I am trying to think of a good way to start a keeper pool (not this year but maybe next year). In my mine it is a fact that: the player who gets lucky and wins the first overall draft pick gets a big advantage for the next 15 years. Really the same thing could be said about the 2nd and 3rd pick. What to do?

Here is my wine-inspired idea:

Hold an 80% keeper draft (meaning if every team is going to have 20 players draft 16 at this time) but exclude Crosby, Ovechkin and Malkin. Every team now has an almost full team but Crosby, Ovechkin and Malkin are still not taken.

Then a ‘third’ person (who is not in the pool and really, really knows his/her hockey pools - someone like Dobber and Co.) is given Crosby, Ovechkin and Malkin. Everyone in the league makes a secret trade offer for Crosby. The ‘third’ person picks the best offer and that team gets Crosby. They have to give up the players back to the ‘third’ person. Then in the same way the ‘third’ person makes deals for Ovechkin and Malkin. In theory a person could end up with more then one of these guys but it is not likely since they would have given too much in getting one to make a competitive offer for the other.

So Crosby, Ovechkin and Malkin are now in the pool but all the players traded for them are not. Those players then get re-drafted by all the teams that didn’t get one of Crosby, Ovechkin or Malkin.

Now hold the rest of the draft to fill out the rosters.

This way the teams that got Crosby, Ovechkin and Malkin had to sacrifice a large amount of their team to do it and they shouldn’t have a huge advantage.

Any thoughts?

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Too many leagues this year... I think I own every player somewhere.

I mean this in the nicest way but that doesn\'t sound great. Bringing in a third party for trading would probably create some hard feelings. Let the chips fall. Also, you could have reverse order for each round eg. 1 - 10, then 10 - 1, then the people getting Crosby,Malkin ,Ovechkin right off the bat will be on bottom of 2nd round for next pick. You could put a maximum point total if you are concerned about a possible inbalance.( 150 or 125 point maximum perhaps) There are lots of good picks out there to build on though, Kovalchuk, Radulov,Kopitar,Frolov, Carle,Spezza, Vanek etc. young that have alot of miles left .Then there will be guys that bagwet the draft with prospects to get in line for the Tavares sweepstakes in 2009. So whether someone gets Crosby or not isn\'t the end of the world for everyone else is what I\'m trying to say. I wouldn\'t make special exceptions because then Tavares comes in and do you make new rules for him and then the next one after that.
Also , the bigger the draft (more players),the less the impact of one player.ie. Possibly Crosby could have alot bigger impact on a 5 player draft than a 20 player draft etc.
Hope this helps ,not trying to be critical so I hope it doesn\'t come across that way.

I think a serpentine draft would do, 1-10, 10-1, etc., like mentioned above.

Really, no matter how you do it, there are plenty of good players to go around. Even at the 8-9 spot you may decide to take Luongo to secure your goaltending and then pick up a top 20 forward in the second round.

Plus, once the drafting is done, anyone who wants to change the look of their team has trades to do it.

When we had our 8-team, 22-players keepers league inaugual draft 2 years ago, we held a zig-zag draft (1 to 8, 8 to 1). Crosby was taken in Round 2, Ovechkin in Round 5, and Malkin was taken in the waiver draft in year one.

I think what you can think of doing is also hold a zig-zag, but set the waiver order so that the person picking last in round one will get to have first dips in the UFA pool during midseason.

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In 9-team, 22 player keepers league (keep 10)
12F, 6D, 2G, 2 Util. G/A = 1pt, W = 2pt, SO = 4pt

Team:
F: Hossa, Spezza, Carter, Kane, H. Sedin, Savard, Tavares
D: None
G: Lundqvist, Miller, Price

*Signed thru 09-10

last year in my 12 player roto pool, the guy who had crosby finished in the bottom half with the guy who had malkin.

Snake draft is fair.

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God bless us,everyone of us!

reeveta wrote:
I gotta tell you - I think that\'s pretty clever. There won\'t be any hard feelings, hell I could be the third party. The third party\'s name need not ever be known. All they are doing is trading the three stars to the guy with the best offer on the table.

That\'s the smartest solution I have ever heard, good one!

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DobberHockey Rules
14 Team Keeper, points only, best 12 skaters 2 dman 2 G count. Playoffs count.
F - Crosby, C.Smith, Wheeler, Parenteau, Hudler, Clowe, Grabovski, Atkinson, Frolik, S. Kostitsyn, Marchand, Peverley, Tavares, Read, Brouwer, Bickell, Gionta, Setoguchi
G - Anderson, Hiller, Markstrom, Brodeur
D - Letang, Del Zotto, I. White, Kronwall, Brodin, Nikitin

repenttokyo wrote:
That was last year. With each passing season, that will be harder and harder to accomplish.

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DobberHockey Rules
14 Team Keeper, points only, best 12 skaters 2 dman 2 G count. Playoffs count.
F - Crosby, C.Smith, Wheeler, Parenteau, Hudler, Clowe, Grabovski, Atkinson, Frolik, S. Kostitsyn, Marchand, Peverley, Tavares, Read, Brouwer, Bickell, Gionta, Setoguchi
G - Anderson, Hiller, Markstrom, Brodeur
D - Letang, Del Zotto, I. White, Kronwall, Brodin, Nikitin

Neat idea to try and ensure more parity. If you try it - keep us informed how it goes.

So would any conditions apply to the 3rd party? Must he accept what he deems to be the best value trade for an excluded player or can he turn down all as not being enough? Would the 3rd party be aware of the league\'s rosters after 80% draft or would he be blind to that? I assume that the 3rd party would not be able to make counteroffers. Would teams be limited to 1 offer on each excluded player only or if rejected could they up the ante with a re-offer?

Given that offers from knowledgable poolies are likely to be rather competitive - would you expect bad feelings when one offer is accepted over another but a case could be argued that the failed offer might be better?

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Yahoo weekly starts 12 team league, keep 17 plus farm

GS, W, L, SV, GAA, SV%, SO G, A, P, +/-, PIM, SOG, GWG, PPP, SHP, HITS, FOW

3C: H. Sedin,Stepan, Stastny, R. Johansen, Hanzal, Anisimov,
3LW: Burrows, Vanek, Ott, Lupul, Dubinsky
3RW: Doan, Pavelski, Brown, Okposo,
6D: Franson, Doughty, Voynov, Subban, Markov, Gonchar, Karlsson
1Util:
2G: Price, Emery


Farm: (< 100 games): S. Elliott, J. Bernier, Galchenyuk, Etem, Eakin, Atkinson