Goalies in fantasy hockey - Unfair???

[Leumas]

Hello Dobberites I come to you asking for advice.

So I run a 15 team deep keeper league that does monthly rosters and we start two goalies each month. Rosters are 24 players and we can keep 12 players each year. Each team is allowed a maximum of 5 goalies. Our goalie stats are W=+1 , L= -1, OTL= +0.5 , SO=2, Saves= +.05, GA= -.10. The top goalies get approximately 100 points using this system.

Last night was our trade deadline and we voted on whether to reduce the maximum number of goalies each team can own. The teams with weak goaltending depth feel that some teams are hoarding goalies and there is no parity in the league in regards to goalies. The motion to reduce goalies was not passed and many of the GMs are frustrated by this.

Here is the League''s Goalie depth chart:

Sam - Holtby, Crawford, Schneider, Mrazek, Grubauer
Ross - Rask, Fleury, Gibson, Markstrom, Lindback
Rod - Varlamov, Hellebucyk, Bernier, Neuvirth, Subban
JG - Ward, Lehtonen, Kuemper, Raanta, Berra

Reid - Luongo, Rinne, Lack, Campbell
Sean - Price, Talbot, Hammond, Darling
Hersch - Jones, Bobrovsky, Howard, Greiss
Darrell - C. Anderson, Mason, Allen, Elliott
Steve - Bishop, Ramo, Pavelec, Ortio
Wayne - Dubnyk, Niemi, Vasilevskiy, Enroth
Schmidt - Quick, Johnson, Nilsson, Khudobin

Jeff - Lundqvist, Lehner, Hutchinson
Russ - Miller, Hiller, Condon

Craig - F. Anderson, Halak
Cam - Smith, Reimer


So obviously if you are one of the teams with two or more great starting goalies you are going to dominate any team that only has a 1A/1B situation going on. Is this an unfair advantage or just part of fantasy hockey? I understand some of the frustration but I don't think reducing the number of goalies we are allowed to carry is going to help fix the problem. In fact I think it makes it worse.

If we went to a 3 goalie max system (as was proposed) what happens when injuries occur to you starters? Let's say you have two great starters and a high quality prospect. Do you have to drop one of your great starting goalies to pick up a crappy back-up goalie just to get starts? Also how are you going to find the next great starting goalie if you are stuck with a couple of 1A/1B goalies just to stay competitive. You have no room to take chances with any up and comers. With a 5 goalie system you have room to play with and keep your team competing through injuries.

I am the commish of this league and want to keep people happy but I'm not sure there is a fix to level the playing field. There just aren't enough true #1 starting goalies in the NHL to go around. There are a handful of NHL goalies who get the lion's share of the starts and that alone creates an unfair advantage.

Are the guys in my pool just being whiners? This league is 9 years old and this has never been an issue before. Is there something I'm missing here that could make using goalies more equitable? Is this just the way it is?

[horrorfan]

Disclaimer - I don't play in keepers but I have one suggestion, depending on whether you think it's feasible:

Couldn't you restrict the number of goalies kept each year? Perhaps to only 1? Not sure if that's fair to those who have the better goalies, but perhaps it's a compromise to allow those with little depth to draft another. With this, you don't need to add a restriction on the number to own post-draft.

That being said, if this is a feasible suggestion, then I would recommend not implementing it until after next season, as people will have managed their teams based on the current keeper rules.

[Axeman33]

Its a fine line and a hard place you are in. It's hard to penalize the guys who have found a way to acquire those goalies (either by smart drafting, FA pickups or trades) but I can also sympathize with the guys who are in need of goalie help. Chances are, the guys who are "hoarding" the goalies also want a kings ransom for them in trades. Not much you can do about that.

Limited keepers means the teams with a lot of goalies has to drop more skaters to keep those goalies, but it seems that goalies also hold a huge value in your league. Teams have to make those choices as to who they want to keep and if they choose to keep more goalies than others, then it is what it is. Maybe, instead of limiting the number of goalies they can carry, you limit the number of goalies they are allowed to keep at the end of the year. I am just spitballing but in a keep 12, make it so they can only keep a max of 2 goalies and the rest go back into the draft for redrafting.

