As the New York Rangers’ organization navigates a rebuilding season, many have demurred the team’s efforts to try and play competitive hockey because of a potential draft selection. They should think about recent NHL history.
Aside from the obvious, players are never going to dress for a professional hockey game and not care about the result, there are other factors at play as to why teams do not just outright tank as teams do in the NBA. Tanking is not a strategy unique to the Edmonton Oilers, Toronto Maple Leafs and Buffalo Sabres this decade.
The first notable tank occurred in 1984 when both Hakeem Olajuwon and Michael Jordan were in college. With multiple franchises recognizing the potential impact either could have on their future, several teams engaged in outright losing. Aging journeymen were suddenly given 40 minutes per night and players took three weeks to recover from a bout of the flu.
Simply put, the NBA is much more unabashed when its teams are interested in landing the top pick. There is also the added factor that one single player can totally change the trajectory of a basketball team in a way that one person can’t in hockey.
Since NHL teams can’t just win a single lottery and immediately get back to relevancy, it often requires a multi-year effort of picking towards the top of the draft. NHL teams dress 18 skaters and two goaltenders every single night, a far larger group than the typical nine-man rotation that most NBA teams incorporate during the regular season.
A culture of losing
The single biggest drawback of consistently losing over an extending period of time is morale. Eventually, players, no matter how talented, will grow tired of the same old story without any hope in sight. Prior to the Sabres trade of Ryan O’Reilly to the St. Louis Blues this past summer, the forward condemned the losing culture and the negative impact his time in Buffalo had.
"“We’re stuck in this mindset of just being OK with losing,” O’Reilly said Monday. “I feel it, too. I think it’s really crept into myself. Over the course of the year, I’ve lost myself a lot, where it’s just kind of get through, just being OK with just not making a mistake. That’s not winning hockey at all, and it’s crept into all of our games."
The Sabres have not made the postseason since 2010-2011 when the group lost in the first round for the second straight year. For much of this decade, Buffalo was a perennial loser that failed to draft well or acquire marquee free agents and it took a mental toll on its players. As O’Reilly further explained:
"“It’s disappointing. It’s sad. I feel throughout the year I’ve lost the love of the game multiple times. You need to get back to it because it’s just eating myself up and eats the other guys, too. It’s just eating us up, and it’s tough.”"
There’s no way to successfully traverse such an existence with no hope in sight. Of Buffalo’s draft picks since its last postseason appearance, just three have managed to be above average players at the NHL level. The three, Jack Eichel, Rasmus Ristolanen and Sam Reinhart are good, but there should have been more.
Eichel may be the player to finally lead the team back to the postseason, but he really should have had a significant team around him prior to this year. However, persistent losing can and does stunt the growth of promising talent. If an established NHL player like O’Reilly is struggling to get up for a game, what is a 19-year-old going to do?
Fun and bad
This brings us to the New York Rangers and the franchise’s effort to rebuild through the draft without totally bottoming out. No matter how strong the urge may be for the front office to sell off any player over the age of 24 to land a bounty of draft picks, there’s a reason teams don’t ever get out of the cellar.
Banking on landing a generational talent at the top of the draft is a one-way ticket to chronic mismanagement. Take the Oilers for example, although the team picked in the top ten of the draft for eight straight seasons, there was a single year of postseason play sprinkled in. So, even if a team does tank, there’s no promise of results.
That’s why the Rangers’ recent stretch of quality play is extremely encouraging. New York hanging in against Tampa Bay on Saturday, February second and winning against the Boston Bruins on Wednesday the sixth are signs of life from a group that has every reason to phone it in.
While Mats Zuccarello and Kevin Hayes are still members of the team, the two are serving as the link from the postseason teams earlier this decade to the players of the future. They were on those resilient Rangers’ teams that rallied back from 3-1 deficits in consecutive postseasons and truly embrace the never say die attitude.
Learning how to play the game the right way is absolutely crucial to establishing a culture of success. The young guys like Filip Chytil, Tony DeAngelo, Neal Pionk, Brett Howden, Pavel Buchnevich and Alexandar Georgiev are expected to push themselves every single night. That attitude stems from the top and head coach David Quinn, who’s pushing the team hard.
If nothing else comes from this season, the head coach is pushing players to expect to win. An insatiable desire for greatness is a driving force for the very best in sports. The Rangers are a long way off from competing for a Stanley Cup, but, building good habits now is the foundation for a positive long-term outcome.
Watching the Rangers rally back from a two-goal deficit against a far more talented Bruins team should encourage everyone in the New York orbit. While not the most talented group of players, the Rangers have heart and won’t just roll over and die when things look tough.