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USATSI

Forward rankings are unquestionably important, but sometimes the gap between two forwards just a few spots apart in the rankings is big, and other times it's so small that you're not losing much value, if any, should you end up with the lower-ranked option. To help you with that, you can use this tier list as a general guide to gauge what the expectations are for each forward. While there's nuance to be had in each group, which will be examined below, the difference in projected value between two forwards of different tiers will typically be greater than between two forwards of the same tier.

Tier 1 – Cream of the Crop

Nikita Kucherov, Connor McDavid, Nathan MacKinnon, Leon Draisaitl, David Pastrnak

Over the past three seasons, these five forwards have led the league in regular-season points, with McDavid topping the pack with 385 across 225 appearances, while Pastrnak rounds out the top five with 329 in 246 outings. They are also the only five players to reach the 100-point mark in each of the past three campaigns. Among this group, McDavid has the highest ceiling should he have better health than he did in 2024-25. However, Kucherov has won back-to-back Art Ross Trophies, Draisaitl is coming off his third 50-plus goal campaign in four years, MacKinnon has recorded over 110 points in each of the past three seasons and Pastrnak has averaged 50 goals and 110 points per 82 games over the same three-year span, so you really can't go wrong with any of these picks.

Tier 2 – Not ideal, but close

Mikko Rantanen, Kirill Kaprizov, Auston Matthews, Mitch Marner, Brayden Point, Artemi Panarin

This group isn't devoid of question marks. Marner will be changing teams, so there might be an adjustment period. Matthews and Kaprizov each have a concerning injury history. Rantanen is coming off a hectic campaign and saw his regular-season offensive production dip as a result. However, all six of these forwards are arguably just a touch below the Tier 1 group and have the potential to finish in the top five in terms of fantasy value if things go their way. In particular, Matthews is a clear Hart Trophy contender at the best of times, but his injury history has pushed him just a touch outside of Tier 1.

Tier 3A – Elite Forwards: Some Risk, Plenty of Reward

Martin Necas, Jack Eichel, Sam Reinhart, Sidney Crosby, Jason Robertson, Lucas Raymond, Tim Stutzle, J.T. Miller, Jack Hughes, Matthew Tkachuk

Most, if not all, of these forwards will have tremendous seasons. However, there is a question surrounding each of them. Can Reinhart return to 50-plus goals, or was 2023-24 an anomaly brought on by his ridiculously high shooting percentage? Will Raymond or Stutzle, each 23 years old, find another level this year? Will Robertson find his way back to the 40-goal and 100-point marks after two campaigns that were somewhat disappointing given his potential? Can Eichel, Hughes and Tkachuk stay healthy (Tkachuk's an especially big risk because he might start the campaign on the shelf)? Will Crosby's age catch up to him? Will Necas match his career-high 83 points from 2024-25 or even exceed it in his first full campaign alongside Nathan MacKinnon? Even in a scenario where you get sub-optimal answers, each of these forwards should put up high-end offensive numbers, which mitigates the risk in drafting them.

Tier 3B – Elite Forwards: The Safe Plays

Kyle Connor, Robert Thomas, Nick Suzuki, William Nylander, Jake Guentzel, Jesper Bratt

The other side of Tier 3 are forwards you can be reasonably sure will give you over a point-per-game. There's the potential that any forward in this group could even reach or surpass the 90-point mark, though you're more likely to find that level of production in 3A, so you are trading a bit of upside for security here. Still, the line between 3A and 3B can be somewhat blurry. For example, it wouldn't raise eyebrows if Crosby ended up falling below some of these forwards in fantasy drafts, given his age. In particular, Suzuki and Thomas are 26 years old, so the idea that they have a little upside left would justify taking them ahead of someone like Crosby. Then there's Guentzel, who is the least likely member of this group to hit that 90-point mark -- he's never done it before -- but his goal scoring makes up the difference. He's recorded at least 30 markers in four straight campaigns and has averaged 40 goals per 82 games over that same timeframe. He also demonstrated during the 2024-25 regular season that he's a good fit for Tampa Bay, recording 41 goals and 80 points, including a league-best 17 power-play goals.

