New York Rangers: Is there value in being in the postseason chase?

Even though it’s unlikely to remain the case for the rest of the season, the New York Ranger organization is in the playoff mix. Is there value in being competitive even in a rebuilding year?

All things considered, the New York Rangers’ coaching staff and players deserve some credit for their professionalism. Coming into the season, it would have been easy to accept the lowest organizational expectations in more than a decade. However, David Quinn’s consistent preaching for relentless play has worked thus far into the season.

The players and coaching staff took those low expectations as a slight to their respective abilities. While the team obviously slowed down prior to this five-day layoff, there was quite an encouraging stretch of hockey in November. Winning nine of 11 games is hard to fake, however, small sample sizes can be misleading.

Much of New York’s success was tied to Henrik Lundqvist playing extremely well and positive regression from the offense. In the first few weeks of the year, the Rangers were shooting well below the league average of nine percent and were due for a good stretch.

Throw in the fact that the team started so terribly, the positive regression of performance was a statistical inevitability and paints a weird picture of a season. Yet, since the Rangers were not expected to compete this season, it poses an interesting question: Is there a benefit to messing up draft position for roster players to get more competitive minutes?

The perpetual rebuild

The danger for a franchise that is officially rebuilding is continually kicking the can down the road. Several organizations around the league have missed the playoffs several years in a row because their front office, coaching staff or roster experienced significant turnover.

Executives and coaches want to keep their jobs as long as possible so pushing expectations further and further away can buy them time. Think about how long the Buffalo Sabres unwound veteran talent for draft picks only to botch the draft picks or trade the player the pick eventually became.

It can be demoralizing to young players to experience nothing but losing in the developmental stages of their careers. Former Sabres’ player Ryan O’Reilly spoke about the impact consistently losing had on him as a veteran. The forward felt like his will to compete and love of hockey was fading because of consistent losing.

“It’s crept into all of our games. Yeah, it’s disappointing. It’s sad,” O’Reilly said Monday, two days after Buffalo closed one of its worst seasons in franchise history. “I feel throughout the year I’ve lost the love of the game multiple times, and just need to get back to it because it’s eating myself up, and eats the other guys up, too.”

Where the Rangers come in

As for the Rangers, the team has several players in their first full NHL season. For Filip Chytil, Lias Andersson, Brett Howden, Tony DeAngelo and Neal Pionk are still learning how to be professional athletes. With players like Lundqvist, Chris Kreider and Kevin Shattenkirk showing guidance, they have decent role models.

Yet, it’s important to keep things in perspective in terms of player development. The best way for players to learn is through playing against high-level competition in meaningful games. An accomplished player like O’Reilly saying that losing hurt his mindset proves just how important the quality of games is in development.

Given the fact that New York is somewhat still in the mix right now, the players still feel like they can play themselves into a playoff spot. Whether or not that is a misguided goal isn’t important, but the players being engaged and taking it upon themselves to prove doubters wrong is encouraging to say the least.

There is something to be gained from remaining in the mix even if the team does not ultimately make the playoffs. Giving the young guys something to play for will only help their development.