[Obmann]

In our league the rule is that you can only roster goalies from three different teams! So you could own three starters and their back ups, but it's highly unlikely...

I think that we found a good role there to even out goalie depth.

[finminer]

There are a few directions you could go: 1) limit goalie keepers to two. If you choose to apply this to next season (I would, to reduce complaining, otherwise it's really a 2-year wait), you might figure out some form of compensation to those who are giving up more top goalies, such as higher draft picks. 2) put a cost on keeping goalies by limiting the total number of keepers. If they choose to keep goalies, they give up more skaters. 3) another way of putting cost to it would be to make them give up picks or get lower picks for keeping more than two. 4) you don't say anything about salaries, cap or cost, but if you want more radical change, go to an auction system for salary cap. Goalie prices would run higher because of their value and they could only fit so many under the cap.

I don't think they are whiners. I think that they are pointing out weaknesses in your system that you need to address. Over time, complaints turn to anger and owners wind up quitting if they feel that they have no shot at improving their teams. This is why I don't like dynasty leagues where players are kept forever, and why I prefer auction salary cap leagues. I like healthy turnover in the top players because it gives everyone a chance to win every year.

[BillyD.]

If we went to a 3 goalie max system (as was proposed) what happens when injuries occur to you starters? Let's say you have two great starters and a high quality prospect. Do you have to drop one of your great starting goalies to pick up a crappy back-up goalie just to get starts? Also how are you going to find the next great starting goalie if you are stuck with a couple of 1A/1B goalies just to stay competitive. You have no room to take chances with any up and comers. With a 5 goalie system you have room to play with and keep your team competing through injuries.

In my league (not a keeper), we have the rule of maximum 3 "healthy" goalie. When 1 goes down you can put him on IR or IR+ and then grab one out of the FAs available.
And when your #1 comes back you have to drop the #4. Once this season a GM had 5 goalies cause he had 2 guys injured at the same time.

[Eskimo Brother]

Another option that hasn't been mentioned yet, that has been a success in some of my leagues that had the same problems, was changing the number of goalies slots that are open, from 2 to 1. So you can keep the limit wherever you like, 3 or 5 or no max, but it reduces the effectiveness of hoarding 4 top starters. It does come with some of the same downfalls as the other methods though.
You could also look into pulling out SO altogether as a stat in your league (also been done with success in some of my leagues). Would marginally bring down the points of the goalies, without affecting the major layout of their point setup. Gives a little more value to the skaters, thus more incentive to keep skaters, and diversifying the draft a little more with goalies.

[anthonybeaty]

This is a tough position to be in. You are sort damned if you do and you are sort of damned if you don't. The teams that have great goaltenders gave up great skaters to acquire the goaltenders. Changing the rules after they have already made this commitment will really piss them off. On the other hand, the user without great goaltending missed a fundamental component of the league and will be pissed off unless you make this change because otherwise their teams won't be able to compete for a few years.

I was in a pool with this dynamic. Half the teams missed an important part of the scoring and didn't draft very well. The commish was in the same boat as you. The turn over was extremely high and after 3 years, the pool collapsed. We tried and tried to find a solution, but came up empty at every turn. Whatever rule changes were implemented pissed off 1 or more people who eventually left. Every year we lost multiple people and spent more time trying to recruit people then we did actually managing our teams. After 3 years, literally half the league bailed and the commish and I were were left trying to replace a ton of managers who would inherit bad teams with no end in sight - we eventually just gave up and folded the league.

It was by far the least fun I have ever had in fantasy sports in over 15 years of doing them. I so wish we had read the writing on the wall and just folded the league after the draft.

I took what I learned from that and made a limited keeper and limited the number of goalie keepers to 1 and the max numbers of keeps to 2. That way there are always lots of goalies in the draft and if a team is terrible, they don't have to wait more than a year or two to recover.