Tier 4 – Great, not amazing

Aleksander Barkov, Tage Thompson, Clayton Keller, Brandon Hagel, Mark Scheifele, Matt Duchene, Dylan Strome, Filip Forsberg, Sebastian Aho, Matt Boldy, Wyatt Johnston, Dylan Larkin, Elias Pettersson, Brady Tkachuk

We're still in the realm of high-end forwards, and the odds are that some members of this group will end up with over 80 points once the dust settles. However, for Tier 3B, a point-per-game is typically the low end of what can be provided, whereas for this tier, it's the high end of what you should safely project. Some of these guys will instead end up with point totals in the 70s or even high 60s if things don't go their way. If you're looking for upside, Thompson should get you at least 35 goals and 70 points, but there's also that outside chance that he flirts with his 2022-23 career highs of 47 goals and 94 points. If you want the biggest roll of the dice, Pettersson is coming off a disastrous 45-point campaign, but at his best, he can produce at a level comparable to the players in Tier 3 or even Tier 2. There's also Tkachuk, who is arguably a step below this group in terms of offense after regressing to 55 points in 2024-25, but even if he doesn't rebound to his 70-plus point ways, he'll still offer plenty of versatility for fantasy managers in leagues that value PIM and/or hits, which is enough to justify his placement in this tier.

Tier 5A – Solid Scorers: Upside edition

Connor Bedard, Juraj Slafkovsky, Kirill Marchenko, Cole Caufield, Aliaksei Protas, Logan Cooley, Dylan Holloway, Matvei Michkov, Macklin Celebrini, Adam Fantilli, Dylan Guenther, Marco Rossi, Matthew Knies, William Eklund, Kent Johnson, Quinton Byfield, Andrei Svechnikov, Mason McTavish, Will Smith, Leo Carlsson, Cutter Gauthier, Shane Wright, Gabriel Landeskog 

There's nothing wrong with a 23-goal, 67-point season, but it's not what Chicago was hoping for when Bedard was selected with the No. 1 overall pick in the 2023 NHL Draft. Still, he only recently turned 20, so anyone questioning if he'll become an elite forward is jumping the gun. Instead, he's the embodiment of this group: A forward who has already established himself as being useful with the potential to do much more. These aren't forwards who have proven yet that they can be better than those in Tier 4, but the upside in this group is high enough that some of them should be taken before the Tier 4 group is all gone. Bedard and Celebrini are the clearest examples of that, but Michkov, Slafkovsky and Caufield also fit that description. Landeskog is the weird one in this group. He's not a young forward like the rest, but after missing so much time due to injury, he's arguably the biggest high-risk, high-reward gamble this year.

Tier 5B – Simply Solid 

Alex Ovechkin, Roope Hintz, Travis Konecny, John Tavares, Adrian Kempe, Alex DeBrincat, Jordan Kyrou, Nico Hischier, JJ Peterka, Seth Jarvis, Drake Batherson, Alex Tuch, Nazem Kadri, Kevin Fiala, Mathew Barzal, Mika Zibanejad, Pavel Buchnevich, Pierre-Luc Dubois, Tom Wilson

Just based on recent offensive results, there's plenty of overlap between Tier 5A and 5B, but while there's tons of upside in 5A, 5B is primarily comprised of forwards where 70ish points is the best-case scenario for 2025-26. Ovechkin is naturally the most interesting forward in this group. Although he's coming off yet another amazing campaign in which he scored 44 goals and 73 points in 65 regular-season outings with Washington, he'll be 40 at the start of the campaign and doesn't have the motivation of chasing the goal title any longer. To that first point, he has managed to age well, but his dip to a career-low 17:43 of ice time per game during the regular season might be an early indication that Father Time is finally winning out. Maybe he'll end up proving yet again that he's being underestimated, but the risk factor is why he's this low. Wilson and Dubois are also worthy of special mention: Neither is quite as good offensively as most of this group, but Dubois stands out in terms of PIM, while Wilson excels in PIM and hits, so it's their versatility that warrants their inclusion in this group.

