Fantasy Hockey signups are open! To sign up go to:
hockey.fantasysports.yahoo.com
Log into your Yahoo account, and choose to create a team. You'll get three options, choose Join Custom.
You'll be asked to enter the League ID: 42802 and the Password: zeekyhbomb
Rules are the same as last year's:
Custom League URL: http://hockey.fantasysports.yahoo.com/league/bbrt
Draft Type: Autopick Draft
Max Teams: 20
Scoring Type: Rotisserie
Max Moves: No maximum
Max Acquisitions per Week: No maximum
Max Trades: No maximum
Trade Reject Time: 0
Trade End Date: March 5, 2009
Waiver Time: 2 days
Can't Cut List Provider: Yahoo! Sports
Trade Review: Commissioner
Post Draft Players: Follow Waiver Rules
Max Games Played: 82
Weekly Deadline: Daily - Tomorrow
Start Scoring on: Monday, Sep 29
Roster Positions: C, C, C, LW, LW, LW, RW, RW, RW, D, D, D, D, D, Util, Util, G, G, BN, BN, BN, BN, BN, BN, IR, IR
Stat Categories: G, A, +/-, PIM, PPP, SHP, W, GAA, SV%, SHO
Weeee, extra team get. Not enough people around here properly grasp the awesome insanity that is hockey, let alone the related fun of fantasy hockey. Something must be done about this.
In short, right now all you can do is put together a list of the players you want most. You can do it from the hockey.fantasysports.yahoo.com/league/bbrt page (they really need to make that link shorter...). On draft day, which is whenever I think we've got all the teams we're going to have and set it, everyone will get a random seed from 1 to however many people we have, and an automatic draft will be done based on everyone's lists. Then, as the real hockey season begins, the fantasy game actually kicks in for real.
On any given day, your fantasy team can have three people playing in each forward position (C, LW and RW), 5 people in D, and 2 goaltenders playing. There are also two "Util" spots for any non-goaltender. Whatever stats the players you have in those positions rack up count as stats for you. There's six forward and four goalie categories that score you points:
Skaters: Goals, Assists, +/-, Penalty Minutes, Powerplay Points, Shorthanded Points
Goalies: Wins, Save %, Goals Against Average, Shutouts
You score points in each category based on your place. If there are six teams, then the team with the most goals scored gets 6 points in the goals category. The second best team gets 5 and so forth. If two or more teams are tied, they split the points for their ranks. For example, in our imaginary six team league, if there was a tie for first (6 points) and second (5 points), they would split the 11 points, getting 5.5 points each.
Trades are possible, and you can drop players to pick up waivers or free agents that aren't on any team. When you drop a player, it goes on "waiver" for 2 days. If more than one player tries to pick up the waiver, the player with the highest waiver ranking gets it -- then their waiver ranking becomes last, pushing everyone behind them up one. Waiver rankings start in reverse order of the draft -- whoever got first draft pick gets last waiver ranking and so forth.
I think you'll find it pretty straight forward once the league is drafted and you can see the My Team and Scores pages filled out. It doesn't take a whole lot of attention, because you can skip ahead to future days and set your team in advance so you can ignore it for a while.
The main thing you have to do besides make sure you're starting the guys on your team who are playing in real life that day is to check at least once a week for injuries. No point in having an injured guy taking up space in your roster while a healthy one sits on the bench or on the free agent market, after all. Beyond that, just keep an eye on your players' stats. If you notice one guy is simply not performing for a long stretch of time, it might be worth cutting and replacing him, unless he's a major superstar and you know he'll get back on track eventually. That's what always works for me, anyway. I'm not one of these ridiculously serious fantasy managers who actually tries to PREDICT how guys are going to play in the future, but I do make decisions based upon recent trends. I think that makes a lot of sense.
Which reminds me, if a player is put on the Injury Reserve in real life, you'll be able to do the same to him on your team. IR doesn't count toward your total players, so that frees up one more spot to pick up a healthy player, without losing anyone. Of course, once that player's healthy again, you have to drop a player to waivers to take him back off the IR. Lop-sided trades (2 players for 1 for example) are possible, but if a player would be put over their maximum team size, they'll be forced to drop a player for it to go through, so there's no point to offering them - better just to offer even sided trades. A quick counter-offer option is possible.
That should sum up the how it works part. The strategy, my friend, is all up to you from there.
Not enough people around here properly grasp the awesome insanity that is hockey, let alone the related fun of fantasy hockey. Something must be done about this. 
