The Puck Stops Here

I am in a keeper fantasy hockey league. Its website is here. We have started to discuss what we will do next year if the NHL has replacement players.

The first option is to not play as long as the NHL uses replacement players. Biggest con is that we are not playing. It is possible that it might put us in an awkward position, if it becomes clear that this situation is going to stay for a long period of time (such as the entire season) we may decide to try to play during the season.

The second option is to play under our current rules. If a GM wishes to release NHL players on his roster and sign replacement players this is his option. Presumably, one would only release borderline players or retiring players and sign the better of the replacements who might have NHL possibilities, but there is no guarantee that all GMs will be intelligent. This replacement time would count in our standings the same way it does in the NHL standings, so it would lead to unpredictable results where very good NHL teams with no replacement players get top draft picks.

The third option is to temporarily expand our rosters with replacement players in a large draft. When replacement players end, we would release the number of players from our rosters that we added (teams need to release their replacement players - they can keep the good ones). The major con is that it will be a lot of work to do this. GMs will have to do a lot of work to figure out who the replacement players are. Some of them will come from "off the beaten path" in leagues we have never watched and never viewed as places that might produce future NHLers.

Do any other keeper fantasy hockey leagues have better solutions?

Any time I talk about my fantasy hockey league, I like to add that anyone reading this post who thinks this might be a fun league to join should leave a message telling us how they can be reached.