Happy draft week, ladies and gentlemen.
In less than 24 hours, the entire landscape of Major League Table Tennis (MLTT) will shift for good. South Korean phenom An Jaehyun will join one MLTT team’s roster. As will African Champions Omar Assar and Quadri Aruna. Those are just three of the many players with enough talent to change an MLTT franchise, all of whom have declared for the Season 4 MLTT Draft.
But which teams will alter their futures and select those players? We won’t know for sure until the Season 4 MLTT Draft begins on Thursday at 12 p.m. EDT. All we can do until then is speculate with the information we have, which onlyincludes the draft order, each team’s needs, and the players who have declared for the draft. Fortunately, that’s all we need for us to perform our best impressions of Nostra-draft-us, and make educated guesses of which teams will select which players on Thursday.
It is worth noting that this is not a “best players” list, nor is it a projection of which players will have the best MLTT careers. The order of this list is based on a combination of talent, team fit and conversations we have had with coaches throughout the season. Every team has a different draft board from one another, and no two boards look the same.
That won’t stop us from trying to predict how the order of the Season 4 MLTT Draft falls on thursday.
If a team wants to build their identity around any player in this draft class, An should be their dream target. At just 26 years old, the No. 22 Men’s Singles player in the world already knows how to win at every level. Singles? He’s a two-time Asian Champion. Doubles? He’s one half of the world’s No. 4 Men’s Doubles pair. Playing on a team? South Korea finished in fourth place at the 2024 Paris Olympics while he represented them. Wins against top talent? Just ask Tomokazu Harimoto (Men’s Singles No. 3) and Felix Lebrun (No. 4) how it felt losing to An.
MLTT? He would enter the league as one of its most talented and accomplished players, ready and able to change the fortunes of whoever drafts him. The Atlanta Blazers, winners of the Season 4 MLTT Draft Lottery, have the first opportunity to do so. They certainly don’t lack in star power; Season 3 No. 1 pick Yuya Oshima (SPINDEX: 2779) and Kayama Yu (2804) both finished in the Top 20 on MLTT’s official power rankings list. But adding a player who can play anywhere at the table will offer the Blazers lineup flexibility that, outside of Kayama, they didn’t have.
The Blazers are about to enter their second season as an MLTT team, and their first under new head coach Koji Itagaki. With only one selection in the first two rounds, this could be their prime chance to add a true difference maker for the next several years. And if the Blazers want that difference maker, there’s no one in this draft class better qualified for that role than An.
If there’s a high-level competition in Africa, Omar Assar has probably medaled in it. Twelve medals in the African Championships. Thirteen medals in the African Games. A record nine ITTF Africa Cup titles, spanning from 2015 to 2026. That’s a legendary resume, but what if we limited that resume to only gold medals in the African Championships and African Games? Assar’s trophy shelf somehow looks even more impressive, unless five Singles gold medals, four Doubles gold medals (including three in Mixed Doubles) and six Team gold medals don’t move you.
It doesn’t take a table tennis expert to claim that Assar can anchor an MLTT team. And it just so happens that the Texas Smash, who are about to select with the second overall pick in the Season 4 MLTT Draft, desperately need an anchor. Hiromitsu Kasahara (2726) did a great job in that role during Season 3, but that was one of his many jobs. He played in Singles 4, Singles 1, Singles 3 and Doubles, and was often the male player Texas relied on throughout the season. And with Joao Monteiro (2714)’s departure, Kasahara’s workload will only increase if nothing is done about that.
Assar’s presence as this roster’s top player, whether that’s in Singles 1 or Singles 4, should allow Kasahara, David McBeath (2700) and Nandan Naresh (2722) a little bit of breathing room. It will also give new head coach Paul Drinkhall another player to rely on for the next several MLTT seasons while he figures out the lineups that suit his team the best.He’s got an important task, after all: get the Smash back to the playoffs. And if he selects the 34-year-old Olympian with the No. 2 pick, that task suddenly looks a lot easier.
What can a three-time Olympian, a five-time ITTF African Cup winner and a seven-time African Champion bring to an MLTT roster? A winner’s mentality. The No. 48 player in the world plays well above his ITTF ranking, having taken down Harimoto and Timo Boll at various points. It’s hard to even call him a mere Top 50 player, as he’s known for becoming the first African player to crack the Top 10 of ITTF’s Men’s Singles rankings list. The 37-year-old has spent decades winning at table tennis, and he aims to do the same for whichever MLTT team drafts him on Thursday.
The opportunity to select Aruna could come as a huge break for the Florida Crocs, who recently lost Liam Pitchford (2897) to Table Tennis Bundesliga. He’s not the only one. Peiyu Zhu (2570) is gone. Chihwei Yeh (2644) and Angel Naranjo (2613) won’t return. Andy Pereira (2693) will also take his talents elsewhere. Only Marc Duran (2649), Daniel Gorak (2670) and Asuka Sakai (2748) will return for Season 4, giving head coach Frank Arias five picks to build out the rest of his new-look roster.
