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A couple of days ago, I ranked the Metropolitan Division center groups. Now, it’s time to take a look at the winger groups. This was yet another tough ranking, particularly from slots 7-4.
Asterisks indicate wingers who can, have, or will play center.
Let’s jump right into it!
The No. 8 team in terms of centers also finds itself in last place for wingers. Mathew Barzal is a legitimate, unquestionable top-line player, but things are pretty bleak beyond him — losing Anders Lee to the Utah Mammoth was a big blow for him.
Out of this crop of players, Simon Holmstrom was second in both Goals Above Replacement (GAR), with +7.4, and points, with 41. Those are respectable numbers for a middle-six player, but the reality is that they completely lack another top-six winger outside of Barzal. In theory, Kyle Palmieri could be that player, but he is aging and coming off of a major surgery.
Matias Maccelli, the Islanders’ biggest free-agent addition, is another serviceable two-way, middle-six player and is undeniably well worth the $2.25 million they gave him. Emil Heineman is coming off a 22-goal, 31-point campaign, but his underlying numbers were relatively putrid, and it’s highly unlikely he plays to that production once again. Anthony Duclair is a fine enough third-line player who had a strong offensive GAR output (+5.0) get completely negated by horrendous defensive GAR (-5.0), while the rest of the crop is full of healthily overpaid players in Ondrej Palat and Pierre Engvall, a fringe NHLer in Kyle MacLean, and a young player who has potential but who is coming off of one of the worst underlying statistical seasons of anyone in the NHL in Calum Ritchie.
With just one true top-six winger, a handful of middle-six players, and a bunch of overpaid fourth-liners and fringe NHLers, it’s no wonder that the Islanders are projected to have an 89% chance of missing the playoffs, according to HockeyStats. They’ve got a lot of work to do, and GM Mathieu Darche would have been far better off committing to a true rebuild around Matthew Schaefer and their pipeline than spending their assets on aging veterans.
There is a giant gap between the Islanders and the No. 7 Pittsburgh Penguins, and I admittedly had a tough time deciding where to put them before settling on this slot.
Bryan Rust is still a legitimate top-six forward and has consistently produced dominant underlying numbers throughout his career (though, admittedly, they have not been up to snuff the last two seasons). His 65 points in 72 games is par for the course for him, and so long as he continues to play with Sidney Crosby, he will have no issue maintaining that pace. Evgeni Malkin was their second-highest-producing winger in terms of raw point totals and their best in terms of per-game play, with 61 points in just 56 games at 39 years of age in 2025-26. He’s not a center anymore, though I’m sure he can slide there if need be, and he is certainly in the twilight of his career, but he seemed to have found the fountain of youth while playing with Ben Kindel.
Rickard Rakell has proven to be an adequate top-six player as well for them in the past, even if his 2025-26 season was a down year. He was a 70-point player two seasons ago, and if he can rekindle some of that energy, he can be a solid top-nine player for them once again.
Their mid-season addition of Egor Chinakhov panned out quite well for them, with the 25-year-old producing +5.8 GAR and 36 points in 43 games with his new squad. There is a legitimate chance that he can maintain that production or even build upon it. Elmer Soderblom, another mid-late season add from 2025-26, had 10 points in 20 games in addition to a +3.2 GAR. Their off-season additions were solid, too, having added all of Andrei Kuzmenko (+3.1 GAR), Nick Robertson (+1.6 GAR), and Hendrix Lapierre (+2.9 GAR) to their squad. Kuzmenko is a prime bounce-back candidate, while Robertson and Lapierre are both serviceable bottom-nine forwards who are aiding in giving the Penguins some youth to build around once Crosby and Malkin retire.
Justin Brazeau is an excellent fourth-line player and always has been, with particularly strong offensive underlyings. Ville Koivunen, meanwhile, who just got handed an eight-year, $32 million contract despite having just 47 NHL games to his name, is a complete wild card who put up some stellar defensive numbers but was a black hole offensively in his 39 2025-26 games. He’s well-regarded, though, and will seemingly have a pretty long runway to show his chops from here on out. Perhaps there’s some offensive juice to tap into.
