z-Archives (other articles)

A pair of Badgers (one current, one former) top my latest list.

My annual top 10 keeper league rankings lists kicks off with the best young defensemen in hockey. The Wisconsin Badgers are represented very well on this list, much like they were in 2011. I am happy to see so many players from my 2011 edition graduate on (or, in other words, play more than 25 games at the NHL level).

I have a few general rules when it comes to building a team in a fantasy hockey keeper league. One of the more important ones is to not plan beyond a two or three year window. You are not building a real NHL club, and too often I see poolies place too much of an emphasis on youth and prospects instead of trying to add players who could help them win now. Using this rule, take a look at your team(s). Can you realistically say you will have a shot at winning the league at some point within the next two or three seasons? If not, time to scrap the rebuild and start adding proven NHL talent.

Welcome back to An Expert’s Audit. Every month we’ll take a look at a reader’s keeper league team in the hopes ofhelping him toward a championship. If you’re interested in getting an audit for your own keeper team you can begin theprocess by emailing Dobber about it.

Now that March Madness is in full swing, poolies everywhere are right in the middle of the playoff push. Desperation mode consumes our minds, we consume more coffee than ever before, we stay up later to watch games in the Western Conference, and we keep a website tab locked on the NHL standings page until the regular season ends.

Few mechanisms have changed fantasy hockey in recent seasons as much as Twitter.

I felt so left out on Monday. Not a single goalie – not even an AHL prospect – was traded all day long. I was up at six o’clock in the morning, only to sit on my butt with nothing to analyze, nothing to say, nothing to do. So instead of this being the final piece of my four-part series on goalies at the trade deadline, I’ve decided to stay on the topic of Blackhawks goaltending, since their team was (and still is) in dire need of an upgrade.

DobberHockey.com $500 Freeroll on FanDuel.com

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This contest is for the games on Saturday, March 3rd, 2012.

This week, I weigh in with my thoughts on what we can expect to see on deadline day, offering my thoughts on what will happen with the 10 most sought after players.

(for a full review of our Fantasy Hockey Trade Deadline coverage, click here)

The art of drafting and developing offensive-minded defensemen into responsible players capable of being trusted with NHL ice-time has not been perfected yet.  National Hockey League teams continue to juggle and tweak their approach with these potential offensive catalysts in hopes of finding the next Erik Karlsson or Kris Letang.  Fantasy leagues that permit drafting of young defenseman often make decisions tough come draft time.  Should you draft the defenseman with good odds of become a regular thirty-to-forty NHL rearguard? Or, is the better approach to identify those defensemen with high offensive upside and disregard the risk of them not becoming an NHLer?  The answers will depend solely on your team’s draft tendency and comfort level with taking risks but The Dean’s List would chose the latter.