Week Nine Waiver Mock Draft

If you haven't been reading the blog or checking out the website, then you're probably blissfully unaware that we're creeping up to Waiver Draft time. I know for most of the regulars in the pool, you're pretty much right on top of things, itching to make that move or two (or three, within the rules) and now that we're just about to get started with Week Eight, I have some time to sit down and ponder what could be done next week, possibly to give some people some hope, maybe even give someone an idea to keep things moving along quite smoothly in Week Nine.  Mostly, it's just me playing around on my own blog site though.

So, I am generally just going through, team by team, picking out the players that should be dropped and then taking the next best player at that position to fill the void.  There is no real strategy to this, other than maybe moving towards the bonus rounds, if there are any, but I mean, how many people are actually reading this, right?

First of all, the picking order on this post is from Week Seven, but this week will determine the final order of the draft, which could have some tweaks to it, understandably.  So, let's see how the first round shapes up, as I currently have everyone making a move.

Round	Pick	Team	Dropped Player	NHL	Pos	Picked Player	NHL
1	1	Scott Buckberry	Sam Gagner	VAN	F	Dustin Brown	LOS
1	2	Eric Wheeler	Laurent Brossoit	EDM	G	Anders Nilsson	VAN
1	3	Steve Bishop	Calvin Pickard	TOR	G	Anton Khudobin	BOS
1	4	Troy Berkley	Sam Bennett	CAL	F	William Karlsson	VGK
1	5	Wes Moroz	Kyle Okposo	BUF	F	Reilly Smith	VGK
1	6	Stacey Campbell	Mikkel Boedker	SAN	F	Alexander Kerfoot	COL
1	7	Ryan Miller	Brett Ritchie	DAL	F	Yanni Gourde	TAM
1	8	Neil Buysman	Martin Hanzal	DAL	F	Adrian Kempe	LOS
1	9	Grant Saskiw	Joshua Ho-Sang	NYI	F	Jesper Bratt	NJD
1	10	Tony Dourado	Loui Eriksson	VAN	F	Justin Abdelkader	DET
1	11	Cam Wagner	Jeff Carter	LOS	F	Brian Gibbons	NJD
1	12	Brenda & Seward	Jussi Jokinen	LOS	F	Christian Dvorak	ARI
1	13	Mike Somerville	Nick Bonino	NAS	F	Bryan Rust	PIT
1	14	Clayton Corley	Joel Eriksson Ek	MIN	F	Erik Haula	VGK
1	15	Chris Suddaby	Thomas Chabot	OTT	D	Olli Maatta	PIT
1	16	Stacey McDonald	Vadim Shipachyov	ZRE	F	Lars Eller	WAS
1	17	Stuart Greenley	Louis Domingue	TAM	G	Maxime Lagace	VGK
1	18	Dale Corley	Patrick Eaves	ANA	F	Andrew Cogliano	ANA
1	19	Derek Wilton	Paul Byron	MTL	F	Jean-Gabriel Pageau	OTT
1	20	Benson Greenley	Mark Streit	ZRE	D	Colin Miller	VGK
1	21	Derek Bell	Antti Niemi	MTL	G	Keith Kinkaid	NJD
1	22	Dale Bradley	Dylan Strome	ARI	F	Craig Smith	NAS
1	23	Brian Towers	Connor Murphy	CHI	D	Ron Hainsey	TOR
1	24	Kristy & Don	Shea Theodore	VGK	D	Jan Rutta	CHI
1	25	Jeremy Dieser	Tobias Rieder	ARI	F	Josh Anderson	CBJ

The race in this case is for Los Angeles Kings forward Dustin Brown, as the Kings have been surprisingly good again this year to start and Brown has found his way to the scoresheet more times than anyone probably expected.  He is far and away the best player, to date, in the available players list and Scott B., who has not had a pleasant start to his first season in the hockey pool, gets a chance to take him and try to climb back up into the standings.