Tier 6 – Fair enough

Steven Stamkos, Rickard Rakell, Anze Kopitar, Jared McCann, Mark Stone, Bryan Rust, Nikolaj Ehlers, Nick Schmaltz, Jonathan Huberdeau, Connor McMichael, Cole Perfetti, Dylan Cozens, Tomas Hertl, Bo Horvat, Gabriel Vilardi, Vincent Trocheck, Brock Nelson, Timo Meier, Carter Verhaeghe, Mats Zuccarello, Pavel Dorofeyev, Brock Boeser, Zach Hyman, Artturi Lehkonen, Alex Laferriere, Patrik Laine

There are some potential diamonds in the rough here. It's getting increasingly doubtful that Huberdeau will recapture his Panthers glory, but you could still take him expecting 20-25 goals and 50-60 points while hoping for more. Then there are cases like Hertl and Stone, who are typically held back due to injury, so you pencil them in for about 65 appearances and wish for better. There are also McMichael, Cozens, Perfetti and Laferriere, who I judged as not having quite an impressive enough resume or the upside necessary for Tier 5A, but they're still young enough to grow their game. At the other end, there's Stamkos, who seemed to show his age last year, but perhaps assuming he's now a 50-60 point forward is writing him off too soon. You also don't want to forget about Hyman. The 33-year-old had just 44 points in 2024-25 and is questionable for the start of training camp due to a wrist injury, but he is capable of cashing in a lot of McDavid goals when everything is gelling. For the most part, though, the forwards in this group are going to have a fine, but not remarkable campaign.

Tier 7 – Rounding out your roster

Mikael Granlund, Tyler Toffoli, Ryan Donato, Anthony Cirelli, Patrick Kane, Teuvo Teravainen, Morgan Geekie, Sean Monahan, Jonathan Marchessault, Anders Lee, Troy Terry, Ryan O'Reilly, Jason Zucker, Ryan McLeod, Ivan Barbashev, Sam Bennett, Brad Marchand, Chandler Stephenson, Conor Garland, Brayden Schenn, Ryan Nugent-Hopkins, Evgeni Malkin, Claude Giroux, Joel Eriksson Ek, Tyler Seguin, Mason Marchment, Evander Kane

At this point, we're just looking for forwards who can adequately fill holes. Any forward I was even moderately optimistic about exceeding expectations by any noteworthy amount was at least thrown in Tier 6, so don't expect me to sing any of these forwards' praises except to say that they should be serviceable in standard fantasy leagues. That said, there are some here that stand out more than others. If your league counts PIM, then Bennett, Evander Kane and Marchand give you a little extra value. If Monahan or Seguin stay healthy, then maybe one of those two will top this tier in terms of points. There's also a chance I'm being too hard on Cirelli, who I expect to regress in 2025-26 but is coming off career highs of 27 goals and 59 points. So, depending on your circumstances, you might want to consider taking those forwards before the others in this group.

Bonus Tier – The Rookies

Ivan Demidov, Michael Misa, Ville Koivunen, Danila Yurov, Jimmy Snuggerud, Ryan Leonard, Gabe Perreault

As far as this year's group of rookie forwards go, Demidov and Misa are the clear frontrunners when it comes to plausible 2025-26 production. Demidov already demonstrated he can excel against men by scoring 19 goals and 49 points across 65 regular-season KHL outings last year, and he added four points in seven regular-season and playoff appearances with Montreal to round out the season. He'll probably serve in Montreal's top six, though he might not be part of the first power-play unit this year. Meanwhile, Misa was the top forward (second overall) selected in the 2025 draft and is joining an exciting, young group of Sharks. San Jose fans shouldn't expect an encore of Celebrini's 63-point rookie campaign, but reaching the 50-point milestone is an obtainable goal for Misa's debut season. The remainder of this group has promise, but outside of Demidov and Misa, you might be better off simply keeping an eye on these rookies if you're in a standard, single-season fantasy league instead of scooping them up on draft day.