LionsHeart
Registered User
I blame Lafreniere in the way Ned Flanders calmly tells Homer that he’s “the worst person he’s ever met.”
Speculation: Roster Building Thread: Part XX (WTF are we going to do this Off-Season edition)
- Thread starter Leonardo87
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McRanger92
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- Jun 7, 2017
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Laf caught plenty of heat here, deservedly so. especially after he put his feet up when he signed that new contract, because he was off to a great start. There's a player there if he starts moving his feet and playing with that edge again. But the Rangers are going to be pressed against the cap and he's got value to other teams for the same reasons I mentioned. Would anyone blame management if they looked to move him? Lafreniere really has no one to blame but himself. In some ways I feel like he'd welcome a change of scenery.
- Jul 16, 2005
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I'm not going to debate deliberate obtuseness. Some orgs in baseball crank out great pitching staffs regularly, some NFL teams always have great LBs or never can produce a QB.
The Rangers can't help themselves from tripping and falling into goaltender gold and a large part of it was Benoit Allaire.
Development matters and I will not debate otherwise.
If you say there is no development on a per-team basis, you are incorrect. We can talk about degree honestly, but it's not a good faith debate to claim there's none.
I can't prove what Kakko or Laf might have been other places versus here, sure.
But it's not within the realm of doubting that the Rangers have failed their young players, specifically their young forwards. You don't make four straight (and we're working on six straight at this point) forward selections and have them all underperform or bust, especially when two or three of them were overwhelming consensus.
The Rangers have a hand in this mess besides "Well the players just sucked."
Not that he isn’t flawed but “all the fans hate him” usually means they’re a good puck moving D 99% of the time
- Jul 16, 2005
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The thing is, if we could get a 25 year old version of JT Miller we'd all sign up for that. Eichel was 25 when VGK acquired him, not at the end of his age 31 season.
- Jul 16, 2005
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I'm skeptical Cuylle can reach those heights, at least with any consistency.
I lean towards let's be ultra thankful we turned Lias Andersson into what appears to be more like a 50 point capable middle six winger.
I don't know if I'd call the trade a win on value because second round picks are almost always valueless, but whoever made that pick gets home-run credit for finding Cuylle. A middle six center would be way nicer but I'll take the middle six winger production.
The thing about KAM is that we're kind of over a barrel with hoping he figures it out because if he's a nothing, we basically have to start over on defense. We kinda almost have to anyway, but if he could blossom into a legit first pair partner for Fox we'd be in a much better spot.
- Jul 28, 2011
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McRanger92
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You dont think Cuylle would score 15 more points on PP1 playing netfront? He's improved significantly year over year including his time in Hartford.
- Jul 28, 2011
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I do think Cuylle could get 15 points on the powerplay over the entire season, but I also think locking Cuylle into PP means we have a skill problem.
McRanger92
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- Jun 7, 2017
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I think Cuylle's skill has always been really underrated going back to his OHL days when he played a huge role for the Spitfires, a team who has historically pumped out NHLers. Its no coincidence Team Canada invited him to the Worlds.
There is no set formula for a Cup winning team. Yes you need a true #1 Center, winger and Dman. Yes you need a line that can shutdown another teams top line. You need at least above average special teams play in the playoffs not just in the regular season.
You do need there to be chemistry. You could have all the boxes checked but if you don't have that chemistry you are going no where.
Then there is who gets hot in the playoffs. A goalie who is average could go on a tare. A player could be unstoppable for a series. Then there's the luck. If Dallas wins the cup, they would not be in that position of Rantanens wrap around didn't bounce off that Avs player
You do need there to be chemistry. You could have all the boxes checked but if you don't have that chemistry you are going no where.
Then there is who gets hot in the playoffs. A goalie who is average could go on a tare. A player could be unstoppable for a series. Then there's the luck. If Dallas wins the cup, they would not be in that position of Rantanens wrap around didn't bounce off that Avs player
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- Jul 16, 2005
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Perhaps. Not sure I want him on the power play though.
I also don't think he has a ton of upside at this point.
