When I returned on Wednesday afternoon from my trip to Oregon, I hadn't started at all on three consecutive days' worth of Ramblings, with the first one due in just over 24 hours. A mock draft seems like something that could get the ball rolling after pushing aside fantasy hockey for a few days of the ocean and waterfalls. I see that Fantrax has just opened for mock drafts, so let's check it out.

I signed up for a mock draft that took place on Wednesday evening, which seems ideal despite my tired state. The first thing I noticed in the first page of rankings is that Thatcher Demko has an ADP of 6.77. Uh oh. Demko is the third-ranked goalie after Connor Hellebuyck and Sergei Bobrovsky. I'd have to think that number will drop over time based on awareness of Demko's injury situation and maybe fewer auto-drafters, but buyer beware if you have an early Fantrax mock draft.

I chose to select at #4 because I had been #3 in my previous mock draft, which had left me with one of the big three of Connor McDavid, Nathan MacKinnon, and Nikita Kucherov. However, Fantrax's ADP rankings placed Hellebuyck and Bobrovsky ahead of Kucherov and McDavid, which is a complete surprise to me. McDavid even had an ADP of 6.58, which seems inexplicable given his standing as fantasy hockey's top dog. I hadn't used Fantasy Hockey Geek to determine how valuable a goalie would be this early, but I'm not taking that chance given the variable value they seem to provide season by season.

Other goalies with outrageously high ADPs include Charlie Lindgren (18.53), Ukko-Pekka Luukkonen (21.44), and Connor Ingram (22.51). Sure enough, they were picked way too early, as you can find out here.

I've gone on the record in the past as saying that autopick isn't as awful as you think. Yet for Fantrax, I would strongly recommend not letting it autopick. Being stuck with a struggling goalie as your first- or second-round pick is a sure-fire way to put your team behind the 8-ball.

Here are the league settings:

Scoring Group	Scoring Category	Points
Skaters	Assists (A)	3
Skaters	Goals (G)	4
Skaters	Hits (Hit)	0.25
Skaters	Short-Handed Goals (SHG)	2
Skaters	Shots on Goal (SOG)	0.5
Skaters	Power Play Points (PPP)	1
Goalies	Assists (A)	3
Goalies	Goals Against (GA)	-1
Goalies	Saves (SV)	0.25
Goalies	Shutouts (SHO)	5
Goalies	Wins (Goalies only) (W)	5

Rosters consist of 5 forwards, 3 defensemen, 2 goalies, and 6 reserves.

Given the bizarre order of some of these ADPs (especially goalies), you're probably better off sorting by FPts (total fantasy points) if using Fantrax. Then you have a top 5 of McDavid, MacKinnon, David Pastrnak, Auston Matthews, and Nikita Kucherov. That makes more sense.

An even better strategy, which I use for fantasy football: Sort by position, then draft the player that has the largest gap in projected points relative to the other options at that position. This strategy could help you make the most out of each pick. That might also help answer the question of whether to draft a forward, defenseman, or goalie. The first pick or the first few picks might simply be best player available, regardless of position. So it's going to be forward with the first pick and maybe even the second pick.

Here are my picks. Numbers are round followed by overall pick. You can view full draft results at my personal blog Goods Fantasy Hockey.

1-4 – Kucherov – This is my second consecutive mock draft picking Kucherov. Hellebucyk was picked at #3 after McDavid and MacKinnon, so I didn't have to spend a lot of time thinking about this one. The nice thing about first-round picks is that you can spend more time thinking about them than any other pick (ie. before the draft).

2-21 – Brady Tkachuk – I recognize that this league counts hits and shots, which are two categories where Tkachuk is elite. One worry I have about drafting Tkachuk is the scoring dropoff early relative to others being drafted around that time. I didn't see anything about head-to-head matchups, so how I earn my points is up to me. With this pick, I don't think I'll sacrifice too much scoring in the name of bangers categories if I opt for more bangers later.

3-28 – Matthew Tkachuk – Let's load up on Tkachuk brothers, shall we? I realize that 2023-24 wasn't his best season, but he is much better than a third-round pick. The two Toronto goalies were picked shortly before by the same team. I don't know whether that was intentional, but I begin to wonder how serious this draft is. If Nate from Apples & Ginos is reading this, he might be having a heart attack by now.

