The September update for the Roto Rankings will appear later today. I'm happy to say that Bangers Fantasy Hockey will be back providing the preseason rankings again this season. In fact, if you would like to view the rankings before then, you can head over to the Bangers website and become a subscriber, then download the rankings (PIM and non-PIM versions). Or you can wait for them to appear here very soon, if they haven't already appeared by the time you read this.

Yesterday I wrote about a few teammates who rose in the rankings this month. Today I'll focus on teammates that have fallen down the rankings and explore the reasons for that.

Pittsburgh

I just finished reading a season preview article that predicted that the Penguins would barely miss the playoffs in heartbreaking fashion again. Whether you think they will make the playoffs or not, we can all agree that this is a team with an aging core that doesn't have nearly enough young talent in the pipeline to counterbalance.

The longtime Big 3 of Sidney Crosby, Evgeni Malkin, and Kris Letang are all at least 37 years of age, while Erik Karlsson is no spring chicken among professional hockey players at age 34. These are all superstars and potential Hall of Famers, with the Big 3 having won multiple Stanley Cups. Yet the bills from years of going all in are now arriving in the mail. Crack open your Prospects Guide and tell me how many of Pittsburgh's prospects can step into the lineup right away, let alone come remotely close to filling the void of these veterans.

I say this about the vets while personally believing that highly productive older players are overlooked too often in fantasy leagues – particularly in keeper leagues. I've rostered Letang in a keeper league for over a decade and will again this season, while I recently placed a bid on Malkin in my slow auction draft. All of the four players mentioned above can still easily be rostered in standard-sized fantasy leagues. In particular Crosby, who has fallen the least among the four players mentioned above.

The other three, however, represent more of a concern. Malkin and Letang have fallen out of the top 100 entirely, while Karlsson is barely hanging on to a top 100 spot. Malkin fell out of point-per-game territory in 2023-24, while Letang lost his top power-play role to Karlsson. Meanwhile, Karlsson's 101-point season in 2022-23 with the Sharks was clearly unsustainable, as his point production fell to "just" 56 points. Again, all of these players have value at the right price. But with the exception of Crosby, none should be drafted in the early rounds anymore.

Edmonton

First off, this has nothing to do with the Oilers' two main superstars, as both Connor McDavid and Leon Draisaitl will be in the top 10. In fact – spoiler alert – McDavid is the top-ranked player to almost no one's surprise. Moving along…

Let's start with Zach Hyman. Did anyone see a 50-goal season coming when 2023-24 started, let alone when the Oilers signed him to that seven-year contract back in 2021? Hyman's hockey journey hasn't exactly been the fast track to hockey stardom, as he has made massive improvements in Ontario junior hockey, then the University of Michigan, then the NHL. Being placed on the Oilers' top power play is a license to print money, although that wasn't necessarily driving the 54-goal season. Hyman has registered 15 power-play goals in back-to-back seasons.

Concerns about Hyman rest with some advanced stats, although not to the point where he's clear bust material. Hyman shot 18.6% in 2023-24, which was ahead of his average of 13.6%. You can probably bet the under on 50 goals again, although a total of 40 goals seems more realistic. Surprisingly, Hyman had a secondary assist rate of 52.2% on just 23 assists, although Hyman should be able to register an assist in more than just over one in four games. A drop in goals should be offset by an increase in assists points-wise, which should dip Hyman's fantasy value slightly since goals are scarcer.   

Ryan Nugent-Hopkins' 104-point season in 2023-24 has been an outlier in his career, considering that he has never reached 70 points in any other season. Nugent-Hopkins has only reached 30 goals once in his career (in the 100-point season), while his peripherals aside from power-play points aren't particularly strong. He'll average over two shots per game, which is fine, but he has never reached 100 hits in a season. With all of that in mind, dropping him in the rankings makes sense.

The saga of Darnell Nurse played out for all to see during the 2024 playoffs. Paid like a top-pair defenseman ($9.25 million AAV), Nurse struggled to maintain a spot as a top-4 defenseman on a team that has serious Stanley Cup aspirations. Nurse's icetime fell about a minute and a half per game, but it dropped even further to under 19 minutes during the playoffs. This potential decline in usage could result in less of what Nurse does best: hits, blocks, and shots. That's why it makes sense for Nurse to fall completely out of the top 100, as is the case here.

Winnipeg

Like Nurse, Mark Scheifele and Nikolaj Ehlers have also fallen out of the top 100. Through the years, Scheifele and Ehlers have regularly been drafted in the top 100. However, this is not the case this season, as Scheifele has a 131 ADP and Ehlers has a 142 ADP. There are still plenty of drafts that can pull that average up, but what seem to be the reasons that they've both fallen?

Scheifele is now 31 years old, so he is past any sort of breakout that fantasy teams want to be on top of. Yet he's been remarkably consistent. Although he hasn't been a point-per-game scorer for two seasons, he came very close in 2023-24 with 72 points in 74 games. Scheifele had a run of six consecutive point-per-game seasons from 2016-17 to 2021-22. There's a bit of regression while league scoring has increased. The fact that he is a center, the deepest forward position, doesn't help when there is so much other talent available. I'll still maintain that Scheifele is a great value pick after pick 100.

As for Ehlers, the age-old question has been when he will appear on the top power play and why Winnpeg coaches seem to ignore him there. I've said this before, and I'll say it again. A Winnipeg beat writer once informed me that Ehlers wants to play the same spot on the wall as Scheifele, who does not want to play in the bumper spot even though he is effective in that spot and can score goals from there. It's possible that this could change at some point, but Ehlers would rather play in the spot that he is comfortable in, even if it means it is with lesser players for fewer minutes.

Interestingly enough, Ehlers did not score a single power-play goal and registered just seven power-play points all season. Brandon Hagel was the only player that scored more overall points and did not have more power-play points than Ehlers in 2023-24. So there's reason to want Ehlers on that top power play. For now, we just have to assume that Ehlers is what he is – a solid even-strength point producer. Maybe the departures of Sean Monahan and Tyler Toffoli will create a spot for Ehlers, but we'll have to wait and see.

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