z-Archives (other articles)

Last summer I was invited to join a head-to-head keeper league involving many DobberHockey members. At the time I was trying to limit my hockey pool involvement a bit, as I was having trouble keeping up with my nine different teams. However, after checking the league out a bit and talking to the members, joining seemed like my only option. A year later, I am thrilled with my decision. The league is very active, very competitive, and quickly became my favourite pool to track.

I came up with the idea this summer after watching a television series entitled “The League.” It is a comedy based on effect of fantasy sports (in this case, a football pool) on five guys. If you haven’t seen the show, I recommend checking it out. What I want to do is combine fantasy sports (in this case, a hockey pool), and some entertainment. Each month a review of the Ultimate Fantasy Pool (creative name, I know) will be posted at DobberHockey. By seeing how our league operates, I hope to provide some perspective and ideas in terms of trading and valuing players. Most importantly, I hope to make it a fun read. Enjoy!

The Frozen Pool section of DobberHockey is one of the main reasons why people visit this site. Jason Arbuthnot has created a wide variety of tools to help you analyze, compare, and evaluate essentially anything relating to the world of hockey. One of the more popular tools has been the line combination chart, which gives the exact breakdown of forward lines and defensive pairings in all situations.

For example, a quick look at Mike Comrie’s preseason statistics show that he played almost 50% of the time with Evgeni Malkin and Eric Tangradi (43.79%, to be precise). It is pretty clear to see how this tool can be useful, as quality of linemates is one of the most important factors when evaluating players in all fantasy hockey leagues (especially potential sleeper picks like Comrie).

As The Carpenters put it, we’ve only just begun. Read on to find out about the latest – and greatest – tool developed by Mr. Arbuthnot.

The preseason has finally come to an end and now we wait with feverish anticipation for the real season to begin. With three days off before Thursday’s Opening Night celebration kicks off the new season, today is a perfect opportunity for me to drop updated goalie previews for the start of the fantasy season.

(Former Herning Blue Fox and current Oshawa General Nicklas Jensen)

The hockey season is well under way in all those leagues not called the NHL. Who's winning the battle for top spot, and who has emerged to stake their claim in the first round? Find out in the first official Bugg Bytes ranking of the season featuring the top 35 players in the 2011 class.

Jason Spezza - What's in Store?

With icons plucked from the famously doomed Roman Empire, a franchise like the Ottawa Senators has to be prepared to weather some downturns in fortune.  Indeed, since advancing to the Stanley Cup final in 2007, and then kicking off the next campaign with 12 wins in 13 games (before collapsing in epic fashion), there hasn’t been much to celebrate in Canada’s capital.

But Sens’ fans can take heart, all was not lost after Roman civilization dissolved into the dark ages, and all is not lost in Ottawa.

Expert and Pro Tier drafts

I was lucky enough to be part of the Campbell league draft and online for the experts draft. Unfortunately I was unable to attend the Wales draft and by all accounts I missed a great one. The Wales draft has already had a great following online as most GM’s have already expressed their opinions on how it went.

Over the weekend, all three live drafts in the third-annual Guild Fantasy Challenge took place. As you would expect, goaltending was at the forefront of each draft, as our Yahoo! Fantasy head-to-head setup had the rare three starting goalie slots this year. Why the crazy change from the normal two-goalie setup that you’ll see in 99.9% of other leagues?

People love being right, and I am no different. I have had my share of swings (Zach Parise the most notable) and misses (Steve Bernier, Paul Kariya) over the past few seasons. Making bold predictions before the season starts is something I enjoy doing, and I know many of you do as well. Last season I posted 10 Fearless Forecasts on my section of the hockey forums. I’ll review those below, as well as list off 10 more Fearless Forecasts for the 2010-11 season.

In addition to having excellent tools that will help you make the right decisions -- from the draft through the trade deadline -- www.hockeypoolgeek.com has partnered with Dobberhockey to get the best damn projections out there (Dobber's) loaded with ease into HPG.  Just follow the link from the HockeyPoolGeek article in the updated version of the DobberHockey Guide, subscribe to HPG and voila: Dobber's stats and HPG tools.  If you've already subscribed to HPG, don't sweat it, the link will work for you too.