Connor McDavid leads the 2026-27 Hart Trophy board at +300 at DraftKings, a 25.0% implied chance. Nathan MacKinnon is next at +350 and Macklin Celebrini at +450, while Nikita Kucherov, who won the Hart for 2025-26, starts fifth at +1200.
That is the price on 24 September 2026, five days before the season opens. The board has 82 names on it and will move with every point, injury and standings swing between now and April.
What is the Hart Trophy
The Hart Memorial Trophy goes to the NHL’s most valuable player. Kucherov won it for the 2025-26 season, playing for the Tampa Bay Lightning, and it was his second Hart after the 2018-19 award.
It is a separate vote from the Art Ross Trophy, which goes to the scoring leader, and the Ted Lindsay Award, which the players vote on. McDavid won both of those for 2025-26 and still did not win the Hart.
2026-27 Hart Trophy odds
This is the top of the DraftKings board as ESPN carried it, with each player’s 2025-26 regular season beside the price.
| Player | Team | Price | Implied chance | 2025-26 GP | G | A | PTS |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Connor McDavid | Edmonton Oilers | +300 | 25.0% | 82 | 48 | 90 | 138 |
| Nathan MacKinnon | Colorado Avalanche | +350 | 22.2% | 80 | 53 | 74 | 127 |
| Macklin Celebrini | San Jose Sharks | +450 | 18.2% | 82 | 45 | 70 | 115 |
| Leon Draisaitl | Edmonton Oilers | +1100 | 8.3% | 65 | 35 | 62 | 97 |
| Nikita Kucherov | Tampa Bay Lightning | +1200 | 7.7% | 76 | 44 | 86 | 130 |
| Kirill Kaprizov | Minnesota Wild | +1400 | 6.7% | 78 | 45 | 44 | 89 |
| David Pastrnak | Boston Bruins | +1500 | 6.2% | 77 | 29 | 71 | 100 |
| Auston Matthews | Toronto Maple Leafs | +1500 | 6.2% | 60 | 27 | 26 | 53 |
| Cale Makar | Colorado Avalanche | +2500 | 3.8% | 75 | 20 | 59 | 79 |
| Jack Hughes | New Jersey Devils | +2500 | 3.8% | 61 | 27 | 50 | 77 |
The implied chance is 100 divided by the price plus 100. Add it up across all 82 players and the board comes to 173.4%, so the book’s margin in this market is wide, and the true chance behind each price is lower than the figure in the table.
Hart Trophy contenders
McDavid has the strongest scoring case. He played all 82 games, led the league with 138 points and won the Art Ross, and the price makes him the favorite for the season about to start. His problem last season was the vote, not the numbers: Kucherov won with 130 points in 76 games.
MacKinnon is the goal scorer of the group. He scored 53 goals in 2025-26 and won the Maurice Richard Trophy, on a Colorado team that had the most points in the league, 121. Makar, his teammate, is the only defenseman in the top ten at +2500.
Celebrini is priced ahead of the defending winner. He had 115 points in 82 games, fourth among the ten players in the table and 15 behind Kucherov, for a San Jose team that finished 39-35-8 and did not make the playoffs. At +450 the price assumes San Jose gets better around him.
Kucherov at +1200 is the defending winner priced as a long shot. He was a First All-Star Team selection in 2025-26 along with McDavid, and Tampa Bay finished 50-26-6.
Recent Hart Trophy winners
| Season | Winner | Team |
|---|---|---|
| 2025-26 | Nikita Kucherov | Tampa Bay Lightning |
| 2024-25 | Connor Hellebuyck | Winnipeg Jets |
| 2023-24 | Nathan MacKinnon | Colorado Avalanche |
| 2022-23 | Connor McDavid | Edmonton Oilers |
| 2021-22 | Auston Matthews | Toronto Maple Leafs |
| 2020-21 | Connor McDavid | Edmonton Oilers |
| 2019-20 | Leon Draisaitl | Edmonton Oilers |
| 2018-19 | Nikita Kucherov | Tampa Bay Lightning |
| 2017-18 | Taylor Hall | New Jersey Devils |
| 2016-17 | Connor McDavid | Edmonton Oilers |
| 2015-16 | Patrick Kane | Chicago Blackhawks |
Seven of the last eleven awards went to players in the top five on this board. McDavid has three of them and Kucherov two. Hellebuyck, a goaltender, is the one winner in that stretch who was not a forward.
How to use these prices
A Hart bet is worth making only when you rate a player’s chance higher than the price does. At +300, McDavid needs to win this award 25.0% of the time for the bet to break even. At +1200, Kucherov needs 7.7%.
The price you take is fixed, and the board is not. The season opens on Tuesday, 29 September, with McDavid and Edmonton at home to Vancouver at 10 p.m. ET, and the full 84-game schedule runs to 10 April 2027.
Nightly calls are on the NHL predictions hub, and nightly lines on the NHL scores and odds page. The rookie race is on the Calder Trophy odds page, the playoff MVP on the Conn Smythe Trophy odds page, and team futures on the Stanley Cup odds page and the NHL conference odds page. For paid NHL picks, the membership trial is here.