Give me one good reason I should buy the Dobber Guide this season?

[TeamRamrod]

Unless you can predict the future, you can't take any prediction as gospel. I'm sure Dobber would like to get his forecast as close as possible. Ultimately I take 4-5 publications and average them out (including Dobber). I take that average as a rough guesstimate. Why I buy Dobber's guide, is for the write ups and insight on prospects I don't get to see regularly. For the ten dollars I fork out for a shitty publication (THN, Forecaster), Dobber's guide is worth ten times that in the amount of information it gives me to make a proper decision to draft. Please note , you do have to read the guide and not just look at the forecasts. I have won my league for the last five years and I give a ton of credit to Dobber and his group, but ultimately, I have to make the end decision on who I draft and trade for. Dobber's guides give me the best opportunity to make an informed decision. The only bad thing about Dobber's info. is keeping it secret from other managers in my league (sadly, I think many of the GM's probably hide the fact that they know about and frequent the site).

[rikkitikki]

Not sure what guide you are talking about but this is what I found from TSN rankings
Name TSN PRED DOBBER ACTUAL WINNER
Kane 72 73 106 Dobber
Kessel 85 81 59 Dobber
Ovechkin 87 85 71 Dobber
Stamkos 77 79 64 TSN
Thornton 70 67 82 TSN
Pavelski 67 66 78 TSN
Kuznetzov 47 49 77 Dobber
...

What we can take away from this is the point predictions were very similar between the guides.
Look at other players like Crosby, backstrom, Tarasenko, Kopitar, Perry, Pacoretty, Monahan. The predictions there are very close.

Typically over the years Dobber's predictions have been more accurate compared to the other magazines nobody is perfect. Perhaps this year they were off a little more but over the long hall they have been quite good and the knowledge of the writing is what is important.

Plus who really could predict Voracek's collapse which effected Giroux. Or that Panarin would succeed so well which helped Kane. Or that Kessel would not play with Crosby, and with malkin hurt most of the season really had no set up man.

[changeling87]

Plus who really could predict Voracek's collapse which effected Giroux. Or that Panarin would succeed so well which helped Kane. Or that Kessel would not play with Crosby, and with malkin hurt most of the season really had no set up man.

I would expect if you charge good money for a guide that you'd get at least a few of these predictions correct

[theslymonkey]

I would expect if you charge good money for a guide that you'd get at least a few of these predictions correct

[Loafer]

Yeah it really sounds like you aren't interested in an answer to your original question.

[changeling87]

Yeah it really sounds like you aren't interested in an answer to your original question.

I'm waiting for someone to give me a proper answer. The best we have so far is from a guy who does it to support the site which at least is an answer. The rest have been "well you can't win em all" apologists. If I choose to buy the guide this year, will it actually help me win my pool (because that's how it is advertised) or will I wind up on the bottom again from following it's advice.

What's your deal anyway? You seem awfully invested in this for a guy who just joined and bought his first guide.

[Duff]

[QUOTE=changeling87;1668083]I'm waiting for someone to give me a proper answer. The best we have so far is from a guy who does it to support the site which at least is an answer. The rest have been "well you can't win em all" apologists. If I choose to buy the guide this year, will it actually help me win my pool (because that's how it is advertised) or will I wind up on the bottom again from following it's advice.


It'S pretty clear that you already made up your mind to not purchase dobber's guide. Why are you wasting your time looking for answers ? I buy the guide because there is a LOT of infomations for my roto-league. If you take the predictions as if it was the holy truth, then you are not a very good pooler.

[LeTrefle]

Projections are projections. No one can tell the future.
Every GMs have the same chance of hitting the surprise homerun (like Panarin) or hitting the wall (like Kessel) at the draft.
You don't win leagues with your draft.
You win with your trades (sell high-buy low) and your roster management.
This site gives you so much information on a daily basis (ramblings, columns, forums...). This is that info that will help you win.
By purchasing the guide, we contribute to maintain this level of information.

[joe jones]

I'm waiting for someone to give me a proper answer. The best we have so far is from a guy who does it to support the site which at least is an answer. The rest have been "well you can't win em all" apologists. If I choose to buy the guide this year, will it actually help me win my pool (because that's how it is advertised) or will I wind up on the bottom again from following it's advice.

What's your deal anyway? You seem awfully invested in this for a guy who just joined and bought his first guide.

It depends on how you use the guide.

1. It will not help you if you buy it and just look at the projections and base your draft on those (edit - caveat, even this might help you actually, just not as much).

2. It will help you if you buy it and use it as part of your overall materials in preparing for your draft (e.g. with reference to, inter alia, off night frequency, advanced stats, strength/weakness of schedule, etc.).

