on. Or maybe he will

I have never actually drafted any team(football or hockey) after the season has already started. I'll be curious to see how Afro's team turns out and how the draft differed from mine which was held in late Sept. Should be interesting.

And therein lies the rub. The cat is already out of the bag on a lot of players, so draft strategies can change significantly at this time. We are all giving advice from the perspective of a pre-season draft. I'm looking forward to what kind of team he comes up with.

Agreed.

Earlier, I advised that he should look at the current standings/stats and compare them to the pre-season rankings/projections to see which/where players show up on both in an effort to indentify which players might be over/under performing. I wouldnt want to see him go too high on a guy who is just off to an unusually hot start (that is likely to cool off considerably) nor pass on a good player that is just off to a slow start. As you essentially pointed out, though, the "rub" is rankings are just predictions and stats are what is actually being accomplished on the ice. Some of the guys who are blowing up are likely on their way to career years and you'd want to be part of that. Some of the guys who are off to slow starts may be in the early parts of down years for them which you'd obviously like to avoid.

Should be interesting to see how it turns out now that there is a 3-4 week sample of play to look at