Makar or ....

[Eskimo Brother]

That post exactly proved my point. Horror of horrors - you might have to wait 2-3 years to get those points. The weight of consistent, forward-thinking philosophy over safe, staid team building is a wide divide. In a keeper league the only way for consistent success is to realize that your moves aren't for today. The joy and fun in these leagues (and I've been a participant for 35 years) is building a team. Your short-sighted advice flies in the face of logic. Good philosophy brings long-term success. Conservatism kills.

Fantasy hockey is a little different. While you're waiting 3-5 years for guys to develop, I'll take the guys like Doughty, win the league a few times, and then ship them off for someone similar who is a few years younger (Morrissey or Trouba for example). Then there's no period of losing
If the joy for you is building a team, go for it. The joy for me is competing to win every single year.

[lucafen4]

That post exactly proved my point. Horror of horrors - you might have to wait 2-3 years to get those points. The weight of consistent, forward-thinking philosophy over safe, staid team building is a wide divide. In a keeper league the only way for consistent success is to realize that your moves aren't for today. The joy and fun in these leagues (and I've been a participant for 35 years) is building a team. Your short-sighted advice flies in the face of logic. Good philosophy brings long-term success. Conservatism kills.

Too much coffee? Chill.
I think you've generalized my comments.

If it's a dynasty where you keep everyone - answers will be different.

say this is a keep 10 with no minors system.

The choice comes down to Doughty or Makar
Doughty 50pts
vs.
Makar ??

You keep Makar
He struggles first 9 games - goes to the AHL for the remainder of the season.
Doughty, a 2nd round pick by another team puts up 55pts.

You're in a big hole vs. what you could have had.

The strategy of waiting 2-3 years for production does not work in all pools.
That's an overarching general strategy that will lead you to finishing middle of the road most years.
You can't apply that to EVERY pool.

There's a reason the people on this forum ask for as many details as the pool as possible
Because league settings dictates advice.

I'm in 5 pools. All different. All different strategies. One, I stockpiled high end prospects this year. Another I sold everything, including the shingles on the roof of the barn to win this year. I dropped an injured Letang for Weegar MacKenzie!!

I have one pool with 3 year contract limits. Holding Makar, waiting for him to reach his production ceiling would be foolish.

Every pool is different. Every different pool requires a different strategy. Therefore, every thread will receive different advice.

The OP will get different answers if this were a cap pool. vs. limited keeper vs. dynasty vs any combination of &/or Multi-cat vs. points only vs. SIM.

It's not about conservatism. It's about trying to make the right choice based on the specific league you're in.

The hilarity of your post is that it's the exact opposite rant of another forum member a couple months ago who went on a tangent about these forums are ALWAYS suggesting GM's take the 'shiny new toy' over proven producers.

Considering the similarity of the two rants... just opposite sides of the fence. I'd argue these forums provide pretty balanced advice. Otherwise both extremes wouldn't be so passionate & offended.

[TornBetween2Pucks]

There's no such thing as too much coffee. You must be a young man to take such umbrage over being proven wrong. Don't be so afraid to own it.

The hilarity of your post is dragging in different league setups to justify your position. You're missing the point. In the initial post it was asked - Makar vs three d who are all solid real-life two way players. Your advice, in this particular instance, showed poor judgment and philosophy.

If you truly believe Doughty is a better keeper in the setup as was initially asked the point I make is valid and true. It shows short-sightedness and conservatism.

Anyway, have a great day. I'm enjoying a coffee at A&W as we throw bricks at each other.

[lucafen4]

Here's my first response:

Well... does he have to sign before the end of the regular season?

If that's the case - you don't have to worry. UMass is in the Frozen 4. April 11-13th. The week AFTER the NHL regular season ends.

Here's my second:

This is true, but Makar's a smaller, different type of Dman. I look at Werenski and see that as a possible immediate impact for Makar.
That said, he needs the opportunity. No guarantees as Barrie has 1 more year and hasn't been traded yet.
A lesser hurdle, but a hurdle nonetheless is to pass Girard on the depth charts

There's no such thing as too much coffee. You must be a young man to take such umbrage over being proven wrong. Don't be so afraid to own it.

The hilarity of your post is dragging in different league setups to justify your position. You're missing the point. In the initial post it was asked - Makar vs three d who are all solid real-life two way players. Your advice, in this particular instance, showed poor judgment and philosophy.

If you truly believe Doughty is a better keeper in the setup as was initially asked the point I make is valid and true. It shows short-sightedness and conservatism.

Anyway, have a great day. I'm enjoying a coffee at A&W as we throw bricks at each other.

I drug different leagues into this because your OP was generalizing to the forum as a whole that 'we' routinely select 60pt players over 80pt players. None of these Dmen are 80pt players. So you're dragging forwards into a Dman conversation.

If you actually read my comments - rather than generalize me into other comments made - I didn't make a comment towards keeping Doughty or Pietrangelo over Makar.
Too much coffee-- skimming, not reading.

In one of my replies to you, I actually pointed out we don't know all the details of the OP's league set up. We're assuming it's a limited keeper.
In a limited keeper without a minors system... YES, I'd keep Doughty.

It could be 2-3 years before Makar puts up stats strong enough to create an argument he deserves to be kept.
Similar to Eskimo Brother, I prefer to win every year. Not give my money away for 2-3 with the hopes a prospect achieves his ceiling.
Ryan Murphy went #2 overall once...
I'm sure someone kept him over a Doughty type player... how do you think that turned out?

Not saying Makar will flop - but that's THE RISK.

signed - young man

[saucelife90]

FWIW it's a keep 16 - so not entirely a dynasty, but the main core of the rosters stay intact.

I didn't give all the info for keepers because I've already narrowed down my keeper list with Pietrangelo, Doughty, and Heiskanen rounding out my last 3 keeper spots on D.. My debate about Makar is simply because, like TornBetween mentioned, looking ahead and grabbing a guy before they breakout can give you extra bonus of gaining a "free upgrade" on your worst keeper. (Even in a 10 team league with lots of talent available in the re-draft, any little edge up on the other 9 teams is great)

A couple years ago, I took over the last place team in one of my leagues and had an extremely mediocre core so I tried this strategy to help speed up a rebuild - At the end of every season, I tried to target a potential breakout player for the following year and add them as a free agent in the off season (I drop a depth player I had no intentions of keeping anyways). I then try and make a 2:1 deal to make room for the potential breakout guy to fit on my squad (didn't work either year because no one wants the last place team's scraps), I just drop my 16th best keeper for the newly acquire FA at the keeper deadline.

The past 2 years;

'16-'17 offseason - Dropped Toews who had 58 points at year end & Added Rantanen after his first full season (38 points)
'17-'18 offseason - Dropped Duchene & added Pettersson (who hadn't played an NHL game yet)

In both scenarios I feel like I upgraded my keepers for free, but at the risk of potentially losing points.

Which brings me to this thread..... and all your opinions... which haven't help one way or the other... since they've been fairly evenly split on both sides of the fence with great points

I still have time to potentially make a 2:1 trade like I mentioned. I finished 2nd this year, and have some quality players (unlike years past) who would be upgrades on bottom end teams, that would just end up being drops for me...