Every season ESPN puts out their ranking of the top-100 NHL players. The list is a retrospective of last season, but also with the expectation of how players will affect their teams in the upcoming season. For example, ESPN specifically used Alexander Barkov of the Florida Panthers as an example. He was left off the list entirely since he is expected to miss all (if not all very close to it) of the regular season. With that in mind, let’s take a look at how the New Jersey Devils did in the rankings.
The Devils That Made It
Five current Devils players found themselves on this year’s rankings. The Dallas Stars lead all teams with seven.
Leading the way was Nico Hischier, who was ranked 23rd after being ranked 63rd last season. Next up, Jack Hughes, who ranks 36th after being ranked 15th last season. Next comes Jesper Bratt at No. 44, after being ranked 79th last season.
The next two Devils showed stability in their rankings from last year. Timo Meier placed 64th, which is only a few spots off from his 68th-placed ranking last season. The last Devils ranked was goaltender Jakob Markström at No. 67 after being 72nd last year.
The Jake Hughes Effect
Seeing Hughes drop was expected after his season ending injury last season. Should he have dropped by this much? A drop of 21 places seems rather drastic for someone who’s expected to be a point-per-game player when healthy. Remember, the criteria for the rankings added a player’s “value for this coming season.” Hughes entered this season healthy, so why does his ranking seem to be based more on last year’s injury?
ESPN’s Greg Wyshnyski justified the ranking with the fact Hughes has only played in more than 70 games once in the past four seasons. Was Hughes ranked with the expectation that another somewhat lengthy, at least lengthy enough to hinder his impact, injury would happen this season? We hope that’s not the case. We can’t fault Wyshnyski for looking at the trend that Jack needs to play for the lion’s share of the season after missing significant parts of the past two campaigns, one of which ended with the Devils disappointingly out of the playoffs.
On the flip side, all four other Devils listed saw their rankings rise over the past year. Captain Nico Hischier rose 40 places with Bratt raising 35. No doubt their strong play in Hughes absence, and to make up the offense they lost when he went down, earned them the extra recognition.
The Rest Of Metropolitan Division
Devils actually lead the division in players ranked with their five. The Carolina Hurricanes and New York Rangers had four apiece. Carolina was represented with Sebastian Aho (No. 28), Seth Jarvis (No. 42), Jaccob Slavin (No. 68) and Logan Stankoven (No. 93). The Rangers had Igor Shesterkin (No. 14), J.T. Miller (No. 37), Artemi Panarin (No. 38), and Adam Fox (No. 52). Shesterkin was the highest-ranked player in the entire division.
It was a minor surprise to see the Islanders have three skaters listed with Ilya Sorokin (No. 66), Matt Barzal (No. 71), and Bo Horvat (No. 100). Washington surprisingly only had two players listed after winning the division last season. The record-breaking Alexander Ovechkin came in at No. 29 and Tom Wilson came in at No. 75. The Columbus Blue Jackets also had two players listed with Zach Werenski (No. 41) and Adam Fantilli (No. 74) representing. Werenski was the highest-rated defenseman in the division.
The two Pennsylvania teams had one player listed each. The Pittsburgh Penguins were represented with, who else, but Sidney Crosby at No. 21. Russian import Matvei Mitchkov represents the Philadelphia Flyers at No. 87.
Snubs For New Jersey?
The Devils didn’t have a single defenseman make the list, although Dougie Hamilton was given an “honorable mention” shout. Unfortunately, for him, the ranking did not take into account his social media admin and professor skills.
Luke Hughes wasn’t exactly a “snub” but it wouldn’t have been a total surprise to see him listed either with some of the names that ended up on this list. He did finish fifth in scoring on the Devils last season. After the four Devils skaters (all forwards) who made the list, Hughes was the next highest scorer.