Fantasy Hockey Draft Advice

Drafting in Fantasy Hockey is quite easy if you are prepared for the draft. Thats why you should do as many mock drafts as possible before your actual draft to practice your draft strategy.

Before the Draft, it is always a good thing to Pre-rank your players. You should pre-rank your plays in case you can't make the draft or something goes wrong with your computer.

The most important thing to know about drafting in fantasy hockey is to know the scoring format you league uses. There are 3 main scoring formats, Head to head, Rotisserie, Points leagues. Your Draft strategies will vary depending on your leagues scoring format and the number of players you need to draft

If you are drafting in a 16 or 20 team league, your draft strategy will differ than if your in a 10 or 12 team league

First you need to be aware of the positional needs for your league.

For example if your league requires 4 C, 3 LW, 3 RW, 2 W, 1 Util, 6 D, 2 G, 4 BN, you should draft a center with your 1st round pick. Centers have more value in most leagues especially in leagues where you count faceoff wins.

Lets say you are in a 20 team league, and you have the 16th pick in the draft, your best bet is to try to draft either Steven Stamkos, John Tavares, Tyler Seguin. Any of those players would be a great player to build a team around. In the 3rd round there are two players you should target, Claude Giroux and Jack Eichel, both these players are legit go to players on their teams and will get at least 80 points this season.

You can't win without GREAT Goaltending, so i wouldn't hesitate to draft a top tier goalie even if it meant using a 2nd or 3rd rd pick on them. The Top tier goalies include Andrei Vasilevksiy, Sergei Bobrovsky, Ben Bishop, Tuukka Rask and Pekka Rinne; if you get anyone of these stud goalies, you are on the right track. If you can't get these goalies, you can go after Carey Price, Braden Holtby,  Marc Andre-Fleury, Jordan Binnington or Martin Jones.

I suggest getting two number 1 goalies because in most leagues, cause you can't win with bad goaltending.

When your league requires you to have 6 Defenseman, you should have at least two dependable point producing defenseman. I wouldn't recommend using a 2nd round pick or 3rd round pick on players like Brent Burns, Erik Karlsson and Victor Hedman; however i would target a player like John Klingberg, Morgan Reilly, Kris Letang or Dustin Byfuglien in the 4th round.

Before drafting a winger, i recommend you draft 2 Centers, 1 Defenseman and 2 goalies, this is a good way to start off your team. You can't miss on your first 5 picks, otherwise your team will suck.

In the next four rounds, i suggest drafting goal scoring wingers. Joe Pavelski should still be available in the 6th round, he should be a great pick at that position. In Round 7 and 8, i would draft players such as Jeff Skinner, Mike Hoffman, Rickard Rakell, Brayden Schenn or Clayton Keller, or just any goal scoring wingers with duel elibibilty.

After drafting your goal scorers, you need to turn your attention to the defense.

By the 9th round, your best option is either Aaron Ekblad or Zach Werenski, but Jacob Trouba is also an option as well. In the 10th round, you can draft another defenseman or you can draft the best player available on the board. You must draft 3 defenseman by the 11th round, if you don't, your defense isn't going to be very good.

The first 12 rounds of your fantasy draft are important, but in order to win your league you need to draft well in the latter half of the draft as well, that is why it is important to know the value picks and sleepers.

There is one hidden gem in fantasy hockey this year, that is Anders Lee, who is ranked 331st overall for some reason. Lee should be drafted anywhere from the 170-200 range, which is a steal, considering he is a player who will get you 25+ goals every year and he is even more valuable if your league counts hits.

Another player who should be back on the fantasy radar is Wayne Simmonds, who is expected the play the very talented 1st PP unit of the Devils. Simmonds is a player who gets tons of PPG, hits and PIM which is great for fantasy hockey.

The Breakout player to watch this year is Kevan Lebanc of the San Jose Sharks. With Joe Pavelski gone, he will be playing on the Sharks first line with Logan Couture and Timo Meier; he will also on the Sharks 1st PP Unit.

As a safety net, i always like to get 3 goalies especially in a H2H because if you lose the goalie categories, it will be tougher to win the matchup. The best candidate for a 3rd goalie would be David Rittich or Petr Mrazek  because they aren't ranked too high but they will be starters on the respective clubs.

If you league goes past 16 rounds, my advice would be to draft players for a specific category. In leagues, that count FW, i would strongly advice filling out your centers first because it is a category. In leagues with Hits and Blks, you should try to draft forwards that get tons of hits and defenseman that get a lot of blks.

My draft strategy is way different in my 20 team league than in a 12 team league.

In deep leagues with big rosters, you have to draft a top goalie before the 3rd round otherwise you will have to settle for a 2nd tier goalie. If you are unable to get one of the top goalies,  try to draft a tandem like Robin Lehner and Corey Crawford or Cory Schnieder and MacKenzie Blackwood. Of course if you are to proceed with mediocre goaltending, you better have a really prolific offense. 

In a 20 team league, you can actually do really well if you have a high powered offense and mediocre goaltending; Your goaltending just can't be horrible.

Drafting is easy if you are well prepared, if you do a few mock drafts and practice your draft strategies you should do just fine.