As we reach the middle of September we approach pre-season hockey quickly. Much preparation is in order for me to feel fully prepared for another glorified fantasy season. As I go through all of my notes and lists I find myself feeling more confident each day. Picking a core that you plan to hold onto throughout the season is a very important part of your fantasy. Really, I find the draft one of the most exciting parts of the season as I either get together with my friends or simply enjoy the online draft where we can chirp each other about any stupid picks that may take place.
The first three rounds of your fantasy draft you should come out feeling great, like you have three excellent players that are going to thrive in this year’s 2015/16 season. Like I mentioned in my last blog, if you prepare yourself properly and pay attention to what players are being drafted when (goalies specifically). Then you will be able to round your team out accordingly and select the right players at the right time in the order you have listed you top forwards, defensemen and goaltenders. That is exactly why I have these lists for myself as I get fully set for my fantasy drafts.
Of course not all of my rankings will be bang on with yours, and I hope you make your own lists but use mine to help guide you with any question marks you may have. My ranking system is based off goals, assists, points, plus/minus, short-handed points, game winning goals, power play points and penalty minutes for my forwards and defensemen. My goalies are ranked including the wins, goals against average, save percent and shutouts categories. So if you have other categories such as hits, blocks, shots and saves then by all means adjust your rankings accordingly.
Top 100 Forwards:
1. Sidney Crosby 2. Alex Ovechkin 3. Steven Stamkos 4. John Tavares 5. Jamie Benn 6. Tyler Seguin 7. Evgeni Malkin 8. Claude Giroux 9. Corey Perry 10. Patrick Kane 11. Phil Kessel 12. Ryan Getzlaf 13. Vladimir Tarasenko 14. Joe Pavelski 15. Jonathan Toews 16. Jakub Voracek 17. Rick Nash 18. Max Pacioretty 19. Zach Parise 20. Nicklas Backstrom 21. Ryan Johansen 22. Anze Kopitar 23. Taylor Hall 24. Logan Couture 25. Tyler Johnson 26. Blake Wheeler 27. Connor McDavid 28. Henrik Zetterberg 29. Daniel Sedin 30. Nathan Mackinnon 31. Alexander Steen 32. Gabriel Landeskog 33. Nikita Kucherov 34. David Backes 35. Filip Forsberg 36. Pavel Datsyuk 37. Jordan Eberle 38. Andrew Ladd 39. Nick Foligno 40. Patrick Sharp 41. Henrik Sedin 42. Wayne Simmonds 43. T.J. Oshie 44. Patrice Bergeron 45. Eric Staal 46. Matt Duchene 47. Jeff Carter 48. Radim Vrbata 49. Johnny Gaudreau 50. Brandon Saad 51. Jason Spezza 52. Ondrej Palat 53. Kyle Okposo 54. Chris Kreider 55. Milan Lucic 56. Patric Hornqvist 57. Sean Monahan 58. Jiri Hudler 59. Gustav Nyquist 60. Scott Hartnell 61. Bobby Ryan 62. Jaden Schwartz 63. Joe Thornton 64. Tomas Tatar 65. Derick Brassard 66. Derek Stepan 67. Bryan Little 68. Ryan Nugent-Hopkins 69. James Neal 70. Ryan Kesler 71. Kyle Turris 72. Jack Eichel 73. James van Riemsdyk 74. Marian Gaborik 75. Valeri Nichushkin 76. Patrick Marleau 77. Chris Kunitz 78. Jason Pominville 79. Jarome Iginla 80. Jonathan Huberdeau 81. Brandon Dubinsky 82. Brendan Gallagher 83. Tomas Plekanec 84. Ryan O’Reilly 85. Evgeny Kuznetesov 86. Brad Marchand 87. Alex Galchenyuk 88. David Krejci 89. Thomas Vanek 90. Tyler Toffoli 91. Ryan Strome 92. Nazem Kadri 93. Nick Bjugstad 94. David Perron 95. Mike Ribeiro 96. Jeff Skinner 97. Mark Scheifele 98. Carl Soderberg 99. Paul Stastny 100. Mike Hoffman
Top 50 Defensemen:
1. Erik Karlsson 2. P.K. Subban 3. Dustin Byfuglien 4. Kevin Shattenkirk 5. Kris Letang 6. Shea Weber 7. Mark Giordano 8. Brent Burns 9. Roman Josi 10. Victor Hedman 11. Drew Doughty 12. Duncan Keith 13. Keith Yandle 14. Oliver Ekman-Larsson 15. Alex Pietrangelo 16. John Carlson 17. Mike Green 18. Sami Vatanen 19. Aaron Ekblad 20. Tyson Barrie 21. Dougie Hamilton 22. Ryan McDonagh 23. Justin Faulk 24. John Klingberg 25. Johnny Boychuk 26. Mark Streit 27. Ryan Suter 28. Niklas Kronwall 29. Dennis Wideman 30. Torey Krug 31. Nick Leddy 32. Hampus Lindholm 33. Jacob Trouba 34. Brent Seabrook 35. Dion Phaneuf 36. Zdeno Chara 37. Jake Muzzin 38. Anton Stralman 39. Cam Fowler 40. TJ Brodie 41. Jack Johnson 42. Erik Johnson 43. Alexander Edler 44. James Wisniewski 45. Tyler Myers 46. Andrej Sekera 47. Dan Boyle 48. Ryan Ellis 49. Michael Del Zotto 50. Justin Schultz
Top 30 Goalies:
1. Carey Price 2. Henrik Lundqvist 3. Braden Holtby 4. Pekka Rinne 5. Marc-Andre Fleury 6. Tukka Rask 7. Ben Bishop 8. Jonathan Quick 9. Devan Dubnyk 10. Corey Crawford 11. Sergei Bobrovsky 12. Semyon Varlamov 13. Jaroslav Halak 14. Corey Schneider 15. Roberto Luongo 16. Steve Mason 17. Brian Elliott 18. Frederik Andersen 19. Ryan Miller 20. Jonas Hiller 21. Andrej Pavelec 22. Jimmy Howard 23. Craig Anderson 24. Cam Talbot 25. Jonathan Bernier 26. Eddie Lack 27. Robin Lehner 28. Martin Jones 29. Jake Allen 30. Petr Mrazek
The goaltending is always the toughest to rate as you don’t always know who the sure starter will be. Just like last year Anaheim has both Gibson and Andersen (who ran away with the starter job last year). Gibson is highly ranked and poised to push Andersen for the starting job at some point. Whether that be this year or the next, there is always the possibility looming.
There are a number of goalie jobs to be fought for this season. Here are a few more I can think of.
Elliot VS Allen (St. Louis) Anderson VS Hammond (Ottawa) Jones VS Stalock (San Jose) Howard VS Mrazek (Detroit) Niemi VS Lehtonen (Dallas) Pavelec VS Hutchinson (Winnipeg) Ward VS Lack (Carolina)
As you can see there are going to be some good battles between the pipes on each of these teams, so be somewhat hesitant when taking one of these options as there is the possibility of the pick back firing. Without risk there is no reward, but there is something to be said about a sure thing when it comes to selecting your goalies, as you usually only have two or three; pending roster sizes of course.
Hopefully my lists have got your fantasy mind thinking and you can tweak your lists accordingly to suit your fantasy pools.
Note: If I missed anyone, or you think someone deserves to be in my lists, let me know and I will update if viable.
Thanks for reading and enjoy the rest of your day.