NHL Mock Draft 2023-2024 - Discussion

[Invictus]

And his hair

[tweetdrivr]

Definitely regret not grabbing Xhekaj in this one. I’ve maneuvered to own him in a couple of multicat leagues I’m in this summer.

[StuntMan12]

Thanks again to Peter for setting this up and everyone who made this a success. Looking forward to the updates!

[Sixtyfourbits]

Definitely regret not grabbing Xhekaj in this one. I’ve maneuvered to own him in a couple of multicat leagues I’m in this summer.

I don’t think I drafted too many guys that others were after, so seeing this reassures me that I got at least one right, even if I drafted him a bit earlier than I should’ve.

[ross10019]

I don’t think I drafted too many guys that others were after, so seeing this reassures me that I got at least one right, even if I drafted him a bit earlier than I should’ve.

Xhekaj is a beast in multicat - and most don’t realize he’s also got sneaky good offensive chops including a bomb of a shot, so will put up some pts.

[duntroon68]

Two years ago, I tried to draft two good goalies and hoped to middle of the pack total goalie points while rostering 22 skaters. I won skater points and finished 7th of 12 in goalie points. Last year, I tried to draft three goalies, a little later, and try to keep an extra skater. Couturier never played a game so that didn’t really work but l lucked into McDavid, Pastrnak, RNH and a final pick overall Hampus Lindholm and managed to beat ross10019 and Dr. Brad by two points while winning skaters and finishing 8th of 15 in goalies. This year, I decided to try to wait on goalies and draft four tandem/backups while drafting skaters as long as possible.


Early, I wanted to maximize points, PPP and shots while not digging a big hole in +/- and banger cats. I don’t worry about injury prone players, if you get them late and they stay healthy then they will out preform their draft slot. I knew that I was going to draft 6 or 7 D and I usually try to get good D early anyway. Later, I would try to fill in blocks, hits, PIMs and shore up +/-. Ideally, I’d draft four goalies in the last four rounds but I knew that wasn’t likely. I tried to draft the hero not the sidekick as much as possible and avoid rookies and other uncertain deployment situations.


1/2 Petterson/Makar. Could both go 90-100 points. Other than EP’s PIMs, no crippling weaknesses.


3/4 Stamkos/Hamilton. PPG forward. Big shooting D. No real holes.


5/6 Fiala/Malkin. 2 PPG forwards. PIMs. Shots. No big holes.


7/8 Pietrangelo/Chychrun. You get your blocks from your D: Pietrangelo. Chychrun can give you some of everything. Or, you know, not play all year.


9/10 F. Forsberg/Laine. I had these two at the top of my list the entire round and honestly felt like they would come back to me. 70ish or more points. 3 shots per game. Core guys on their teams.


11/12 Zuccarello/Schenn. Zuccarello has almost 30 PPP per year the last two seasons. Schenn is a 65 point hits play.


13/14 Hertl/Bunting. Hertl is solid but for +/- and a main guy. Bunting was a PIMs with some points pick. Hopefully, he helps with +/-. He’s more a sidekick but core players are becoming scarce and I figure, as a free agent signing, he’ll get some decent deployment.


15/16 Talbot/Francouz. My goalie list was always very short and it was getting shorter. Talbot, hopefully gets the strong side of the platoon for an improving Kings team and Francouz stays healthy and picks up as many Colorado starts as he can.


17/18 Pulock/Hathaway. My first fourteen skaters were about points and I knew I had to jigsaw puzzle together enough hits, blocks and PIMs to compete in all of the skater cats. Pulock gets few PIMs but a plus +/- 30 point player getting 130ish each of shots, hits and blocks with a handful of PPP covers a lot of other bases. A few other 250+ hitters had gone and Hathaway covers PIMs and throws in some blocks.


19/20 John Anderson/C. Murphy. I still needed shots to cover, well, Murphy, and Anderson shoots, hits, scraps and gets PP time even if he does little with it. Murphy fills in my three banger needs.


21/22 Varlamov/Manson. Varlamov should get decent ratios. Manson’s 82 game averages are pretty good and Colorado should mean positive +/-. I really considered Zadorov instead of Manson and I was surprised he was never drafted.