[Leumas]

Hey thanks for the replies thus far guys. Lots to think about. I’m hoping for more opinions here. Judging from some of your signatures this must be a problem for many many leagues. I see lots of teams with 3 starting goalies in their sigs.

It is definitely a tough situation. The guys who have good goaltending depth HAVE used their valuable draft picks (we only draft 6 per year) or have put the work in to make significant trades to get those good goalies. The guys who are complaining in some cases have NOT drafted ANY goalies at all. When I’ve mentioned try to make a trade the response is “the prices are too high”. Yet other people are getting it done.

The other thing that bothers me is this. Isn’t the whole point of fantasy hockey to hoard all the best players? In my league this same “hoarding” problem exists with defensemen. Some teams have tons of great D-men and others have nothing. Where does this stop? Do I have to place a limit on Dmen too. How do I tell GMs “You’ve been playing this game too well. Please give up some of your best players to those who suck.”

I will try to comment on some of the suggestions.

1. Reducing the max number of keepers

Here is the depth chart in my League again with #1 starters in bold and 1A/1B’s in italics

Sam - Holtby, Crawford, Schneider, Mrazek, Grubauer
Ross - Rask, Fleury, Gibson, Markstrom, Lindback
Rod - Varlamov, Hellebucyk, Bernier, Neuvirth, Subban
JG - Ward, Lehtonen, Kuemper, Raanta, Berra
Reid - Luongo, Rinne, Lack, Campbell
Sean - Price, Talbot, Hammond, Darling
Hersch - Jones, Bobrovsky, Howard, Greiss
Darrell - C. Anderson, Mason, Allen, Elliott
Steve - Bishop, Ramo, Pavelec, Ortio
Wayne - Dubnyk, Niemi, Vasilevskiy, Enroth
Schmidt - Quick, Johnson, Nilsson, Khudobin
Jeff - Lundqvist, Lehner, Hutchinson
Russ - Miller, Hiller, Condon
Craig - F. Anderson, Halak
Cam - Smith, Reimer

I don’t see how reducing the number of goalies gives any of the weaker teams a #1 starter. There just aren’t enough to go around period. It may give the illusion of spreading the #1 goalies around but still there are too many 1A/1B situations in the NHL for this to be true.
There will always be some teams with two #1 starters and many with only one. How is that fair?

2. Go down to only 1 goalie per team.

This would seem to be the most equitable way of doing it, however If you look at the top 15 or so goalies in the NHL there is only a small handful that get significantly more starts than the rest. Guys like Lundqvist , Schneider, Holtby may get up to 70 games whereas another #1 starter may only get 50. How can you call this fair?


Here is a question for those in Leagues where you are only allowed to own 2 or 3 goalies.

If you have 2 or 3 great goalies, what do you do when one of your great starters gets injured? Do you have to drop him or trade him and pick up a less quality backup just to get starts? How do you deal with injuries if you can only own 2 goalies at a time?

Anyhow good discussion guys. Keep ‘em coming.

[fantasyhockeygeek]

For me, the guys complaining are way out of line. I'm assuming it's just points for skaters? If that's so, then they misread player value, simple as that. In this scoring system, goalies are damn valuable. Kari Lehtonen, who had an epically bad year by most standards in 2014/15, still put up 98.6 points in this setup. Price, as league MVP, put up 127.2. Simply put, a starter that sees games is worth more than virtually every skater. I'd guess more than 50% of the top-20 producers in this league last year were goalies. So the teams that are hoarding goalies are smart. Those that are short of goalies are mis-reading the setup. "Price is too high"? BS. In this setup (again, assuming skaters are just scoring points), a mediocre goalie is worth more than a star skater. So if those GMs aren't willing to deal a Jamie Benn for Lundqvist or Luongo or Bishop or Fleury or Varlamov or Rask, it's not that the price is too high, it's that those GMs are making mistakes.

There are 360 players owned, and 180 kept from year to year. I'd be floored if 30-40 goalies weren't kept.

