Sunday, July 24, 2011

Quick Positional Review of the Last Four Draft Seasons

Last year at about this time, I had a look at the positional drafting for the top three teams in the standings over the last few years.  I thought I would have another quick look at it today, see if there was any changes to the patterns over time.

The biggest difference in 2011 was the number of participants in the pool, which really spread out the wealth of talent that the NHL has to offer.  In 2008 through 2010, the pool only had 17 teams, but in 2011, we finally cracked 20 teams and there was an impressive amount of points collected in the year.

2008PointsForwardsDefenseGoalies
1st Place (Stuart)8203rd4th3rd
2nd Place (Clayton)8171st12th13th
3rd Place (Chris)7805th2nd7th
-----
2009PointsForwardsDefenseGoalies
1st Place (Clayton)7871st16th4th
2nd Place (John B.)7695th6th9th
3rd Place (Peter)7697th7th3rd
-----
2010PointsForwardsDefenseGoalies
1st Place (Leon)7795th4th3rd
2nd Place (Wayne)7731st8th6th
3rd Place (Dale B.)7639th10th2nd
-----
2011PointsForwardsDefenseGoalies
1st Place (Allan)8092ndT-1st1st
2nd Place (Kristy and Don)7157th4th6th
3rd Place (Chris)70810th6th4th

Well, Allan really ran away with the 2011 pool, just having the right combination of players in every position, which led to the near 100-point cushion he had by the end of the season.  Tops in defense and goalies, not too far behind the leader in forwards, it really makes for a lopsided victory.

The placement of the 2nd and 3rd place teams in the 2011 looks actually quite average, because neither team actually finished in the top three in any of the positions, which gives you an indication how spread out the points were in the pool, beyond Allan.  There was a certain level of consistency in the top of half of the pool by the two teams, which is likely the only thing keeping them up where they were last year.

Here's hoping there are a couple more participants in the 2012 season and maybe a team that doesn't quite runaway with the whole thing, making it a little more interesting.

No comments: