Staal and Vanek can contribute in 7 categories for you and likely close to a top 10 scorer in both cases - Fleury can contribute in 4 and we know he likely will be pretty good in 2 of those categories and likely not among the league leaders in the other 2. Sorry but keeping Fleury doesn\'t compute.

Keep Staal or Vanek and draft a tier 2/3 goaltender - money in the bank. You need a centre so keep Staal.

__________________
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

What exactly are your positional requirements?

If you\'re required to dress a minimum of 4 wingers, then to me Vanek over Staal is a no-brainer.

You\'ve got 12 teams times only 4 keepers per team, so there will be plenty of high scoring C available in your draft. High scoring wingers are much harder to come by.

This way you can concentrate on drafting G and C and let everyone else fight over the leftover wingers.

Difficult choices for sure. Eliminate goalie Ward right off the bat.
Stay away from Fleury, his GAA and Sv% will put him middle/lower pack. As someone earlier said you can draft a solid goalie later.

I\'d look at Phaneuf, but only if you are required to have a minimum number of defencemen. With your categories, he\'s likely in the top ten for defencemen. 50 pts, +10, 98 pen mins and 31 PPP. His numbers were pretty much the same as the previous year.

If you\'re stuck on a forward, then you\'ve only got two choices: Vanek or E.Staal. Vanek jumped from 48 pts to 84. It\'s quite a jump, but it wasn\'t completely unexpected that his points would jump last year. He is 23 years old (good age for a breakout year) and was taken 5th overall in \'03. He should be on the top line and PP unit for BUF. The departed Briere and Drury had 30 and 27 PPP\'s respectively. Someone\'s got to step up and replace at least some of those points. Vanek only had 22 PPP\'s last year, so there is room for improvement. I don\'t think we\'ll see that +47 again this year, but I don\'t think it was totally a fluke.

Eric Staal had an off year going from 100 pts down to 70. His +/- has been in the single digit negatives for the last three years. PPP went from 40 to 26. I see Staal improving to the 85-90 pt range and his PPP\'s should be up as well, likely between 35-40.

My choice. It would come down to positional requirements. If I need to dress 4 defencemen, then I stick with Phaneuf. If I need to dress a certain number of LW or W, then I would go with Vanek.

If you disregard positional requirements, based on your scoring categories, I\'d still take Vanek over Staal, but only slightly.

__________________
12 Team "Experts" Roto representing Dobberhockey 2nd
G,A,PPP,+/-,SOG,Hits,Blocks,Wins,GAA,SV% - Keep 4
4C-Kopitar,M.Koivu,Stepan,Matthias,Prospal
4L-Marleau,Steen,M.Foligno,N.Foligno,Morrow,Umberger
4R-Hossa,Hornqvist,Little,Alfredsson,Oshie
6D-Byfuglien,Phaneuf,Doughty,J.Johnson,Burns,Wideman, Kostka,Methot
2G-M.Smith,Backstrom,Reimer

12 Team Salary Cap Roto Dynasty 3rd (G,A,Pts,FPts,DPts,Pim,SOG,H,BS,W+OTL+SO,GAA,SV%)
12F-Ovechkin,Kopitar,P&E Kane,Kessel,Ryan,M&N Foligno,Ennis,Hodgson,Killorn,Horton,Wolski,Morrow ,Bonino
6D-Subban,J.Johnson,Carle,Wizniewski,Franson,Spurgeon ,Kostka,M.Fraser
2G-Rask,Anderson,Emery
Farm-Markstrom,Scrivens,Brunner,Nyquist,G.Bourque,B.Con nolly,T.Barrie,Brennan,Barberio,Orlov

Hello chiro \'et al\'

You have a nice problem to have.

From a forward perspective, I would prefer to own Vanek now, but Staal long term. Vanek will get more pp time with the departure of Briere and Drury. The first line: Afinogenov/Roy/Vanek, will have increased playing time as well. Staal is still only 18 years old. He is only going to get bigger and better. Staal could be the replacement for Malkin when he returns to Russia in a few years. The only problem for Staal, at this point in time, is the depth at centre ice that the Penguins own.

From a goaltending perspective I like Fleury. You know that he is going to get you over 40 wins. Much has been made of his gaa and save % but that is going to improve. He is only 22 years old.

My thoughts.

raffi wrote:
2 of each C, LW and RW; 4 D; 1 util; and 2 goalies.

