ESPN's Forward Tiers: Beyond the First Four Fantasy Picks

ESPN's Sean Allen published his 150-player forward tier list for 2026-27 on September 4, using his own fantasy-point projections to rank players in groups. Inside a group, everyone is functionally interchangeable. Between groups, the drop is real and steep. Think airline boarding groups. First in Group 1 or last in Group 1, you still get your bag in the overhead bin.

The practical payoff comes when the two picks ahead of you take the guy you wanted and the guy right beside him. On a flat ranking you scramble. If you know five players share that tier, you take the next one and lose nothing.

Group 1 is four deep: Connor McDavid (projected 237.9 ESPN standard points, 263.5 last season), Nathan MacKinnon (235.8, 253.9), Macklin Celebrini (232.5, 237.0) and Nikita Kucherov (221.9, 234.1). No wrong answer among them, and neither Cale Makar nor Evan Bouchard nor any goaltender is close enough to justify jumping the line.

Group 2 runs eight names, from Nick Suzuki (203.6) and Matt Boldy (201.0) through Wyatt Johnston, Martin Necas, Kirill Kaprizov, Auston Matthews, Leon Draisaitl and Jason Robertson. Matthews at 197.0 projected against 153.3 last season is the clearest bet on a bounce back, with Draisaitl and Robertson in the same conversation. Necas depends on staying MacKinnon's linemate, which is the safest assumption in Colorado.

Group 3, ten deep, is where you land if you spent your first pick on a defenseman or a goalie. Juraj Slafkovsky opens it at 186.9. Aleksander Barkov closes it at 172.3 after not playing last season. Dylan Holloway sits at 174.5, well above his 126.6 from a year ago, which is admittedly aggressive. He posted 2.59 fantasy points per game in his 24 games after the Olympic break.

These are Allen's projections, built off three-year averages, historical age comparables and some manual override. They are not the in-game ranks.