All in all, the Penguins have a well-rounded winger group, with a couple of legitimate top-six wingers in Rust and Malkin, a couple of capable top-nine wingers in Rakell and Chinakhov, and a boatload of serviceable depth, most of whom put up strong metrics under the hood. My concerns are two-fold: 1) their best wingers are on the wrong side of the aging curve and also injury-prone, and 2) they lack a game-breaker on the flanks. Other than that, it’s a good group.
Kirill Marchenko is doing a lot of heavy lifting here as far and away the best winger on this list so far. He’s flirted with being a point-per-game player for two seasons now, most recently scoring 27 goals and 67 total points in 76 games while on a sweetheart of a deal ($3.85 million AAV, which expires at the end of this season). He’s been an offensive monster for quite some time, and there’s reason to believe that there’s much more in the tank for the 26-year-old, especially if he were surrounded with more talent.
Valeri Nichushkin was a solid pick-up from the cap-strapped Colorado Avalanche. He was superb on both sides of the ice in 2025-26, having an offensive GAR of +5.6 and a defensive GAR of +5.5 while being one of the unluckier Avalanche in terms of production (49 points in 72 games despite those underlying numbers). He immediately slots in as their second-best winger, barring a turnaround from Kent Johnson.
Johnson, still just 23, though he seems to have been in the league forever, had a relatively awful year compared to expectations. In 2024-25, things seemed to have clicked in his first season in a top-six role, as he produced 24 goals and 57 points in 66 games. He wasn’t trusted in that role this go-around, though, and ultimately ended the year with just 22 points in 76 games while playing over four minutes less per game. If he bounces back, the Blue Jackets will have three legitimate top-six wingers.
Dmitri Voronkov is another who has struggled to meet the expectations set two seasons ago, with the 25-year-old producing just 32 points in 63 games in 2025-26, though he posted strong two-way underlying metrics. He, too, was handed fewer minutes than his 2024-25 performance should have deserved.
Conor Garland is a serviceable third-line winger who has consistently won his minutes and produced reasonably well, though he had just seven points in his 21 games with Columbus. He should be expected to bounce back. Danton Heinen’s underlying numbers were strong on both sides of the puck in 2025-26, so he should be an excellent bottom-six winger for them this coming season. Miles Wood, Mathieu Olivier, and Ryan Lomberg are all of a similar ilk, though Olivier stands out as an outlier in terms of underlying numbers (+8.1 GAR in 2025-26) and production (15 goals and 11 assists in 61 games).
A lot is riding on this season in terms of the Blue Jackets’ winger group. Marchenko is already unlikely to re-sign, and he certainly will not if Columbus has another sub-par season. If they’re bad again, I would also question the futures of Kent Johnson and Dmitry Voronkov, who are on expiring contracts (though they are RFAs). They’re banking on a few bounce-back seasons, too, and that’s never a comfortable spot to be in.
Originally, I had Philadelphia one spot higher but ultimately had to talk myself down by virtue of their winger group being somewhat unproven.
Travis Konecny gets a worse rap from Flyers fans than is deserved, in my opinion — he’s still a useful offensive tool despite his defensive deficiencies, having produced a +7.6 offensive GAR and 68 points in 77 games. He won his minutes last year to boot, and though he’ll be 30 by season’s end, he still has more in the tank as a bona fide top-six winger.
Porter Martone only played in nine games, but looks like the real deal. His 0.911 GAR/60 handily ranked first on Philadelphia, and he accumulated 10 points in those nine regular season games. He had an additional five points in 10 postseason games. Martone rightfully enters 2026-27 as the betting favorite for the Calder Trophy — if all goes as planned, he should be a near-or-at point-per-game forward and be handed first-line, first power-play unit deployment.
