rakish

My current belief is that it isn't. It sucks to picks first, because picking 8th will get you almost the same player as first. I've jiggled the numbers a little bit from the other day In 2016, over the past 12 years, for forwards, I have Matthews 6th, Keller 10th, Tkachuk 17th, Laine 32nd (I weigh age 16 really high, which kills Laine), Alex Nylander at 93. in 2017 I have Nolan Patrick at 42nd, Suzuki at 60, Pattersson at 64, Hischier at 66, Valardi at 73, Andersson at 86. So Buffalo, picking in the same spot, will likely get a better player in 2017 than they did in 2016.

Yeah, you will be using the picks that Botterill uses. One of the advantage, that Botterill has over us is that he gets to move, and we have to pick where he picks. Your list will look a lot like Craig Button's, or Bob McKenzie's. My list is much shorter because, for instance, I won't be taking Hischier, so I don't bother putting him on my board. If someone goes off the board (if a team picks Valimaki at #5, you don't get to choose him at #8). The player you get at #8 (if Buffalo does use that pick) is your highest ranked player, that is still available. Sometimes I play that if you get Hague at #38, I can't get Hague at #57, regardless if he is still undrafted. But I'm not going to play that way this year. One thing to be careful of is that Botterill could trade up or trade down, so your list needs to be ordered so you could draft, say #15 and #32 instead of #8. I like both Valimaki an Vesalainen, but I think you're right, they both go in the middle of the first round.

I missed this somehow. I like Jokiharju, he's 13th among my 17 year old defensemen, which would be a good pick at #38, if he's still there.

This chart will warm your heart

First, look at this link for 2016 Scoring is an important metric, but it's also important how you score related to your team. Antipin gets outscored by 40 points (I use base 60) to fellow defenseman Chris Lee. As for the team, Mozyakin outscores him by 60 points, the Lee number is a huge number. Admittedly, if Antipin doesn't play with Lee, his valuation shouldn't be as weak as it is, but the plus/minus tells us they probably play together (It's actually the only valuable use for plus/minus). I don't have time to track down box scores to see who plays with whom. in 2015, the numbers are almost exactly the same. Lee outscores him by 20, Mozyakin by 52ish. Zaitsev in 2015, his last KHL season, he outscores the next highest D by -10 in my lingo (remember base 60). Radulov outscores him by roughly 40. Zaitsev is a normal size NHL defenseman, Antipin isn't. The teams, as far as 2015, are relatively the same. The model could be outrageously wrong, that's why I like to test it with Mom's Basement Stakes. And yes, I don't look at playoffs. Outside of what my model considers, Zaitsev started playing with men in 2009-10, Antipin in 2012-13 (yes they are born 14 months apart, but 36-14 is 22 months) (When they start playing with men is a big advantage in valuating Euro defensemen). Zaitsev did two tours of U20, Antipin one. So overall, I don't think Antipin and Zaitsev are comparables, I'm not surprised the model doesn't think so either.

The only thing I worked on this year is league value. My current belief is that you must have a league value for each age, so I did that. My issue with it now is that I think MHL is too strong, for instance forwards from the 2016 draft look like this: 1 AUSTON MATTHEWS NHL 2169 2 PATRIK LAINE NHL 1991 3 CLAYTON KELLER NCAA 1804 4 IGOR SHVYRYOV MHL 1486 5 MATTHEW TKACHUK NHL 1316 6 CLIFF PU OHL 1157 7 JESSE PULJUJÄRVI AHL 1143 8 ANDREI ALTYBARMAKYAN MHL 1099 Two of those picks are out of whack. How far? Hard to tell. So confidence? I would say it's OK on interleague comparisons, but not great.

In my valuation system, Antipin is a no. He was the 50th best defenseman in his age group in 2016, his best year that I've seen was 25th in his age group, but he's generally in the 40's. This is my chart, comparing Antipin to Zaisev (sp?). Falk Fedun Casey Nelson

I wanted to revisit the post above because I don't think people are realizing the magnitude of the difference between the Sabres and the Leafs. You saw what adding 5 rookies was like last year, they will again be adding 5 rookies again this year, we will see if the prediction about next year will hold up next year. While no one this year will be a Calder Candidate like the 3 last year, they have 5 prospects coming while Buffalo has 1 (Guhle sp?). The big effect will be this: As the Leafs' dead contracts disappear, they will be able to add an important piece this summer. Oshie? Fleury? Radulov? The guy in Russia...what's his name...Kovalchuk (I'm not saying Kovalchuk is a great idea, I'm saying they got options) The good news is that the Sabres' 2016 draft was good (but not great). Do two more drafts like that in 2017 and 2018, and you will have something.

