2007/2008 CP Head 2 Head Fantasy Hockey Pool

[Swayze11]

Jarome goes 1st overall... suprising pick

[Ro]

OK, here's a fun, discussion-starting couple of questions:

1- What pick of your own were you most happy with?
2- What pick of your own do you want a do-over for?
3- What was a great pick by another guy?
4- What player went a little too early?
5- Name the final four teams.

------

1- Spezza for sure, surprised he dropped that low in the 1st round. Otherwise, I liked my Horton pick.
2- Rolston. Not 4th round value, but I needed a winger at that point so I didn't fall too behind and start having to pick from the scrubs.
3- Eric Staal - 3/17. He might be a top 10 points guy this year.
4- Langkow, 3/15. Don't think he will repeat a 77 point performance.
5- FurnaceFace, T@Ts, Tilley, frequitude

[Ro]

FlamesKickAss
1. (1) Jarome Iginla
2. (36) Olli Jokinen
3. (37) Marty Turco
4. (72) Rick Nash
5. (73) Andy McDonald
6. (108) Mathieu Schneider
7. (109) Brendan Shanahan
8. (144) Jamie Langenbrunner
9. (145) Dwayne Roloson
10. (180) David Legwand
11. (181) Tom Poti
12. (216) Jaroslav Spacek
13. (217) Sean Hill
14. (252) Alexander Steen
15. (253) Chris Clark
16. (288) Stephen Valiquette
17. (289) Chris Simon
Super-Rye
1. (2) Sidney Crosby
2. (35) Maxim Afinogenov
3. (38) Thomas Vanek
4. (71) Matt Carle
5. (74) Justin Williams
6. (107) Corey Perry
7. (110) Patrik Elias
8. (143) Johan Holmqvist
9. (146) Ed Jovanovski
10. (179) Ladislav Nagy
11. (182) Tom Preissing
12. (215) Daren Machesney
13. (218) Bryan Allen
14. (251) Phil Kessel
15. (254) Ian Laperriere
16. (287) Marek Schwarz
17. (290) Martin Rucinsky
Wpg Flames Fan
1. (3) Joe Thornton
2. (34) Nicklas Lidstrom
3. (39) Dion Phaneuf
4. (70) Kari Lehtonen
5. (75) Ryan Getzlaf
6. (106) Zdeno Chara
7. (111) Markus Naslund
8. (142) Wojtek Wolski
9. (147) Lee Stempniak
10. (178) Tim Connolly
11. (183) Ryan Malone
12. (214) Travis Zajac
13. (219) Peter Mueller
14. (250) Ales Kotalik
15. (255) Thomas Greiss
16. (286) Tyler Arnason
17. (291) Nick Boynton
Double Dion
1. (4) Dany Heatley
2. (33) Marc Savard
3. (40) Ray Emery
4. (69) Lubomir Visnovsky
5. (76) Zach Parise
6. (105) Cristobal Huet
7. (112) Brian Campbell
8. (141) J.P. Dumont
9. (148) Matthew Lombardi
10. (177) Jussi Jokinen
11. (184) Sami Salo
12. (213) Dainius Zubrus
13. (220) Brent Seabrook
14. (249) Eric Brewer
15. (256) Vaclav Prospal
16. (285) Taylor Pyatt
17. (292) Fred Brathwaite
Jiggy_12
1. (5) Roberto Luongo
2. (32) Ryan Whitney
3. (41) Milan Michalek
4. (68) Brad Richards
5. (77) Keith Tkachuk
6. (104) Philippe Boucher
7. (113) Jason Pominville
8. (140) Martin Straka
9. (149) Marc-Andre Bergeron
10. (176) Dustin Brown
11. (185) Michal Rozsival
12. (212) Josh Harding
13. (221) Robyn Regehr
14. (248) Brendan Morrison
15. (257) Mikael Samuelsson
16. (284) Erik Ersberg
17. (293) Mark Bell
Azure!
1. (6) Evgeni Malkin
2. (31) Daniel Briere
3. (42) Pavol Demitra
4. (67) Slava Kozlov
5. (78) Andrew Brunette
6. (103) Nikolai Khabibulin
7. (114) Kevin Bieksa
8. (139) Mark Recchi
9. (150) Mike Modano
10. (175) Mike Commodore
11. (186) Mattias Ohlund
12. (211) Michal Neuvirth
13. (222) Mike Van Ryn
14. (247) Jochen Hecht
15. (258) Jason Chimera
16. (283) Wade Dubielewicz
17. (294) Colby Armstrong
The Pagal
1. (7) Miikka Kiprusoff
2. (30) Chris Pronger
3. (43) Alex Tanguay
4. (66) Michael Cammalleri
5. (79) Peter Budaj
6. (102) Paul Kariya
7. (115) Shea Weber
8. (138) Robert Lang
9. (151) Drew Stafford
10. (174) Todd Bertuzzi
11. (187) Barret Jackman
12. (210) Todd White
13. (223) Patrick Kane
14. (246) Cory Murphy
15. (259) Carey Price
16. (282) Kristopher Letang
17. (295) Brett Sterling
Displaced
1. (8) Alexander Ovechkin
2. (29) Daniel Sedin
3. (44) Sergei Gonchar
4. (65) Chris Mason
5. (80) Alexei Zhitnik
6. (101) Jason Blake
7. (116) Shane Doan
8. (137) Fredrik Norrena
9. (152) Pierre-Marc Bouchard
10. (173) Marek Svatos
11. (188) Jordan Leopold
12. (209) Doug Weight
13. (224) Steve Reinprecht
14. (245) Keith Ballard
15. (260) Owen Nolan
16. (281) Dan Hamhuis