23/24 Haula/Daccord. I really thought about Duclair but in the end I went really boring with Haula. He doesn’t improve any category, except +/-, but he doesn’t hurt you in any category. He’s just adding a little bit across the board which might get a handful of roto points in the end. Duclair might score 60+ points with 25 PPP but he might score 45 with a minus 40 +/- and no banger stats. Daccord might get into a tandem in Seattle if Grubauer stutters.


I haven’t looked at anyone else’s team and have done no sophisticated math but if I am blessed with health and my goalies get starts then I think I’m OK. But I think my margins are pretty tight.


And one other player I was keeping in mind, that didn’t even make the Also Rans, Brenden Gallagher.

[ross10019]

Two years ago, I tried to draft two good goalies and hoped to middle of the pack total goalie points while rostering 22 skaters. I won skater points and finished 7th of 12 in goalie points. Last year, I tried to draft three goalies, a little later, and try to keep an extra skater. Couturier never played a game so that didn’t really work but l lucked into McDavid, Pastrnak, RNH and a final pick overall Hampus Lindholm and managed to beat ross10019 and Dr. Brad by two points while winning skaters and finishing 8th of 15 in goalies. This year, I decided to try to wait on goalies and draft four tandem/backups while drafting skaters as long as possible.


Early, I wanted to maximize points, PPP and shots while not digging a big hole in +/- and banger cats. I don’t worry about injury prone players, if you get them late and they stay healthy then they will out preform their draft slot. I knew that I was going to draft 6 or 7 D and I usually try to get good D early anyway. Later, I would try to fill in blocks, hits, PIMs and shore up +/-. Ideally, I’d draft four goalies in the last four rounds but I knew that wasn’t likely. I tried to draft the hero not the sidekick as much as possible and avoid rookies and other uncertain deployment situations.


1/2 Petterson/Makar. Could both go 90-100 points. Other than EP’s PIMs, no crippling weaknesses.


3/4 Stamkos/Hamilton. PPG forward. Big shooting D. No real holes.


5/6 Fiala/Malkin. 2 PPG forwards. PIMs. Shots. No big holes.


7/8 Pietrangelo/Chychrun. You get your blocks from your D: Pietrangelo. Chychrun can give you some of everything. Or, you know, not play all year.


9/10 F. Forsberg/Laine. I had these two at the top of my list the entire round and honestly felt like they would come back to me. 70ish or more points. 3 shots per game. Core guys on their teams.


11/12 Zuccarello/Schenn. Zuccarello has almost 30 PPP per year the last two seasons. Schenn is a 65 point hits play.


13/14 Hertl/Bunting. Hertl is solid but for +/- and a main guy. Bunting was a PIMs with some points pick. Hopefully, he helps with +/-. He’s more a sidekick but core players are becoming scarce and I figure, as a free agent signing, he’ll get some decent deployment.


15/16 Talbot/Francouz. My goalie list was always very short and it was getting shorter. Talbot, hopefully gets the strong side of the platoon for an improving Kings team and Francouz stays healthy and picks up as many Colorado starts as he can.


17/18 Pulock/Hathaway. My first fourteen skaters were about points and I knew I had to jigsaw puzzle together enough hits, blocks and PIMs to compete in all of the skater cats. Pulock gets few PIMs but a plus +/- 30 point player getting 130ish each of shots, hits and blocks with a handful of PPP covers a lot of other bases. A few other 250+ hitters had gone and Hathaway covers PIMs and throws in some blocks.


19/20 John Anderson/C. Murphy. I still needed shots to cover, well, Murphy, and Anderson shoots, hits, scraps and gets PP time even if he does little with it. Murphy fills in my three banger needs.


21/22 Varlamov/Manson. Varlamov should get decent ratios. Manson’s 82 game averages are pretty good and Colorado should mean positive +/-. I really considered Zadorov instead of Manson and I was surprised he was never drafted.


23/24 Haula/Daccord. I really thought about Duclair but in the end I went really boring with Haula. He doesn’t improve any category, except +/-, but he doesn’t hurt you in any category. He’s just adding a little bit across the board which might get a handful of roto points in the end. Duclair might score 60+ points with 25 PPP but he might score 45 with a minus 40 +/- and no banger stats. Daccord might get into a tandem in Seattle if Grubauer stutters.


I haven’t looked at anyone else’s team and have done no sophisticated math but if I am blessed with health and my goalies get starts then I think I’m OK. But I think my margins are pretty tight.


And one other player I was keeping in mind, that didn’t even make the Also Rans, Brenden Gallagher.

