The Pool Worthy Goon Squad

The mini-game wheel is ready to spin and we're only a few weeks away from doing so, but not before picking our hockey pool teams at the draft.  We have been fortunate, in my opinion, to have seen the PIM Pool hit in the last couple of years, because that does add a much different element to the Waiver Drafts and it's really fun to watch during the year.

I had done this kind of post back in 2015, just ahead of the first time we had the PIM Pool, pre-announced before the draft, which was rectified by the mini-game wheel the next year, but I did up this post to give an idea of what kind of players you may want to consider, if you want the chance to win your money back in the pool, if the overall points crap shoot doesn't go your way.

So, what I've done is I've separated the pool worthy players, the top 200 forwards, top 100 defensemen and top 50 goalies and then sorted them by their minutes in penalties and voila!  Here is the team that you could finish 14th in the draft and then run away with the PIM Pool, nearly doubling the winner's total from last season.

Forward	NHL	Points	PIM
Wayne Simmonds	PHI	54	122
Evander Kane	BUF	43	113
Andrew Shaw	MTL	29	110
Matthew Tkachuk	CAL	48	105
Nazem Kadri	TOR	62	95
Patrick Maroon	EDM	42	95
Brandon Dubinsky	CBJ	41	91
Josh Anderson	CBJ	29	89
Defense	NHL	Points	PIM
Dustin Byfuglien	WPG	52	117
Dion Phaneuf	OTT	30	100
Radko Gudas	PHI	23	93
Josh Manson	ANA	17	82
Goalies	NHL	Points	PIM
Ryan Miller	ANA	43	22
Frederik Andersen	TOR	75	16
		588	1,250

Patrick Maroon, Dustin Byfuglien and Dion Phaneuf all make repeat appearances, between the 2015 and 2017 list. There are a few too many players that were sub-30 points on this list to be too good for the overall money, but what can you do? You're going to win your money back anyways.

Well, unless someone doesn't turn around and draft a team like this, just purely for the minutes...

Forward	NHL	Points	PIM
Cody McLeod	NAS	6	145
Tom Wilson	WAS	19	133
Micheal Haley	SAN	12	128
Matt Martin	TOR	9	123
Antoine Roussel	DAL	27	115
Ryan Reaves	PIT	13	104
Zack Kassian	EDM	24	101
Austin Watson	NAS	17	99
Defense	NHL	Points	PIM
Mark Borowiecki	OTT	3	154
Deryk Engelland	VGK	16	85
Luke Schenn	ARI	8	85
Brandon Manning	PHI	12	83
Goalies	NHL	Points	PIM
Mike Smith	CAL	44	14
Devan Dubnyk	MIN	90	10
		300	1,379