In yesterday’s post, I looked at the New York Rangers performance this season and their overall roster profile. We saw a team that appears to be in real danger of missing the playoffs the season after making a run to the Eastern Conference Final. Today, we’ll look at some options to improve the roster in season to make a return trip to the postseason.
Current Lineup
In yesterday’s post, we looked at the Rangers roster profile and saw a team that is expected to be near average defensively but grades out very poorly in even strength offense. A below average forward group appeared to be the biggest factor, while their defense corps looked like it could also stand an upgrade.
Let’s look at the current lineup in more detail to get a better picture of the current roster. First, we’ll look at projected net impact along with cap hit. Next, projected offensive and defensive impact.
Strengths
Center Depth: The combination of Mika Zibanejad, Filip Chytil and Vincent Trocheck down the middle gives the Rangers a fairly robust lineup down the middle. Chytil has shown development in his profile through the season to date, which could lead to some internal improvement here before the stretch drive.
Goaltending: Igor Shesterkin continues to perform like one of the top few goaltenders in the world. He gives the Rangers a chance to win on most nights, even when the team in front of him doesn’t have their best game.
Areas for Improvement
Top 6 Wingers: While center depth is a strength, the top 6 desperately needs an injection of high end impact to make the entire lineup more dangerous offensively. Swapping Kreider and Lafreniere may help a bit, but the right side needs an addition or two.
Forward Defensive Impact: The current top six has a number of players who are expected to struggle defensively. That leads to excess time spent in the defensive end and lack of opportunity to attack. We’ve already identified the top 6 wingers as a weakness and finding an upgrade that can help the offensive players play in the attacking end would be beneficial.
Bottom 4 D: The bottom pair could clearly use an upgrade on the left side. Looking at the offensive/defensive impact of the Miller/Trouba pair, it looks like a defensive upgrade on the second pair could also yield dividends. Such a move could bump Miller down to the third pair, where more favorable matchups may also maximize his impact.
Cap Situation
The Rangers have $2.58M in current cap space and $7.1M in projected deadline cap space (via CapFriendly). That’s certainly enough to make some improvements.
The trouble is that waiting until the trade deadline to make a move presents a real risk of falling behind in the playoff race early given the team trends we saw in yesterday’s post. Moving out some salary could provide some additional flexibility for additions, yet it would also create another hole in the roster that would need to be addressed.
Trade Deadline Targets
It’s time we step into the GM’s chair and look for some options to improve the Rangers roster with the intent of making the playoffs this season. With the Rangers current position in the standings and knowledge of their team metrics, we’ll assume we need to make at least one move well before the deadline so we can’t use the full $7.1M in deadline cap space. Let’s take a look at some potential targets to address the weaknesses we identified above, with a focus on pending free agents.
Jonathan Drouin (MTL): A 27 year old pending UFA, Drouin would add some skill to the top 6. We don’t need salary retention included in the deal to take on his $5.5M cap hit at the deadline but it would certainly help make some additional upgrades if we did.
Vladimir Tarasenko (STL): The Blues continue to be streaky this season. If they fall into seller status by the deadline, Tarasenko could become a rental option. His $7.5M cap hit means we likely need some salary retention in the deal if we want to make another addition.
Tyler Motte (CHI): The Senators aren’t where they hoped to be in the standings and it could mean some pending UFAs become available by the deadline. Motte fit in well with the Rangers after last season’s deadline acquisition. Motte won’t give us the big upgrade to the top 6 we’re after but could be a useful secondary addition with only a $1.3M cap hit.
Nick Bjugstad (ARI): Similar to Motte, Bjugstad is not likely to land high in the lineup but could be a secondary upgrade. The pending UFA has a $900k cap hit this seaosn and has played better than projected on a very weak Coyotes squad.
Caleb Jones (CHI): Jones is a pending RFA and could provide a boost to the bottom 4. He’s performing below projection so far this season, but there may be some team effects showing through in Chicago. He comes with a very affordable $1.35M cap hit and there’s a possibility the Rangers could extend the 25 year old past this season as well.
Hypothetical Post-Deadline Lineup
We need a legitimate top six winger and a couple of secondary upgrades will help improve the roster as well. Since we want to make a few moves, we’ll go for the lower cap hit top six winger option we identified in Jonathan Drouin. Depending if we get any salary retention in the deal, we may be able to swing this further ahead of the deadline. Even if we wait until the deadline, we should have enough to make a couple of affordable additions in Tyler Motte and Caleb Jones. With all the moves, we’ll assume that we’re able to put together a suitable package without including a current NHL roster player.
The addition of Drouin gives the top 6 some additional punch. Barclay Goodrow moves into a more suitable role in the bottom six where he’ll see some more favorable matchups. Tyler Motte provides another reliable bottom six option that is defensively responsible yet also capable of chipping in offensively. And while adding Caleb Jones doesn’t quite get us the second pair upgrade we hoped for, it does give us an upgrade on the left side that’s capable of taking spot duty in the top 4.
Of course, there are plenty of unknowns for us armchair GMs. The precise moves we’ve identified may not even be possible. But it does provide us a glimpse of what may be possible. If the Rangers can identify and make some similar upgrades to the ones we’ve outlined above, they’ll be much better positioned for the playoff race and postseason.
It’s also not the only way to upgrade the roster. How would you upgrade the Rangers roster?
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Historical player data from Natural Stat Trick. Contract data from CapFriendly.
