October is around the corner, which means it is fantasy hockey draft season!
As you may know by now, I fancy myself as the numbers guy on the Die By The Blade crew. On top of my analytical contributions to the 2019-20 season – of which there will be plenty – I have decided to offer up my services as your go-to advisor for the fantasy hockey season (unless you’re in my leagues…then go away). Whether it’s fulfilling daily fantasy needs, or, in this case, gaining an advantage in your season-long league, just keep your stick on the ice as I hope to feed you the game-winning assist.
So, what better way to start than with some position rankings? My database is updated as of September 25th, and breaks down each player’s projections at even-strength, special teams, player usage and roles, and team performance. In order to keep things clear-cut, I will simply provide a list of the top projected fantasy players at each position for the upcoming season. I will leave the position value or auction price up to you, since many leagues vary in procedure.
So without further ado, here are the lists:
Keep in mind that I used Yahoo’s default scoring settings for head-to-head points leagues as the basis for these projections.
Center
- Patrice Bergeron, BOS – I know, I KNOW! He may be the surprise number one at center (roll your eyes if you wish), but consistency across the board renders Bergeron the most valuable at his position. With Brad Marchand and David Pastrnak flanking his line, and the Bruins poised for another strong season, Bergeron’s expected goal total outvalues the NHL’s best talent.
- Connor McDavid, EDM
- John Tavares, TOR
- Nathan MacKinnon, COL
- Auston Matthews, TOR
- Tyler Seguin, DAL
- Sidney Crosby, PIT
- Jack Eichel, BUF – Eichel has steadily climbed up fantasy rankings each year and after a strong performance last season, he looks to improve on those numbers and establish himself as a top 10 center in fantasy circles
- Sean Monahan, CGY
- Steven Stamkos, TBL
- Dylan Larkin, DET
- Aleksander Barkov, FLA
- Eric Staal, MIN
- Sebastian Aho, CAR
- Mika Zibanejad, NYR
- Mathew Barzal, NYI
- Jonathan Toews, CHI
- Nico Hischier, NJD
- Brayden Schenn, STL
- Sean Couturier, PHI
- Evgeni Malkin, PIT
- Matt Duchene, NSH
- Logan Couture, SJS
- Pierre-Luc Dubois, CBJ
- Tomas Hertl, SJS
26. Brayden Point 27. Derek Stepan 28. Ryan Getzlaf 29. Elias Pettersson 30. Nazem Kadri 31. Paul Stastny 32. Anze Kopitar 33. Ryan O’Reilly 34. Mark Scheifele 35. Evgeny Kuznetsov 36. Nicklas Backstrom 37. Colin White 38. Ryan Nugent-Hopkins 39. William Karlsson 40. Vincent Trocheck 41. Mikael Backlund 42. Max Domi 43. Dylan Strome 44. Bo Horvat 45. Kevin Hayes 46. Phillip Danault 47. Jack Hughes 48. Filip Chytil 49. Roope Hintz 50. Jordan Staal
Left Wing
- Timo Meier, SJS – Two-for-two on surprises, eh? Meier grades out as the top left wing in my projections as the benficiary of a good line, good team, and very strong individual metrics. He scores a high percentage of his goals around the goalmouth, so his expected goal total projects to remain very high. He ranks significantly lower in Yahoo’s default rankings, so sit awhile on him and make sure to thank me later for stealing a top player in a mid-round.
- Brady Tkachuk, OTT – The Senators may be in for a tough season, but the younger Tkachuk will be a major bright spot for Ottawa’s present and future. He’s another one that will be a steal in mid-rounds. If you miss out on Meier, take Tkachuk.
- Alex Ovechkin, WSH
- Jamie Benn, DAL
- Taylor Hall, NJD
- Jason Zucker, MIN
- Anders Lee, NYI
- Jonathan Huberdeau, FLA
- James van Riemsdyk, PHI
- Jonathan Marchessault, VGK
- Viktor Arvidsson, NSH
- Evander Kane, SJS
- Zach Parise, MIN
- Gabriel Landeskog, COL
- Jeff Skinner, BUF – Coming off a 40-goal season, Skinner projects really well again this season. Talent-wise, he is clearly the Sabres’ top left winger. That won’t necessarily get him back on Eichel’s line, however, as they have yet to be put together at even strength this preseason. Still, he edges out the competition on his team at his position in the rankings (barely…)
- Nino Niederreiter, CAR
- Jake Guentzel, PIT
- Victor Olofsson, BUF – What? Is it Sabres bias? Well…actually…no. I just come up with the algorithm, and the numbers tell me the rest. My model projects Olofsson so high because of his metrics and production at the NHL level, his projected spot on Eichel’s wing, and his likely spot on the Sabres’ top power-play unit. My advice would be to wait until the final rounds to take a flyer on him if you don’t have Sabres fans in your league, or, if you do, hope they happen to miss this post! Let that be a lesson to never miss a post from us again.
- Chris Kreider, NYR
- Artemi Panarin, NYR
- Jaden Schwartz, STL
- Tyler Bertuzzi, DET
- Leon Draisaitl, EDM
- Claude Giroux, PHI
- Matthew Tkachuk, CGY
26. Rickard Rakell 27. Nikolaj Ehlers 28. Brad Marchand 29. Andreas Johnsson 30. Andreas Athanasiou 31. Alex DeBrincat 32. Johnny Gaudreau 33. Kyle Connor 34. Max Pacioretty 35. Alex Galchenyuk 36. Jake DeBrusk 37. Micheal Ferland 38. Zach Hyman 39. Gustav Nyquist 40. Tyler Johnson 41. Mikael Granlund 42. Frank Vatrano 43. Tanner Pearson 44. Jonathan Drouin 45. Tomas Tatar 46. Nick Ritchie 47. Jakub Vrana 48. Brandon Saad 49. Clayton Keller 50. Oskar Lindblom
Right Wing
- Brendan Gallagher, MON – Gallagher grabs the top spot at right wing because of his high expected goal metrics and power play contributions. Another one that gets to high danger scoring areas consistently, Gallagher found synergy last season on Montreal’s top line with Danault and Tatar.
