Champions are champions, whether hoisting the Stanley Cup or whatever passes for a trophy in your fantasy football league. For the astute fantasy football GM, however, much can be gleaned from the Blackhawks’ triumphant run through the NHL Playoffs. READ MOREBreaking Down A Winner
The path to Lord Stanley is not an easy one. Similar in many ways to a fantasy football season, the NHL Playoffs offer up weeks of ups and downs. The demands and pressures Chicago felt during their run is not that different from the ones you will endure during the 2010 fantasy football season. You don’t have to love hockey to appreciate a championship team.
Overcoming Adversity And Injury
I’m starting with this one because it’s the most intangible attribute a fantasy owner can learn. I have always argued that luck is one of the most significant factors in fantasy football. Luck comes in two forms, good and bad. Since hiding from luck isn’t an option, the next best thing is to understand it’s all part of the game.
If you watch any sports lately, not just hockey, I’m sure you can find a missed call or two. It happens. Phantom calls are everywhere. For the Blackhawks, they dealt with them and persevered.
Tomorrow’s debut of the A-Team movie couldn’t sum it better, “I pity the fool who cries when his or her fantasy team is hit by a freight train of injuries and unforeseen bad luck.” It can happen to any team, including yours. Luck has a way of evening out so the more you play through the misfortune, the closer you are to flipping the coin in your favor. If Chicago’s Duncan Keith can lose a mouthful of teeth and come back determined to win, you can too.
Line Depth
You can win with a stars and scrubs team if the above mentioned luck meter tilts in your favor most of the way. The better way to go in my opinion is set yourself up with the best chance to win each week by fielding a strong deep team capable of matching up every week.
Throughout the entire playoff run, Joel Quenneville did as good a job as you will ever see at getting the guys he wanted on the ice. It cost them a few goals and even a win as they got caught in a line change, but in the end it proved to be advantageous.
As a fantasy football owner, having quality options allows you to play the best matchups each week and ultimately increase your team’s ability to put up higher point totals on a weekly basis. A star player can get you to the playoffs, but one bad game in week 16 could cost you a title if the rest of your team can’t score.
The path to Lord Stanley is not an easy one. Similar in many ways to a fantasy football season, the NHL Playoffs offer up weeks of ups and downs. The demands and pressures Chicago felt during their run is not that different from the ones you will endure during the 2010 fantasy football season. You don’t have to love hockey to appreciate a championship team.
Overcoming Adversity And Injury
I’m starting with this one because it’s the most intangible attribute a fantasy owner can learn. I have always argued that luck is one of the most significant factors in fantasy football. Luck comes in two forms, good and bad. Since hiding from luck isn’t an option, the next best thing is to understand it’s all part of the game.
If you watch any sports lately, not just hockey, I’m sure you can find a missed call or two. It happens. Phantom calls are everywhere. For the Blackhawks, they dealt with them and persevered.
Tomorrow’s debut of the A-Team movie couldn’t sum it better, “I pity the fool who cries when his or her fantasy team is hit by a freight train of injuries and unforeseen bad luck.” It can happen to any team, including yours. Luck has a way of evening out so the more you play through the misfortune, the closer you are to flipping the coin in your favor. If Chicago’s Duncan Keith can lose a mouthful of teeth and come back determined to win, you can too.
Line Depth
You can win with a stars and scrubs team if the above mentioned luck meter tilts in your favor most of the way. The better way to go in my opinion is set yourself up with the best chance to win each week by fielding a strong deep team capable of matching up every week.
Throughout the entire playoff run, Joel Quenneville did as good a job as you will ever see at getting the guys he wanted on the ice. It cost them a few goals and even a win as they got caught in a line change, but in the end it proved to be advantageous.
As a fantasy football owner, having quality options allows you to play the best matchups each week and ultimately increase your team’s ability to put up higher point totals on a weekly basis. A star player can get you to the playoffs, but one bad game in week 16 could cost you a title if the rest of your team can’t score.
Shots On Goal
Patrick Kane’s series clincher in overtime was a puck thrown at the net more than it was a shot. Throwing pucks towards the net creates more scoring chances. Every team that simplified their game plan to highlight this philosophy found success. It didn’t always lead to wins, but it led to more goals being scored. The more chances you have to score the more likely you are to score.
In fantasy football scoring chances equates to touches. When a player touches the ball he has the ability to score points for your beloved fantasy team. If there is any stat you want to follow along throughout the season it is touches and targets. In this case, more is better.
This also applies to speculative player additions and handcuffs. There is no guarantee a backup will see the same touches or targets as a team’s number one option. A team that loses it’s top RB is just as likely to throw the ball more as it is to hand the ball to it’s second best ball carrier. When filling out your roster, look for players who have the best chance at getting maximum touches or targets if the guys above them on the depth chart miss time.
Changing On The Fly
This might be the hardest skill to master and quite frankly I am not even sure you can actually master it. I’m talking about the ability to know when to stop relying on something that has been working extremely well and make a change. We’ve all heard the expression, “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.” The problem we face as fantasy owners is that the more success we have with something the less likely we are to feel it is broken. If we don’t feel it is broken them we subscribe to the adage and refrain from fixing anything. Our confidence in players can blind us to identifying the parts that are broke.
Remember what I said about line depth? The Blackhawks began the Stanley Cup Finals using the same line combinations that got them there. Philly smothered Chicago’s best scoring line in the opening games of the series and ultimately got themselves back into the series because the best players weren’t scoring. The ‘Hawks were blinded by the past production from that top line and kept running them out there. Once they realized something was broke, they fixed it. They one decision led to more offense from the entire Blackhawks team.
Sometimes fantasy owners do have to bench their best players against good teams. Sometimes fantasy owners do have to trade away their best player because their roster resembles a M.A.S.H. unit. How do you know when to sell high or buy low? It’s the toughest skill to master, but when you fix the problem at the right time, it can make all the difference in your 2010 fantasy football season.
Preparation
Last but not least is preparation. More specifically, using your experiences from previous years to steer clear of previous pitfalls. If you don’t think the young Blackhawk players learned a thing or two from last year’s loss to the Detroit Red Wings in the Western Conference Finals you are mistaken.
Experience is a big deal; it makes us more knowledgeable fantasy football owners. What are people looking at first when evaluating players in 2010? They are looking at last year’s performance. We always look to the past to help us find success in the future. It’s not just in constructing fantasy football player rankings; it’s in preparing for your draft, communicating amongst your league mates to broker a deal and identifying your opponents’ biases.
When you spend 17 weeks slaving over a fictional team of professional players, you inevitably learn a thing or two. You learn how to balance your fantasy sports addiction with the rest of your life and you learn how to be better at playing the game that is fantasy football. You learn that the only way you can win a championship is to be even better the next year.
Congratulations to the 2010 Stanley Cup Champion Chicago Blackhawks!
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