how’d we do?
April 11th, 2008 by Ianso, as we neared the end of the hockey season i sent out an email to every guy who let me take a look around his team this season and i asked how their fantasy hockey season turned out. i’m basically a bitter, small man so i was looking for a bit of an ego boost and i wanted to know whether we were all wasting our time trying to make things better for the few who wanted another perspective on their team. i’m going to grade myself to see if i suck at this whole thing or not. teams and reviews are listed in no particular order since guys just responded to my email as they had time.
Ken Diorio’s Ice Capades and Michael Cauda’s Boom Boom Geoffrion’s Ghost are in the same fantasy league and Mike recommended that Ken get a review from me. they played each other in the semi-finals and Ken went to the final. Ken was tooth and nail to make the playoffs and ended up in the final. there was no word if he won the whole shooting match or not but still, it’s impressive that both guys went so far. i’m calling both these reviews a win (2-0-0).
Justin Kelly’s Kerry Fraser’s Hair went from 12th to 8th before falling short and being knocked out of playoff contention. he won 6 matchups in a row but came up short in the end. Kerry Fraser’s Hair was my first weekly review here at hockeyanalysis.com. he improved his squad but fell short in the end. i’d like to call it a win because he improved but i’ll call it a push since he didn’t make the playoffs (2-0-1).
Dean Herback’s Regina Pats stayed where he was in the standings after his review but he did ration his limited transactions to his own benefit throughout the season. he lost his semi-final matchup to a guy from Winnipeg (couldn’t happen to a nicer guy there Dean) and no it wasn’t me. in the end the results from Dean’s pool are a push (2-0-2).
Chris Diaz’s Eltingville Express won it’s division but came up short in total points. he finished in the money and i’ve yet to receive my cut. you guys do realize that i’m basically a bastard right? this is a win (3-0-2).
Tim Jarrold’s TJ’s Tigers started the season 4-8 then went 8-0 and finished the year at 12-9 to make the playoffs. they knocked off the top scoring team in the 1st round and lost to the eventual league champion in the semi’s. they finished in 4th, just out of the money. the Tigers say they’re willing to do this team review thing again in the future so i’m definitely calling this one a win (4-0-2).
Joseph Ampon’s Six DeVries of Separation finished in 3rd on the season and when i reviewed his team he was in 2nd. i told him to go out and get more SOG, knowing that’d translate into more G and his failure to get more G cost him this race. well, i live and die by this so i have to call this a loss since he fell down the standings (4-1-2). holy crap Ampon, help a brother out here! (i’m just kidding Joseph. your team name last year of “He ain’t heavy, he’s my Brodeur” is an all time fave of mine and i’ve named one of my keeper teams after that concept).
James Nickerson’s UKflames was a keeper team that was already out of the running when i came on the scene. the question became, how do we make things better for next year? we traded a slew of vets away, got some young studs and draft picks back and i’m actually rather proud of how much his team sucked toward the end, that’ll make things better at draft time. this will sound weird but UKflames fell down the standings and this review is a WIN (5-1-2).
Paul Miller’s MillerTime just returned to the championship podium after a sabattical of a few years. i looked at MillerTime briefly last year but wasn’t able to take a run at helping him during the year last season so i made sure to work him into the mix early this season. he made a ballsy trade to land Luongo/Erat but it cost him Nicklas Backstrom/Parise and it went a long way to putting him over the top this year. anyway, dude won so this is an obvious win (6-1-2).
Joey Wilson’s Spezz Dispenser kicked ass and took some names this season. he finally proved his hockey knowledge to these guys after a couple years of trying. i say he just cured his own case of addsy-dropsy and the battle was half won. i’m still waiting for my cut Joey (another joke of course … unless you think i’m serious then send cash to … ). this is a win (7-1-2).
Stephane Rodiers’ team was called Stephane Rodiers, highly original i know. i was only able to work with Steve for about 4 days but it was a whirlwind of 4 days. despite a lot of hot air being thrown around by me the whirlwind produced no results for Stephane in his keeper. the only thing i can say is that if i’m travelling through the Ottawa valley sometime i could call this guy up and go out for a cup of Joe, that’d be cool. if we had been able to get ANYTHING done then i could call this a push but … there’s no way, this is a loss (7-2-2).
Steve Knippel’s Olympiques came out on top in a games limit league that i don’t think he enjoyed all that much. he was playing for pride but at least he got to kick his own brother the Navy captain, around the schoolyard for a bit. i collected on this one. Steve and i went to a hockey game last week and watched the Moose destroy the Marlies while i sat there solemnly in my Maple Leafs sweatshirt. a win (8-2-2).
