Why Chris Kreider drives Ranger fans crazy

Bring up Chris Kreider‘s name to New York Rangers fans and it is guaranteed to start a debate.   His supporters will maintain that he is one of the most valuable players on the team and tick off the following reasons.  He is a game changer when he uses his size and speed.  He’s a team leader and top scorer who is crucial to the power play.  When the Rangers signed him for seven years at $6.5 million a year, they got a bargain and a guarantee that they will have a force on the left side until 2027.

His detractors will say that he is a streaky scorer, prone to long periods of low production.  Although he is one of the strongest and fastest players on the team, he rarely uses those assets.  He has the most seniority on a young team, but doesn’t acknowledge that he needs to be a team leader and doesn’t lead by example.  They will say that the contract he signed will come back to haunt the team for years to come as it won’t expire until he is 36 years years old.

His detractors are winning the debate so far this season. He has scored one goal in four games. He has taken eight shots while averaging over 18 minutes per game.  He hasn’t scored at even strength and his plus/minus is a-2.

At 5v5 his Corsi For percentage is 42.31%, meaning that when he is on the ice the Rangers have had 33 shot attempts compared to 45 for the opposition.  It’s second worst on the team, ahead only of linemate Mika Zibanejad.  He’s had only three high danger scoring chances at even strength. The only player (including defensemen) on the team with fewer is Kevin Rooney who has played only one full game this season.

Sure, Kreider is built for the power play, but he has scored only one power play goal despite more time with the man advantage than any player not named Artemi Panarin and that goal ricocheted off a defenseman.

In his favor, he is killing penalties for the first time in his career, logging 4:55 shorthanded, fifth most among forwards.

So, who is the true Chris Kreider?

The answer is that he is both.  Perhaps the most accurate description from either camp is that he is streaky.  Actually, he is incredible streaky and that means when critics say that he vanishes for long periods and has little impact on the team, they are right.  But they are wrong when he is hot. When he is on a hot streak, he is the game changer that everyone hopes for and he is a key to the Rangers being a winning team.

How streaky is he?  We took a look at the last five seasons and found that Kreider’s streaks are not limited to a handful of games, they go on for weeks.  In fact,  the last two years, the difference between his droughts and his hot streaks has been vast.

2019-20 season

Last season Kreider was in an extended slump for the two months of the season.  In his first 28 games he scored six goals and added seven assists for 13 points.   Over his last 35 games he scored 18 goals and 32 points.  He increased his Goals Per Game (GPG) average from 0.21 to 0.51 and his Points Per Game(PPG) average from 0.46 to 0.91.

In other words, he doubled his production the last 35 games he played, just in time for him to cash in with his big contract.  If he had not picked up play, there is no way the Rangers would have re-signed him and similarly, his revival was a big reason the Rangers played so well the back half of the season.

2018-19 season

Two seasons ago it was the reverse.  Kreider started off hot and then he cooled off. In his first 52 games he scored 24 goals, a 0.46 GPG rate.  He added 20 assists for 44 points, a .85 PPG rate.  Over a full season, that would have meant 37 goals and 70 points.   He finished with 28 goals and 52 points.

Over the last 27 games of the season he scored only four goals and four assists.   That was a .15 GPG and .30 PPG rate for over one third of the season.

2017-18 season

While the last two seasons has shown radical shifts, he was less inconsistent in the 2017-18 season, most likely due to the fact that Kreider missed 24 games with a blood clot. In essence, he had to restart his season twice.  As a result, he had two mediocre stretches of goal scoring, but had good assists totals after coming back from the blood clot.

2016-17 season

In 2016-17, Kreider had his best season as a goal scorer, totaling 28 goals in 75 games. But again, it was a tale of two seasons.  In his first 40 games he scored 18 goals and totaled 34 points.  The last 35 games he had only 10 goals and nine assists.  That was a drop off in GPG from .45 to .28 and a drop in PPG from .85 to .54.

Again, instead of scoring what projected to be 36 goals and 70 points he finished with 28 goals and 53 points.

2015-16 season

The 2015-16 was Kreider’s fourth season in the NHL and at age 24 he was no longer a raw rookie.  He displayed the same inconsistency that he has shown over the last five years.   In the first 40 games of the season he scored only six goals.  In the last 39 games he scored 15.