The HARSH REALITY Facing The New York Rangers

The HARSH REALITY Facing The New York Rangers

This isn’t how anyone thought the season would start out for the Rangers. After a road loss to the Calgary Flames, New York has dropped to 35-2 in their first 10 games. Still winless at home and still struggling to find their offensive footing. Sure, some growing pains were expected. They have new players, a new coach, a new system, etc. But no one predicted that things would look this rough just a few weeks in. The Rangers have failed to turn expected goals into, well, actual goals. There’s been a noticeable lack of energy across the roster, and several of their top players have regressed, no longer driving play the way that they once did. Even worse, their highly touted draft picks haven’t developed as planned, and that’s just completely stalled the natural progression of this team, leaving the franchise stuck in a rather unfortunate rut. But is it all hopeless after just 10 games into the season? or could this simply be a rough patch that the Rangers can bounce back from? Well, let’s find out together. What’s up, guys? Welcome back to the channel. Before I get into my breakdown on the Rangers, just a quick channel update. Um, for the schedule for the rest of the season, I’m going to be posting two videos per week. So, you’re going to get one full team breakdown on Monday or Tuesday where I deep dive into one organization, whether they’re struggling, having success, or maybe it’s just a team you want to learn more about. That will happen earlier in the week. And then later on in the week will be the long weekly recaps you guys have been liking a lot where I talk about all the teams, highlights, and just do a full analysis of what’s going on in the league. So, Monday or Tuesday single team breakdown, later in the week, weekly recap. Now, for today’s video, I have this separated into two different parts. The first half is going to be all about the bad stuff that’s happening with the Rangers, what they’re struggling with, what they need to improve on, etc. The second half is actually going to be praising them a bit because I feel like they’ve done a lot of good to start the season, but not a lot of people are talking about that. So, then I’m going to conclude it by just kind of talking about whether or not the Rangers can turn this around or if they’re kind of just going to be a bad team that a lot of people had too high of expectations for. So, if you guys have been enjoying the content lately, be sure to give this video a thumbs up, subscribe now, and let’s get into our breakdown of the New York Rangers. So, what’s wrong with the Rangers? Let’s start with the obvious offensive struggles. The Rangers, at the time of this recording, ranked 31st in goals for per game at 2.33. Their power play is also struggling a lot, ranking 24th with a 16.7% success rate. And outside of Taylor Radish, there’s only two players on this team with three or more goals, and one of them is a defenseman, Adam Fox. Now, I alluded to this slightly in the intro of the video, but the Rangers seriously lack players who can drive their offense. Of course, the older guys, the core that they have were supposed to be doing this, but just kind of going through player for player. JT Miller looks like he’s playing through an injury and almost lacks that extra half step that made him so impactful while he was playing in Vancouver. Arti Paneran looks like he’s been back and forth since the start of last season. And his overall performance doesn’t reflect that of an 11 million dollar player. Mika Zabanad looks like he’s on the longest slump of his life, particularly on the power play, a spot where he’s typically so impactful. But since the start of last season as well, he’s looked like a ghost in that area. Couple all of this with the fact that they’re missing Troche from their lineup who usually elevates either that second or third line. And what you get is a team that doesn’t seem to have the offensive advantage that they should have on paper, or at least the offensive advantage that existed just 2 years ago when the team won the President’s Trophy with these exact same players. Now, I’ve made countless videos on this, so I’m not going to get back into it. I I just can’t do it. But the reason the Rangers struggled last season was because of their front office and their coaching. Obviously, there was no buyin from the players, and yes, there was a severe lack of effort, but when you’re trading away team captains, highly touted draft picks, and then threatening to trade longtime players, that’s obviously not great for morale. And I think at this point, there is a small chance that this has crept into the locker room again and is still kind of holding this team back. Even with a new head coach, a new captain, and new players joining the lineup, it almost feels like that lack of motivation is still very present within that New York Rangers locker room. A quick fix for lack of motivation, usually you get a new head coach. That doesn’t seem to be working out in certain areas, and we’ll talk about Mike Sullivan a bit more later. But another fix is to inject some youth energy into the lineup, bring up some young guys who have a lot of potential, and maybe see if they can motivate that older core. But with the Rangers, one of their biggest problems has been their lack of prospects, or more specifically, their inability to properly develop these prospects into players that, well, can be effective for their lineup. New York fans know that the Rangers aren’t the best at drafting, but particularly in the first round, they are abysmal. And when they do eventually find a talented player, they either ship them off way too early or stump their development by not properly putting them in situations that suit their game. Just look at some of these names. Ko, Miller, Kratzov, Lungfist, Heedle, Anderson. They’re all gone. And now players like Schneider, and Offman are not planning out the way that they had hoped. And they’re likely going to get shipped off at some point. And just the worst of all of these picks, maybe the most, I don’t know, polarizing pick in Rangers recent history has been Alexi Lafrrenier, who has all of the talent in the world, or at least did coming into the draft and just hasn’t been that sort of player that the Rangers really needed him to be. Since being drafted, Lafrrenier has had an up and