Which is still a great outcome for us, but I think this is probably what he is, other than, I expect he'll have outlier seasons here or there, yeah, maybe he'll hit 60 once.
But I think he's a 40-50 point guy.
Which again, A+ for a second round pick and very nice to have as a 22 year old plug and play middle sixer.
haohmaru
boomshakalaka
I'm saying your argument that XYZ player on ____ would've been better on _______ is terribly flawed.
That's entirely speculative and hypothetical. It's impossible prove one way or the other.
Maybe on San Jose Lafreniere would've been thrust into first line minutes and completely caved in. You simply don't, and will never, know.
Can you make a generalized statement that other teams have better developmental programs? Sure. But I also look at Lias, Kravtsov, Kakko, etc... and see them doing exactly what they did here elsewhere. Some player develop later. Some never do. Some are drafted and are put into a position to succeed because there's a roster spot that fits where he's currently at. There are SO many variables.
Maybe not draft at the position you're deepest at over and over? Maybe trade that 1OA for 6th and 22nd so you're not 6 deep for 4 roster spots? I don't have all the answers but clearly this is part of the issue for the Rangers and their frustrated draft picks.
I also see Howden, Barron, etc... who this fanbase couldn't wait to shoot into a star flourishing later in their careers because this organization constantly needs instant gratification instead of patience.
Kakkko should never have been traded and its one of the things I'm really peeved with Laviolette about.
haohmaru
boomshakalaka
Not sure about this. I'm doubting we've seen his ceiling. If he takes a page from Kreider and pays the consequences for standing in front of the goalie on the PP he certainly can get to that 60 point range.
Assuming someone gives him this opportunity, of course.
Who had Tom Wilson pencilled in for 65 points at age 30 when he had 19 points in 82 games as a 22 year old? No reason to think Cuylle can't get to that level given the right set of circumstances.
GoAwayPanarin
learn w/ da bern
If they wilted then did McDavid wilt in the finals last year when he was held scoreless over Edmonton's last 2 games despite nearly setting the playoff record for most points in a single run? Is it because he isn't as good as Florida's top guys even though he has the 3rd highest playoff pts per game ever?
See how ridiculous that sounds? (Eichel went pointless in gs 6 and 7 vs Dallas last year. Did he wilt?)
I think the bigger issue is that the other guys (see: the other 6 players in the top 9 and really the other top 6 line) didn't do enough. Would have been the perfect time for Panarin to step up and actually take over for a few games (mind you, this was actually a pretty decent series for him and probably his 2nd best overall as a Ranger. Some will point to Pittsburgh but I'll point you to the 290302939023902309293 turnovers he had in that series. I remember how it ended, but I also remember everything that happened before that) instead of being just okay.
The aforementioned duo of Kreider-Zibanejad literally gave them a 2-0 lead in G3 after lighting them up in g1. They more than did their part in that series.
Tampa didn't exactly fill the net with pucks the rest of the way either. Games 5 and 6 were 2-1 games IIRC (or basically 2-1 games.)
The age thing is a legit concern but thats rarely brought into the conversation because it's being applied to who he is right now.
Is it a bigger concern than all of the time Eichel missed before being acquired? Because he's continued to miss time after being acquired by Vegas too (this is the first time he finished the season with a games played number that began with a 7 or higher since 2018-19 and only the third time he's done so ever.) Not exactly on topic, but its why they should stay away from him as a UFA.
This is the issue I have with the Eichel hindsight. Anyone who claims that they wouldn't have referred to him as declining damaged goods prior to their cup run is a liar outside of maybe 1 or 2 people. I've been here long enough to know how this place operates and tbh it was looking that way.
There a huge difference in retroactively giving him the label of being elite and doing so with Point (who there just wasn't enough data on, he grew into that player because he was a young player) and Eichel (who showed flashes, but had 3 injury plagued season in a row with okay at best production.)