- Nikita Kucherov, TBL
- Cam Atkinson, CBJ
- Vladimir Tarasenko, STL
- Blake Wheeler, WPG
- Filip Forsberg, NSH
- David Pastrnak, BOS
- Phil Kessel, ARI
- Andrei Svechnikov, CAR
- Mitch Marner, TOR
- Joe Pavelski, DAL
- Patrick Kane, CHI
- Evgeny Dadonov, FLA
- Kyle Palmieri, NJD
- Ondrej Kase, ANA
- Travis Konecny, PHI
- Mark Stone, VGK
- Alex Radulov, DAL
- Patric Hornqvist, PIT
- Anthony Mantha, DET
- Jordan Eberle, NYI
- Sam Reinhart, BUF – A pretty safe pick, if he’s available. Whether he’s playing with Eichel all season or not, Reinhart has shown he can produce either way.
- Brock Boeser, VAN
- Reilly Smith, VGK
- Kevin Fiala, MIN
26. Dustin Brown 27. Tyler Toffoli 28. Mikko Rantanen 29. Elias Lindholm 30. Jakub Voracek 31. Patrik Laine 32. Conor Garland 33. Tom Wilson 34. William Nylander 35. Craig Smith 36. Kevin Labanc 37. Jakob Silfverberg 38. James Neal 39. Pavel Buchnevich 40. Andrew Shaw 41. Oliver Bjorkstrand 42. Wayne Simmonds 43. Teuvo Teravainen 44. Dominik Kahun 45. Ondrej Palat 46. T. J. Oshie 47. Alex Tuch 48. J.T. Miller 49. Josh Anderson 50. Jeff Carter
Defense
- Roman Josi, NSH – Josi takes the top spot at defense thanks to an offensively improved Nashville team. With P.K. Subban leaving town, Josi no longer has competition for quarterbacking the first power play unit and free rein to rack up the additional points as a result.
- Brent Burns, SJS
- John Carlson, WSH
- Erik Karlsson, SJS
- Dougie Hamilton, CAR
- Victor Hedman, TBL
- Seth Jones, CBJ
- Morgan Rielly, TOR
- Kris Letang, PIT
- Jacob Trouba, NYR
- Mark Giordano, CGY
- Alex Edler, VAN
- Alex Pietrangelo, STL
- Erik Gustafsson, CHI
- Ryan Pulock, NYI
- Shea Weber, MON
- Mikhail Sergachev, TBL
- John Klingberg, DAL
- Darnell Nurse, EDM
- Thomas Chabot, OTT
- Torey Krug, BOS
- Oscar Klefbom, EDM
- Shayne Gostisbehere, PHI
- Zach Werenski, CBJ
- Tyson Barrie, COL
26. Josh Morrissey 27. Matt Dumba 28. P.K. Subban 29. Shea Theodore 30. Tyler Myers 31. Ryan Ellis 32. Duncan Keith 33. Aaron Ekblad 34. Rasmus Dahlin 35. Michal Kempny 36. Rasmus Ristolainen 37. Brent Seabrook 38. Drew Doughty 39. Erik Johnson 40. Sami Vatanen 41. Radko Gudas 42. Nate Schmidt 43. Ivan Provorov 44. Jakob Chychrun 45. Justin Schultz 46. Oliver Ekman-Larsson 47. Jaccob Slavin 48. Ryan Suter 49. Jeff Petry 50. Marc-Edouard Vlasic
Goaltender
- John Gibson, ANA – If Anaheim gets back into the playoffs this season, it will be because of Gibson. His advanced goaltending metrics are unparalled by any of the others at his position, and should lead to a bunch of saves above average. Of course wins play a major role in fantasy goaltending, and that may be the one thing working against his case. Still, Gibson stands at the top of the hill.
- Pekka Rinne, NSH
- Ben Bishop, DAL
- Andrei Vasilevskiy, TBL
- Devan Dubnyk, MIN
- Antti Raanta, ARI
- Frederik Andersen, TOR
- Sergei Bobrovsky, FLA
- Connor Hellebuyck, WPG
- Marc-Andre Fleury, VGK
- Philipp Grubauer, COL
- Joonas Korpisalo, CBJ
- Robin Lehner, CHI
- Carey Price, MON
- Cory Schneider, NJD
- Matt Murray, PIT
- Carter Hart, PHI
- Semyon Varlamov, NYI
- Martin Jones, SJS
- Carter Hutton, BUF – The impending starter for the Buffalo Sabres, Hutton doesn’t quite project in the top half of the league for fantasy purposes. If he can return to his 2017-2018 form, however, that can certainly change.
- Jordan Binnington, STL
- Brayden Holtby, WSH
- Tuukka Rask, BOS
- Craig Anderson, OTT
- Jimmy Howard, DET
26. Jonathan Quick 27. Henrik Lundqvist 28. Jacob Markstrom 29. David Rittich 30. Petr Mrazek 31. Mike Smith 32. Darcy Kuemper 33. Jake Allen 34. Keith Kinkaid 35. Anders NIlsson 36. Cam Talbot 37. Juuse Saros 38. Ryan Miller 39. Jack Campbell 40. Alex Stalock 41. Anton Khudobin 42. Linus Ullmark 43. Corey Crawford 44. James Riemer 45. Curtis McElhinney 46. Jonathan Bernier 47. Alexandar Georgiev 48. Casey DeSmith 49. Aaron Dell 50. Malcolm Subban