Follow @lucasneilson84 Now that I have provided my top ranked Fantasy players in my previous blog, I would like to add a more comprehensive list which will assist you in the middle rounds of your draft. As you will see below I have included an extended list of my top 50 forwards, top 25 defenseman and top 20 goalies. Beside each of my player’s rankings I have added fellow HockeyBuzz bloggers Colin Dambrauskas’ rankings with a C, and Mike in Buffalo’s rankings with an M. Example: 1. Crosby (C1) (M1) – meaning Colin ranks this player #1, Mike ranks player #1. Now you have some additional input from two other bloggers who have been kind enough to compile these rankings for me - a big thank you to Colin and Mike!
Top 50 Forwards: 1. Crosby (C1) (M1) 2. Stamkos (C3) (M2) 3. Malkin (C2) (M4) 4. Perry (C5) (M9) 5. Ovechkin (C4) (M5) 6. Getzlaf (C10) (M12) 7. Giroux (C12) (M7) 8. Tavares (C6) (M6) 9. Toews (C19) (M3) 10. P. Kane (C14) (M14) 11. Kessel (C11) (M10) 12. Seguin (C7) (M8) 13. Benn (C9) (M13) 14. Kopitar (C18) (M21) 15. Hall (C21) (M26) 16. Pavelski (C33) (M16) 17. MacKinnon (C27) (M20) 18. Datsyuk (C42) (M40) 19. Sharp (C13) (M18) 20. Couture (C36) (M27) 21. Kunitz (C30) (M22) 22. Duchene (C32) (M28) 23. Zetterberg (C15) (M11) 24. Marleau (C26) (M24) 25. Parise (C20) (M32) 26. Hossa (C37) (M44) 27. E. Staal (C__)(M__) 28. J. Thornton (C17) (M46) 29. Skinner (C35) (M43) 30. Bergeron (C47) (M30) 31. Landeskog (C25) (M31) 32. Pacioretty (C31) (M23) 33. Simmonds (C__) (M38) 34. Backes (C16) (M19) 35. Spezza (C28) (M50) 36. Backstrom (C8) (M15) 37. Nash (C__) (M__) 38. D. Sedin (C24) (M__) 39. Gaborik (C__) (M__) 40. H. Sedin (C39) (M__) 41. Johansen (C__) (M33) 42. Van Riemsdyk (C34) (M29) 43. Okposo (C__) (M39) 44. Vanek (C40) (M35) 45. Lucic (C29) (M45) 46. St Louis (C46) (M41) 47. Steen (C23) (M25) 48. Neal (C22) (M17) 49. Krejci (C41) (M36) 50. J. Carter (C__) (M38)
Wheeler (M34) Stastny (C43) (M42) Drouin (M47) Hartnell (M48) B. Ryan (M49) Iginla (C44) O’Reilly (C45) Oshie (C48) Hornqvist (C49) Eberle (C50)
Top 25 Defenseman: 1. Karlsson (C1) (M4) 2. Weber (C2) (M2) 3. Keith (C4) (M6) 4. Subban (C3) (M1) 5. Pietrangelo (C8) (M10) 6. Doughty (C5) (M3) 7. Hedman (C20) (M17) 8. Oliver-Ekman Larsson (C14) (M8) 9. Yandle (C10) (M14) 10. Letang (C13) (M12) 11. Suter (C9) (M7) 12. Byfuglien (C11) (M5) 13. Kronwall (C21) (M19) 14. Shattenkirk (C6) (M11) 15. Chara (C7) (M15) 16. Giordano (C19) (M9) 17. Ehrhoff (C__) (M23) 18. Seabrook (C17) (M22) 19. Wisniewski (C15) (M13) 20. Markov (C16) (M__) 21. Phaneuf (C24) (M21) 22. M. Green (C__) (M__) 23. McDonagh (C18) (M18) 24. Fowler (C__) (M__) 25. Trouba (C23) (M20)
Burns (M16) Vlasic (M24) R. Murray (M25) Krug (C12) Niskanen (C22) Carlson (C25)
Top 10 goalies: +10 to consider 1. Rask (C1) (M1) 2. Lundqvist (C4) (M7) 3. Quick (C6) (M3) 4. Price (C3) (M4) 5. Bishop (C7) (M2) 6. Fleury (C8) (M8) 7. Varlamov (C5) (M__) 8. Bobrovsky (C__) (M6) 9. Crawford (C2) (M5) 10. Lehtonen (C__) (M9) 11. Howard (C9) (M__) 12. Schneider 13. Niemi 14. Bernier 15. Miller 16. Rinne (C10) (M10) 17. Mason 18. Smith 19. Holtby 20. Andersen/Gibson (who will run away with the #1)?
This of course leads to the question of who will get the most starts for Anaheim, who I believe will be one of the Western Conferences powerhouses yet again this year. If you have the option of taking more than two goalies in your fantasy pool…consider the option of taking a ‘for sure’ starter and possibly both of the Anaheim goalies. This ensures you will have a goalie in for Anaheim each game they play and if you notice one of the goalies embracing the number one roll you can drop the other goalie who has become the backup. One tactic I like to use is carrying one less defenseman on my fantasy team. Of course there are many factors to consider. Does your Fantasy pool include shot blocking? Body checking? Penalty minutes? If that’s the case, perhaps this isn’t for you. You would then surely want to have a full defense squad in your nightly lineup to rack up the hits, shot blocking and penalties from defending their net.
Now that you have viewed my top fantasy lists I'm confident that you now have a better understanding of which players to focus on in early to middle rounds. Feel free to use my rankings and adjust accordingly as needed. I’m hoping that by looking at the rankings from Mike and Colin you will be able to be more decisive with your picks and feel more confident in your selections. In my next blog I will prepare some sleeper picks to look for in the middle to late rounds of the draft to assist you when the bigger names start falling off the radar.
Hopefully you are already feeling more confident about this year’s upcoming Fantasy draft! Thanks for reading and of course feel free to comment or ask any questions.