The New York Rangers announced that they signed former 1st overall pick Alexis Lafreniere to a 2 year extension earlier this week. The deal is worth $4.65M and sports a $2.325M AAV.

   While the deal will ostensibly keep Lafreniere in Rangers Blue for the immediate future, it’s done little to quiet rumours that the club could still be shopping him behind the scenes. A possibility that would certainly be an outlier amongst recent number 1 overall picks.

   The simple truth is that whether it be their system, coaching, organizational philosophy or a combination of all three, the Rangers have done an exceptionally poor job at developing their top prospects of late.

   From 2013 through 2016, the Rangers rattled off 4 consecutive playoff appearances, culminating in an Eastern Conference Finals appearance as well as a Stanley Cup Finals loss to the Los Angeles Kings. As a result of that run of success, the Rangers were willing to part with draft capital in an attempt to bolster their roster to “win now”.

   Over the course of four drafts, New York picked no higher than 41st overall, before finally returning to the 1st round in 2017. But despite having top ten picks in 4 consecutive draft classes, the Blueshirts have very little to show in terms of homegrown talent in their system.

   Swedish born forward Lias Andersson was the front office’s first crack at replenishing their prospect pool in 2017. But fast forward 6 years and he’s only managed to suit up for 110 games total, registering 17pts (7G, 10A) along the way. Now a member of the Los Angeles Kings, Andersson never found his footing in the Big Apple, and couldn’t live up to his 7th overall draft status.

   NHL regulars such as Casey Mittelstadt, Gabriel Vilardi, Martin Necas and Nick Suzuki were taken in short order after the Rangers made their selection.

   2018 saw New York roll the dice on talented Russian forward Vitali Kravstov. 64 games into his career, a trip back to Russia, and a trade to Vancouver later, the 6’3” winger is already on his last legs in the NHL with only 12pts (6G, 6A) to show for his 9th overall draft pedigree.

   The following year mercifully yielded a draft pick who is still under Ranger control. But despite a career high 40pts (18G, 22A) last season, Kaapo Kakko hasn’t lived up to his 2nd overall billing with 98pts (44G, 54A) across 4 NHL campaigns. Rangers GM Chris Drury is hoping that last year’s mini-breakout is a sign of things to come for the talented Finn, but with a new coach in Peter Laviolette set to take over, that’s far from a given at this point.

   Which brings us back to Lafreniere. While there was rampant debate about who would be selected from the 2nd pick onwards in 2020, Lafreniere was viewed as a “slam dunk” 1st overall selection three years prior.

   With 297pts (114G, 183A) in 173 games for the Rimouski Oceanic, Lafreniere was being touted as the next great French-Canadian forward to come out of the QMJHL. 

   However, coaching changes, front office turnover, and an almost laughable amount of movement up and down the line up has left Rangers fans underwhelmed with the team’s first number 1 draft pick of the NHL Entry Draft era.

   Making matters worse is the level of impact those selected after Lafreniere in the 2020 draft have already had on their rebuilding clubs. 

   Tim Stutzle (3rd overall, Ottawa) looks to be staking his claim alongside Jack Hughes as the next wave of top line NHL centres. Lucas Raymond (4th overall, Detroit) has enjoyed back to back years of high level production in the Motor City. And Jake Sanderson (5th overall, Ottawa), and Jamie Drysdale (6th overall, Anaheim) look like they’re already on the cusp of vying for top pairing minutes with their respective clubs.

   So grave is the matter, that New York couldn’t even bring themselves to offer Lafreniere a cursory 3 year extension, opting instead to hedge their bets with a 2 year pact instead. Not exactly a ringing endorsement from management that they’ve got confidence in the 21 year old winger at this stage of his development.

   In fact, despite the fact that the Salary Cap has more than doubled since it was first implemented in 2005-06, Lafreniere’s deal is the lowest AAV contract handed out to a number 1 overall pick in the Salary Cap Era.

   Lafreniere’s $2.3M AAV deal trails that of every 1st overall pick who’s reached their 2nd contract since the implementation of the salary cap. And yes, that includes even cautionary tale poster boy Nail Yakupov.

   The Saint-Eustache, QC native’s 91pts through the first 3 seasons of his career are the second lowest amongst qualifying players. A list that also includes 3 blue liners. Even more jarring however is the fact that he’s played the 7th most games of anyone on the list, and only managed to beat out the aforementioned Yakupov by 3pts despite playing 24 more games than the former Oiler.

   While some of the blame has to be shouldered by the player, most of it should be heaped on the Rangers front office, who’s track record of developing high end talent is almost non-existent at this point. 

   Former 2018 1st round blue liner Nils Lundkqvist now seems like an everyday NHL defenseman. Unfortunately it took joining the Dallas Stars for him to unlock that potential. Despite being a 6th draft pick, defenseman Morgan Barron was at one time a highly touted prospect in the Rangers system. But after fizzling out across two stints in New York, he was moved to Winnipeg where he put together the first full NHL season of his career registering 21pts (8G, 13A) across 70 games this year.

   Filip Chytil appears to have finally carved out an everyday role for himself. But he’s still fallen well short of his 21st overall expectations, with 3 campaigns in the 20 point range, before registering a career high 45pts in 2022-23. Only 23 years old, the book hasn’t been written on the Czech forward quite yet. But at best, he and K’Andre Miller appear to be the rather low ceilinged exceptions to the rule.

   Task number one for Laviolette will be to try to help “the kid line” of Lafreniere, Chytil and Kakko reach their full potential in New York this fall. However, that’s also a task he needs to balance with the heightened expectations of both the fanbase and front office for a deep playoff run after a disappointing 1st round exit to New Jersey this past spring.

   Laviolette brings championship experience to the table, but also doesn’t come with a reputation for nurturing prospects along the way. Currently projected to have the 9th best record in the NHL this season by several sportsbooks, Laviolette doesn’t have the luxury of bringing the kids along slowly at this point. And should they find themselves in the dog house of the former Cup winning coach, Lafreniere and company could find themselves relegated back to the kids table fighting to see north of 10 minutes of ice time a night.

   Should that scenario play out, the rumblings around the former 1st overall draft picks availability will only continue to increase.

-Kyle Skinner

Twitter: @JKyleSkinner

Photo: Tlop2000. This file is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 International license.

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