- Jul 28, 2011
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Barron is still a 10 min, 4th line player. Same as his projection was for us. He's a responsible player, who can take important faceoffs though.
haohmaru
boomshakalaka
By all indications Drury went hard after Eichel (part of the reason Buchnevich was traded was for the cap space he thought he'd need for Eichel but settled for Zibanejad) and Buffalo's owner said "f*** that."
Not much you can do about "f*** that" coming from an owner.
And I completely get it. I'm the owner of this sad sack franchise and I'm going to send Eichel to a team from my state and watch them win the Cup? No way.
haohmaru
boomshakalaka
Could've kept him and passed on Goodrow. Cap savings, more goals, more size, cost controlled for years.
- Jul 28, 2011
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That's a separate argument. Although, in those first 2 seasons Goodrow gave us 30+ points and Barron wasn't doing that. The term and money was an issue, I won't disagree.
Mike in Houston
Registered User
I'm posting this because of a request to do it. If the moderators take it down, please DM me and tell me posting paywall articles violates a TOS and I'll stop.
Post Sports+ Inside The Rangers
Alexis Lafrenière’s role in the demise of the Rangers offense — and what it means for his trade windowBy Mollie Walker
For all that went wrong for the Rangers this past season, the loss of their most dominant line at five-on-five was one of the most peculiar.
The most dynamic unit at even strength in 2023-24 — Artemi Panarin, Vincent Trocheck and Alexis Lafrenière — wasn’t even a semblance of itself in 2024-25. It was a torpedo to the Blueshirts offense, which further crumbled to smithereens without help from the power play.
In a reader question this week, Stan Dumoch wrote to say he believes Lafrenière’s name doesn’t come up as often when blame is assigned for poor play, but he’s wondering what everyone thinks about No. 13 and what the future holds for him.
It’s true, Lafrenière probably didn’t catch as much heat for this past season as did other big-name players in the Rangers lineup. That’s more on account of him still falling into the younger players category than anything else.
The 23-year-old, however, certainly got a ton of flak after disappearing once he signed a seven-year, $52.15 million extension in late October.
“I thought I had a good start, and then struggled to be consistent in my game,” Lafrenière said on break-up day. “Didn’t really make a difference. I’m obviously disappointed in my year.”
After a borderline breakout season in 2023-24, Lafrenière finished this past campaign with 11 fewer goals (17, down from 28) and 12 fewer points (45, down from 57). There wasn’t nearly as much involvement from the 2020 first-overall pick or any sort of consistent compete level on a game-to-game basis.
It wouldn’t be an off-the-board move to look to trade Lafrenière, who just wrapped up his fifth NHL season and has severely underperformed. His eight-team no-trade list doesn’t kick in until the 2026-27 season, which might prompt president and general manager Chris Drury to do something sooner rather than later if that’s the route he wishes to go.
“I always expect a lot out of myself,” Lafrenière said. “Obviously, when you sign for more money, there’s always a little bit more pressure. I try not to think about it too much. If I make whatever the amount of money, I just want to perform the best I can. I don’t think I did that this year.”
Panarin, Trocheck and Lafrenière skated the first 10 games of the season together before Mika Zibanejad centered the two wings for a handful of games. The trio ended up lining up together on 52 occasions, outscoring opponents 37-28 at five-on-five through 667:28 of ice time, according to Natural Stat Trick.
This after owning a 54-39 edge in scoring when they were on the ice last season, when they racked up 863:21 of ice time together.
Reader Joseph Cosgriff wants to know what was different about the overall play of this line from last year to this year.
Trocheck had a very mature response when asked during break-up day why he thought his line wasn’t able to recreate their chemistry from last season.
“That’s a good question. I wish I had an answer,” Trocheck said. “I think we would’ve fixed it a lot sooner if I did. I think part of it could be just expecting it. Like I said, you can’t just show up and expect to recreate something without putting effort in or putting work into it. Not that we weren’t working at it every day.
“It was just, I feel like once you get to a certain point and you’re not succeeding like you were the year before, it starts to weigh on you mentally. You start thinking you need to change everything. And sometimes could just be a bounce here and there and you’ve already changed your whole outlook on everything.
