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Over the last several Ramblings, we have been reviewing the 2025-26 fantasy output of specific players and comparable seasons from recent history. On Friday, we covered the seasons of Matthew Knies, Dylan Holloway, Cole Caufield, Adam Fantilli, and Marco Rossi. Today, we'll cap off the comparisons by focusing on defencemen outside of the upper-end tiers.

As a reminder, for this article, fantasy value is determined on a per game basis and relative to the player's position. That means we are only comparing forwards to forwards and defencemen to defencemen. Also, we are relating fantasy value to a "replacement level" player, which is the average value in each fantasy stat for a top waiver wire option. How replacement value is determined is discussed more at length here.

We are only considering seasons where a defenceman played at least 41 games, the comparison campaigns are from 2021-22 through 2024-25, and the stats are goals, assists, power-play points, shots, blocks, hits, and penalty minutes.

Player data for fantasy evaluations is from Evolving Hockey.

Alexander Nikishin (2025-26) and Darnell Nurse (2021-22)

There are three reasons why this is an apt comparison. First, Nikishin's 2025-26 was his rookie season, but as an older rookie, he turns 25 years old in October. The comparison season from Nurse was his seventh full year in the league but it was his age-26 season. Despite the large gap in games played at these respective points in their careers, the ages weren't that far apart.

What is also apt is that as a member of the Edmonton Oilers, Nurse has not had a season where he's earned more than 40% of his team's power-play time since 2018-19, and his 2021-22 campaign saw him finish with 25.1% (per Frozen Tools). Nikishin took 30.6% of the available PPTOI as Shayne Gostisbehere took the lion's share of time on the top PP unit. That 30.6% for Nikishin is also in a season where Gostisbehere played just 55 games.

The final reason this is a fair comparison is Nikishin got a lot of his fantasy value from goals and peripherals. Nurse has typically done the same: over the last six seasons, 29% of Nurse's points have been goals, the third-highest rate of 38 defencemen with at least 200 points in that span. Nikishin's rookie season saw him get 33% of his points from goals, to go with the solid peripheral production.

There are two differences. The first is Nurse played over 25 minutes a game in 2021-22 while Nikishin skated just 18:11 in 2025-26. More ice time should elevate his peripheral production.

The second difference is Nikishin does have a chance to be the top PP defenceman for the Carolina Hurricanes sometime soon. Gostisbehere has one year left on his contract, and he'll be 34 years old at the end of next season. At that point, Nikishin could elevate his fantasy value past anything Nurse has done in his career. Until that time, Nikishin will be a solid multi-cat fantasy option, but with a ceiling.  

Thomas Harley (2025-26) and Evan Bouchard (2021-22)

This is an interesting pairing because Harley is older now (24) than Bouchard was then (22), but Bouchard was stuck behind a veteran option on the power-play depth chart, much as Harley is. Bouchard would eventually take over the top role and that has made him an elite fantasy option for three years now, but the question is when (or if) Harley does the same for the Dallas Stars.

One big problem for Harley in 2025-26 was that he shot just 5.3%. He had shot 9.8% across the prior two seasons and 8.9% across his first four campaigns. If he has a normal shooting percentage and scores 10 goals instead of six, there may be less consternation about his fantasy value. We know Harley had multiple injuries that lingered all season, so a bounce-back in 2026-27 is a good bet.

The real issue is the power play. If Harley can't wrangle the top power-play role from Miro Heiskanen, he won't offer more than modest PP value. Combine that with low Hit and PIM values, and there is a limit to Harley's fantasy upside in multi-cat formats. Without a spot on the top PP quintet, Harley won't be a top multi-cat fantasy option.

Darnell Nurse (2025-26) and Jacob Trouba (2023-24)

It is worth exploring what Nurse was in the fantasy realm this past season given his request for a trade. He has had several good fantasy seasons, but using these evaluations, he has not had a top-20 fantasy season in any of the last five years, and his 2025-26 campaign was a big downgrade from that he did across the prior two seasons. He is 31 years old and has nearly 900 combined regular season and playoff games on his résumé. When the 2025-26 season started, Trouba was 31 years old with 910 combined regular season and playoff games.