Matvei Michkov, meanwhile, gets a worse rap from the coaching staff and some members of the media than is deserved. He should be the focus of the organization along with Martone, but Rick Tocchet and company have done their best to give him as poor a treatment as possible for… some reason. Still, despite getting two fewer minutes per game this year than his rookie season, he put together another 20-goal, 50-plus-point campaign with above-average defensive impacts to boot. He ended the year sixth on the Flyers in total GAR. If the Flyers were competently run, he would be handed top-six minutes like candy and plugged alongside Martone and Trevor Zegras. Alas.
Tyson Foerster was given a $7.1 million AAV extension this summer, and it was well-earned. Despite playing in just 29 games this past season, the 24-year-old was seventh on the team in total GAR, finishing third on the squad in GAR/60. He brings a ton of value on both sides of the puck, using his upper-echelon shot and offensive intelligence to be a threat from anywhere in the offensive zone. In my eyes, he’s more of a second-line talent than a first-line talent, but he has the two-way chops to be extremely effective in that role even if his skating isn’t all that great. Owen Tippett, meanwhile, is another effective middle-sixer who relies more on his speed and physical tools than his mental ones. He put up 51 points in 81 games in that role in 2025-26, and there’s no reason to believe he’ll slow down that pace.
They also have some intriguing depth pieces in Nikita Grebenkin, Alex Bump, and Denver Barkey, all of whom are still young and developing. Grebenkin is a work in progress, but Bump and Barkey are already apt at playing NHL defense and have the room and runway to pitch in more on the offensive side of the puck.
This is a winger group with a ton of depth, and young depth at that. They lack a true game-breaker, though, at least until Martone or Michkov develop into that. Martone is too new to label as such right now, and Michkov isn’t trusted enough by the coaching staff to be that player yet. They have the blueprint, though, for one of the premier winger groups in the entire NHL. That much is undeniable.
Adding Pavel Dorofeyev was a great move for the Rangers, who already had a couple of legitimate top-six forwards. The 25-year-old, after being acquired, was then handed an $11 million AAV contract that runs until 2033, so it stands to reason that he’ll be their highest-deployed forward. It’s for good reason, too — despite having okay offensive numbers at 5v5, Dorofeyev has been one of the league’s best power-play forwards and has consistently sported excellent defensive numbers. His defensive GAR in 2025-26 alone was +4.7. He has scored at least 35 goals in two consecutive seasons, and it stands to reason that, despite some questions about who the facilitators are going to be, he can build upon that production simply by virtue of increased deployment.
Alexis Lafreniere has quietly been very good himself, putting up a +16.0 GAR season in 2025-26 on the back of superb two-way numbers. His 57 points in 82 games still didn’t live up to the expectations of a first-overall pick — and a relatively highly-touted one at that — but he has undeniably been improving year-over-year and has looked far better than that production would have you believe. He’s a great player, and one who will be a staple in the Rangers’ top-six for a long, long time.
JT Miller is positionally fluid, though I think he’s likelier to play down the middle than on the wing. Still, he deserves a shout for being yet another legitimate top-six forward.
Past those three, Gabe Perreault looks primed to take a step forward (especially if he is thrust into a second-line role, as he probably should be). His +5.6 offensive GAR was sixth-best on the entire Rangers’ roster in 2025-26, and he only appeared in 49 games. As a facilitator, he is a special talent — perhaps it will be Perreault feeding Dorofeyev passes at 5v5, which would almost certainly solidify him as a top-six player throughout the year.
Will Cuylle had a down year from an underlying perspective, but he is still a capable defensive forward and, at 24, will almost certainly bounce back offensively. Oliver Bjorkstrand, a bona fide Devil killer, is on the wrong side of 30 now, but still possesses strong enough offensive chops to be a threatening member of their third line. Tye Kartye was undeniably good for New York once he was acquired at the trade deadline, sporting an astounding +4.8 offensive GAR and 14 points in just 24 games, so it’ll be interesting to see what he can do in a full season with the Rangers.
Taylor Raddysh, Matt Rempe, and Jaroslav Chmelar are all fourth-line caliber players, with none of the three being particularly interesting. Chmelar led the group in GAR (+1.9) simply because his penalty differential was so excellent; Raddysh was the best offensive player; and Rempe is genuinely perfectly fine as a fringe NHLer despite being one of the dirtiest players in the league.
