Takes and trash talk from both ALL sides of the NHL's most obscure PATHETIC* rivalry

* Thanks, Kevin Lowe!

Monday, April 07, 2008

Draft Lottery Preview: I Can't Believe I Care About This

The NHL Draft Lottery is happening today at 5 PM on Versus. Here's a comprehensive explanation of how the draft lottery works, courtesy of James Mirtle. The odds of gaining the top pick today are as follows:

Tampa Bay Lightning: 25%
Los Angeles Kings: 18.8%
Atlanta Thrashers: 14.2%
St. Louis Blues: 10.7%
New York Islanders: 8.1%

Other teams have a shot at moving up 4 spots but they can't win 1st overall, so who cares about them. Their odds, all added up, equals 19.6%.

Basically, I only really care that the Kings pick in the top 2. If we win the whole thing, awesome. If Tampa Bay wins it that's okay too, because the Kings would still get their pick of a number of top defensive prospects. If one of the other 3 teams in the top 5 (or the Columbus Blue Jackets, who sit at 6th right now) win, however, I'll be pissed. That would drop us down to 3rd. According to my calculations, the Kings have a 57.2% chance of staying in the top 2.* Hopefully everything works out for us, but I'm not holding out too much hope. That's one of the benefits of being a Kings fan; you'll always be ready for the worst thing possible to happen.

*That's probably wrong, just so you know.

7 comments:

Anonymous said...

The good news for you is the Blues are in there and if anything is going to be in your favor THUST me it is the Blues being there. Right now this team is finding wasy to lose games when they should have been closer to getting in the playoffs.

Unknown said...

THUST you?

Mr. Plank said...

If I'm looking at this right, since there is a 19.6 chance the bottom teams cannot obtain the first pick wouldn't that make Tampa Basement's odds more along the lines of 45% for getting the top pick?

@ nut: I think the guy meant trust. As for the rest of his post, I don't really follow.

Cheechew said...

Knowing the MO of Lombardi, regardless of where the Kings pick, they will probably trade down and still get the guy he really wants. Lombardi has for the most part gone against the so called experts and picked his own guy and not the guy who the public wished he should take. And for the most part has done a real good in the draft.

Unknown said...

Yeah I know it was supposed to be trust I just thought it was hilarious that it was the one word in his paragraph that he capitalized.

RudyKelly said...

The Lightning have a 25% chance of winning the lottery but a 48% chance of keeping the 1st overall pick. It's confusing, I know.

Unknown said...

Something kind of interesting: there is an article on ESPN right now that talks about Stamkos and how awesome he is. In it, the talk about how Lombardi was seen talking to Stamkos after one of his games (it also says the Kings have the best chance at the first overall pick, obviously they haven't been following this as close as we have). Then it quotes an unnamed scout who says,"I have no idea what he'd have to ask [Stamkos] beside his sweater size. Any questions you might have, he answers on the ice." This shows that a lot of teams still employ morons for scouts, or have poor policies. Anyone who thinks talking to a player to make sure he's not a complete fucking douche before you draft him (i.e. Alexander Daigle, Pat Falloon) is a naif.