Even as a hockey fan, I find myself surprised by the start of the season each year. Overlapping with the start of football and fantasy baseball playoffs, I tend to put off any hockey prep until the days before the draft. With that in mind, I’ve decided to correlate my hockey draft strategy with my football approach. Hopefully this can be helpful to those looking to get into hockey this season, as well.
Understanding your league’s scoring is the first step (think draft strategy in PPR vs Non-PPR). While some leagues use a category scoring format, I’ve found point leagues to be a little more common and easier for new players to grasp. In hockey, physicality stats are typically where we’ll see the most variation. I’ve been in leagues that award for penalty minutes, and while it’s admittedly fun to win a matchup thanks to a five-minute fighting major in garbage time, it’s more common to see points awarded for hits and blocked shots. This increases the value of certain players (and I’ll get into some examples) but goals, assists, and shots on goal are ultimately where most points come from. Plus/minus is another scoring metric that can be used (a player gets a point for a goal scored while on the ice and loses one if a goal is scored against the team). I view this a lot like wins for pitchers. It says more about the quality of a team rather than the player and try to avoid this in fantasy leagues.
There can also be some variety in roster breakdown. For the sake of this exercise, centers and wingers will be grouped together as forwards, in addition to defensemen and goalies.
Top Tier – These would be the Christian McCafferys and Dalvin Cooks, guys who were seen the default first and second in most drafts. In hockey, these are Connor McDavid and Leon Draisaitl, who comprise two thirds of the Edmonton Oiler’s top line and the top two point scorers in the NHL last year. My top five rounds out with Nathan MacKinnon (Colorado), Auston Matthews (Toronto), and Nikita Kucherov (Tampa Bay). Towards the middle of the first round you start getting into names that seem like they’ve been towards the top of these lists forever (think Deandre Hopkins) like Alex Ovechkin and Patrick Kane. These are guys who have consistently been major point scorers throughout their career. Even if Ovechkin’s scoring declines in his age 36 season, his physical presence will do enough to keep him in the conversation (98 hits in 45 games last season). Other names to target here are Mikko Rantanen (Colorado), David Pastrnak (Boston) Sebastian Aho (Carolina), Jonathan Huberdeau and Aleksander Barkov (both with Florida). While all talented scorers, these are players that’ll see production boosts playing on the top lines in high-scoring offenses, giving them that edge you want in a top pick. Towards the middle rounds, understanding line combinations are key when looking for supplemental scoring and potential value. Simply put, players are going to put up more goals and assists when they play with better players. Nicklas Backstrom has been one example in past years, playing on Washington’s top line with Ovechkin (though injuries make him a risky play this season). Ryan Strome has also seen his career take off with the Rangers, playing on a line with Artemi Panarin, and Brayden Point has proven to be a fantasy stud on Tampa’s top line and power-play unit.
Next, we get into the workhorse running backs of hockey: defenseman. The top defenseman will put up high totals in hits and blocked shots, while logging time on the power-play, which leads to point production. The top two defenseman taken in most drafts will be Victor Headman (Tampa Bay) and John Carlson (Washington). Both will post high point totals (45 and 44 last season, respectively) as the point men on strong power play units and will likely go in the first round. However, I’ve found more success taking a top forward with my first pick, and then pivoting to a D-man on the turn – Najee Harris or Austin Ekeler would be the closest football comps here, as high-volume players at a premium position. Some guys I’ve been targeting are Adam Fox (NY Rangers) and Cale Makar (Colorado). This’ll be the first non-shortened season for both players, and I fully expect them both to be first rounders next year with a full year of production. Makar plays on one of the league’s best power play units, while Fox was awarded the Norris Trophy last season as the league’s top defenseman, while playing with a young Rangers team that saw improved offensive production. Darnell Nurse (Edmonton), Kris Letang (Pittsburgh), and Roman Josi (Nashville) are some more veteran players to target here.
As you build depth, volume remains key when filling out defense. While you won’t match the point production of the top options, a strong, stay-at-home defenseman will be on the ice enough to score physicality points. Alec Martinez (Vegas) was the best example of this last season, blocking 168 shots while averaging over 22 minutes of ice time a game. That said, Martinez is one player likely to be drafted too high this season based on his offensive production last year. It’s hard to imagine his 0.6 points-per-game not regressing towards his career mark of 0.36. D-men I’ve been targeting in later rounds include Ryan Pulock (NY Islanders), Justin Faulk (St. Louis), Seth Jones (Columbus) and Jared Spurgeon (Minnesota). These types of players offer a high enough floor to round out a lineup and have the potential to chip in modest offensive production.
I like to balance this high-floor approach by targeting some high-upside forwards that always seem to be available in late rounds. Two of my favorites this year are Kaapo Kakko (NY Rangers) and Kirby Dach (Chicago), who were the second and third picks in the 2019 draft. While neither made the immediate impact that we’ve seen from other top prospects, both have showed flashes of immense talent as they’ve adjusted to the NHL as teenagers. As both the Rangers and Blackhawks move into the advanced stages of their rebuilds, Kakko and Dach are likely to see time on the top two lines, with some talent surrounding them,
Finally, we get into the quarterbacks of the fantasy hockey world: goalies. I’ve gone back and forth on when the right time to draft a goalie is. The most important scoring metric for goalies are wins, therefore making a starting goalie on a good team an incredibly valuable asset. The Patrick Mahomes of hockey is Andrei Vasilevskiy, the starter on the back-to-back champion Tampa Bay Lightning. Vasilevskiy is likely the only goalie to go in the first round, and I can’t bring myself to take a goalie that high. I also have a hard time seeing the value in the next tier of goalies (Hellebuyck – Winnipeg, Lehner – Vegas, and Kuemper – Colorado). Therefore, I tend to target goalies in the middle rounds, and try to double up (most leagues require two starting goalies). Some of the guys I’ve wound up with are Juuse Saros (Nashville), Thatcher Demko (Vancouver), Jordan Binnington (St. Louis), and Frederik Andersen (Carolina). I’ve been somewhat surprised to see Andersen and Binnington going as low as they are, as both are entrenched as the starters on what should be good teams. Saros and Demko both have less experience starting (both impressed when they took over the job last year), and both play on mid-tier teams, though with the potentially to show improvement in 2021-22. It is also becoming more important to insure goalies with their backup, as we’ve seen more teams implement time-shares throughout the season. This is something I would expect to increase with the first full season in almost two years.
As we get into the season, I look forward to delving into some more specific team and positional breakdowns. If you haven’t played fantasy hockey before, this season is a great time to start. Join a best ball (puck?) league, study up on line assignments, and enjoy.
