New York Rangers: Ranking the prospects by tiers

The New York Rangers have a lot of really good young prospects. Let’s separate them into tiers to get a better understanding of their depth.

It’s incredible how much better the New York Rangers’ prospect pool has become over the last 15 months.

Of course the team has had five first round picks in that time span, but they’ve acquired a diverse array of promising young players over that time, too. They’ve even hit on some of their later picks, at least it appears that way as of now.

By now you’ve probably seen a ton of different prospect rankings. Blueshirt Banter did a very good, in depth rankings of the farm system and so did Corey Pronman of The Athletic. We’ve even done our share of prospect rankings, including these position-by-position rankings. Today, we’re gonna put these prospects into tiers.

Now, anytime you’re dealing with prospect rankings you must know that it is an inexact science and not everything ends up the way it may appear. With that said, I am confident that these tiers do the prospect pool justice.

It is worth noting that any player who has played in 10 games or more with the Rangers were left off this list. That includes Neal Pionk, Tony DeAngelo, John Gilmour and Boo Nieves.

Now let’s dive right in!

Tier 7

Tyler Wall, Brandon Crawley, Gabriel Fontaine

This tier is for players who probably don’t have a chance at being every day NHL players but could get a chance to play a few games at the level under extreme circumstances.

The most interesting name here is that of center Gabriel Fontaine.

There are some folks out there who I respect that have suggested that Fontaine may be a dark-horse candidate for the 13th forward job with the Rangers this upcoming season.

Fontaine is a former sixth round pick of the Rangers in 2016 (171st overall) who’s bread and butter is the defensive side of the game. The 21-year old has decent size at 6-foot-1, 196 lbs. He isn’t going to blow by you but he could skate well enough to play at the NHL level.

The question with Fontaine is will he be good enough to contribute offensively at the NHL level?

In a bottom six role in Hartford last season, Fontaine notched nine goals and nine assists in 57 games. Offensive production like that won’t get a guy noticed but Fontaine is still young enough to continue his development. He has Steven Fogarty written all over him, which is probably not a good thing.

Tier 6

Sean Day, Tim Gettinger, Patrik Virta, Ville Meskanen, Riley Hughes, Lauri Pajuniemi, Nico Gross

This tier is for players who have a chance at making the NHL because of one skill set that they excel at, yet have some holes in their game that need filling.

Sean Day is the poster child for that description.

Day is an exceptional skater with plus offensive ability. He was granted exceptional status at age 16, allowing him to play in juniors a year early. There are only four other players that have received the same honor; John Tavares, Aaron Ekblad, Connor McDavid and 2018 first round pick Joe Veleno.

Getting a player with those credentials in the third round like the Rangers did in the 2016 draft is worth the risk. However, Day is at risk of being the first player with exceptional status to be declared a bust by the hockey world.

For as great as his skating is, Day has been nothing short of a huge disappointment defensively and really hasn’t gotten a ton better over the years. His poor positioning screams “low hockey IQ.” You can have all the skill in the world but if you can’t think the game properly, you are at a huge disadvantage.

Day will begin the year in Hartford unless something goes horribly wrong that causes him to start the season with the Maine Mariners of the ECHL.

Tier 5

Olof Lindbom, Ty Ronning, Jacob Ragnarsson, Michael Lindqvist, Morgan Barron

This tier is for players that are going to be, at the very least, very good AHL players and/or solid depth pieces in NHL lineups.

Ty Ronning is a guy who could exemplify all of this starting in 2018.

The little guy, standing in at just 5-foot-9 (which is probably being generous), has some big shoes to fill. His father, Cliff, had a tremendous NHL career where he tallied 305 goals and 563 assists in 1137 NHL games with the St. Louis Blues, Vancouver Canucks, Phoenix Coyotes, Nashville Predators, Los Angeles Kings, Minnesota Wild and New York Islanders.

Ty has a high motor and has always been known for his work ethic. He has been a respected leader for the Vancouver Giants over his WHL career and has some sneaky good offensive ability. Think of a poor man’s Mats Zuccarello.

Ronning will turn 21 in October. He hopes to make the team out of camp this year.

Olof Lindbom deserves to be in this tier as well based on how mature he is at age 18.

Known for his stout positioning in net and his hockey IQ, Lindbom definitely has a chance to be a player at the NHL in the future. It’s just going to take a long while for him to get there.

Goalies generally take longer than position players to develop, and Lindbom still needs to grow into his body and continue to get some reps. He’s a bit smaller than most of today’s goalies at just 6-foot-1, but so is Henrik Lundqvist and it hasn’t hindered him.

The jury is out on if he could be an NHL starter. Time will tell, but it is definitely reasonable to believe he could develop into a quality backup at the very least.

Tier 4

Joey Keane, Ryan Lindgren

These two defenseman get their own tier because while they both have some question marks surrounding their game, they both project to be pretty useful players that’ll become every night NHL contributors down the road.

Ryan Lindgren is already an extremely popular prospect around this fan base.

As I wrote last week, Lindgren is the best example of hockey natural selection in the Rangers’ system. By that, I mean he has the hard-nosed, rough-em-up physicality that old school defenseman were known to have, while also having the ability to skate like some of the better puck-moving defenders of today’s game.

Joey Keane, on the other hand, is an OHL overager who is fundamentally sound in all zones. The advanced statistics community thinks he’s pretty good, too.

