1st overall pick - who do you take?

[SgtCrosby87]

Hi everyone, for the league in my sig I have the 1st overall pick.

There were some players not kept that surprised me, which has me second guessing who I should take first overall.
Are any worth picking ahead of Hischier or Patrick?

Couture
Doughty
Gardiner
Giordano
Kuznetsov
Lundqvist
Monahan
Perry
Pietrangelo
Staal
Suter

Cheers,

[PenguinHunter]

Are you competitive enough to win this year?

If so, I do not take Patrick or Hischier. I do not think they will have rookie years like McDavid or Matthews and help you win.

I think I would Monahan, Couture or Kuznetsov if I want to compete this year.

[tweetdrivr]

All of them are better than the two rookies.
Lundqvist
Doughty
Peitrangelo
Kuznetsov
Giordano
Couture
Monahan

In that order for you.

[tweetdrivr]

Are you competitive enough to win this year?

If so, I do not take Patrick or Hischier. I do not think they will have rookie years like McDavid or Matthews and help you win.

I think I would Monahan, Couture or Kuznetsov if I want to compete this year.

Even if he isn't it's not a dynasty keeper it's a limited so the rookies aren't even on my radar. Lehner as your number 2 G is worrisome. Grab another top D or shore up LW or C and move Granlund to RW with Atkinson. Keep Aho active and put Palmeri on the bench.

[Pengwin7]

With the 3U spots, those should be assigned pretty much to forwards, especially since you don't have HIT/BLK.
12F/5D/2G league.

You also count GWG - which is essentially another G category... about 15%-20% of all goals are GWG... depending on team strength (whether they might win game).
So... you have to target shooters. The league doesn't have many here.

I notice your lists seems to probably be the top guys on your Yahoo! board, sorted alphabetically by last name.
Gardiner is Yahoo 107... but sometimes there are good players farther on... can you maybe post top 25 "by rank"... I've... got a feeling there might be something solid... deeper... farther.

Yahoo! often doesn't capture specific league settings.
You want G/SOG/GWG... a sniper, so give me some more names.

Personally, I probably go with Hischier here.
Your team is not that good (sorry) and you have some "keepers" that shouldn't be: Palmieri, Yandle, maybe not even Lehner.
Even Aho, Atkinson, Granlund... yeah, they're probably 60-90 range in a 120 keeper, so yes, they are keepers, but they just aren't elite keepers... which win championships.
You've got 1 (Crosby), maybe 2 (Gibson) elite keepers...

I think you need to really improve to win - and so I'd advise you to not go for it.
Take Hischier and... if he slides, take Patrick next.

[Canucks_fan18]

With the 3U spots, those should be assigned pretty much to forwards, especially since you don't have HIT/BLK.
12F/5D/2G league.

You also count GWG - which is essentially another G category... about 15%-20% of all goals are GWG... depending on team strength (whether they might win game).
So... you have to target shooters. The league doesn't have many here.

I notice your lists seems to probably be the top guys on your Yahoo! board, sorted alphabetically by last name.
Gardiner is Yahoo 107... but sometimes there are good players farther on... can you maybe post top 25 "by rank"... I've... got a feeling there might be something solid... deeper... farther.

Yahoo! often doesn't capture specific league settings.
You want G/SOG/GWG... a sniper, so give me some more names.

Personally, I probably go with Hischier here.
Your team is not that good (sorry) and you have some "keepers" that shouldn't be: Palmieri, Yandle, maybe not even Lehner.
Even Aho, Atkinson, Granlund... yeah, they're probably 60-90 range in a 120 keeper, so yes, they are keepers, but they just aren't elite keepers... which win championships.
You've got 1 (Crosby), maybe 2 (Gibson) elite keepers...

I think you need to really improve to win - and so I'd advise you to not go for it.
Take Hischier and... if he slides, take Patrick next.

