NHL Fantasy Pool Value

[tiger]

dunno if I should start a new thread or just hijack this one.

I was wondering how we can make the NL hockey pool more interesting and promote trades.

Clearly each year there are only a few buyers and a few sellers, but mainly the GMs try to just build via the draft. Do we keep it the same b/c that's exactly how it is in the NHL?

The only thing I can't figure out is how to motivate GMs to try to win. Some of the GM in our pool would be pretty successful as a real life GM, and others would lose their job along with millions for the club.

I guess it is like real life then, since some GMs just suck and destroy a franchise for a long time with bad drafting, bad trades, bad management, no vision, etc.

Since there's nothing but bragging rights and pride at stake, some GMs just don't mind being in the gutter for years.

[[JT]]

start all over, play for money

[Wetundies]

add in penalty mins, then we can start drafting some goons. 1 point per penalty min, then no one want crosby or ovech, cuz o'brien and his 500 mins would be worth more.

[JKY88]

We should pick players we actually know! (Dibs on Carson)

Of course, then we'll have to count plus/minus as well. Shark's 20pts in 15 games doesn't look so good when you factor in the minus 13

[joel]

I think there are a lot of reasons there is little movement in the NL pool now. There are a number of ways we could improve this but they would invovle some significant changes to the way our pool is structured.
*Free agent pick ups (there should be a re-entry waiver rule to this though)
*Playoff round (so teams will try to make the playoffs (competition for the lower standing teams), and promote acquiring "playoff players" in order to win the cup! This also adds a level unpredicatability of who comes out on top at the end, which adds the level of compete for GMs.)
*Salary caps (teams will have be forced to adjust to a budget)
*Player contracts (Limit the years a player can stay on a team)

Those are a just a couple of suggestions, I have tonnes more where that came from. How do we even implement those changes, though? We need a Competition Committee to come up with suggestions for improvements to the NL pool, and then have a Board of Govenors to vote on those amendments.

I think basically what the NL pool needs is more to shoot for than just 1st place in the standings as some people consider that race lost before the start of the season and most of the rest by the end of October.

[tiger]

cool...

How about if you don't make the top 1/2 in 5 years, you're fired as a GM and you lose your team.

[joel]

That might work. If we had extra GM or reduced the number of team in our league we could have a job queue where fired GMs have to wait for another GM to get fired before they get hired to that team.

[tyson]

couple issues at work here.
firstly, there isn't much incentive to win. simple way to address this would be to play for money instead of bragging rights. everybody throw in 30$ at the draft, previous years winner decides where to donate the money, current year's winner gets tax receipt.
second, people are too worried about getting zipziped. this one will be addressed indirectly. people will have more incentive to win and will be willing to be a little more active. i would also think that more people would do a better job scouting and therefore mitigate the risk of being zipziped.
third, people are lazy.

there are some other ideas that we could look at too.
ex. a traded player goes to a new team and may fill a different role in the NHL, so lets say that if I trade a player that TSN lists as LW/RW that i have on my LW for the year, the new GM can switch him to RW to suit his team if he so wanted.

[tiger]

The position switch could be interesting.

I don't mind implementing changes, as long as it really promotes interest. I don't want to back at square one in 3 years after spending tons of time and energy changing the format.

[joel]

So before this thread, got hijacked, the some names were brought up and it's time to assess on accurate our predictions were:
Rich Peverly - I said he could hit 70-75 pts. I was off by 20. He seemed to really slow in the 2nd half. Went undrafted.
Matt Moulson - When Tavares slowed down in scoring, he seemed to slow too. But he did end up going in 3rd round.
Dan Sexton - his short game hot streak, was only that. went undrafted.. he may make the team on the 3rd line this year.
Antii Niemi - ended prying the starter reigns from Huet as predicted, carried the team to the cup. Dave predicate that they couldn't keep him. and it turns out to be the case. He did go in the 1st round as i predicted though.
Simon Hjarlmsson - still stuck behind the depth of the chicago blue line. went undrafted
Brooks Laich - 59pts. i called 60-65, so pretty decent call. went in the 2nd round
Ryan O'Reilly - cooled off in the second half, almost was drafted...
Kirill Kabanov - wow can a prospect plummet more in the rankings than this guy. was still selected in the early 2nd round, so my 1st round call was not too far off the mark.

2010-11 NHL Fantasy Pool Value topic to come...