17. (296) Richard Zednik
FLAMESRULE
1. (9) Martin Brodeur
2. (28) Milan Hejduk
3. (45) Patrick Marleau
4. (64) Chris Drury
5. (81) Brian Gionta
6. (100) Patrice Bergeron
7. (117) Brenden Morrow
8. (136) Rob Blake
9. (153) Fredrik Modin
10. (172) Ron Hainsey
11. (189) Andrej Meszaros
12. (208) Dan Turple
13. (225) Marek Malik
14. (244) Jeff Carter
15. (261) Peter Schaefer
16. (280) Radim Vrbata
17. (297) Steve Mason
Suave
1. (10) Jaromir Jagr
2. (27) Niklas Backstrom
3. (46) Sheldon Souray
4. (63) Scott Niedermayer
5. (82) Martin Biron
6. (99) Rod Brind'Amour
7. (118) Bill Guerin
8. (135) Brad Boyes
9. (154) Martin Erat
10. (171) Joe Corvo
11. (190) Alexei Ponikarovsky
12. (207) Brendan Witt
13. (226) Derek Morris
14. (243) Mike Comrie
15. (262) Viktor Kozlov
16. (279) Pascal Leclaire
17. (298) Johan Franzen
FurnaceFace
1. (11) Vincent Lecavalier
2. (26) Marc-Andre Fleury
3. (47) Simon Gagne
4. (62) Alexander Semin
5. (83) Scott Gomez
6. (98) Olaf Kolzig
7. (119) Alexander Radulov
8. (134) Anze Kopitar
9. (155) Paul Mara
10. (170) Christian Ehrhoff
11. (191) Jere Lehtinen
12. (206) Ruslan Fedotenko
13. (227) Mike Fisher
14. (242) Paul Martin
15. (263) Mark Parrish
16. (278) Pavel Kubina
17. (299) Ilya Bryzgalov
VANFLAMESFAN
1. (12) Marian Hossa
2. (25) Marian Gaborik
3. (48) Kristian Huselius
4. (61) Paul Stastny
5. (84) Bryan McCabe
6. (97) Steve Sullivan
7. (120) Jonathan Toews
8. (133) Manny Fernandez
9. (156) Adrian Aucoin
10. (169) Brett Clark
11. (192) Martin Gelinas
12. (205) Ruslan Salei
13. (228) Josh Tordjman
14. (241) David Vyborny
15. (264) Christopher Higgins
16. (277) Jon Quick
17. (300) Donald Brashear
frequitude
1. (13) Ilya Kovalchuk
2. (24) Evgeni Nabokov
3. (49) Martin Havlat
4. (60) Mats Sundin
5. (85) Rick DiPietro
6. (96) Wade Redden
7. (121) John-Michael Liles
8. (132) Petr Sykora
9. (157) Glen Murray
10. (168) Chris Neil
11. (193) Marco Sturm
12. (204) Peter Forsberg
13. (229) Michael Ryder
14. (240) Filip Kuba
15. (265) Shawn Horcoff
16. (276) Raffi Torres
17. (301) Marc Staal
sudbury ROaches
1. (14) Jason Spezza
2. (23) Henrik Lundqvist
3. (50) Alexander Frolov
4. (59) Brian Rolston
5. (86) Michael Nylander
6. (95) Vesa Toskala
7. (122) Sergei Zubov
8. (131) Chris Kunitz
9. (158) Nathan Horton
10. (167) Miroslav Satan
11. (194) Shane O'Brien
12. (203) Dustin Penner
13. (230) Craig Rivet
14. (239) Mikko Koivu
15. (266) Duncan Keith
16. (275) Frantisek Kaberle
17. (302) Tomas Plekanec
SebC's scorers
1. (15) Martin St. Louis
2. (22) Dominik Hasek
3. (51) Daymond Langkow
4. (58) Dan Boyle
5. (87) Manny Legace
6. (94) Sean Avery
7. (123) Jordan Staal
8. (130) Tomas Holmstrom
9. (159) Scott Hartnell
10. (166) Chris Phillips
11. (195) Saku Koivu
12. (202) Anton Volchenkov
13. (231) Mike Komisarek
14. (238) Michal Handzus
15. (267) Maxime Talbot
16. (274) Ben Eager
17. (303) Boyd Gordon
OILFAN #81
1. (16) Jean-Sebastien Giguere
2. (21) Joe Sakic
3. (52) Henrik Sedin
4. (57) Brian Rafalski
5. (88) Tomas Kaberle
6. (93) Ray Whitney
7. (124) Ales Hemsky
8. (129) Andrei Markov
9. (160) Darcy Tucker
10. (165) Gary Roberts
11. (196) Francois Beauchemin
12. (201) Dan Cloutier
13. (232) Joffrey Lupul
14. (237) Jason Arnott
15. (268) Jarret Stoll
16. (273) Steve Bernier
17. (304) David Aebischer
T@TS
1. (17) Henrik Zetterberg
2. (20) Jonathan Cheechoo
3. (53) Eric Staal
4. (56) Tomas Vokoun
5. (89) Derek Roy
6. (92) Jay Bouwmeester
7. (125) Cory Stillman
8. (128) Joni Pitkanen
9. (161) Nikolai Zherdev
10. (164) Roman Hamrlik
11. (197) Alexei Kovalev
12. (200) Stephen Weiss
13. (233) Scott Walker
14. (236) Ryan Suter
15. (269) Kyle Calder
16. (272) Al Montoya
17. (305) Sergei Fedorov
Tilley
1. (18) Daniel Alfredsson
2. (19) Pavel Datsyuk
3. (54) Ryan Smyth
4. (55) Ryan Miller
5. (90) Erik Cole
6. (91) Cam Ward
7. (126) Nicklas Backstrom
8. (127) Kimmo Timonen
9. (162) Mike Knuble
10. (163) Marek Zidlicky
11. (198) Kyle Wellwood
12. (199) Teemu Selanne
13. (234) Erik Johnson
14. (235) Dennis Wideman
15. (270) Mike Ribeiro
16. (271) Brian McGrattan
17. (306) Georges Laraque

