Drafting Strategies and Tips

[narduch]

I wasn\'t sure where to put this, so I\'m using this forum. I was curious to see what tips and tricks others use in attacking their drafts. How do you prepare for the actual draft day. What do you bring to the draft table. For my own examples, my main league is a 10 team keeper league where we keep 10 players. This was sort of inspired by the recent Burnsy article.

1. The first thing I do is make a list where I write down all my keepers on a sheet of paper by position. I think this is an important thing have at the draft. As the draft goes on, any player I pick will be slotted in their proper position.

2. I make my own cheat sheets based on position. Most guides only give you a large list, or they don\'t separate the wingers. Meanwhile, most pools have spots for both LW and RW. The other thing I do is check if Yahoo (this could be any site) actually lists the player at his proper position. This also allows me to move players up and down at my own discretion. At the same time, I still have a general list, because you still want to draft the best player available.

3. I avoid certain teams. There are teams that I won\'t draft players from, no matter what. This season, those teams are Dallas, Phoenix and Edmonton.

I started this thread because I\'m curios to see what others do. Any contributions are greatly appreciated.

Post edited by: narduch, at: 2007/09/11 10:30

[lanky522]

Those strategies are good, although I wouldn\'t necessarily discriminate based on teams. Would you not draft Mueller or Turris in a deep keeper pool just because phoenix isn\'t that good right now?

I remember a few years back when pittsburgh sucked, and a certain player named sidney entered the league. Teams that didn\'t draft him because he was on a \"crappy team\" are probably regretting it now.

Remember, a star on a crappy team can often be better than a role player on a good team...

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Other than your thoughts on strategy, my main one would be to have a flowing strategy. You can\'t start the draft with a set strategy and follow it to a tee. You have to compromise and changed your strategy and player lists based on your draft position, what other players do, and what sort of \"openings\" you see.

You\'ve got to take what you\'re given. If you aren\'t ready to compromise or change your strategy, you\'ll get flustered quickly as the players you planned on taking are disappearing before your eyes.

[The Comish]

lanky522 wrote:

Other than your thoughts on strategy, my main one would be to have a flowing strategy. You can\'t start the draft with a set strategy and follow it to a tee. You have to compromise and changed your strategy and player lists based on your draft position, what other players do, and what sort of \"openings\" you see.

You\'ve got to take what you\'re given. If you aren\'t ready to compromise or change your strategy, you\'ll get flustered quickly as the players you planned on taking are disappearing before your eyes.

Lanky, Are your thoughts based on the Dobberhockey Experts draft!? It sounds like many of us had to \"go with the flow\".

narduch, you are right to break down your rankings by position. You will also need to forecast each players numbers for the upcoming season (and beyond if it\'s more than a one year pool).

Focus on how your league awards points. If there are no penalties for having a bad plus/minus, then by all means take guys from PHX and EDM. Someone has to play on the power play. If your league scoring values penalty minutes try to get the talented players who rack up penalty minutes, so you don\'t have to take a goon pick.

It really depends on your league setup and scoring for who\'s important in your draft. Break down the positions and try to group players into tiers, that way you know who the top guys are and when to take certain positions. By that I mean, if you have 10 defencemen in your first tier and 7 or 8 of them have been taken, you might want to jump in and grab one or two of the remaining top defencemen.

[narduch]

lanky522 wrote:

Those strategies are good, although I wouldn\'t necessarily discriminate based on teams. Would you not draft Mueller or Turris in a deep keeper pool just because phoenix isn\'t that good right now?

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You\'ve got to take what you\'re given. If you aren\'t ready to compromise or change your strategy, you\'ll get flustered quickly as the players you planned on taking are disappearing before your eyes.

Its funny you mention Crosby, because I did draft him. I also think that he was a clear special case, and was a no-brainer first overall pick.

Just because I have rules/guidelines for teams, it doesn\'t mean that they are rigid. Dallas is a perfect example, while I would stay away from its forwards, I think Boucher and Zubov have excellent fantasy value.

You touch on another important point, the fact that drafts never go as planned. You can do all the prep and planning in the world, but things will never go the way you like them. The key is to be able to adjust to what everyone else is doing and to have enough info so that when the players you really wanted get drafted by your opponents, you still have some great alternates.

In the end there is no real science to this. But any edge we can gain is valuable.

[narduch]

The Comish, that\'s a great suggestion to tier the players. I\'m going to do that for this year.

Thanks to both of you guys for responding. I\'m a bit of a nerd for draft preparation.

[peekNpoke]

If you are in a pool and know the guys who are in it, try to make a note of the teams they like and dislike, any players in particular that they were happy to have in past pools. Any guys they absolutely hate.

Its not a perfect thing but it could help you make a choice especially if you are involved in a snake draft and you are trying to figure out if a player would survive till your next pick.


As a little trick, a long time ago, I used to make my own draft sheets and hated when guys would try to sneak a peek or try to read the markings through the opposite side, so I glued an old hockey news article to the sheet so they couldn\'t see through and on top of that I made sure the article was about some old player (tried for Leaf - home town). So all they got was a bold headline about Foligno or Francheschetti. I won\'t say it worked all the time but I know I got someone to pick up Foligno when he was past his prime. But that guy was an easy target for that kind of thing.

[Shoeless]

Narduch

You know you are a Fantasy Hockey Draft Preparation Nerd when you submit your draft preparations on draft day in a sealed envelope to the Association by the same name. The envelopes are opened after all drafts end and are then judged to determine Draft Nerd of the Year. The prize is always a state of the art external hard drive to handle your homemade player and team databases and analysis spreadsheets.

Last year\'s winning entry included a table top from a university library upon which was scribbled some complex formula for indexing the value of 2nd unit PP D guys with right hand shots in a 1 year points league.

I can send you the entry form if you are interested.

Post edited by: Shoeless, at: 2007/09/14 04:35

[narduch]

LOL

Doesn\'t posting on this forum make you a fantasy hockey nerd by default? :P

[Shoeless]

Heck no! Some of us are voyeurs. I don\'t play fantasy hockey, I just do fantasy hockey forums.