Awesome rundown!

Like the overall makeup of your squad - and I think Talbot/Francouz/Varly is a good G strategy that could get you a high finish in GAA/Sv% if Talbot can bounce back (reunited with Mclellan of his Oilers success days so could happen).

[Pengwin7]

Pengwin7 theory:

1. In Roto, it is usually critical to have solid-to-good goalies. I wanted to get three #1 goalies out of the gate that could possibly finish me top 5 in all five goalie cats. The other advantage to good goalies in this (all starter) format is that by drafting solid goalie - I only plug 3 spots with them. I can use all 21 remaining slots for skaters. Although my skaters won't be "high end", I have the potential to get more man games from 21 skaters than from those 4 goalie teams with 20 skaters. One CAN get 82gp from a skater in the final round. One simply can't count on 40+ starts from a goalie in final round.

2. Avoid rookies - non-generational rookies rarely pan out as anything decent. Get solid skaters.

3. Get all PPP #1 D-men. Fill those slots, there'll be lots of PP1 forwards late in draft.

4. Get healthy players that'll likely play 80+gp.

5. Draft PLUS players. Plus/minus is real and adds up. I lost track of this only in the very last round - where I was just coming off some Flyer discussion and realized their likely PP1, Cam York, hadn't been drafted. Well, fine - but he might finish -35. Oops.

6. Intentionally avoid HIT/BLK/PIM. Thing here is... the players most likely to get injured are "bangers" - so I don't really care to dabble here.


Overall - my team is OK.
Without crunching numbers, if my team stays healthy I could finish top3 in all scoring stats and hopefully will be top 5 in all goalie stats, especially ratio - but hopefully also 55+ starts from Oett, Gus, Jarry.
But I'm also likely to finish bottom3 in HIT, BLK, PIM.

Projected finish 6th/14. (There's some solid 1-year drafting GMs here - more time/care spent than me on this stuff. Hopefully none cheating and using FHG.)
Draft Grade: B-. I can't say I put a lot of effort in besides the opening theory above. I picked players as I went without an ounce of time reviewing team or other rosters (something I'd do if I was more serious about my finish in the league).

[tweetdrivr]

How is use of the guide cheating??

[Pengwin7]

Using Fantasy Hockey Geek during a draft with friends or colleagues (Dobber forum folk) is cheating.
It's a helpful tool to understand player value - but if you are picking players with help from some type of software that the rest of us may not have... it's cheating.
If somebody wants to do it in a pay league with non-friends... or non-Dobber folk... fine.
But competing against fellow friends/Dobber-pals and using advice from a computer program is cheating (and that person loses my respect).

I'd hope nobody here cheated during this draft.

[Invictus]

Fantasy Hockey Geek not really a guide.

[ross10019]

Pengwin7 theory:

1. In Roto, it is usually critical to have solid-to-good goalies. I wanted to get three #1 goalies out of the gate that could possibly finish me top 5 in all five goalie cats. The other advantage to good goalies in this (all starter) format is that by drafting solid goalie - I only plug 3 spots with them. I can use all 21 remaining slots for skaters. Although my skaters won't be "high end", I have the potential to get more man games from 21 skaters than from those 4 goalie teams with 20 skaters. One CAN get 82gp from a skater in the final round. One simply can't count on 40+ starts from a goalie in final round.

2. Avoid rookies - non-generational rookies rarely pan out as anything decent. Get solid skaters.

3. Get all PPP #1 D-men. Fill those slots, there'll be lots of PP1 forwards late in draft.

4. Get healthy players that'll likely play 80+gp.

5. Draft PLUS players. Plus/minus is real and adds up. I lost track of this only in the very last round - where I was just coming off some Flyer discussion and realized their likely PP1, Cam York, hadn't been drafted. Well, fine - but he might finish -35. Oops.

6. Intentionally avoid HIT/BLK/PIM. Thing here is... the players most likely to get injured are "bangers" - so I don't really care to dabble here.


Overall - my team is OK.
Without crunching numbers, if my team stays healthy I could finish top3 in all scoring stats and hopefully will be top 5 in all goalie stats, especially ratio - but hopefully also 55+ starts from Oett, Gus, Jarry.
But I'm also likely to finish bottom3 in HIT, BLK, PIM.