Nurse's profile isn't too dissimilar from Trouba. The latter had a couple of very good seasons in 2021-22 and 2022-23, then 2023-24 started the downturn. He rebounded in 2025-26 skating for an up-and-coming Anaheim Ducks roster, but a lack of penalty minutes hurt his fantasy value significantly. If we remove the PIMs component, then Trouba's 2025-26 was a massive improvement from the prior two years.

Coming off a down year and assumed to be moving to a new organization, it's fair to wonder if the same happens to Nurse, but it all depends on his landing spot. Maybe he's moved to San Jose and skates for an up-and-coming Sharks team that needs depth on the blue line and would give him a chance of earning some modest PP time and heavy overall ice time. Or maybe he's moved to Washington where he's locked out of the power play entirely and is a top-4 defenceman skating 20 minutes a night. We just won't know until the trade happens, but after what we saw with Trouba, we can't discount a rebound from Nurse.

Bowen Byram (2025-26) and Travis Sanheim (2023-24)

Byram just had his best fantasy season since 2022-23 and was 1 of 4 defencemen to post over 40 points with fewer than 10 power-play points (Noah Dobson, Mattias Samuelsson, and Mattias Ekholm were the others). As we've seen with others who aren't top PP options, Byram gets a lot of fantasy value from goal scoring, as 26% of his points were from goals this past year, and 29% across the last five years.

Considering Byram's concussion problems, it was great to see him have a productive season and contribute so well in the playoffs, but it is a wonder how much better things can get. As Harley is stuck behind Heiskanen for a top PP role, Byram is stuck behind Rasmus Dahlin, and will have some competition from Owen Power. Without a top PP role, his production upside, and thus his fantasy upside, are limited.

Upside limited by power-play production is familiar territory for Sanheim. Over the last three seasons, he has just 10 power-play points in 244 games. If he could put up just 10-11 PP points a season, he's a genuine threat for 45+ points, and the ladder just keeps rising with more PP production.

The same is true of Byram. He can have good even-strength production skating for a Buffalo Sabres roster that lands somewhere inside the top-10 for goal scoring, but he won't have great overall production. Even in leagues without penalty minutes, Byram's average-to-poor fantasy values in things like shots, blocks, and hits further caps his fantasy upside. Byram rebounded in a big way in 2025-26, but with the peripheral limitations and modest power-play production, we may have seen the best fantasy effort that we can hope from him, just as we got from Sanheim in 2023-24.

Simon Edvinsson (2025-26) and Kaiden Guhle (2024-25)

It seems like Edvinsson is a fresh face, but at the end of the 2025-26 season, he had 175 career NHL games. At the end of the 2024-25 season, Guhle had 169 career NHL games. Guhle is a year older, but there isn't much of a difference between these two, at least in terms of age and experience in the relevant seasons.

There can be two true things about Edvinsson: He has shown the ability to be a pillar of Detroit's defensive depth for years to come, but that his production will be limited. A big reason is that the Detroit Red Wings are 30^th in the league by 5-on-5 goal scoring per 60 minutes over the last two seasons. They are also staring down the barrel of trading top centre Dylan Larkin with no replacement other than whomever may come back in the trade. It is doubtful that returning player has the immediate impact of Larkin, so there is a big issue with Edvinsson's point production for the near-term.

Limited power-play production on a team that struggles to score at 5-on-5 will exert a lot of downward pressure on Edvinsson's fantasy potential. The good news is that things like hits, blocks, and PIMs are areas where Edvinsson can contribute, and that will make him a relevant multi-cat defenceman, just as Guhle has been (at least, when he can stay healthy). But there are limits to what Edvinsson can offer given the team around him, so "relevant multi-cat defenceman" is about the best we can hope for. He can be a top-50 option in this format, but this is not the next MacKenzie Weegar or Darnell Nurse just yet. Maybe in a few years once (if) Detroit re-tools/rebuilds, but not yet.