New York Rangers: More Chris Kreider craziness

So, what about Kreider?

There are two schools of thought when it comes to Kreider.  The first is that he is a vital piece of the offense that will be hard to replace.  He is a close friend of Mika Zibanejad’s and that chemistry is important when it concerns your best player.  If he is willing to sign for shorter term, say five years, then the money will be well spent since he is in great shape and has been mostly healthy in his career.

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Finally, the sell-offs of the last three years has to stop.  Sacrificing experienced, quality players cannot continue if the team is expected to contend for a Stanley Cup.  While the Rangers have replenished their farm system they have lost Derek Stepan, Ryan McDonagh, J.T. Miller, Mats Zuccarello, Kevin Hayes and Michael Grabner, all formidable and valuable players.  While the Blueshirts have added Artemi Panarin and Jacob Trouba, it’s mostly been a bevy of kids who are still some years away from peaking.

The other school of thought is that while valuable, retaining Kreider would cripple the team financially and force them to trade players like Ryan Strome, Anthony DeAngelo or Pavel Buchnevich.   Not only that, keeping Kreider would mean no windfall at the trade deadline.  The expectations for what they could get for him has to include a legitimate NHL player and a top prospect or draft pick.

Realities

There is an argument for both perspectives.  As maddening as he can be, he does bring an intangible to the team that they will be hard pressed to replace. If it was simply a matter of signing Kreider to a five year contract instead of re-signing Ryan Strome, there’s a simple answer.  Do it.  But if it is going to take $7 million dollars, it means trading Strome and  Buchnevich.  Can that pair bring the kind of return that Kreider could bring at the deadline? It’s worth exploring.

The bigger problem is the lack of depth among forwards in the organization.  Keeping Kreider, but losing one third of your top six could be a case of one step forward and two steps back. The decision would be a lot easier if the team knew that Kaapo Kakko, Vitali Kravtsov, Morgan Barron and Lauri Pajuniemi would be ready to be important contributors by the third  year of Kreider’s new contract.

And that is the conundrum. Keeping Kreider a Ranger for the next five years makes sense if the team is ready to be a Stanley Cup contender in that time.  But if keeping him means more years of on the job training for a bunch of twenty-somethings, we can expect more of what we have seen this season.  And that’s a pretty good description of the Buffalo Sabres.