[SebC]

SOG? I hope we don't add it... I did my entire draft preparation assuming it wasn't a factor!

As to how I did that preparation.

Step 1: Copy last year's stats from Yahoo into Excel for skaters and goalies.

Step 2: Calculate the league average and standard deviation for each pool stats. I had to make the columns for SHP and PPP but that's easy.

Step 3: Calculate each player's z-score ( (value of stat for player - average ) / standard deviation) in each pool category.

Step 4: Sum up the z-scores for a player's "Fantasy Score".

Obviously there are some flaws in the method and ways that it could be improved, so it was just used as a guideline to spot players who might be flying under the radar because they excel in the less glamorous categories. Even since the draft I've improved it (by fixing the goalies ratings, which were way too low, and combining all skaters into one pool because they play the same categories - Brodeur is now ranked #1, not Souray)... but I figure it's a pretty good way to rank players in head-to-head pools.

So my team should be pretty good on paper. Time to see if they win any games.

[Swayze11]

1- What pick of your own were you most happy with?
2- What pick of your own do you want a do-over for?
3- What was a great pick by another guy?
4- What player went a little too early?
5- Name the final four teams.

1- Heatley or Zubrus because I was suprised how far he dropped
2- Brathwaite... I was scrolling through the LWs to find somone I wanted and it got auto drafted
3- 8. (134) Anze Kopitar. 8th round?!?! I was eyeing him and praying nobody would pick him but he did
4- Jarome Iginla. I know hes a amazing player, but with the 1st overall pick not being crosby is crazy.
5- Wpg Flames Fan, sudbury ROaches, FurnaceFace, and hopfully me :S

[SebC]

1- What pick of your own were you most happy with?

St. Louis at 15th overall. I have him ranked second among skaters... 11 SHP last season!

2- What pick of your own do you want a do-over for?

Maxime Talbot... I had an extra centre already.

3- What was a great pick by another guy?

Colby Armstrong... by far the best RW available in the final round. Oh and Legwand was a guy I really wanted too. Ergo Roszival, but I was expecting him to go.

