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New York Rangers: Henrik Lundqvist and the great unknown

By Nicholas Zararis

NEW YORK, NY - MARCH 30: Henrik Lundqvist #30 of the New York Rangers salutes the crowd after being named the winner of the 2017-2018 Steven McDonald Extra Effort Award prior to the game against the Tampa Bay Lightning at Madison Square Garden on March 30, 2018 in New York City. (Photo by Jared Silber/NHLI via Getty Images)
NEW YORK, NY - MARCH 30: Henrik Lundqvist #30 of the New York Rangers salutes the crowd after being named the winner of the 2017-2018 Steven McDonald Extra Effort Award prior to the game against the Tampa Bay Lightning at Madison Square Garden on March 30, 2018 in New York City. (Photo by Jared Silber/NHLI via Getty Images) /
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The New York Rangers are a team up in a cloud of uncertainty. Outside of Henrik Lundqvist in net, nothing else is guaranteed.

Building a quality organization in the National Hockey League is a difficult task. There are organizations who spend the better part of a decade trying to field a competitor. In addition, there is no promise that things will get better following conventional wisdom. Sometimes, making decisions that should work, do not pan out and hold a team back. This is exactly why the Buffalo Sabres have been rebuilding for the better part of a decade.

For the Rangers, there is not a whole lot that is known about the team going forward. Outside of Henrik Lundqvist in goal, there really is not a safe player on the roster. The veteran goaltender refused an offer to be traded at this year’s deadline because of his full no-movement clause. For Lundqvist, seeing the rebuild through is a matter of personal pride.

There is a path forward for New York the next few seasons. The problem for Lundqvist is that the veteran goaltender will be 36 years old by the end of next season. This means that the team’s goals and Lundqvist’s goals do not realistically line up going forward. The Rangers are at least one year away from seriously competing for a Stanley Cup.

There is so much uncertainty for the future of the Rangers, that it is difficult to project next year’s team.

Restricted free agents

For the most part, the Rangers have a decent core of players. Chris Kreider, Mika Zibanejad, Mats Zuccarello, Pavel Buchnevich, Filip Chytil, Lias Andersson, Neal Pionk and Kevin Shattenkirk are under team control for next season. Those eight players are all serviceable pieces on a legitimate contender. In the case of Andersson, Buchnevich and Chytil, they have not reached their true potential and still have room to grow.

The problem for New York lies in the realm of restricted free agents. Brady Skjei, Kevin Hayes, Ryan Spooner, Vladislav Namestnikov, Jimmy Vesey, and John Gilmour are all restricted free agents. Although the Rangers have nearly $30 million in cap space, several players are due for raises.

It’s likely that Skjei and Hayes will see the biggest jumps in their respective average annual values. The Boston College Alumni saw the biggest jump in performance during the 2017-2018 season and is poised to improve next year. Playing against the toughest competition of his entire career and starting 60% of the time in the defensive zone, Hayes posted a career high in goals.

On the blue line, the team expected Skjei to jump up to serve as the replacement for Ryan McDonagh following the trade deadline. Although there were a fair share of growing pains for Sjei, the University of Minnesota alumni has the raw skills to grow into the role.

The holes

The biggest problem for next year’s team are the holes. The 2017-2018 Rangers were a flawed compilation of talent that failed in every phase of the game. If the group had stayed healthy, they may have had a chance, but that is a hypothetical. Things did not break right for New York and they missed the playoffs for the first time in eight years.

Going into the 2018-2019 season there are a handful of holes on the roster. The team realistically needs two top four defenseman and at least one if not two top six forwards. Those are premium positions that are sure to cost a lot of money. In a salary cap sport it is not easy to add such valuable pieces on a whim.

This likely means that the Rangers will be forced to part with a talented player to get a talented player. Outside of John Tavares, there are no premium free agents this summer, so a trade will have to be the mode of improvement. The Rangers have a glut of talent at the center position, so a center will likely be trade bait this summer.

Next: Five teams teams that a Mats Zuccarello trade fits

Next season will be the most bizarre for New York in a long time. The team still does not have a head coach and lacks any coherent identity. Outside of Lundqvist, pretty much everything is unknown.

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