The 2007-08 NHL season is fast approaching. Many of you are getting ready for your fantasy hockey seasons. Besides getting player knowledge, there is a lot to do to prepare.
Whether you are a commissioner of a fantasy hockey league or just a team manager you should be aware of the advantages and disadvantages of having an automatic draft and a live draft.

This topic is important. You should at least discuss it with your fellow team managers. If that is not an option, maybe it will at least affect the type of league you join. No matter what you decide to do, good luck with drafting!

Automatic Draft Advantages:
1. You do not have to sacrifice several hours out of your busy schedule to participate in a draft. Once you pre-rank players, it drafts players for you.
2. You do not have to coordinate with everyone in your league to gather at one place and time, it will take care of drafting for you.
3. If you are short on people, it is easier to get participants from multiple locations to join your league.
4. It takes a little bit of time to pre-rank your players. If you do it well enough however, you should be able to take advantage of others who do not pre-rank (accepting the league’s rank) or do not pre-rank well. Rookies, injured players or even players that have changed often do not get ranked with their potential in mind.
5. If you are young or if your knowledge of players is really lacking, having the league’s pre-ranked system may actually help you get players you might not have known. This is especially true in leagues with many teams and a very deep draft.
6. The draft results are automatically entered in your league, thus saving the commissioner from taking the time to enter all the information

Automatic Draft Disadvantages:
1. You do not know your draft order
2. You can not alter or change your drafting strategy
3. It does the draft for you and you will not know who is on your team until the automatic draft is done
4. The league’s pre-ranked players may not be suited for the scoring categories for your type of league and thus you may get players that will not be best for you.
5. Knowing that you are free and hours will not be wasted on a draft, your significant other may ask you to go shopping or something equally boring.

Live Draft Advantages:
1. You will find out your draft order slightly ahead of time and you can determine who your first pick and so on.
2. You can change your draft strategy at any moment in the draft based on what other team managers are doing, what players are available and what players you need. This can be helpful in attaining the right players for your
3. True organized and knowledgeable experts can manipulate the draft by making certain picks and thus affect how other team managers draft
4. You feel the thrill and excitement of draft day

5. You can have fun, gather friends, wear a hockey jersey, drink beer, eat pizza and wings and most of all talk hockey
6. If done online, you can see what positions players are listed as playing for your particular league (if more than one position) and thus draft correctly

Live Draft Disadvantages:
1. It takes time out of your busy schedule
2. They often take longer than expected
3. People sometimes share notes or sleeper picks thus ruining it for those who are prepared
4. If done offline, the commissioner has to manually enter the draft results