What is the difference between minor and major penalties?

A minor penalty is usually a small infraction of the rules and are often quite common in NHL games.  With fantasy hockey players, penalties are negative, and are not helpful in your picks due to the two minute in the penalty box the player will face.  If the other team scores a goal during this time, the player no longer is out of the game, even if it is less than two minutes. Some examples of things that could count as a minor penalty include tripping, interfering, roughhousing, and so on.  Minor penalties are not too drastic when affecting the game played, however it can give the opposite team a better advantage for those few minutes.  

A major penalty will always put the fantasy player out of commission for five minutes.  The most commonplace major penalty is that of players who start a fight or are intentionally attempting to harm another fantasy player.  A solid strategy for those drafting players is avoiding picks that are known to start a fight.  Doing some analysis on the matter helps the person drafting picks avoid fantasy players who will end up allowing the opposing team a “power play”, or having at least a man advantage.  This can cause a larger disadvantage for the team and is an extended time that your fantasy hockey pick will not be in the game.  Penalty minutes can be detrimental for your team because this inferior position, of having less skaters on the ice, can easily result in goals for the opposing team.  This can largely affect the game flow for the rest of the game and can result in your fantasy hockey players seeing less ice time than usual.  Less time on the ice easily correlates with less opportunities to accrue fantasy hockey points.  

When fantasy players incur a penalty, this is counted against them in what are called “penalty minutes”, making players with a higher value, less desirable to draft.  Not only does fantasy hockey analysis allow this for better understanding of the effect of penalties on the player, but it also allows an overall better understanding of the game.  Better picks mean a higher chance at winning weekly in fantasy hockey, and therefore, understanding penalties is incredibly important and helpful.