4- What player went a little too early?

Iginla.

5- Name the final four teams.

FlamesKickAss, jiggy_12, frequitude, SebC's scorers

[Frequitude]

I agree with SebC. The draft is done so we can't change the stats. Next year perhaps...

Originally Posted by SebC

Step 1: Copy last years stats from Yahoo into Excel for skaters and goalies.

How did you do this neatly? I tried and it's all messed up with hyperlinks and the stats are all in the same cell with just spaces between them.

[Frequitude]

What pick of your own were you most happy with?
Peter Sykora (8/138). I'm gambling that yahoo awards him LW this year to shore up my left wing. I kinda left my LW out to dry hoping for this. Oh, and he'll be Crosby's trigger man.
Honorable mentions go to Ryder (13/229) and Horcoff (15/265).

What pick of your own do you want a do-over for?
Glen Murray (9/157). There was tons of RW talent left on the board. I jumped the gun a bit thinking I needed another RW. I've also gotta switch out Marc Staal once the waiver period is over. I've got someone in mind.

What was a great pick by another guy?
Oilfan#81 - Hemsky (7/124), Lupul (13/232)
FurnaceFace - Gomez (5/83)

What player went a little too early?
Hejduk (2/28) - Just not a second round guyJarome Iginla (1/1) - Love the pick, but you gotta go with Crosby
Cheechoo (2/20) - He's a dependant player that requires Thornton. I try to stick to guys who can produce alone in the first couple rounds.

Name the final four teams.
FurnaceFace, Oilfan#81, sudbury ROaches, and well...frequitude.

[SebC]

Originally Posted by Frequitude

How did you do this neatly? I tried and it's all messed up with hyperlinks and the stats are all in the same cell with just spaces between them.

I asked CP for help! Just left the hyperlinks in place though... they don't bother me that much.

http://forum.calgarypuck.com/search.php?searchid=187836

[Frequitude]

Originally Posted by SebC

I asked CP for help! Just left the hyperlinks in place though... they don't bother me that much.

http://forum.calgarypuck.com/search.php?searchid=187836

Woooo. Very nice. This will help a ton to prep for my money league draft. How did you find your SD/z-score system worked for the draft. I like where you went with that. Last year I chose instead to take absolute totals for each player and assign a weighting to each category, then added the weighted totals up for each player to arrive at a "score".

I really like the stats approach though. Gives a better indication as to how a player compares relatively to everyone.

[Frequitude]

I've got another question for everyone:

What lessons did you learn from the draft?

Me, I learned the LW talent drops off FAST. LW and RW each have a similar number of studs, but there are far more tier 2 RWs than tier 2 LWs.

[SebC]

Originally Posted by Frequitude

How did you find your SD/z-score system worked for the draft?

Well there are a few bugs... Originally I had the goalies way too low. I figure multiplying their scores by 5 as there are 5 times as many skaters as goalies fixes it, and indeed it does, putting Hasek at +21.99, Kipper at +21.93, Heatley at +21.45. Brodeur though is +35.56! That's a 13.57 standard deviation between him and the next highest player! Also, as far as skaters go, Crosby is 7th, but I suspect that year to year improvement will justify having him as the top selection, although a case could be made for Brodeur's shutouts.

Another issue is that some stats, such as SHP and GWG, have a sample size problem, and are more likely to end up tied than others, such as assists, +/- and PIMs.

Then there's a bucketing issue, with the Cs LWs RWs and D. Originally I had seperate lists for Dmen and forwards, which gave the top defensemen and forwards similar scores. But then, if the defensemen have a lower average and standard deviation, a higher z-score will indicate less performance for a defenceman than it would for a forward. So I merged them into a skaters category. But that leads to another issue as I would have liked to cut down the list.

And the reason for that, is that really the guys who aren't getting drafted at all shouldn't be listed in my stats, because they're not in the game. So I wanted to remove guys and recalculate (which changes the order - leading to the possibility that the wrong guys would be cut out - maybe it would work best if you remove one guy at a time?). But I couldn't do that with a merged list of skaters. I guess the solution would be to do each position individually, make cuts, and then make the complete list, but that leads to the same error of making the wrong cuts. Actually, even better (but more effort) would be to make the combines skaters list, then cut guys by positions from the total list.

Another issue was making one file which is sortable on a season total basis and a per game basis (it's easy to make z-score formulas for both). Maybe if I knew how to sort by a middle column in Excel, or wasn't too lazy to make two files...

