A Naked Appeal for You to Buy Hockey Prospectus 2015-16

For generations, the written word has impacted humanity in countless, immeasurable ways.  Holy texts have guided humanity for years. Revolutions were ignited with pamphlets, theses, and manifestos.  Classic stories put to paper not only entertained us but allowed us to learn important lessons about other places, other people, and even ourselves.  Works have allowed us to study the past to achieve a better future as well as allow us to help ourselves be fitter, more attractive, more influential, more social, and possibly even happier.  All of these are worth seeking out.

Yet, there is a gap. None of those will help you get ready for the 2015-16 NHL Season.  Now there is one that will: the Hockey Prospectus 2015-16.

The annual edited by Timo Seppa is your comprehensive guide to upcoming regular season of the greatest hockey league the world has known.  There are well over 500 pages to help you get more knowledge on every single team and every single player who played in the league last season.  That's right: every single player.  If they played a game in the NHL last season, there's a profile, their stats in their last three seasons, and a VUKOTA projection for them.  Martin Havlat? In.  Tim Sestito? In. Kael Mouillierat? You bet. Brendan Morrow? He's there too.  Eriah Hayes, David van der Guilk, and Anton Forsberg? Woo, woo, woo, you know it.  I think you get the idea. Additionally, there are total performance charts and an essay for every single team focusing on a particular issue.  Reading this will help you learn more about your favorite team and the 29 other teams they will face.

On top of that, there's a list of the top 100 NHL prospects, compiled by Ryan Wagman, with a blurb on each prospect. There are also tables of players organized by GVT and VUKOTA for quick reference as to who stands out.  There are also stat-specific essays relevant to the game as a whole. Tom Awad explains GVT and VUKOTA. Jack Ries compared Fenwick with estimated possession from play-by-play logs.  Ryan Stimson wrote about one of the next steps forward for hockey analytics: passes; you can learn exactly what made Scott Gomez stand out from most everyone else in the league last season among other things.  It's all together in one handy reference and it's out right now before the season begins - the perfect time to pick one up and get educated.

This year's book has had contributions from twenty six hockey writers in various capacities from Micah Blake McCurdy to Awad to me.  Yes, me.  A key reason why I'm making this naked appeal for you to buy this book is because, once again, I'm in it.  I wrote the profiles for the Devils and Rangers players for another season. I even wrote the essays for the Islanders and Devils.  It's also a point of pride that Ryan was asked to be a part of it.  Other than Shane O'Donnell at Litter Box Cats and Stephen Burtch at Pension Plan Puppets, there aren't any other regular names on this network that I recognize. It's a point of personal pride to be a contributor to this annual for another year, and it speaks to the respect that sites like All About the Jersey carry.  Our placement in this book is due to the work we've done, and that's partially driven by readers like yourself.  So I thank you for helping in that way to make it possible as much as I thank Timo Seppa and the HP staff for having myself and Ryan involved in this year's book.

And the best way to keep that going is to buy the book.  If a personal plea and my description of this year's annual so far has not convinced you, perhaps an excerpt would.  The Hockey Prospectus page for this year's book includes a sample from the Washington Capitals: an essay by Matthew Kory and a few of their player profiles by Pat Holden. It even includes some testimonial quotes from some guys named Jarmo Kekalainen and Ray Shero -  you know, just two active general managers in the National Hockey League.

OK, enough of the sell, here's the cost.  At that same page, there are links to get the book in two ways. I'll provide you the direct links to both stores. You can pick up an electronic PDF version of the Hockey Prospectus for $14.99 at Payloadz. Should you want a paperback copy to hold in your hands,then you can go to Amazon and get it for $25.99. Again, with the 2015-16 NHL season coming up, this is the important text to learn about the entire league.

Thank you for reading my naked appeal for you to buy this book that I'm a part of for this year.  Hopefully, I'll get to do it again next year.  If you want a more detailed season preview of the Devils, then you're in luck: that's what we'll be doing this week here at All About the Jersey.  Plus, there will be some actual news coming as the Devils recently made their next set of cuts (more on that soon). On top of that, there should be a new Talking Red appearing this evening.  There's always more happening here.  Hockey doesn't stop. Neither does shilling: thank you for reading - and, seriously, please buy the book.