If they weren't valuing goalies and making sure they had them, there's nobody to blame but themselves. Making any change here severely penalizes the teams that looked at the league scoring setup, crafted a strategy accordingly, and went about building their rosters.

How do you fix it from here? Either blow up the league and create a new scoring system where goalies aren't the most valuable players, or get GMs that are willing to manage to a league's scoring system, not their own perception of where value "should" be. Limiting the number of goalies kept or per roster strikes me as a band-aid, and one that penalizes the smart GMs.

[ntrspctv]

5 goalie slots?! crazy!

5 goalie slots... on a 15 team league?! wtf!

I agree with a lot of what is said above. Hard to change after so long, lots of time put into creating teams and people who stacked goalies did it right by playing by what the rules and game were, but the 5 goalie slots left too large of an exploitable hole to maintain a balanced league.

[Leumas]

5 goalie slots?! crazy!

5 goalie slots... on a 15 team league?! wtf!

I agree with a lot of what is said above. Hard to change after so long, lots of time put into creating teams and people who stacked goalies did it right by playing by what the rules and game were, but the 5 goalie slots left too large of an exploitable hole to maintain a balanced league.

Really? We aren't starting 5 goalies. We are starting only two.

It is interesting to see the different opinions on this.

Would you or anyone else mind answering the question I posed above?

Ie. Here is a question for those in Leagues where you are only allowed to own 2 or 3 goalies.

If you have 2 or 3 great goalies, what do you do when one of your great starters gets injured? Do you have to drop him or trade him and pick up a less quality backup just to get starts? How do you deal with injuries if you can only own 2 goalies at a time?

[anthonybeaty]

Really? We aren't starting 5 goalies. We are starting only two.

It is interesting to see the different opinions on this.

Would you or anyone else mind answering the question I posed above?

Ie. Here is a question for those in Leagues where you are only allowed to own 2 or 3 goalies.

If you have 2 or 3 great goalies, what do you do when one of your great starters gets injured? Do you have to drop him or trade him and pick up a less quality backup just to get starts? How do you deal with injuries if you can only own 2 goalies at a time?

We deal with injured players by using IR slots. We keep a limited number of IR slots so managers have to decide who to keep and who to drop. An injured player on IR does not count towards the roster counts.

[horrorfan]

Another thing that I haven't seen mentioned, but related to what FHG commented on:

How big are your rosters in total?
How much do goalies affect the total team production?
What is the range from the top goalies to the mediocre ones?

If there are a ton of skater slots and the gap between the goalie 'tiers' is not very large, then does having the top goalies really have a significant effect on the total, when perhaps the weaker goalie teams have better skaters to prop up their overall production? How do the weaker goalie teams perform overall compared to the goalie 'hoarders'?

Also, if the relative gap between the top and mediocre goalies is more narrow than the gap of the top to the mediocre skaters, then aren't top skaters more valuable? It doesn't necessarily matter that there are more goalies with high point totals than skaters, it just means you may not need an elite goalie to be successful.

That being said, it may not address the concerns stated, in that if you are already down and can't acquire production to prop up your team, other than paying a high price, then how do you get out of it. With 12 keepers and 15 teams, that's 180 players, a good amount and if you don't have the top skaters and enough goaltending, you could be in a hole. But that being said, like FHG said, I wonder if it's just poor league settings management.

[Referee3083]

Would you or anyone else mind answering the question I posed above?

Ie. Here is a question for those in Leagues where you are only allowed to own 2 or 3 goalies.

If you have 2 or 3 great goalies, what do you do when one of your great starters gets injured? Do you have to drop him or trade him and pick up a less quality backup just to get starts? How do you deal with injuries if you can only own 2 goalies at a time?

I'm not the perfect person to answer this question (our league allows you to have a max of 4 goalies on your roster, but you can only keep a max of 2 year over year). One of the ways we dealt with the injury issue is through added IR spots. Each team has 4 IR spots (3 of which can be used by goalies), and we don't count goalies in IR spots against our roster maximum of 4 goalies.