“And then we had a lot of line changes throughout the year, it came back to us a bunch. But, at the end of the day, it’s on us to look in the mirror, go back, look at film, see what we did wrong, see what we were doing great couple years ago, which we did a lot of this year. I mean, me and Laf and Bread [Panarin], we sat down and watched video from games last year and tried to figure out what the difference was. A lot of times, there wasn’t a difference, and the puck just wasn’t going in the net.
“Sometimes, I think that you get to a point where you’re not succeeding like you were, you just start to try too much. I think that’s where it got to a certain point this year, maybe halfway through the year, we each individually started to try to take it upon ourselves and we tried too much. A lot of the time it ended up going the opposite way.”
Mailbag
Do you think Chris Kreider still gets traded over summer? Or does Mike Sullivan get a crack at him to get him back on track?
— Rob Bulldog, Patrick O’Neil
I do anticipate at least one major change to the Rangers’ personnel, and Kreider is one of the easiest and most logical moves to make. While players such as Zibanejad and Panarin have iron-clad no-move clauses, Kreider only has a 15-team no-trade list and two seasons remaining on his contract. That he added to his injury history this past season might not help, but it’s not impossible.
Who is the front-runner for Joe Micheletti’s job?
— Tom Santacroce
It’s still pretty early to identify a front-runner, but names that were floated to me included Dave Maloney, Brian Boyle and Ryan Callahan.
Why do people/Chris Drury expect Mike Sullivan to be able to do something Peter Laviolette couldn’t? Looking from the outside, I find them similar. Both competent, low-key types. Had Drury gone for a John Tortorella type or a younger coach, it would have made more sense to me.
— No Name
If you haven’t listened to the latest episode of our “Up in the Blue Seats” podcast, I suggest you try to catch Larry Brooks’ analysis of the Drury-Sullivan tandem. I think Brooks is right in his assessment that Drury’s history with Sullivan could bode very well for the Rangers. Drury didn’t have a significant pre-existing relationship with either of his former two coaches, Gerard Gallant and Peter Laviolette, which probably wasn’t an ideal setup. That should be a major difference right off the bat for Drury and the dynamic between the coaching staff and management.
I don’t disagree with your assessment that Sullivan and Laviolette are similar, but Sullivan was with one organization for a decade (winning two Stanley Cups) and Laviolette only got as far as 41 games into his sixth season in Nashville (lost in the Stanley Cup Final once) in his longest stint with one team.
Watching the playoffs is a reminder how physical the play is. I am wondering if Rangers management has concerns about the small stature of Gabe Perreault and if they are working with him with a strength and conditioning coach to add some muscle and pounds. The skill set with Gabe seems to be there, but I am worried that he would get pushed around when the games get super-intense and physical.
— Paul Karp
Every player at that age is going to need to bulk up and focus on strength and conditioning, but everyone I’ve talked to about Gabe Perreault has expressed the same confidence in his ability to overcome his size.
I’ve been told Perreault’s hockey IQ is his superpower. The way he thinks the game is so elite that he “problem solves” his way through every obstacle in front of him.
Assuming Adam Fox comes into camp 100% healthy, how do we get him back to his Norris Trophy level of performance?
— Drew Silvester
It’s time to move on from Fox. Get something for him now. He’s failing. I wouldn’t give up on K’Andre Miller.
— Mike Kavanagh
I have a theory that Adam Fox not only has not been the same player since the knee-on-knee collision and injury re-aggravation during the playoffs in the 2023-24 season, but he’s also had a lot of mileage put on him since he made his NHL debut in 2019. Now, of course, Fox is the Rangers’ No. 1 defenseman, and that comes with a heavy workload. But I think the 27-year-old would do better under a more balanced lineup when it comes to sharing the responsibilities of power play, penalty kill and top minutes on D.
Fox finished the season with the second-highest average power-play time per game (2:55) and the sixth-highest average penalty-kill time per game (2:01).
I was wondering what your thoughts were on Niko Mikkola, who was included in the deal that brought Vladimir Tarasenko to the Rangers. I would have liked to see Drury find a way to keep him on the roster.