With so many holes to fill, it could be tempting for the Crocs to use this pick on a true Singles 2 threat or a proven Doubles player. But there’s no bigger hole than the one left by Pitchford, the No. 1 selection in the Season 2 MLTT Draft. Not only does drafting Aruna at No. 3 give the Crocs their close-to-perfect replacement for Pitchford, it gives them what could be their only opportunity to do so. There will be plenty of opportunities to build out this roster for the Crocs. There won’t be many opportunities to draft a player of Aruna’s caliber.
The Bay Area Blasters find themselves in a unique position compared to the other five lottery teams. Those teams have at least one area of relative weakness, but not the Blasters. They have four true Singles threats in Lily Zhang (2606), Taehyun Kim (2730), Jinbao Ma (2756) and Elsayed Lashin (2712). Kim and Baek Kwang-il (2608) helped form one of the better Doubles threats in the West Division this season. They didn’t miss the postseason due to a lack of talent; they did so through bad luck with injury and absences.
That points to the Blasters selecting whomever they deem the Best Player Available on Thursday with the No. 4 pick. And with An, Assar and Aruna off the board, that player seems to be former Takuya Jin, the former No. 44 Men’s Singles player in the world. The T. League champion and Polish Superliga champion knows a thing or two about earning titles with clubs, and his spot on 1. FC Saarbrücken - TT’s Champions League-winning roster in 2023 proves that his success knows no borders.
Tim Wang and the Blasters are looking to add an excellent communicator and ideal culture fit, and to ensure that this year’s first-round pick competes with the team. There aren’t many players who fit that bill better than the veteran Jin, who could make the Blasters the next beneficiary of his winning ways.
Romain Lorentz loves his fellow Frenchmen. He selected Alexandre Robinot (2760) with the No. 5 pick in the Season 3 MLTT Draft, his first-ever selection as an MLTT head coach. It’s difficult to imagine Lorentz regrets his choice, as Robinot finished his rookie season with a Singles percentage of 55.6% (30-24) and a Golden Game percentage of 57.1% (76-57), good enough for him to end Season 3 as the No. 13 player on MLTT’s official power rankings list.
That’s not the only reason why Antoine Hachard makes so much sense as a Los Angeles Spinner, though. It’s easy to see Robinot and the former No. 91 Men’s Singles player alternating between Singles 1 and Singles 4, and it’s even easier to envision Hachard taking down opponents as he did Simon Gauzy (Men’s Singles No. 19) in the 2019 French Table Tennis Championships. And for his excellence in Singles, he’s even better in Doubles. Hachard has two silver medals and four bronze medals in Men’s Doubles at the French Table Tennis Championships, which gives Lorentz plenty of flexibility midway through matches.
This is the first of the Spinners’ three selections in the Season 4 MLTT Draft, and this pick will almost determine the team’s identity going forward. And if Lorentz makes Hachard the second consecutive Frenchman to become a Spinner with the No. 5 pick in the MLTT Draft, that identity could easily become one of versatility all across the table.
If Daniel Gorak scored two more points in the final Golden Game of Season 3, the New York Slice would have made the postseason. Adam Hugh would have taken an expansion team to its first postseason and given the Slice its first taste of postseason table tennis. That didn’t happen. Koyo Kanamitsu scored those two points before Gorak could, which sent the Princeton Revolution to Championship Weekend and the Slice to the MLTT Draft Lottery.
As the final team to miss the postseason, the Slice don’t find themselves in a strong position heading into the Season 4 MLTT Draft. Fortunately, they find themselves in the perfect position to address their biggest need: Singles 2. Neither Choi Haeeun (2533) nor Jessica Reyes Lai (2412) will return to New York for Season 4, leaving the Slice with a current total of zero women on their roster. They’re not the only team with this issue, but they are among the best-positioned teams to address that need.
If the board falls this way, they would have their choice of any woman eligible to be selected in the Season 4 MLTT Draft. The best of those players is 25-year-old Zhang Binyue, who brings invaluable China Super League experience to the United States. She’ll be going up against some of the world’s top women in MLTT, but she’s used to that. She’s beaten Izabela Lupulesku (Women’s Singles No. 91) and Sofia-Xuan Zhang (No. 116) before, and she could continue taking down elite women as a member of the Slice.
There aren’t many holes you could poke at the Princeton Revolution from a roster-construction standpoint last season. Cho Seungmin (2815) finished the regular season as the league’s No. 1 player and runner-up for Men’s MVP, all while anchoring the Revolution in both Singles and Doubles. Fellow Top 20 players Benedek Olah (2771) and Yang Shuo (2751) provided Cho with Singles support throughout the season. Hsien Tzu Cheng (2589) and Jiangshan Guo (2557) may have been the league’s best two-woman punch in Singles 2 last year, and Koyo Kanamitsu (2670) and Jinxin Wang (2721) helped in both Doubles and Singles. The Revolution were versatile, flexible and dominant when they needed to be, which earned them a spot at this year’s Championship Weekend.