The Waiver Draft will feature a good number of players that are injured, sent down to the minors, having retired or just having very poor starts to the year.  There are some names that are certainly surprises on this list, like a Sam Bennett or Shea Theodore, but this really is the nature of the beast.

The goaltending market is another issue, which may not get fixed for some teams, because there really isn't a whole lot out there, in terms of goaltending.  Is the goalie you're going to drop get more minutes than the one you're picking up?  Is he on a better or worse team?  Is he injury prone?  Hell, how far down the depth chart is he?  That last one is really a question about the goaltending in Vegas, more than anything, trying to note that there are going to be some land mines out there to avoid.

As it stands though, everyone has something to give up in the opening round of the Waiver Draft and of course, things can change drastically in a week or two.

How about round two then?

Round	Pick	Team	Dropped Player	NHL	Pos	Picked Player	NHL
2	26	Scott Buckberry	Christopher Tanev	VAN	D	Deryk Engelland	VGK
2	27	Eric Wheeler	Jesse Puljujarvi	EDM	F	Brock McGinn	CAR
2	28	Steve Bishop	Tyson Jost	COL	F	MattIas Janmark	DAL
2	29	Troy Berkley	Jeff Petry	MTL	D	Joel Edmundson	STL
2	30	Wes Moroz	Radko Gudas	PHI	D	Gustav Forsling	CHI
2	31	Stacey Campbell	PASS
2	32	Ryan Miller	Jaromir Jagr	CAL	F	Derek Grant	ANA
2	33	Neil Buysman	David Backes	BOS	F	Ryan Hartman	CHI
2	34	Grant Saskiw	Fredrik Claesson	OTT	D	Tim Heed	SAN
2	35	Tony Dourado	Alexander Edler	VAN	D	Michael Del Zotto	VAN
2	36	Cam Wagner	Nolan Patrick	PHI	F	Danton Heinen	BOS
2	37	Brenda & Seward	PASS
2	38	Mike Somerville	PASS
2	39	Clayton Corley	PASS
2	40	Chris Suddaby	PASS
2	41	Stacey McDonald	Artturi Lehkonen	MTL	F	Tom Pyatt	OTT
2	42	Stuart Greenley	PASS
2	43	Dale Corley	Pavel Zacha	NJD	F	Derek Dorsett	VAN
2	44	Derek Wilton	Zach Bogosian	BUF	D	Brad Hunt	VGK
2	45	Benson Greenley	Patrick Sharp	CHI	F	Trevor Lewis	LOS
2	46	Derek Bell	Troy Stecher	VAN	D	Kris Russell	EDM
2	47	Dale Bradley	PASS
2	48	Brian Towers	Cam Fowler	ANA	D	Dan Hamhuis	DAL
2	49	Kristy & Don	PASS
2	50	Jeremy Dieser	Trevor Daley	DET	D	Dmitry Kulikov	WPG

The depth of the original draft really shows when we get down to the second round of the Waiver Draft, as I am expecting a good number of teams to pass on their next pick, mostly because this is a long season and the players that teams have, although they could be hurt or not playing very well, could turn things around in the back end of the season.

In other cases, it could be a good time to cut bait and just get someone who is a little bit better or maybe a little bit more consistent. 

Between the first two rounds, the Vegas Golden Knights really steal the show, with seven players taken in this mock draft, including Deryk Engelland, who you wouldn't normally suggest as being a good hockey pool player, but he has been given quite the opportunity with the expansion team and that has translated into decent enough numbers to be considered for the pool this year.  Go figure!

Of course, the second round isn't quite where everything will end, but it will for right now.  If your team suffers an injury in the week, especially in the long-term variety, the bonus round is there for you to make that move, just so you're not coming out of Week Nine with a long-term injury on your books.  Also, if your team does have an injured player that hasn't returned in the week, beyond the second round of the Waiver Draft, then it is allowed to move that player along as well.  All picks in the bonus round will be first come, first serve.