The end of summer also means the start of fantasy football, basketball and hockey season. Many handicappers play fantasy sports on the side; both pursuits deal with evaluating teams and athletes, using many of the same statistics.

The stats for a typical fantasy hockey league are fairly straightforward:

Skaters: goals, assists, penalty minutes, plus-minus, etc.
Goaltenders: wins, goals against average, save percentage, shutouts

A starting roster usually consists of 13 players: six forwards, four defensemen, two goaltenders and a utility skater. You also get four bench players. The key to winning this game is drafting for need. Strong goaltending is essential with this set-up, so draft the three best you can get your hands on.

There are only a handful of good scoring defensemen out there, so they get second priority at the draft. If you can’t get Sidney Crosby or Alex Ovechkin as a forward, don’t sweat it. There are plenty of second-tier forwards to go around.

It takes a special kind of person to be a professional hockey player. It’s not enough to be physically gifted, or a quick thinker – you also need some serious testicular fortitude. Hockey is a bloodsport; even today’s family-friendly game can leave you picking splinters out of your face.

No wonder these alpha males end up dating at the deep end of the gene pool. Mike Comrie and Hilary Duff are rumored to be engaged. Jarrett Stoll and Rachel Hunter are ready to start a family. Dan Hinote and Amy McCarthy, sister of Jenny, got hitched last month.

The Stoll-Hunter romance has drawn extra attention, partly because the 38-year-old Hunter has been “romantically linked” to a long list of actors, singers (including a 16-year marriage to Rod Stewart) and, yes, fashion intern Sean Avery. So what if Hunter is 13 years older than Stoll? Alexei Yashin and Carol Alt have already blazed that trail.

There’s nothing as exciting as a good, old-fashioned hockey rivalry – unless you get the same matchup three times in a week, or worse, once every three years. The NHL brass has wisely shifted its efforts back toward a more balanced schedule – every team will play every other team at least once in 2008-09.

It’s not quite as good as having each of the other 29 teams coming to your hometown arena, but it’s a step in the right direction. If you’re up north, you will be paid at least one visit from every other Canadian club. And the league is still emphasizing division rivalries – the Montreal Canadians, for example, will face the Boston Bruins six times, down from eight last year.

The new schedule promises the rekindling of some inter-conference battles that have fallen by the wayside – like the Canadiens vs. the Detroit Red Wings in an old-fashioned Original Six matchup. They’ll play in Detroit on Nov. 26.

There’s no question the NHL wants to see more scoring. Commissioner Gary Bettman himself says he wants to shrink goaltender equipment yet again. Goalies are already 85 percent as bulky as they were before the lockout. What’s a poor netminder to do?

Organize, of course. The Goalie Equipment Working Group was formed at the end of April, with five goalies and four NHL executives (including ex-goalies Jim Rutherford and Garth Snow, the bulky one) getting together to discuss the issue. Whether the GEWG will have any real affect on the league’s decision-making process is debatable. But at least the goalies will have their say.

Hockey has seen tremendous advancements in equipment technology, enough that today’s goaltender is an entirely different animal than 30 years ago, when Rutherford was between the pipes. The rules need to keep up with the technology – but the aim should be for a more beautiful game, not necessarily more flashing red lights.

Mark Parrish is suddenly available. Any takers?

August 1 came and went with no further news on the Mats Sundin front. His agent, J.P. Barry, told the Vancouver Sun that the offers made by the Vancouver Canucks and Montreal Canadiens were particularly flattering. But Barry also says there are six teams interested in Sundin, three who want to remain nameless. How intriguing.

If your favorite team doesn’t land the incumbent captain of the Toronto Maple Leafs, there’s always Mark Parrish. He suddenly became available when the Minnesota wild bought out the last three years of his contract. Wild GM Doug Risebrough called it strictly a salary-cap decision, but the question is, who needs a 16-goal scorer who’s already north of 30 years old? Nashville’s name has come up.

Of course, there’s always Europe. Jaroslav Modry leaves the Philadelphia Flyers blueline a little thinner now that he’s joined HC Liberec in the Czech Republic. Modry returns to the club he played for during the 2004-05 NHL lockout.

The NHL draft is over and most of the available free agents have signed. So instead of news, we get even more speculation over the future of Mats Sundin. The incumbent captain of the Toronto Maple Leafs is supposed to announce on Aug. 1 whether or not he’ll retire.