It’s tough giving the Rangers any flowers, but they had a genuinely good off-season and have a surprisingly decent forward group, at least on the flanks. Dorofeyev and Lafreniere are bona fide top-sixers. Perreault could get there himself with proper deployment, and their bottom-six seems to be perfectly capable of winning their minutes. It’s going to be an interesting season for the Rangers — my guess is that they fight for a Wild Card spot in the Metropolitan Division, though ultimately a lack of playdrivers may hold them back. The question isn’t whether their players can score, but whether those complementary players (Dorofeyev, Mika Zibanejad) will actually receive passes and have play driven for them.
The Devils have done a great job of improving their depth this off-season, adding the likes of Swiss-Army knife Evan Rodrigues, top-nine goal-scorer Anthony Mantha, bottom-six speedster Jesper Boqvist, and wild-card prospect Amadeus Lombardi to the mix.
Rodrigues had been a fantastic do-it-all forward for the Florida Panthers for a number of years, and now finds himself penciled into the middle-six of the Devils lineup, where he’ll slot up either alongside Nico Hischier on the second line or alongside Cody Glass on the third. His versatility is his best asset, being able to cater his play to the context in which he is deployed — if he needs to be a shutdown player, you’ll be sure to see his defensive metrics shine. If he needs to produce, he can play that role admirably as well. Mantha, who was inked to a two-year deal in free agency, is coming off a career-best 33-goal, 64-point campaign in which he played in the middle-six all season. He produced those numbers with very limited deployment alongside Sidney Crosby and Evgeni Malkin and while still being in the early stages of recovery from his ACL injury, so it’s tantalizing to think of what he could be at full health and alongside better playmakers and facilitators than he has ever played with. I wouldn’t expect him to shoot over 18% again, but I wouldn’t be shocked if he surpassed the 30-goal threshold again.
Jesper Boqvist is extraordinarily fast and has used that to be a nuisance defensively (even though his offense has taken a hit because of that role) since he joined Florida. He will be a staple on the Devils’ fourth line. It’s impossible to predict what Lombardi is, but the organization is undeniably high on him and it seems prudent to pencil him into the lineup as a potential middle-six contributor.
The Devils also have the best winger in the Metropolitan Division in Jesper Bratt, who was snubbed from the NHL’s Top 20 Wingers list and, realistically, is a top-15 winger in the league. He’s a special player who, assuming Jack Hughes is healthy, will push for 90 or more points in 2026-27 while providing the team with slightly above-average defense and plenty of playdriving to boot. He’s been the Devils’ most consistent forward for a number of years, has added a layer of physicality that has rendered the “soft” arguments inept, and is on a bargain of a deal.
Then, there’s Timo Meier, who was a fringe top-20 winger himself when he was first acquired by the Devils back in the 2022-23 season. He hasn’t produced like he did in San Jose, a problem that has been furthered by his forward-best $8.8 million AAV cap hit, but he has inarguably been a playdriving presence whose habits haven’t changed all that much. He’s defensively sound, plays a unique playstyle, and has been extraordinarily snakebitten for a number of years now. There’s certainly reason to believe that, without being bogged down by some of the hardest deployment in the league while playing next to Hischier and with some puck luck, Meier can turn back into the perennial 30-plus goal-scoring, 65-plus point-getting forward he was prior to his arrival to the Devils.
Arseny Gritsyuk was a bit of a revelation in his rookie campaign, being the second-best player in the entire NHL in terms of his individual impact on shot attempts. His with-or-without-you numbers are mind-bending, in the sense that players who played with him typically had about a 7-10% negative swing in terms of their expected goal share (xGF%) when playing away from him. Gritsyuk didn’t produce all that much considering these insane on-ice metrics, with just 13 goals and 31 total points in his 66 games, so there’s reason to believe there will be a good amount of positive regression to hit him this season. He was inked to a ludicrously team-friendly $3.25 million AAV deal earlier this summer.
