New York Rangers common supervisor Chris Drury has made it clear, by repeating history, that his facet are open for business because the Olympic break and commerce deadline method.
Artemi Panarin can be gone. It’s seemingly {that a} raft of veterans will observe him out the door. Will former first total choose Alexis Lafreniere be a kind of leaving Madison Sq. Backyard?
Alexis Lafreniere has foundational potential
There’s a military of people that will let you know that the Rangers faltered in taking Lafreniere with the primary choose in 2020. He was, although, the consensus prime choose, regardless of who held that choice. Over three seasons with Rimouski Oceanic within the QMJHL, Lafreniere racked up 327 factors in 193 video games, incomes comparisons to David Pasternak and Alex Ovechkin.
Lafreniere is clearly an impressive expertise. He possesses a depraved wrister, nice imaginative and prescient, can stickhandle with the perfect of them and might activate a dime. It was solely a few seasons in the past that Lafreniere emerged as a 22-year-old, posting 57 factors in 82 video games. Extra impressively, he was arguably the Rangers finest skater all through the playoffs, particularly in opposition to the reigning – and eventual – champion Florida Panthers, with 14 factors over 16 video games.
That was two seasons in the past, and he has struggled since (hardly the one Ranger to take action). However when he turns it on, he’s completely world class. His efficiency in opposition to Florida within the Winter Basic was distinctive, main the Rangers to a dominant upset win with the primary three-assist sport of his skilled profession.
The NHL is the primary time in his hockey life that Lafreniere hasn’t been the clear finest participant on his group. As a lot as a rebuilding and/or retooling Rangers group would possibly wrestle to bury the biscuit, might Lafreniere start to seek out himself once more when there isn’t any Panarin or Vincent Trochek to dominate the play? Does he embrace accountability? Do we start to see these elite turns? That visionary playmaking? The laser guided wrist pictures?
Most significantly, can we see Lafreniere regain his edge? The killer intuition that made him a prime choose?
What if he doesn’t? What if this sometimes good however typically infuriating participant is solely what Lafreniere is? Even when he plateaus as a 60-point-per-season participant, at a $7.45m cap hit, that’s completely acceptable within the new cap setting.
Is Alexis Lafreniere a product of his environment?
Again in 2023, this author questioned Lafreniere’s off-ice professionalism and skill to be a cog in a machine versus the fulcrum of an assault. Whereas he might discover a new gear when the offense is constructed round him, it’s extra seemingly that Lafreniere’s laissez-faire angle to the game implies that he’ll seemingly by no means attain his prodigious potential.
That additionally raises the query: is Lafreniere a symptom, relatively than a trigger?
Is “‘Laffy’s” finest season merely a results of enjoying alongside Trochek (77 factors that season) and Panarin (120 factors), all three having fun with profession years? Given Panarin and Trocheck have continued to provide at a stable tempo even because the Rangers kind has plummeted over the previous two campaigns, Lafreniere has fallen away sharply, suggesting that he isn’t a driver of play. Reasonably, he’s a symptom. If his group play nicely, he shines. If not, Lafreniere struggles alongside them.
To that finish, if each of these two get moved, does Lafreniere wrestle additional with out elite playmakers subsequent to him? Reasonably than embracing the accountability of main a line, does he wilt underneath the stress?
The decision
Lafreniere’s commerce worth has by no means been decrease. A scarcity of acceptable gives for a proficient, if perplexing, participant might lead the Rangers to carry him and see what he can do with elevated accountability.
That stated, the Rangers tradition is evidently horrible. Lafreniere doesn’t strike anyone as the kind of persona who can lead a locker room reboot. Does that imply Drury takes successful now, realizing that his worth might probably drop additional?
It appears extra seemingly that the Rangers solely transfer on a commerce with a stable return, which is unlikely to eventuate. That stated, it solely takes one Lafreniere believer.