Anyway, I won't know how well it works until well into the season. For the most part though, I think it works fairly well. It looks pretty good in theory (although even in theory there are errors - that's why I just used it as a guideline - e.g. my Handzus pick which had NOTHING to do with my calculations). For the most part, players are ranked where you'd expect them to be so I see that also as an indication that it's an alright way to do things. It's easy to create custom rankings for a points pool, but I wanted some concrete stat for head-to-head, and the z-score system is what I came up with. Maybe for next year's pool, I'll have it perfected.

[SebC]

Originally Posted by Frequitude

I've got another question for everyone:

What lessons did you learn from the draft?

Me, I learned the LW talent drops off FAST. LW and RW each have a similar number of studs, but there are far more tier 2 RWs than tier 2 LWs.

Same here. I have Avery and Holmstrom.

Also, I learnt that Yahoo lists a lot of wingers as centres, which makes the LW shortage even worse.

[Frequitude]

I thought we were leaving max moves at unlimited until the start of the season so the autodrafters could fix their teams.

Some of those teams are pretty unbalanced. Like Suave, who has 2LW, 2RW, 5C, 5D and 3G.

[FurnaceFace]

1- What pick of your own were you most happy with?

Tough call as I'm pretty happy overall. Maybe Martin and Mara as later round Dmen as they're the top Dman for the team so likely see a bunch of ice. Mara going to a better team makes me hopeful his +- improves while his PIMs stay the same.

Getting Kopitar late was good and picking up late round top line guys like Lehtinen and Fedotenko rounded things out nicely. Parrish is likely to get LW/RW status too so he's nice to have.

2- What pick of your own do you want a do-over for?

Again, tough to choose but I'm a little uneasy with Kolzig as I'm banking on an improved Caps team improving his win count. I had him, Bulin and Huet on my short list so not sure who of the three is the correct pick. Happy though to get Bryz as a 3rd goalie as he could end up a starter somewhere before the season is out. Looking at the list I could have done worse. Just glad to have two starters.

3- What was a great pick by another guy?

Pagal grabbed Bertuzzi who on a good team as a first line forward will do well in all stats. a nice pickup at 174. I was hoping he'd get overlooked and go another round or two.

4- What player went a little too early?

There were a couple picks from the heart not the head and chief among them is Iginla. He's first round material but not first pick.

5- Name the final four teams.

I've been through enough of these leagues to know predicting is usually a crap shoot as injuries and trades play a big role and not to be discounted is the interest factor as sometimes the guy with the good team forgets about the league for a couple of weeks and then ends up out of touch and gives up. A work from the wise, don't let this happen. I had the world's worst NFL autodraft one year and I ended up 3rd.

These things are always a heap of fun, glad to be part of it.

[FurnaceFace]

Originally Posted by Frequitude

I thought we were leaving max moves at unlimited until the start of the season so the autodrafters could fix their teams.

Some of those teams are pretty unbalanced. Like Suave, who has 2LW, 2RW, 5C, 5D and 3G.

Agreed, might as well leave it open until everyone gets their teams set.

I'd also like to argue for unlimited moves period. I can't imagine ever wanting to overhaul my team that much as you run the risk of losing better players to other managers.

If it really is a concern then forcing a week to week pick would prevent this. You end up picking your roster on Sunday or Monday morning prior to the start of the week. It makes thinks interesting as you need to pay attention to matchups more and are actually affected by mid week injuries.

[Frequitude]

I kinda see what you're saying FF, but do you think day to day changes promotes a more continual interest? I've never done week to week, but it kinda makes sense to me. We struggled enough to maintain interest last year.

As for unlimited and day to day...trust me, you are way better off changing out your bottom 4 or 5 guys every night to get a full roster. For each position you "stream", it's like having a 40 point guy play 7 times a week vs. a 60 point guy play 3 games a week. Easy choice. Take it from a guy who did it 2 years ago in one pool...tres gay.

[SebC]

I like unlimited week-to-week, personally.

[Suave]

I really really wish I could have made the draft. Still can’t believe I didn’t remove Niedermayer from the draft list, oh well, now I have to hope he returns. I will defiantly have to do some tweaking of my roster once the season starts. Though I am really happy with the Jagr pick and I think Boyes could have a breakout year. I like my goaltending and am hoping Leclaire will start 30-40% of the games which could let me trade one of my goalies for a winger. Can’t wait for the season to start.

[Pagal4321]

Well as for max moves...it can be changed throughout the season. So if someone is approaching the max moves, and hasn't been abusing it (changing players every night) then I can bump it up. Just a precaution to kind of close that loop hole.
I forgot to do that in one of my baseball pools this year and some guy was picking up pitchers every night....annoying.