Rounding out their incredibly deep top-nine will presumably be Dawson Mercer (for now), who has been a consistent complementary player with solid defensive outputs since he was drafted. He has still yet to miss a single game in his career. It should be noted, though, that Mercer generally struggles when not alongside an upper-echelon playdriver, so given that he may not be a mainstay in the Devils’ top six, it’ll be interesting to see how he produces and how his underlying metrics hold up. Connor Brown, then, who meshed quite well alongside Bratt and Hughes to end 2025-26, seems likely to be on the fourth line, barring a trade that sends one of the Devils’ other forwards elsewhere. Brown is another do-it-all forward who can play in any capacity, and ended the 2025-26 season seventh on the Devils’ roster in total GAR.
Stefan Noesen seems like the odd-man out of the Devils’ roster, to be honest, given his declining foot speed, age, and cap hit, but if he stays and rekindles some of what made him a palatable bottom-nine winger two seasons ago, he could be a viable depth option as well.
This Devils winger group has top-end talent with Bratt and potentially with Meier. They also have an absurd amount of depth, with plenty of players who could fight for the remaining top-nine spots. Their fourth line should be vastly improved, too, so there’s a lot to like. I just couldn’t place them any higher given that they still need one bona fide top-six winger to add to the group.
The Hurricanes, to me, narrowly edge out the Devils for the #2 slot in the Metropolitan Division.
Seth Jarvis is a monster on both sides of the puck, though he will be missing the first couple of months of the season. When healthy, though, he’s a consistent shoo-in for 30 goals and 60-plus points while contributing a ton defensively. He was third on the Hurricanes in GAR (+13.8) and second among wingers, but his health undersold how effective he is when he’s firing on all cylinders. At his best, he’s a fringe top-25 winger in the league.
Nikolaj Ehlers, in his first season with the Hurricanes, led them in GAR (+18.0), being second-best in offensive GAR (+13.9) next to Sebastian Aho. Ehlers predictably had the best season of his career from a points perspective, totaling 71 in his 82 games, by virtue of getting the most deployment he ever has. He was also a candidate for the Conn Smythe trophy (and arguably should have received it), given his 18 points in 18 playoff games. His speed makes him a constant counter-attack and rush threat, and he turned things up defensively this past season.
Rounding out the Hurricanes’ list of three bona fide top-six wingers is Andrei Svechnikov, who had an atrocious start to the season but ultimately ended up being one of their best players. Offensively, he was a dynamo, with a +11.0 GAR (though a lot of that was nullified by his astoundingly poor -6.0 defensive GAR). He had his best year from a production standpoint on both a total points and per-game basis, with 31 goals and 70 total points in 79 games. Did he have a career-best 15.9% shooting percentage and career-high 29 power-play points? Yes he did. Is he still a dynamic 5v5 playdriver who produces a ton of high-danger chances? Yes he is.
Jackson Blake is more of a middle-sixer than top-sixer, but he is on the upper end of that spectrum. He had a career-best 53 points (22 goals, 31 assists) in 2025-26 in his age-22 season, and there’s no reason to believe he won’t continue developing into a perennial 60-point guy. On top of that, he has solid defensive instincts and a penchant for playing the Hurricanes’ patented physical style. Logan Stankoven will likely be playing down the middle like he did for most of last season, but he’s worth mentioning as a two-way middle-six stud himself.
Taylor Hall and Jordan Martinook will likely be the mainstays on their third line, and for good reason. Hall is still an insanely useful offensive weapon, with a +7.0 offensive GAR last season. He produced 48 points while playing under 15 minutes per game, and was a point-per-game player in the postseason as well. He’s 34 now, but looks better than he has in a half-decade. Martinook, also 34, is still a 30-plus point player year in and year out, and has shutdown capabilities as well. If anyone embodies the personality of a Hurricane, it’s him.