down career. in 2022 23 he really started to show promise sign that new contract but since then has just failed to move further in his development or even reach the same heights that he did that one season and it’s not a problem Alexi Lafrrener is going to be a good player but when you’re taken as the first overall pick and then you compare him to say future picks like Mlin Celbrini or even Connor Bdard they’ve already done way more in their short careers than Lafrenier has done in almost double that time and this is the model that has hurt the Rangers and follow along wrong with me? The way you build out your roster is you draft and develop players. If you fail to do that, you tend to go into free agency or the trade market to bring in players to build out your core. Now, the Rangers did a really good job with this and got some good years out of these players. But now they’re getting older and all look like they can’t drive play like they used to. So, the natural progression would be to continue drafting while you had that core and then have young players take on more responsibility while you lessen the role of those aging stars. But where the Rangers have messed up is they don’t have any players in their pipeline to take on the roles of those older players. And what they’re left with is an offense that’s getting slower, more stagnant, and just can’t seem to score the same way that they used to. Now, obviously, it’s not all grim. I think this core does have another level to them. There’s obviously still time for laugh and to develop, and they also have Gabe Perau coming up through their system who could be a huge injection for this lineup. But based on how their offense has been working through the first 10 games, I don’t see them just turning a corner all of the sudden and finding ways to score goals. I think that they’re going to have to mix something up. I’m not sure what, but something’s got to change for them to sort of light a fire underneath these guys and get them going again. Now, I’m done with all the bad stuff, so let’s get into some fun conversations around this team. Everything that’s going right for the organization right now. Through their first 10 games of the season, the Rangers have controlled 55.6% 6% of expected goals at five on five. That’s fourth best in the NHL and is a huge leap from the 25th ranking they had last year and the 23rd ranking they had the year before that. They’re also out chancing opponents at even strength, which is another unfamiliar stat for this group. And they’ve done it against a fairly average schedule. Not to mention, puck possession has always been a staple of Mike Sullivan’s teams, and seeing it translate to the Rangers this quickly has been an encouraging sign. It’s showing up on both sides of the puck as well. Their expected goals against per 60 has dropped from 2.8 to 2.23 while their expected goals for per 60 has climbed all the way to 0.25. Now, this is where I want to get into Sullivan. He’s always been a huge defensive guy and what he’s done to this Rangers Dor has been honestly incredible. I think they have one of the best defenses out there with his system. Will Borggan looks awesome, Adam Fox is revitalized, and Gabricov was the perfect addition to this group. And when you couple that with the amazing start they’ve gotten from their goalending, this team is honestly built from their back end. And if they can just get their offense going a little bit, they’re going to be incredibly dangerous to face. To further this discussion, I just want to highlight a few of their team stats real quick. Right now, their defense has been phenomenal, allowing the second fewest goals per game at 2.33. And their goalending as well has been ridiculous. Their save percentage right now is second in the league at 926. But individually for goalies who have played five or more games, Igor Shurken is leading the league in both save percentage at a 0.930 and goals against average at 1.86. You know what they say, defenses win championships. And it doesn’t hurt when you have one of the world’s best goalies playing out of his mind. So, with the good and the bad laid out, how do we feel about the Rangers? Are they a good team that’s just had some bad luck, or are they a bad team that just can’t score? Maybe there is a little bit of a mix there, but I do tend to believe that they’re more of the first thing. When you’re built that well from your back end out, I tend to believe that water will find its level. Albeit, I do think that their offense could use a little bit more juice and they need to start playing a lot better at home because that record right now is a bit embarrassing. But I think that the Rangers are a really good team. They’re going to turn that corner and I really do believe in those three young guys that I talked about earlier. And I believe that they’re going to make a huge impact for this team. Maybe not immediately, maybe not this season, but over like the next year or two, I have to believe that those guys along with this core are going to be able to start producing at a much higher level. But that’s all I got on the New York Rangers today. Of course, I want to hear from you guys, though. Do you agree with my takes? Do you disagree? Drop your thoughts in the comments below. And if you enjoyed this video, be sure to give it a thumbs up and subscribe. Now, I also have a few other pieces for you guys to check out on the screen right here. So, be sure to watch those after this one. And again, thank you guys so much for watching this video and supporting the channel. I will see you in the next upload.

The New York Rangers have officially hit rock bottom… 10 games into the season and the Rangers are still winless at home, sit at the bottom of the league in goals scored, and seem to lack any sort of identity despite playing well defensively and getting league best goaltending. Is it possible for the team to turn things around? Or is it too late? Let’s find out together. Subscribe to Jimmy Hockey for more NHL News and Breakdowns.

TikTok:

@jimmyhockeyy

Instagram:

https://www.instagram.com/jimmyhockeyy/

#nhl #hockey #stanleycupplayoffs #icehockey #hockeyhighlights #montrealcanadiens #hockeyvideos #goldenknights #edmontonoilers #nhlplayoffs #nhlhockey #connorbedard #chicagoblackhawks #vancouvercanucks #nhltradedeadline #mikkorantanen #bradmarchand #bostonbruins #edmontonoilers #connormcdavid #newyorkrangers