Yahoo! Fantasy Hockey Introduction V2.0 - Topic

Stealth

Member

Posts: 27,518

Joined: May 10 2009

Gold: 13,891.00

Aug 22 2011 10:39pm

Yahoo! Fantasy Hockey Introduction

DRAFT BREAKDOWN:

First of all, The Yahoo! Fantasy Hockey Homepage is found here
- http://hockey.fantasysports.yahoo.com/
Think of it like the NHL draft; a player can only get drafted by one team.
For this example there will be 10 teams in the league
- Yahoo! randomly selects the positions that everyone will draft in (i.e. Who gets first pick, second pick, third, etc.)
- Whoever gets first pick in the first round (1st overall) will draft last (10th) in the 2nd round and get the first pick of the 3rd round (and thus 2 picks in a row).
  Calm down its not all its cracked up to be sometimes lol.
- Draft order looks like this: 1/2/3/4/5/6/7/8/9/10/***10/9/8/7/6/5/4/3/2/1/...and so on (***represents the end of a drafting round).
  - So 1st and 10th pick get back-to-back picks but have to wait to get their pick.

When it is your turn to draft you have 2 minutes to act.
- If you dont act within 1minute and 50 seconds a buzz will sound to alert you that you have 10 seconds to draft
- If you fail choose a player in time, your pick will be auto drafted (the next best player for that open position on your team)

Draft strategy (as in which position do I want to pick) C/RW/LW/D/G is up to you always.
The Draft window is run by Java so make sure your software is up to date (Update to all OS found Below)
- http://www.java.com/en/download/manual.jsp

Mock or fake drafts can be performed at your discretion any time before the real draft so you can test your system settings and get comfortable with how the draft works.

-Yahoo! Standard set up looks like this (Can be adjusted)

2x Centers
2x Right Wing
2x Left Wing
4x Defenseman (No left and right, Just D)
2x Goalies (Can add 3+ Depending on settings)
1x Utility/Flex Position (Any extra PLAYER position. Cannot be used for Goalie)
4x Bench (Players and Goalies that are not counted towards the current day's point totals)
1x IR Spot (Injured Reserve can only be used for players tagged with "IR" )

See Below for Example

With that, you will draft 17 players (in this example).

The IR spot (shown in ORANGE is for players that get injured and placed on the Injured Reserve List.
If they get placed on the Injured Reserve List by the NHL, Yahoo will place them on the IR as well

THE BENCH

The bench is just the remaining players on your roster that arent "playing" that night.
Each night players will have scheduled NHL games (i.e.- Habs vs Wings).
- So, that night your Andrei Markov will have a game at 7:30pm and Nicklas Lidstrom as well at 7:30.
- BEFORE 7:30 that night you need to have Markov and Lidstrom placed (drag and drop system) in the Defenseman position and NOT on the bench. Unless of course, you want them to sit on the bench that night.

If a player is on the "Bench" they cannot earn you points that night.
- So if you chose Markov as one of your 4 defenseman playing that night over Lidstrom (Lidstrom is on the bench), then whatever points Markov accrues, you earn but whatever points Lidstrom accrues you do not earn. (more on the points thing later)
Some nights you will have to make a decision of who to "play" and who to "sit"

You have 2 "playing" center spots in this example.

If you have Kopitar/Getzlaf/Malkin all playing in NHL games on the same night, you will have to chose which two will play and which one will sit on the bench.
Some nights it is a tough decision. For that, Yahoo! offers great stats to help you decide.
You can click on the players name and it will bring up their career stats AS WELL AS the stats they have against the team they will face next for both this season and career!!. This should help you decide.

So you chose to play Kopitar and Malkin, ok.

Now you have a Utility spot to put Getzlaf in, IF YOU CHOOSE.
If you do not want Getzlaf to play because you have Semin as a 3rd RW and think for some reason that he will put up more points that night, then by all means, put Semin in as the Utility position and Getzlaf on the bench. Some nights it will be a tough decision.
Again, you can put any player you want in that Utility position except a goalie.

GOALIES

Our example league has a minimum of 4 starts a week.
- This means that IN TOTAL, your goalie tandem has to start in a minimum total of 4 games to qualify your goalie categories.
- You dont get any bonus for going over the 4 starts other than having the potential to gain better/worse goalies stats because they played a great/poor game.
Typical goalie stats are Wins/Goals Against Average/Save Percentage/ Shut Outs.
It is typically only 4 out of 13 stats to be scored on (more on scoring later) but TRUST ME- the goalies categories can win you a week.
- How can the goalie categories win my week?
  - If your goalie is Martin Brodeur and he gets a shutout there is 1 SO with the best GAA and S% possible with a win. So even if your opponents goalie gets a win but no shutout, right there you have him beat on 3 of the 4 goalie categories (you beat him on GAA, S% and SOs.)
If you are unsure how many starts your goalies have accumulated in a week you can check by clicking the “Minimum Games” link located below your goaltending category on the MY TEAM page (shown below).