Projected finish 6th/14. (There's some solid 1-year drafting GMs here - more time/care spent than me on this stuff. Hopefully none cheating and using FHG.)
Draft Grade: B-. I can't say I put a lot of effort in besides the opening theory above. I picked players as I went without an ounce of time reviewing team or other rosters (something I'd do if I was more serious about my finish in the league).

Solid analysis as always bud.

I think the 3 versus 4 goalie approach makes sense - but I feel it’s better to go with 4 and have two great backups in solid teams (eg Raanta and Swayman, say) who will help GAA/Sv% (and even shutouts) big time and still give you a shot at the volume goalie cats. If you go 3 workhorse G starters only, then unless you draft them all early chances are your 3rd goalie is going to be a weak starter or a good starter but on a bad team. but for sure, the extra skater makes a difference, and I’m taking a risk there.

On the Blocks/Hits/PIMs I totally hear you, but some guys who contribute, and all those categories AND SOG should legitimately go high, like a Trouba or a Nurse for example, even though they violate your sensible rule about focusing on PP1 defensemen first.

On the plus minus, I like that approach but at some point it breaks down because you have some very valuable players available later in the draft who can bring you points coverage beyond what you should be getting at that point in the draft, but it comes at the cost of a potentially bad plus minus hit. And you have to go for it.

Same with injury-prone, avoid at all costs but it gets so tempting at some point…

[Invictus]

I don't think it's cheating especially for a slow draft. Also makes our site pals money!

I find you tend to come out plenty ahead in hits/pim if you use it, unless you mentally (manually) correct your picks.

I don't think anyone here used it for this draft.

[ross10019]

Using Fantasy Hockey Geek during a draft with friends or colleagues (Dobber forum folk) is cheating.
It's a helpful tool to understand player value - but if you are picking players with help from some type of software that the rest of us may not have... it's cheating.
If somebody wants to do it in a pay league with non-friends... or non-Dobber folk... fine.
But competing against fellow friends/Dobber-pals and using advice from a computer program is cheating (and that person loses my respect).

I'd hope nobody here cheated during this draft.

Yeah totally agree. It’s like using ChatGPT for a friendly draft. But the Guide is kosher because it’s manual, and the whole point of the mock draft is practicing how to prepare for and run a draft, and using the Guide is central to preparing for drafts.

[Pengwin7]

Solid analysis as always bud.
I think the 3 versus 4 goalie approach makes sense - but I feel it’s better to go with 4 and have two great backups in solid teams (eg Raanta and Swayman, say)

You might be right.
I'm always trying different strategies in different leagues.

The strongest "working" strategy - which some people, especially duntroon, I believe - use a lot is the "Skater-Heavy" format.
That works especially well with a top 3 pick.
That said - ROTO - with FIVE goalie cats and no in-year moves makes for a different case.
I don't want to be 50/50 on any goalies. A guy like Raanta - yeah - IF he stays healthy - yeah, great value.
But with Kotchetkov in waiting... a little "tweak"... and it's 10gp from Raanta. Ooof, possible.


But... it'll be interesting case-study at end-of-year.
We could look at several people drafting goalies and forwards in a select # of rounds.
Several people took goalies in rounds 2/3/4, some did not.
Some took goalie in late rounds.

So... say... 3 goalies and 3 forwards all in rounds 2/3/4/16/20/22... something like that... what distribution gets better value.
I don't know.

But I use this theory in fantasy football with limited bench.
I prefer a rockstar TE & QB... with late "bye" for each, not same week... if you can get it.
Because then you can load up the bench with RB&WR without having to roster a backup TE or QB.
Make sure you have different bye weeks for TE & QB and you have a LOT of bench to try to hit on those RB,WR.

Different sport - but same theory - which is to roster a few ELITE positional player so that you can focus elsewhere with other roster spots.

The thing about fantasy hockey, too...
...is that LUCK is a big factor.

The teams that win... they get a lot of luck.
I know the winner in RHRS last year happened to mid-draft Ullmark and later-draft Swayman.
I mean... that's some good luck with how Boston's season went...
But nobody can PREDICT that sort of thing.

So - best any of us can do would be to have a working theory.



Out of curiousity - has anybody checked an input on Fantrax "projected" (stat) standings?!?!
I'd be interested to see how that shakes out.
The Fantrax projections are pretty good - we all had access to those - and by the way picks went off the board - I'd say most of us were checking on those - especially as the "available" list.