Ryan Lennox’s camelshuffle squeeked into the playoffs and then began to dominate. anything can happen in the H2H playoffs and all you need is a ticket to the dance. Ryan won his league and that’s a win for me too (9-2-2).
Kevin Benkie’s Lucky Charms had a dookie for logo, funny and revolting at the same time. he went up the standings but i don’t think it was any of my doing. i suggested that he shop Braydon Coburn around since he’d be a good keeper option for guys and now it looks like Coburn should be among Kevin’s keeps himself. i guess it was a good thing that nobody took him up on the Coburn option. i see this as a loss (9-3-2).
gabe y’s Injured Reserve improved from 7th to 3rd but he lost in the first round of the playoffs to a team that he had previously advised about how to stream players in order to win. that kinda backfired on both of us i guess. i’m not sure whether this is a win or a loss because he improved but in crunch time the team fell on it’s face. i’m calling it a push (9-3-3).
Ivan Lee’s Trigun went from 9th place and 34.5 pts out to 2nd place and 9.5 pts back. unfortunately the guy who won the league was the loudmouth of the league so that’ll be hard to live down. definitely a win though (10-3-3).
Regi King’s Terminators were in 2nd when i came on the scene and he finished in 2nd place. i advised him to go out to improve his goals situation and there was no discernable difference by the end of the season. his team stayed in the same position but he didn’t get the improvement where he needed it so i have to call this a loss (*!$#*)(10-4-3).
my buddy Will Wong’s Chinese Takeout improved in assists and SHP to jump from 4th to 1st and take away his championship. i advised him to trade PIMs to a competitor at a bargain price because he couldn’t be hurt there and the guy he was trading with could hurt 2 of his main competition in PIMs easily. it worked like a charm and i get beer and wings out of the deal. nice. (11-4-3).
Conclusions
well, there we have it. i actually reviewed over 20 teams this season and only a handful gave me the old screw you in terms of responding back. i’m hoping that it isn’t because their team imploded in front of them and they blame me. since they didn’t respond though i’ll assume that no news is good news.
25 pts out of a possible 36 ain’t too shabby at all, that’s .694 hockey. the Red Wings were the only NHL team with a better win percentage than me at .701 this season. yeah, ok it’s not even close to fair to compare myself to the Red Wings but … well who cares, i came within an OT winner of taking home the President’s Trophy BABY!
who’s the MAN? well, i guess i’d have to say Nik Lidstrom but outside of him, it’s me today.
let me have this guys, i’ve already told you i’m a small, bitter man. by the way, thanks to all for their willingness to let me peruse things this year. i really do love this stuff.
Posted in fantasy team review
5 Responses to “how’d we do?”
By R.J. Pangman on Apr 11, 2008
Love to see you promoting my Red Wings buddy!
Even if you are a leafs fan, you’re not half bad 
Nice article, and thanks for the help!
By Steffen on Apr 12, 2008
Actually, Ian, I dropped to third in the last 2 days of the season, as I had used up my F and D starts about a week before, and some other wise-ass caught me in a few categories…
Nevertheless, you helped immensely and should still consider it a “win”. See you soon.
By stephane francoolie on Apr 13, 2008
Ian,
5th place gets a prize in my league, I win! Thanks for advising me not to make certain trades. I extend the invitation again. If ever you’re in the area, let’s schedule some ”puck talk” over lunch- my treat !
By Ian on Apr 14, 2008
Steffen, it sucks that you fell to 3rd in the last couple days, i think you told me that when we went to the game but i don’t remember.
Stephane, i doubt i’ll make it down to the “homeland” anytime soon and even then i’d be a good couple hrs drive away from you. thx for the invite though, it’d be nice.
RJ, you didn’t even bother to respond on how your team did but that’s ok, we got nothing done in a month of firing off trade requests so i’d probably have to consider it a LOSS. since you didn’t respond then it doesn’t hurt my win percentage.
By R.J. Pangman on Apr 22, 2008
Ok, Fair enough, I’ll respond now
I ended up finishing 7th, right about where I started, However we had the Lottery Draft on Friday and I get to choose 2nd and 5th overall, so that’s not half bad…Even tho trade wise we got nothing accomplished, by me just sitting on my team (With respect to trading away Kipper for Turks and Neil) That was the best advice for me, I need to have more patience with my teamm and realize that it’s just an average team and doesn’t have a chance at winning unless I do sit on it 