My yearly draft contest is back, rechristened Mom's Basement Stakes, though there are no stakes. You need to create a draft board deep enough for the whole draft. We then figure out who you would have taken for the Sabres' draft, and see how that turns out. How many do you need on your board? Bob McKenzie will run out of picks, and he has a list of 75, if I remember correctly. I tried 22 last year, and ran at least 2 short, but my picks are less mainstream than Bob's. So it depends. A short recap of prior years: The 2014 draft, Craig Button had a big year in 2016, with Reinhart, Ondrej Kase, Brayden Point, Emil Johansson, Vlad Kamenev. My Reinhart, Brayden Point, Barbashev team was crippled with the injury to Axel Holmstrom. The Hockey News' Barbashev also relied on Holmstrom, and whose team is fading with Sam Bennett's career. Tim Murray's selections may have move into 3rd place, as Reinhart ranks above Barbashev. In 2015 we move to Winnipeg because everyone would take Eichel, then there would be no selections for a couple rounds, so I found a team with better selections. Winnipeg kicked all of our butts. Kyle Connor, Roslovic, and Niku all had good years according to my computations. Pronman is in second with Aho the Swede, Kylington, Konecny, and Tkachev all having good years in 2016-2017. The other 4 of us are pretty much together in last place, me, with Andersson, and Bob McKenzie, Button, and the Hockey News with Kyle Connor. In 2016 we are back to Buffalo. I am well out in front with Chychrun, Bernhardt, Shvyryov, and Zile. Tim Murray is probably second with Pu and Asplund having good years. Hockey News has Pu and Debrincat. Pronman has Aho the Swede(again) and Debrincat. Button has Quenville and Debrincat. Bob McKenzie has no one with a top 20 season among his peers. In the first round Bob chose Nylander, who will have better years. 2017 is very interesting. Looking at Liger's mock, 4 out of the 5 best prospects, according to my model, might be on the board when Buffalo picks at 8 or 9, I forget which. Looking at the past 12 years will give some context as to the strength (or not) of this draft. Among forwards, Pettersson had the best 2016, and ranks 27th over those 12 years, so for me, he's a standard number 3 pick. Vilardi's 2016 ranks him at 45th over those 12 years, so he's a standard 4th or 5th overall pick. Liljegren ranks 14th among defensemen over the 12 years, so he's a standard number 2 or number 3 pick. I'll post my board for Mom's Basement Stakes before the draft. I put up 2 new apps. One is a development app that allows you to compare drafted (and a few undrafted, but not many) players over the past 12 years. So if you want to compare say Eichel to Matthews, you can use this link, and see that Matthews 2016 season falls directly on top of Eichel's regression line. The second is a linemates app, so you can see, say, Eichel's results with each linemate. For me, the correct answer last year was Okposo, which really shouldn't be a surprise. I also have an explanation post that walks you through using the linemates page, it's a bit difficult to use. All of this can be found at 45b.us Other Sabres' things of note. For 2016, I have Eichel ranked 5th among forwards, but Crosby is the oldest in my data, so players like OV and Malken aren't considered. Risto ranked 9th among defensemen, again, the age thing. Pu is ranked 6th among 2016 forward draft picks Guhle ranks 13th among his defending draft class

Current balance is 1865 1 unit on Los Angeles line is -120

Why are the two numbers different? Oh, nevermind

There's nothing I would recommend more.

I did open mic in the 90's but I'm not... what's the word? ... good. The local open mic is for musicians, which isn't worth doing, but this thread has made me find that Richmond, only an hour away, has a real open mic community. So I'm thinking about doing it again. It sucks a lot of time out of my day, it's worse than having a job.

Current balance is 1765 1 unit on Washington line is -140

I think Matt, we are making the same argument. If save percentage was a useful stat, drafting goaltenders would be simple, but it far too contextual and I think you're right it doesn't seem to translate between skill levels. The same holds true for Quarterbacks. Minor league forwards, on the other hand, project much easier with a bit of data manipulation, since goals and assists is a useful stat.

I don't think save percentage is a useful statistic. I think it's why it's difficult to draft goaltenders. If you break down their game logs, despite what Pi thinks, Nilsson has played a much more difficult group of teams. The Sabres will score more against the Rangers than they do against the Bruins because the style of play changes. Nilsson's opponents have averaged 75.5 goals so far (I'm too tired to calculate goals per game, which would be better) where as Lehner's opponents score under 69.5. Additionally, Bylsma will play a different game regarding his confidence in his goaltending, so in the end, I think the only valuable stat is GF-GA as compared to opponents GF/GA, which is decidedly Nilsson right now. Let's look at a few games Lehner Montreal: Lehner gives up bad goal on long wrist shot, 1 rebound, 1 deflection, 1 scrum Edmonton: 2 weak side rebounds Calgary: 1 bad rebound, 1 bad foligno, 1 bad Lehner, 1 bad O'Reilly Vancouver: One bad Bogo, one bad foligno/O'Reilly Minnesota: Bad rebound coupled with bad O'Reilly/Larsson Toronto: 1 bad Kulikov, 1 bad Risto/Foligno/Larsson Ottawa: 1 bad Larsson New Jersey: 1 bad Kane, 1 bad Nelson, 1 bad Lehner/Risto/Girgensons, 1 bad Risto St Louis: PK rebound, bad Risto/Reinhart, bad Nelson/Falk Tampa: Reinhart, Kane, Baptiste (worth the bus ticket the next day), Risto/Larsson Calgary: Franson, PK Risto/Grant Detroit: Fedun or O'Reilly Boston Washington Nilsson Philadelphia: 3 PKs, 2 on Bylsma (which I will discuss at another time), the other is a Bogo/Foligno botch Minnesota: 1 bad Nilsson, 1 bad Franson, 1 bad Grant/Delo, 1 no highlight Florida: Shutout New Jersey: 1 bad Gionta/Larsson, 1 Penalty Shot Pittsburgh: Grant Ottawa Washington Rangers Edmonton OK, conclusions? I think Lehner's been OK. Playing tight without having any scoring in the lineup has been good for his save percentage. I think Nilsson has been better.

Current balance 1890 1 unit on edmonton line is -125

So are you going to go through all the box scores, or am I?

While I refuse to take a side on this argument, this link will warm your heart PA http://www.ontheforecheck.com/2011/2/2/1964714/do-the-nhls-original-six-franchises-receive-special-treatment

Current balance is 1790 1 unit on Boston line is -130

Nonsense, it's Eichel's fault for not sprinting toward his own goal on Kane's puck possession

Current balance is 1940 1 unit on Rangers line is -150

behindthenet.ca used to, but the NHL changed their game logs to javascript, making scraping more difficult, and it doesn't look like they are going to update for this year. Not sure that's the cause and effect (not sure when NHL.com changed), but it's a nice narrative

current balance 2100 1 unit on Ottawa line is -160

Done