Really do you think Hischier or Patrick will be produce more then let's say Monahan or Kuzy? I understand your point of grabbing a young stud instead of a wily vet because the team is not ready to compete but both Monahan and Kuzy aren't old either. I personally think Hischier or Patrick would be hard pressed in the next 2 to 3 years maybe even in their careers to produce at Monahan or Kuzy's level.

[tweetdrivr]

Really do you think Hischier or Patrick will be produce more then let's say Monahan or Kuzy? I understand your point of grabbing a young stud instead of a wily vet because the team is not ready to compete but both Monahan and Kuzy aren't old either. I personally think Hischier or Patrick would be hard pressed in the next 2 to 3 years maybe even in their careers to produce at Monahan or Kuzy's level.

Nailed it.

[Jouko-Pouko]

From that group of players when there's no salary cap in use, I would take Kuznetsov.

[SgtCrosby87]

Thanks for the feedback so far. The decision to go with a rookie vs someone more established is exactly why I made this thread.

Honestly I doubt I'll be competing this year. Last year I missed the cut but won our consolation playoffs. The year before I barely made it in but got eliminated first round, so I missed out on Matthews & Laine.

In order, here's Yahoo rank based on last year stats:
18: Stall
31: Backlund
41: Koivu
43: van Riemsdyk
45: Hayes
48: Kesler
49: Lee
And for goalies:
74: Budaj
113: Grubauer
126: Raanta

So there are guys there that will add value in later rounds, but not first overall.

Fantasy hockey geek (w/ Dobber projections) goes:
35: Pietrangelo
37: Kuznetsov
40: Doughty
52: Staal
53: Voracek
57: Suter
59: Monahan
Goalies:
20: Raanta
22: Markstrom
23: Lundqvist

To help compare, Gibson is #4 goalie, Lehner is 17. Crosby is #5 skater, Granlund is 26, Panarin is 31. With keep 10 (2 goalies), I'd have to hit some home runs early in the draft to get some of that elite talent to compete going forward.

[RizzeeDizzee]

If you're not wild about Nico or Nolan, can you try to trade the pick to someone drooling over them? That's an idea, and you might get better return overall than by using the pick.

[Belexus75]

many are better than the rookies

if you need D than DD is your pick, if you go after F i would probably take Kuz with some consideration to Monahan.

[Pengwin7]

Really do you think Hischier or Patrick will be produce more then let's say Monahan or Kuzy? I understand your point of grabbing a young stud instead of a wily vet because the team is not ready to compete but both Monahan and Kuzy aren't old either. I personally think Hischier or Patrick would be hard pressed in the next 2 to 3 years maybe even in their careers to produce at Monahan or Kuzy's level.

You are welcome to have your opinion.
Perhaps you will be correct.
It will be a fun one to check on over the years.

[Canucks_fan18]

You are welcome to have your opinion.
Perhaps you will be correct.
It will be a fun one to check on over the years.

For sure I wasn’t dogging your assessment. I think Nico might have the higher ceiling then Nolan but that’s just the eye test thus far. I just think both Monahan and Kuzy have already performed at an elite level in the NHL and our still young with room to grow (a little bit with Calgary getting better and Kuzy getting more PP time/staying with Ovi) that they are at a level where you would hope those youngsters would get at. Even look at Nate Mack now dynamic talent but do to situation and whatever reason hasn’t even performed up to the level of Kuzy/Monahan yet.

[SgtCrosby87]

The draft was held over the weekend. I went Hischier first. The first round went: Hischier, Monahan, Kuznetsov, Doughty, Voracek, Radulov, Lundqvist, Staal, Barkov, Pietrangelo, Raanta, Perry.

Patrick came around to me in the next round so I got him too. My full team is in the sig. Thanks again everyone.

[havanablast21]

Hischier AND Patrick? Well done. I think you know the direction your team is going in and I think it's a good one. I liked Peng7's assessment and that should be your focus now. Unless you wanted to move those assets, but I'm guessing you're pretty happy to have both 1 and 2 this year.

Think Hall/Seguin draft year (but maybe a slight tier lower).