— Dennis McNerney
I love hearing how much fans want Niko Mikkola back because I know he’d be thrilled to see it. In the grand scheme of things, however, the Rangers weren’t able to afford to keep him at the time, and it’s safe to say the towering Finn would not have become the player he is today if he remained in New York. Mikkola took on the personality of the team around him, the Panthers. It was in that system and surrounded by those players that Mikkola found this level of his game. He’s blossomed into a strong defenseman, but I think his stock rose considerably because of what he became in Florida.
Please discuss pros and cons of giving big bucks to K’Andre Miller. I’d rather pay big bucks to a free-agent D who brings toughness.
— Michael Shalett, Mo Dufrense
Pros
• Minutes-guzzling defensemen don’t grow on trees and this would solidify another young player long term
• Still young (25) with room to grow and untapped potential
• Familiarity with D partners such as Fox and Will Borgen, who are both here for some time
• His reach, long strides and athleticism
Cons
• Periodic abundance of turnovers
• Defensive lapses a concern
• Depending on contract, could be lengthy salary-cap commitment
• Five seasons in and his offensive game hasn’t translated that well
• Would take up cap space that could otherwise be used to sign a free agent defenseman or acquire another defenseman to fill a top-four role
Do Michael Peca and Dan Muse have a realistic chance to stay?
— Doug Sutherland
They should! I don’t think the Rangers would put them in the running if they didn’t have a realistic chance. I’ve talked a lot about how Peca and Muse have made their mark on the 2023-24 Rangers and the 2024-25 Rangers, beginning with Muse’s ability to make any practice intense and Peca’s hands-on impact on the team’s long-standing issues of faceoffs. Peca is believed to be a future head coach, as well, and Muse has history coaching Perreault with Team USA.
haohmaru
boomshakalaka
It's really not. The Rangers played him, what, all of 20 games and traded him? They clearly did not think of him as a 10-13 minute 4th line guy moving forward or the prudent move would've been to keep him and his tiny salary.
GoAwayPanarin
learn w/ da bern
I don't think it was about sending him in state.
I think that basically became a no go when it became knowledge that it was Eichel's preferred destination. They weren't happy with the way he wanted to handle his neck injury (and the spectre of ADR was enough where most teams didn't want to touch him) so it was more of a spite thing.
I don't remember the timeline so maybe I'm wrong, but I think that we knew Eichel was going elsewhere by the time Buch was traded. I do feel like someone in the media wrote about this recently though.
haohmaru
boomshakalaka
Sportsnet’s Mike Futa was a recent guest on Tim and Friends in Toronto and weighed in on the Jack Eichel situation. He was asked if he felt when this saga finally ends, will Eichel be on the Rangers.
“When (Sabres GM) Kevyn Adams talks about it, I don’t get for one second that he’s comfortable with the situation, but I do believe he holds all the cards,” Futa answered. “Probably because that’s where Eichel has made it quite clear it’s where he wants to be, that’s the last place the place in the world where Buffalo wants to trade him.”
- Jul 16, 2005
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- 13,377
Admittedly I can't say "Lafreniere would have been X if San Jose drafted him."
But I can say without reservation that there is a clear downgrading effect to being drafted and developed by the New York Rangers.
It's all circumstantial, but, circumstantial evidence is still valid to create an inference and the inference here is too clear.
Thanks for mentioning Howden, because he's additional evidence. The second he got away from here he turned from one of the worst players in the league into a serviceable, even quality, middle 6 center.
There is zero doubt in my mind that in a functional environment, Kakko and Lafreniere look a hell of a lot more like legitimate top picks.
- Jul 28, 2011
- 15,541
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Rangers clearly went for win now and thought the additions of Copp would help the playoff run. They blew it against Tampa. Had they won and got to the cup, potentially winning the cup, nobody looks back and says anything about "Look at Barron Flouring now, wish we had him on the 4th line."
I agree, whoever thought Goodrow deserved that money, that term and that clause was an idiot.
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