4-45 – Rasmus Dahlin – I figured one or more of the top d-men would be available at pick 4, but Dahlin was the only available d-men of that group left. That top tier included Cale Makar, Quinn Hughes, Roman Josi, and Evan Bouchard, who was picked just one pick before Dahlin.

5-52 – Jake Guentzel – I had actually targeted Andrei Vasilevskiy here, as he had an ADP of 40, but Fantrax projected him as highest in terms of total points over the season. However, Vasilevskiy was taken two spots before me. Of the players left, I was the most confident in his new Lightning teammate Guentzel. A few players around (Kyle Connor, Dylan Larkin, Connor Bedard, Tage Thompson) had similar projections, but my gut told me to go with Guentzel here.

6-69 – Alexandar Georgiev – He's a high-volume goalie who should be good for wins and saves. Plus remember that goalies have been flying off the board in this draft. My rule of thumb is wait until pick 100, but I have to make an exception here because there might be not much left by then. His price is much more reasonable than the goalies listed above.

7-76 – Thompson – Tage is not an elite option in my books, but the seventh round is ideal for his talents. It's also ideal when a player that was in a given tier two rounds ago is still available. I was also considering Timo Meier here. Meier has better peripherals but Thompson is a slightly better scorer.

8-93 – Josh Morrissey – The gap between Morrissey and the next-highest d-men such as Morgan Rielly, Mackenzie Weegar, and Moritz Seider was significant enough for me to make this pick. A lot of d-men who I would project below Morrissey were getting drafted at around this time. The only comparable to Morrissey in terms of points in this large group is Noah Dobson (picked at 87), who is falling too far in the mock drafts I've seen.

9-100 – Meier – Remember what I said about players I'm considering still on board two rounds later? Meier is my first bench player, but I could move him around when openings arise (although this is a mock draft and nothing more). Plus, there's still some decent d-men to pick when it's my turn, just not at the level of Morrissey.

10-117 – Charlie McAvoy – The choice was between him and Kris Letang. Power-play points only count for 1 point, but I think McAvoy could be a bit more productive at this very moment. Not surprisingly, Letang was picked immediately after McAvoy.

11-124 – Samuel Montembeault – Dustin Wolf, Adin Hill, Darcy Kuemper, John Gibson, and Frederik Andersen were the other best options available, so we're getting into the low-upside starters and timeshare options. If Montreal has upgraded significantly this offseason, Montembeault could turn out to be a solid Zero G option.

12-141 – Ryan Nugent-Hopkins – He's not the best option for peripherals, and power-play points don't score particularly high in this league. Yet RNH was a 100-point scorer only a season ago, so I don't think I can go wrong here.

13-148 – Wolf – I don't think Calgary will be very good. I have seen one or two writers show more confidence in him than I would, but Wolf should be the Flames starter. He's okay as a third goalie option.

14-165 – Patrick Kane – Best player available in terms of projections. I was targeting Roope Hintz here, as I was surprised he was available this long. However, Hintz was picked two spots before this pick.  

15-172 – Vince Dunn – I was targeting defensemen and he was the best one available in my opinion. Seth Jones, Devon Toews, and Alex Pietrangelo were also available.

16-189 – Macklin Celebrini – For the final round, why not. I was also considering one of the names available in the 15^th round as well so I could have five d-men on my roster. To my surprise, Toews, Jones, and Pietrangelo were all left on the board in this draft. I don't like rookies in single-season drafts, but I might as well swing for the fences on a final pick. You have much higher upside than a so-called safe pick, while dropping a final-round pick is easier to justify.

Overall, I think I made some solid picks for not really prepping. I think my worst picks were probably my goalies, but considering how quickly they were drafted, I had to reach a bit. It's important to go into a draft with some sort of plan, but also be prepared to be flexible and make adjustments if things don't play out the way you expect. I figured goalies would get drafted too high anyway, since there were a few autopickers with the rankings/ADPs set way too high on them.

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