[StuntMan12]

I like to look at the top 4 major magazines and compare all their projections and reasoning, I also ask advice on the many knowledgable posters on this site then couple that with whatever hockey knowledge I have and make my predictions and assumptions. I made my list of predictions which I have spent at least 40+ hours on

[Rodgort]

I'm waiting for someone to give me a proper answer. The best we have so far is from a guy who does it to support the site which at least is an answer. The rest have been "well you can't win em all" apologists. If I choose to buy the guide this year, will it actually help me win my pool (because that's how it is advertised) or will I wind up on the bottom again from following it's advice.

Proper answer I guess: Because I have won using it this guide than I have using other magazines

Bold part: Predictions are predictions, hockey is an incredibly lucky game. Unless you have a crystal ball that can predict injuries, coaching changes, season long powerplay usage, when a player gets in the dog house, lingering injuries, locker room in-fighting, players randomly slumping, trades, deadline trades, low shooting percentage, high shooting percentage, Ottawa players to 100% accuracy, goalies having awful years, goalies having vezina years, low on ice shooting percentage, high on ice shooting percentage, etc. all guides will never be right

[Eskimo Brother]

Proper answer I guess: Because I have won using it this guide than I have using other magazines

Bold part: Predictions are predictions, hockey is an incredibly lucky game. Unless you have a crystal ball that can predict injuries, coaching changes, season long powerplay usage, when a player gets in the dog house, lingering injuries, locker room in-fighting, players randomly slumping, trades, deadline trades, low shooting percentage, high shooting percentage, Ottawa players to 100% accuracy, goalies having awful years, goalies having vezina years, low on ice shooting percentage, high on ice shooting percentage, etc. all guides will never be right

Solid answer.
If you are doing things on your own, then you miss things, like minor trades/signings, or line tinkering, or injuries, or even a new goalie coach coming in. It is this kind of insight that you can use to build upon your hockey knowledge, and HELP you win your pool. No pool can be won just off of a draft guide. No pool can be won by a single trade, or anything of that sort. The key is that the guide helps you get a better trade twice a season. It helps you find one extra gem off the waiver wire. It helps you draft based on what you need to win your league. It gives you solid advice on the teams that we miss a lot of, like the Anaheim's and Vancouvers of the world for us East coast dwellers.

Lets relate fantasy hockey to taking a university course. For example then, the yahoo database is your prof. Gives you an okay overview, but it's not perfect, or really something that you end up acing exams off of. You need some extra reading/study etc to really understand the course. Some people go it alone, and just go off of what they know. Some people are smart enough to ace the course anyways that way.
The Dobber guide is the bank of notes/tests/exams that previous students have accumulated, and given to you. You can be dumb, and still fail the course with it. BUT, for the average student, the extra notes, tests, exams, assignments, etc, are extremely useful when used properly.
The Dobber guide is the collection of notes from most of the smarter students. Some of the other banks of notes/tests etc, you question the intelligence of some of these previous students.

Did that all make sense? Because that's really the best explanation I can give. The Dobber guide is meant to further knowledge. If you knew that Kane was going to get 106 points, then you wouldn't have to buy the Dobber guide, you would be making your own. I didn't know it, that's for sure.
I consider myself a very good fantasy player, and I would say my fantasy record (and total life winnings ) reflects that. If I was to go back through all of my predictions for last season, I'm sure there would be some that I got closer to than he did. On the whole however, it probably isn't all that close, in Dobber's favour.

[Kofax]

I don't know why there are so many people here defending the guide. We all find it beneficial, enjoy reading it, and then enjoy debating the content.

This guy does not feel the same way and expects a guide he uses to give him a winning team. He doesn't appear to be interested in anyone telling him otherwise.

Let him move on and our community will be the better for it.

[lektrix]

I have purchased the guide 5-6 times in the last 8 years and I have finished 1st 5 times and 2nd 1 time. Success! Maybe it's the guide, maybe it's me, who knows?

But I'll admit I've slowly used the guide less and less as the years pass by and I still remain successful... why?

Because I've developed my own ideas, formulas, and just a solid sense of how to succeed in fantasy hockey and they more or less align with Dobber's general themes.

So why do I still buy the guide sometimes? Because I don't have time to research players and prospects, I don't have time to watch regular season games, and I can rely on them to do all the homework and number crunching for a measly $10 or whatever minute amount they charge. I just need to show up on draft day, do my 30 minutes of research using Dobber's prep work, apply my draft formula, and know that I have a chance to finish near the top.

[havanablast21]

Hmmnm.. I've purchased it 3 times over the past 3 seasons. In that time I finished 2nd, 1st and 1st (respectively). Maybe you're using it wrong!?