It seems unlikely Sundin will hang up his skates. He may be 37 years old, but he’s coming off yet another productive season: 32 goals and 46 assists in 74 games. Sundin also has a two-year, $20-million offer on the table from the Vancouver Canucks, who are in desperate need of some scoring talent – and some good news to feed their restless fans.

The Canucks can offer Sundin the moon and stars, but they can’t offer him a reasonable chance to win his first Stanley Cup. Vancouver is priced at an already optimistic 30-1 on the NHL futures market. Expect Sundin to keep his options open a while longer.

Are the Canucks insane for offering an old guy like Mats Sundin $20 million over 2 years? (That was a rhetorical question.)

There aren’t too many names of note left on the NHL’s list of unrestricted free agents. Unless you include Peter Forsberg, Joe Sakic and Teemu Selanne, who will almost certainly either return to their former clubs or retire. Brendan Shanahan would reportedly like to return to the New York Rangers, but they might not have enough money left after binging on Markus Naslund, Wade Redden, Michal Rozsival and others.

That leaves Mats Sundin - except he’s announced that he will not make a decision until “the end of July or the beginning of August,” according to a Swedish newspaper. The Vancouver Canucks offered Sundin $20 million over two years; the same newspaper reported earlier that Sundin had accepted that offer, prompting a denial from his representatives.

The Canucks are 30-1 long shots on the Stanley Cup futures market. Even if Sundin packs his bags for the West Coast, Vancouver would remain several pieces short of a legitimate Cup contender.

You suck, Kevin Lowe. Just ask Ducks’ GM Brian Burke.

Who’s the most important guy on a hockey team? The general manager. He’s the one (usually) who decides which players to sign and which to let go. So if you’re looking for a team to fade in 2008-09, find a team with overpriced star talent and a lousy GM pulling the strings.

Here are the bottom 10 names on The Hockey News GM Rankings for 2008:

21. George McPhee, Washington
22. Dale Tallon, Chicago
23. Cliff Fletcher, Toronto
24. Bryan Murray, Ottawa
25. Scott Howson, Columbus
26. Larry Pleau, St. Louis
27. Dean Lombardi, Los Angeles
28. Don Waddell, Atlanta
29. Kevin Lowe, Edmonton
30. Jay Feaster, Tampa Bay

McPhee and Tallon get reprieves for their work this offseason (this list was compiled in March). Feaster, on the other hand, resigned last week as part of the team’s makeover under new ownership. Don’t let the door hit you on the way out.

The salary cap has brought the Silly Season to the NHL. The free-agent comings and goings of the past two weeks have given the futures market a rolling hip-check into the boards. Most prominently, Marian Hossa has jumped from the Pittsburgh Penguins to the Detroit Red Wings, making Detroit a very strong candidate at 7-2 to defend Hockeytown’s Stanley Cup title.

Pittsburgh hasn’t stood pat. The Pens fleshed out their forward situation by adding veterans Miroslav Satan and Ruslan Fedotenko to the right side. With Sidney Crosby and Evgeni Malkin still in their ascendancy, Pittsburgh is in the driver’s seat in the Eastern Conference and a solid value at 6-1 to win the Cup.

Making like a thief in this whole situation are the Chicago Blackhawks (22-1). After three relatively quiet seasons rebuilding under GM Dale Tallon, Chicago added defenseman Brian Campbell and goalie Cristobal Huet. The United Center is going to be hopping again this winter.

It wasn’t much of a secret last month when Alexander Ovechkin of the Washington Capitals took home the Hart Memorial Trophy. Before the awards ceremony, the NHL’s online shop briefly linked to an Ovechkin T-shirt proclaiming him the league’s MVP.

Not that we needed a T-shirt to tell us that. Ovechkin also won the Art Ross Trophy and the Rocket Richard Trophy for most points (112) and goals (65). He was easily the best player (non-goaltender category) in a season where Sidney Crosby was shelved for six weeks with a high-ankle sprain. In the Hart voting, Ovechkin took 128 out of 134 first-place votes, leaving Evgeni Malkin and Jarome Iginla in the dust.

Other award winners included Martin Brodeur (Vezina), Niklas Lidstrom (Norris), Patrick Kane (Calder), Pavel Datsyuk (Lady Byng, Selke) and Washington coach Bruce Boudreau (Adams). Lidstrom has won six of the last seven Norris Trophies and needs two more to tie Bobby Orr for the record.