The issue with these two defenders in the eyes of the prospect analysis crowd is that neither looks like they have tremendous upside.

Lindgren did not produce a lick of offense in college. In 67 college games spanning two seasons, the Minnesota native only tallied three goals and 13 assists. With that said, his 10 game stint in Hartford was a lot more promising offensively. He notched two goals and two assists in that time frame.

It is worth noting here that Brady Skjei similarly didn’t produce much offensively in the same program, so Lindgren’s offensive numbers might say more about the system he played in then his actual ability. Yet, the questions still remain.

Whereas with Keane, there are many question marks surrounding his ability to get better offensively since he doesn’t really have any plus-level skills.

Regardless, both should make for solid third pair defenders if nothing else.

Tier 3

Brett Howden, Yegor Rykov, Libor Hajek

This tier is for players who will be quality middle-of-the-lineup-type players.

Although I really like all three of these prospects, my favorite of the group is Brett Howden and it’s not even close.

Howden is a natural leader. He has served as the Moose Jaw Warriors’ captain over the last two seasons and was an alternate captain the year before that. Howden was a leader on and off the ice for his team, and while he might not have the high end skill as a guy like Filip Chytil (who we;ll get to soon enough) he has the work ethic to become a top notch player on the team.

Howden plays a tremendous two-way game and has a terrific shot in close. He’s the guy that isn’t afraid to go to the corners or the front of the net to make something happen. He plays hungry and has a very good shot to go along with his high IQ. He’s gonna be a fun player to watch develop.

It speaks volumes of the job Jeff Gorton has done to bolster the prospect pool when you consider he traded for all three of these players in the span of a week.

If all goes right, Howden could be a second line center while Rykov and Hajek fill out the second pairing of the next Rangers’ contender.

Tier 2

Lias Andersson, Igor Shestyorkin, K’Andre Miller, Nils Lundkvist

There are some NHL franchises who would love to have these four as the centerpieces of their prospect pools. The Rangers are lucky enough to have them as their second tier of prospects. Unless something crazy happens, these four could be future NHL All Stars and key cogs in a championship team.

The Rangers have gotten a lot of flak for drafting Lias Andersson at seventh overall while leaving players like Casey Mittelstadt, Gabriel Vilardi and Michael Rasmussen on the board in the 2017 draft. The team expected Andersson to make the team out of camp but it was obvious that he was not ready.

Andersson ended up playing games in the SHL, AHL, NHL, World Juniors and World Championships in 2017-18. That has to be incredibly hard for any human to travel that much. Imagine having to play hockey at a high level in all those different situations, too?

Andersson was very good at each level he played at but was exceptional at both the World Juniors level, as well as in the AHL. In 13 World Juniors games, Andersson tallied nine goals and three assists as he captained Team Sweden. In the AHL, he was one of the league’s best 19 year olds, posting five goals and nine assists in 25 games.

Andersson may not end up being a top-line center at the NHL level, but he’ll likely end up being one of the top second line centers in the game as well as a potential future captain.

Then there’s the heir apparent to Henrik Lundqvist in Igor Shestyorkin.

Shestyorkin has been one of, if not, the best young goalies under the age of 25 in the world. He’s been in part of a time share with the best team in the KHL, SKA St. Petersburg, over the past two seasons. He’s posted back-to-back seasons with a .933 save percentage or better and has 15 shutouts over those seasons, the most in the league.

The KHL does not have much parity so it’s hard to tell how good he’d be at the NHL level. He’s played extremely well in national tournaments too, which bodes well. His contract expires after the 2018-19 season. If he comes over to North America for the 2019-20 season, expect him to split starts with Lundqvist.

Tier 1

Filip Chytil, Vitali Kravtsov

It’s a pretty view from the top of the Rangers’ farm system. Not only is it fair to assume these two  will be first-line caliber players, but I think both have the potential to be stars in the NHL for a long, long time.

We’ll start with Filip Chytil, since he’s the player we’ve all gotten a chance to watch on Garden ice so far.

Chytil will be turning 19 when training camp starts and he already has a season of AHL hockey under his belt. After making the team out of training camp unexpectedly, he didn’t last with the Rangers too long. Chytil played just 12 minutes over two games before the team sent him down to Hartford.

In his 46 games with the Wolf Pack, Chytil was extremely productive. The Czech Republic native tallied 11 goals and 20 assists for 31 points. 31 points for an 18-year old at the AHL level is almost unheard of. The last player to produce anywhere close to those numbers at that age was William Nylander of the Toronto Maple Leafs.

Chytil has the size (6-foot-3), the skating ability and the hands to become a 30-plus goal scorer during his prime years, just like the other player in this tier.

Vitali Kravstov was looking like he’d be a late first-round to second-round pick during the 2017-18 KHL season. Then he went off in the postseason. In 16 playoff games, Kravtsov notched six goals and five assists for Traktor Chelyabinsk and cemented himself as one of the world’s top young players. That’s why the Rangers selected him with the ninth overall pick.

For the people wondering if his production would carry into this upcoming season, Kravtsov was one of his team’s best players in their first few preseason games before he joined Russia’s U20 team for the Four Nations Tournament. Not only did he play well, but he was named the tournament’s best forward, notching four goals and three assists in three games.

Kratsov will likely join the Rangers for the 2019-20 season, while Chytil will likely have a spot in the Rangers’ top-six come October.