For their fourth line and depth, the Hurricanes have two perennially underrated assets in William Carrier and Eric Robinson. Those two have both consistently dominated the game from an underlying perspective and make up one of, if not the single most dangerous fourth line in the entire NHL. Deslauriers is a fringe guy, but he’s a great locker room presence and can play in a pinch. They also have a complete wild card in Bradly Nadeau, who should assume the hole that Jarvis’s injury opens up until he’s healthy. He’s small, but tenacious, and has one of the best shots outside of the NHL.
The Hurricanes have three top-of-the-lineup wingers in Jarvis, Ehlers, and Svechnikov. They have fantastic depth and arguably the two best fourth-line wingers in the league on top of it. Their only “hole” is that they don’t have a point-per-game-plus player in their lineup outside of Aho, but they did prove that a team doesn’t need that to win the Cup this past season.
It was never really a question as to who the top-ranked winger group in the Metropolitan Division would be after the Washington Capitals added Alex Tuch and Jordan Kyrou to the roster.
Tuch, 30, was given a $10.5 million AAV contract that seems fair right now but will almost certainly age poorly. Still, he’s a legitimate top-six player who has scored at least 33 goals and 66 points in three of the last four seasons. He’s been above a point-per-game once in his career (2022-23), and was a staple on the Sabres’ top line from the moment he was acquired in the trade that sent Jack Eichel to Vegas. Most of his value comes on the offensive side of the puck, with an admittedly middling +0.2 defensive GAR to go alongside his +12.4 offensive GAR last season. He should stay consistent as a 30-goal, 60-plus point-getter in his first few seasons with the Capitals.
Kyrou, meanwhile, was acquired for pennies on the dollar this off-season. The Capitals sent off the 16th overall pick, Connor McMichael, and prospect Milton Gästrin to St. Louis in exchange for his services. That may seem like a high price to pay, but this is a player who had produced at a 34-goal, 74-point pace for the four seasons leading up to 2025-26. In 2025-26, he had an aberrational 18 goals and 46 points while perplexingly taking a backseat to the likes of Dylan Holloway and Jake Neighbors in terms of ice time, but he had some of the best defensive metrics in the entire NHL and should have been a candidate for the Selke Trophy.
Tom Wilson has long been one of the best second-line players in the NHL and has seemingly leveled up in the past two seasons, surpassing 30 goals and 60 points in each. He’s defensively elite, physical as can be, and locked up long-term at a reasonable contract, even if he is 32. They also have the Protas brothers (the Protii, if you will), both of whom are lab-grown physical specimens who are both at least 6’5 and 225 pounds and both of whom skate like the wind and have hands as smooth as butter. They’re freaks of nature, and I mean it in the best way possible. Aliaksei has consecutive 25-plus goal, 50-plus point seasons under his belt and was fourth on the Capitals in GAR last season, and Ilya produced four points in the only four games he has to his name.
They’re also in the last season of Alex Ovechkin, who, despite his nonexistent speed and lackluster defensive efforts, can still score 30-plus goals as he has in all but one of his 21 seasons in the NHL. He’s 40 now and practically stands still on the ice, but with a shot like that, it simply doesn’t matter. Ryan Leonard just completed his rookie season and scored 45 points — 20 goals and 25 assists — in 75 games while playing in a third-line capacity. There’s no reason to believe that he won’t be able to keep that play up and then some, especially with the stacked cast around him. Pierre-Luc Dubois is predominantly a center at this point, but he deserves a shout as a palatable middle-sixer as well.
Justin Sourdif is arguably the league’s best fourth-line center, though he has played on the wing as well. Complementing him will be Ethen Frank, an incredibly fast, incredibly useful two-way fourth-liner, and Anthony Beauvillier, who is still capable of potting 10-15 goals a year in limited deployment.
The Capitals have the best top-nine depth in the league, with Tuch, Kyrou, Wilson, the Protas brothers, Leonard, and Dubois all being top-nine players. Their fourth line looks to be strong as well, particularly with Sourdif down the middle. Either way, their winger group is so strong that they should be a contender for the top team in the Metro.
Next up, I’ll be ranking the Metropolitan Division’s defense groups. Stay tuned!
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