Projecting the Rangers’ salary cap issues beyond next season

The 2021-22 roster

So, for that $67 million, what does the roster look like?

Line 1:  Panarin-Strome-Kakko
Line 2: Kreider-Zibanejad-Buchnevich
Line 3: Lemieux-Chytil-Kravtsov
Line 4:  Gauthier-Howden-DiGiuseppe

Spare forward:  Andersson

Defense 1: Trouba-Miller
Defense 2: Fox-Lindgren
Defense 3:  DeAngelo-Hajek

Spare defense:  Rykov or Lundkvist

Goal:  Shesterkin
Goal:  Georgiev

At first look, it appears the team is in pretty good shape. It’s much the same roster that they have today, with another full year of NHL experience under their belts.  The rebuild continues with the addition of K’Andre Miller, Vitali Kravtsov and potentially Nils Lundkvist and Yegor Rekov along with the revival of Lias Andersson.  It also appears that there is some room for the team to dip into free agency and fill some holes in the lineup.   Is this a realistic picture?

Intangibles

Although it’s easy to assume that the team will give their restricted free agents the minimum, it may make some sense for the Rangers to lock their best young players up for a longer term.  The prime example is Igor Shesterkin.

Shesterkin will be an arbitration eligible RFA in 2021-22.  He will also be an unrestricted free agent after the 2021-22 season since he turns 27 in December 2022.  If he is as good as he has shown so far in his brief NHL career, the Rangers would be wise to lock him in for long term. Could they get him to sign a six year contract for $5 million per year?

Shesterkin is unusual because he is an older player.  The other RFA’s are not as close to free agency so the Rangers can play hardball and sign them for bargain rates.  The challenge is that many of them will be a year from arbitration eligibility and it may makes sense to sign some of them for longer term to avoid that.

An example was last summer.  The Ranger had arbitration eligible RFA’s in Pavel Buchnevich and Jacob Trouba and chose to sign both of them to avoid arbitration.  In Trouba’s case they inked him to seven year, $56 million deal.  Buchnevich signed a two year, $6.5 million contract and will be in the same situation again after next season.

Should they do the same with Filip Chytil?  He is five years away from UFA status and will be eligible for arbitration after the 2021-22 season.   Ryan Lindgren is in the same position, as is Brett Howden.  There’s no rush, but depending on how these players develop, they may have to make those decisions.

Whatever route they choose to take, there will be consequences for years to come.