Practice Drafts!

Now being offered by CBS. That's a freebie that got me to register, and almost any other giveaway would have left me cold.

They're here:

http://mockdraft.1.hockey.sportsline.com/

Do this a few times and you'll see that picking first is a huge advantage, even over picking second.

Also, a normal strategy is to go HERO, G G D D whereas I think this year it might be better to go HERO D D G G

Heroes: Ovechkin, Malkin, Crosby, Iginla, Datsuyk, Zetterberg, Thornton, Lecavalier

I would say top seven in points

http://sports.espn.go.com/nhl/statistics?stat=nhlscoring&sort=pts&season=2008&seasontype=2

unless your league puts a serious premium on goals, in which case

the top three or four are extremely important:

http://sports.espn.go.com/nhl/statistics?stat=nhlscoring&league=nhl&sort=goals&order=true&qual=true&season=2008&seasontype=2&pos=all

The top 11 defencemen are special and Phaneuf pays a special PIM dividend and DET defencement provide wonderful +/-

http://sports.espn.go.com/nhl/statistics?stat=nhlscoring&season=2008&seasontype=2&pos=d