Spinning off the organizational Top 25 Under 25 lists that SB Nation NHL blogs do each year, we did a leaguewide Top 25 Under 25 rankings for SB Nation’s main website over the past month. Connor McDavid unsurprisingly topped the list, which came from ballots submitted by 23 different SBN writers.
Brandon Saad was the only member of the Chicago Blackhawks to be ranked. He was No. 22.
Now that we’ve gotten the entire rankings out of the way, I thought I would throw the list that I submitted for the rankings up here. Brandon and Dave also submitted their own list as the one for Second City Hockey since mine was being done as a writer for the main website. They can share theirs with you sometime if they’d like!
There’s been a ton of discussion about the rankings over the past month, which was pretty much what I hoped for. Unsurprisingly there was a lot of disagreement, which was always going to happen with so many good players to choose from. I definitely learned a bit from all the responses, and I appreciate all that feedback from everyone.
So here’s my Top 25 Under 25 list, which I essentially put together by asking myself which player I’d rather have for the next 10-15 years, totally ignoring contract considerations. I don’t know if there’s a perfect way to do this — one way would be to rank them as assets by taking their contract status into account — but here we are for now.
1. Connor McDavid, Oilers center
2. Auston Matthews, Maple Leafs center
3. Patrik Laine, Jets winger
4. Jack Eichel, Sabres center
5. Zach Werenski, Blue Jackets defenseman
6. Aleksander Barkov, Panthers center
7. Nikita Kucherov, Lightning winger
8. David Pastrnak, Bruins winger
9. Aaron Ekblad, Panthers defenseman
10. Matt Murray, Penguins goaltender
11. Mark Scheifele, Jets center
12. Johnny Gaudreau, Flames winger
13. Filip Forsberg, Predators winger
14. Seth Jones, Blue Jackets defenseman
15. Nathan MacKinnon, Avalanche center
16. Leon Draisaitl, Oilers winger
17. Hampus Lindholm, Ducks defenseman
18. Nikolaj Ehlers, Jets winger
19. Jacob Trouba, Jets defenseman
20. William Nylander, Maple Leafs winger
21. Mitch Marner, Maple Leafs winger
22. Dougie Hamilton, Flames defenseman
23. John Gibson, Ducks goaltender
24. Brandon Saad, Blackhawks winger
25. Oscar Klefbom, Oilers defenseman
So there are probably a few things I’d tweak here and there now after discussions wih other people, but this is what I had. Feel free to yell at me!