SCORING AND POINTS

This example is for a Head-to-Head league (which is currently what all of JSP leagues are set to).
For this example you will score points forGoals/Assists/Plus-minus/Power Play Points/ Shots on Goal/Face Offs Won
Throughout the week (Monday to Sunday) Yahoo! will automatically total your teams totals in these categories.
- If by the end of the week you have more goals in total that your opponent, then you get ONE point.
- If you tie on goals neither of you gets a point- it is a wash (zero points)
- This goes the same for every category.
Leagues that count penalty minutes will receive points for THE MOSTpenalty minutes NOT the least.
The picture below Is a truncated version of the Weekly Matchup.
The Numbers in the GREEN box are totaled to give you the numbers shown in the SCORING SUMMARY box.

As you can see in the image below, Face Off won is a category that points will be scored on. With that, it is typically a good idea to fill your Utility position with a Center. This is because centers can get goals and assists just like anyone else but you can get more faceoffs.

This post was edited by Stealth on Aug 22 2011 11:01pm

Stealth

Member

Posts: 27,518

Joined: May 10 2009

Gold: 13,891.00

Aug 22 2011 10:40pm

MULTI-POSITION ELIGIBLE PLAYERS

Throughout the year, Yahoo! may add position eligibility to certain players.
- Yahoo! will typically add a position to a player's eligibility if they play more than 5 games at that position full time.
An example of this that you will see in the draft is Patrick Marleau.
- He can play both Center and Left Wing. What does this mean?
  - All this means is that Marleau can play EITHER center or left wing for you on a given night.
  - This is helpful if you have your Left Wing positions (2) filled for the night, then you can stick him in at Center if you choose to do so.

WAIVERS

Waivers is a simple concept.
- Click on the "Players" tab on the navigation bar and it will bring you to a spreadsheet of all the players in the NHL.
- Here you can easily click-to-rank the players based on any stat that you see there.
- For instance, if you want to rank all the players by goals scored, simply click the "G" for goals and it will rank them highest to lowest.
To pick someone up off of waivers just click the "+" sign in front of their name. ( Green box in the image below)
- After doing this you may need to drop a player off of your roster. Yahoo! will notify you if this is the case and guide you from there.
Seen Below: The red box means that this player was dropped from a team earlier in the week and cannot be owned until the indicated date.
Waiver priority found on the LEAGUE page will play a role in who gets “dibs” .
The Yellow box is the “My Watch List” button.
- If you click this flag it will turn blue and this player will be tracked (much like a tracked thread in JSP).
- You can find your tracked players by clicking the MY TEAM button on the navigation menu and choosing the My Watch List option below.

OVERALL TIPS AND SUGGESTIONS

Make sure that each player that has an NHL game on a given night is PLAYING and NOT on the bench.
Some nights you will have literally your entire roster playing and will have to decide who to "Play" and who to "sit on the bench"
- If possible, fill that Utility position with a center IF Face-offs Won is a category that scoring is for
There is a Bench spot for goalies it is just hidden sometimes.
- Click on your goalies name and start to drag him and it will open up all available spots for him.
The drag and drop system is VERY self explanatory and I trust that all of you will pick it up on the first day.
Make sure that you plan ahead of time to take your injured player off of the IR.
- Taking a player off of the IR generally takes 24 hours until he is eligible to play for your team.
- So if you think he will play tomorrow night, take him off the IR spot tonight.
- Placing someone on the IR gives you an extra spot on your roster, so pick someone up off of waivers when you do this.
- Visa-versa : taking someone off of IR will mean that you will have to drop someone off of your roster.
- Yahoo! will notify you if this needs to happen.
  The IR spot is just a hidden spot after your bench.
- You WILL NOT see this spot available if you do not have any eligible players! However, when someone gets injured, you will see this spot available for you.

OTHER STYLES OF LEAGUE PLAY

The above information is based largely on a HEAD-TO-HEAD league format
- This is the most common style of fantasy league
Keeper Leagues
- Any fantasy hockey pool that "rolls over" into other years is called a "Keeper" or "Dynasty" league. The leagues can be run each year in any of the above formats with a winner declared at the end of each season. At the end of the year team managers decide which players they wish to protect (the number varies - from protecting and keeping all players, to keeping as few as three or four players). Before the NHL season opener, a fantasy draft is held to fill out the rest of the roster.
Points
- A 'Points' league is one in which point multipliers are assigned to certain categories and all owners try to accumulate points by scoring in these categories without the weekly competition. For instance, if 10 points are awarded for a goal and 5 for an assist, a manager who selects a player who scores 10 goals and 30 assists will collect 100 plus 150 points for a total of 250 points. Points are awarded for multiple scoring categories in the same fashion.
Rotisserie
- A 'Rotisserie' league is one in which teams are ranked in order from best to worst. In a 10 team league with 10 categories, the maximum number of points a team can earn is 100 (by finishing 1st in each category). The least is 10, by finishing last and collecting only 1 point per category. Rotisserie leagues are likely the most strategic type of fantasy pool and reward managers whose team has strong, balanced scoring across all categories.

There is alot more we could talk about such as Trades/Waiver priority(who gets the player if both teams select them at the same time) and such. But ill wait for that question to arise.
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