Draft Strategy Thoughts?
I am looking for advice re: draft strategy. I obviously need to draft only wingers and D men haha...
With a limited Keeper, who do you target with the first round and on? Traditionally, i have targeted the best available players based upon expected production in the next year, I have looked for value in each round and underperforming players that I've expected to turn it around.
I have stayed away from drafting rookies for the most part with my picks. This strategy has worked well for me as I have won my league overall in 2 of the past 3 years and finished 2nd in the other year.
That being said, I'm not getting new top players/prospects to re-fresh my lineup. (I have gotten lucky w/ getting Boeser off the wire). I also drafted Pastrnak in a late round in 2015 but traded him for Andersen - Thus, I am getting value off the wire or in later rounds.
However, at what point should I be looking to really draft for the future? What are thoughts on draft placement of elite prospects? Obviously Dahlin and Svechnikov will go early, but where do you draft Pettersson or other guys that may not perform as well as you would like in the current season when much more helpful players for the current year are available - and will not be there as the draft gets into deeper rounds.
My thoughts are that I'm set to win now so go for the win. I'd like to start gearing up for the future a little bit though as well as my core ages and our keeper pool is expanding to 12 next season.
To the forum: What are your draft strategies with limited keepers that you have thought worked well?
League: H2H - Keep 15
Managers: 12
Rosters: 25 (4C, 4LW, 4RW, 6D, 2G, 5BN)
Scoring Categories: G, A, P, +/-, PPG, PPA, SHP, GWG, SOG, FW, BLK, HIT, W, L, GAA, SV, SV%, SO
Projected Keepers in Bold (Rebuild)
C: Bedard, Cozens, Zegras, Lundell, B. Hayton, A. Cirelli, JG Pageau
LW: Svechnikov, Raymond, Byfield, Laine, D. Voronkov, A. Henrique
RW: Caufield, Jarvis, Perfetti, Marchenko, J. Quinn, K. Kakko
D: Seider, Bouchard, L. Hughes, Sanderson, Korchinski, Romanov
G: Demko, Kochetkov, Thompson, Askarov
Championships: 2016, 2018, 2019