All of those players will return to the Revolution for Season 4, which leaves them with just one pick in the Season 4 MLTT Draft. They don’t have any obvious weaknesses, but you could maybe critique their consistency midway through the order. With several options in this year’s draft, it would certainly be nice if the Revolution could use their sole selection on a Men’s Singles and Mixed Doubles champion, especially if that player hails from the world’s most successful table tennis country.
That’s what Cao Yantao could be for the Revolution, but he’s much more than that. He’s a 2019 Croatia Junior Open U18 Boys’ Doubles Champion and a member of the 2017 National Second Team. He’s earned nationwide success as recently as 2025, when his Nandagang Table Tennis Association Team took down the Hangzhou Yueshu Team at the Zhengzhou Table Tennis Grand Prix in January. And just a few months later, Cao and Shi Xunyao advanced to the second round of the 15th National Games Mixed Doubles event. If Cao can bring that same success to the Princeton Revolution, an MLTT Cup could be just within reach.
The Chicago Wind only have one pick in the Season 4 MLTT Draft, and that’s all they need. They have Season 3 Men’s MVP Robert Gardos (2810) and Men’s MVP finalist Emmanuel Lebesson (2790) at the bookends of every match. Season 2 Women’s MVP Mo Zhang (2566) won’t have anyone contesting her in Singles 2. Those three superstars will be joined by the many talented players that can offer support in Singles 3, including Jeongwoo Park (2803), Alex Cazacu (2666), Sean Zhang (2657) and Daniel Tran (2577).
If only that talent extended to Doubles. The Wind became the first team to clinch the postseason despite finishing Season 3 with the worst Doubles percentage (44.4%) in the West Division. That tied the New York Slice and Florida Crocs for the worst Doubles percentage in all of MLTT. That can’t happen again if the Wind have any championship aspirations, making a Doubles threat a near-lock for the No. 8 pick.
That should make Clarence Chew someone that the Wind should consider taking if he falls to them. Lubomir Pistej and Jakub Zelinka (Men’s Doubles No. 19) learned how much of a threat Chew is in Doubles earlier this year, when he and countryman Josh Chua (Men’s Doubles No. 53) upset them at the Singapore Smash 2026. It wouldn’t be the first time Chew caused a commotion in Doubles at the Singapore Smash; he and Ethan Poh took down Ovidiu Ionescu and Alvaro Robles (Men’s Doubles No. 43) at the same event in 2022, the same year they defeated Nicholas Lum and Finn Luu (Men’s Doubles No. 31) at the Commonwealth Games.
The Carolina Gold Rush also have one selection in the Season 4 MLTT Draft, and they approach it with a very complete roster. There aren’t any areas on the Gold Rush’s roster that need to be addressed, allowing them to take an upside swing on a tantalizing prospect. It’s risky, but that’s what it would take for the Gold Rush to win their second MLTT Cup. And what better way to avenge their loss to the Portland Paddlers in the Season 3 MLTT Championship match by drafting one of their own?
Kang Dong-Soo looked untouchable in Week 3. He won eight of his nine singles games that week, which he finished as Men’s Player of the Week. That was the last time the United States heard of Kang until the Paddlers released him this past offseason, but his declaration for the Season 4 MLTT Draft suggests that he’s not ready to abandon his MLTT career yet.
It’s a small sample size, but Kang ended his first regular season in MLTT as the No. 3 player on its official power rankings list. He thrived in MLTT’s unique format last season, and he would fit nicely as a defensive replacement for Wei Wang (2671). It’s difficult to say if Kang, who only played in Weeks 1 and 3 last season, would be able to maintain that production for a full season. But for a roster as rock-solid as Carolina’s, they can afford to take a chance on someone as proven as Kang.
The Paddlers didn’t win the Season 3 MLTT Cup with a roster lacking in talent. Nikhil Kumar (2793) and Sid Naresh (2606) gave Portland the league’s best Doubles record last season, Kotomi Omoda (2574) finished third in Women’s MVP voting, and Hampus Nordberg (2758), Jens Lundqvist (2786) and Min Hyeok Kim (2735) did a fantastic job commanding Singles throughout the season.
At this point, the Paddlers’ needs are granular. Kumar is the Paddlers’ only left-hander on the roster, and they could use some more depth to replace the recently departed Kang Dong-Soo. Several candidates immediately come to mind, but Minseo Oh stands out. MLTT talent won’t be an issue for him; he took down Edward Ly, Nandan Naresh and Koyo Kanamitsu on his way to winning the 2025 U.S. Open in December. International talent won’t even be an issue either; the 26-year-old has a 66.7% record (38-19) on the world circuit. Oh knows how to win, and it makes perfect sense for the reigning champions to add another champion to their roster.
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