You overwhelming help here has produced:


E. Staal:
leaftodd
RangerFan
Shoeless

Vanek:
raffi

Fleury:
smoothfun
typo88
Loki
hockeylifer

Phaneuf:
Comish

__________________
14 TM H2H dynasty; 30man active roster - 4x C, LW, RW; 6 D, 2 G, 10 BN
Unlim prospect roster, only filled through draft/trade
G, A, P, +/-, PM, PPP, SHP, GWG, SOG, FW, Hits, BkS, W, GA, GAA, SV, SV%, SO

C: Malkin, Backstrom, M. Richards, B. Boyle, Sobotka
LW: Hall, Lucic, Hagelin, Stalberg, R. Smyth, Carcillo, Beleskey, T. Glass
RW: Eberle, Wheeler, Radulov, Eriksson, Voracek, N. Johnson, Burish
D: Boyle, Yandle, Whitney, Carle, Vlasic, Stuart, Gilbert, M. Stone, Barberio
G: Price, Backstrom, Harding, Montoya
P: Elliot, McKegg, Bouchard, Hackett

chiro wrote:
Taking in consideration that you need 4 D\'s I would go with Phaneuf.Does not hurt to have one of the top D\'s in the league.By the way nice team.

I wanted to update this for all those who offered their advice, and add a new question.

I kept Fleury, and boy am I glad I did. With the goalies that were kept, people paniced and took many more goalies in the first and second rounds. The likes of Mason, Dipietro, Lehtonen, and I ended up taking Ward with my 1st rounder too all went in the first 15 picks. (equivalent of the 5th/6th rounds with 4 keepers/team) My Vanek got scooped up in the Supplemental draft, and Staal was taken before my first pick.

My new questions deals with my next pick. I\'m figuring on going D here. My team looks like this so far:

2x C-
LW- A. Ovechkin
LW- D. Heatley
RW- M. Hossa
RW-
UTL-
4x D-
G- M. Fleury
G- C. Ward
5x BN-

Of the 6 teams that draft inbetween my 2nd and 3rd picks 3 of them have 2 centers, 2 have 1 C and the last doesn\'t have one while 3 teams have 0 D, 2 have 1 D and 1 has 2 D. So I think I\'d be best grabbing a D now and coming back with a C, or best available. There are 2 more picks b/f mine and neither have a D yet. So 1 or 2 of these guys may disappeard. Here\'s my D choices based on the top 100 D list from this site:

3 Kaberle
7 Dan Boyle
8 Lubomir Visnovsky
9 Dion Phaneuf
10 Joni Pitkanen
11 Marc-Andre Bergeron
12 Jay Bouwmeester
13 Brian Campbell
14 Matt Carle
15 Sergei Zubov
16 Erik Johnson
17 Brian Rafalski
18 Jack Johnson
19 Kimmo Timonen
20 Wade Redden
21 Andrei Markov
22 John-Michael Liles
23 Sheldon Souray
24 Kevin Bieksa
25 Zdeno Chara
26 Shea Weber

Some of the remaining forwards, based on the top 300 from this site are:

17 Alexander Radulov
23 Brad Richards
27 Henrik Sedin
30 Maxim Afinogenov
33 Anze Kopitar
37 Patrik Elias
40 Andy McDonald
41 Nicklas Backstrom
44 Patrice Bergeron
45 Michael Nylander
46 Paul Stastny
47 Mats Sundin
48 Justin Williams
49 Brian Gionta
50 Daymond Langkow

So do you think I am best suited to grab a D, and which one? Or do you think I should nab one of the remaining forwards assuming there will still be a solid D or 2 for my 3rd rounder? My personal considerations are Kaberle, Phaneuf, Rafalski, Bouwmeester, Richards, Sedin and Radulov.

It\'s a keeper, but I\'ve got solid keeper options. If I fall out of the top 6 I risk losing all of them b/c I\'ll move to Div II. So I\'m mostly concerned with the best for this season at this point. Any other keeper option is a bonus, but not worth losing many pts this year.

Stats are G, A, P, +/-, PM, PPP, SHP, W, L, GAA, SV%, and SO.

I don\'t mean to be long-winded. I just want to make sure you have the info you need. Thanks all!!

Post edited by: chiro, at: 2007/09/05 12:18

__________________
14 TM H2H dynasty; 30man active roster - 4x C, LW, RW; 6 D, 2 G, 10 BN
Unlim prospect roster, only filled through draft/trade
G, A, P, +/-, PM, PPP, SHP, GWG, SOG, FW, Hits, BkS, W, GA, GAA, SV, SV%, SO

C: Malkin, Backstrom, M. Richards, B. Boyle, Sobotka
LW: Hall, Lucic, Hagelin, Stalberg, R. Smyth, Carcillo, Beleskey, T. Glass
RW: Eberle, Wheeler, Radulov, Eriksson, Voracek, N. Johnson, Burish
D: Boyle, Yandle, Whitney, Carle, Vlasic, Stuart, Gilbert, M. Stone, Barberio
G: Price, Backstrom, Harding, Montoya
P: Elliot, McKegg, Bouchard, Hackett

My recommendation is Visnovsky - this year and beyond.

__________________
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