Archive for the ‘Fantasy Hockey’ Category

Jaci of WickedBruins Fan Submits: 

When being a Bruins fan, one has to expect and accept changes that take place throughout the season and off-season. We have to roll with the punches. In past seasons, the player turnover was equivalent to New England’s ever-changing weather; it would change anytime the wind switched directions and a fan wouldn’t know what to expect in the outcome.

This past season was different.

Only two trades happened during the season. One was when the Bruins sending a forward over for a defenseman that had a rough start but turned into one of the many bright spots of the season.

Those two trades were acquiring Alex Auld for Nate DiCasmirro and acquiring Shane Hnidy for Brandon Bochenski.

The Bruins finished the season with much of the same personnel that started the season, which were:

Goalies: Manny Fernandez, Tim Thomas. Defensemen: Bobby Allen, Andrew Alberts, Zdeno Chara, Andrew Ference, Mark Stuart, Aaron Ward, Dennis Wideman. Forwards: P.J. Axelsson, Patrice Bergeron, Brandon Bochenski, Phil Kessel, Chuck Kobasew, David Krejci, Milan Lucic, Glen Metropolit, Glen Murray, Jeremy Reich, Marc Savard, Peter Schaefer, Marco Sturm, and Shawn Thornton.

The team that finished out the season was (new names bolded):

Goalies: Alex Auld, Manny Fernandez, Tim Thomas. Defensemen: Bobby Allen, Andrew Alberts, Zdeno Chara, Andrew Ference, Shane Hnidy, Mark Stuart, Aaron Ward, Dennis Wideman. Forwards: P.J. Axelsson, Patrice Bergeron, Phil Kessel, Chuck Kobasew, David Krejci, Milan Lucic, Glen Metropolit, Glen Murray, Petteri Nokelainen, Jeremy Reich, Marc Savard, Peter Schaefer, Vladimir Sobotka, Marco Sturm, and Shawn Thornton.

Any Bruins fan should give props to the players who were here all season and got us to where we wanted to see them, the playoffs. As we all know, some of these players might not be wearing the spoked-B come this October, but this was a great team to watch on the ice this season.

General manager Peter Chiarelli certainly built Boston a strong and hard-working hockey team, and hopefully it will only get stronger in 2008-2009.

Earlier this season, I offered up some fantasy hockey tips to help you win your draft this season. While I thought I was doing you all a favor by imparting some knowledge, some e-mail that I received seemed quite the contrary.

After a couple of early season goaltender pick-ups in Chris Osgood and Josh Harding, I also managed to wrap up Sergei Samsonov as a free agent when he joined the Carolina Hurricanes.

All in all, my fantasy hockey season has been exceptional. This past week I was helped out by some outstanding performances by Alexander Ovechkin and Olaf Kolzig of the Washington Capitals.

As you can see, NHL Digest.com is dominating the Yahoo Fantasy Hockey League this season.

As further evidence of domination, I offer you the results from Week 17 of the Fantasy Heroes Hockey pool .

I contemplated picking up Teemu Selanne after he announced his return to Anaheim, but I decided against it given the outstanding performance of my forwards thus far.

I hope that this decision doesn’t come back to bite me down the home stretch of the season. It is quite possible that Selanne could post excellent numbers to close out the season.

I would highly suggest that if you have room for another forward on your team, due to injury or poor performance, that you pick up Selanne.

Sign Up Now

For those of you who have yet to sign up for our e-mail subscription, please do so. NHL Digest will be offering a hockey pool for next season that will be open to subscribers.

There is also a rumor floating around that there may be random prize drawings during this season’s playoffs…so sign up already!

The Strategy

Fantasy hockey league season is upon us once again and it is time to scour the rosters of each team in search of that elusive perfect fantasy hockey combination.

There are many different ways to score fantasy leagues and just as many, if not more, strategies to utilize when selecting players for your fantasy hockey team this season.

Now, before you go blindly into your draft selecting Crosby, Lidstrom, and Brodeur, be sure to fully understand how your draft is scored and how many players from each position that you are required or allowed to choose.

Understand The Scoring System

During the 2004-2005 season I participated in one fantasy league where 1 point was awarded for each goal or assist. There were no restrictions on the number of players from each position and players could be selected by more than one person in the draft. Each draft entrant was required to select any 20 players in the NHL for their team.

The key in the scoring of this draft was that goaltenders received 5 points for a win and 10 points for a shutout. So, guess what one enterprising guy did? You got it… He selected 20 goalies! He was well within the rules set out by the draft and was all but guaranteed to get at least 5 points per night. There were a few nights when he racked up 40-50 points and needless to say, he won the draft hands down.

Of course, each league is scored differently but it is always important to understand the rules. It is especially important in a situation where each NHL player can only be selected by one team in the fantasy league.

Don’t Forget The Goalie!

In this scenario, it is almost always the case where the top scoring forwards will be selected first. However, it has been my experience that when points are given for goaltender performance, it is always necessary to select the best goaltender available within the first two picks of the draft.

There are years where a forward of defenseman may surprise everyone and rack up a tone of points. However, it is very rare that a goaltender comes out of nowhere and wins substantially more games than in previous years, unless the goalie has switched teams in the off season.

Yes, Martin Brodeur is a great goaltender, but his team in New Jersey has definitely helped him achieve an extraordinary amount of wins and shutouts over the past decade. The same holds true for Dominik Hasek. These are skilled goaltenders, but fantasy players earn points, in the majority of leagues, for wins and shutouts.

In rare cases, there may be points awarded for save percentage. In this case you may want to select someone like Roberto Luongo, who typically faces a lot of shots. In any event, picking a goaltender early in the draft that has a strong defense in front of him, is traditionally a good move.

What About The Goons?

When points are awarded for penalty minutes in a fantasy league, it is highly unlikely that this is the only category that points are awarded for. Therefore, taking Ben Eager just to own the penalty minute category probably isn’t a good idea; unless you can pick him up in the last round.

As we know, points are typically awarded in fantasy leagues for goals and assists, so one must take that into consideration when selecting players when attempting to earn a few penalty minute points. So who should you choose?

According to last season’s statistics, good choices for a player who spends some time in the sin bin, but also contributes offensively are Sean Avery and Chris Neil. I have surprised many other fantasy players over the years by selecting this type of a player in the early rounds of a fantasy draft. More often than not, this strategy has paid off in the end.

This is especially rewarding when your “penalty minute pick” has an especially good offensive year. Both Avery and Neil have the potential offensive upside to make them worthy of an early round selection, while still padding that penalty minute category.

You are now prepared to go out and draft an unbeatable fantasy hockey team!

Don’t forget to drop us a note during the season to tell us how you are doing in your fantasy league!