It is a lot of money for a very long time — but there was no other choice. That seems to be the consensus about the seven-year, $59.5 million, extension Henrik Lundqvist signed yesterday. After all, this New York Rangers’ goaltender has won a Vezina Trophy, and been nominated for five. His career save percentage is a dominant .920. IH gave him his due before the season started: Lundqvist has been one of the best, if not the best, goalie for the last several years.
But an $8.5 million AAV (average annual value) with a no-move clause for seven more seasons pins the Rangers against a wall – if New York does not amnesty buyout their current team-leading scorer, Brad Richards, this summer, the trio of Lundqvist, Richards, and Rick Nash will account for one-third of the team’s salary (assuming that the cap rises from $64.3 million to $70.2 million, which it is projected to do).
Pittsburgh tied down Sidney Crosby, Evgeni Malkin, and Kris Letang for a sum cap hit of $25.45 million (36.3 percent of the team’s finances next season) until 2022. But here’s the thing: Sidney Crosby is the best player in the NHL in the prime of his career. Evgeni Malkin is arguably the second best player in the game in the prime of his career. Kris Letang is a very skilled defenseman with huge offensive capability and may play for Team Canada in Sochi. Letang is also in the prime of his career. If you are going to pay your core handsomely, you need them to be gangbusters. When even one or more of these three have been injured, major problems have arisen for the Penguins.
And injuries are a huge consideration since it is hard to imagine why fate would be any more forgiving to the second most expensive, much older triad. Nash will be 30 in June, Richards will be 34 in May, and Lundqvist will be 32 in March. They are all just beginning their contracts, and a franchise needs its high-end pieces to be transformative impact players. A team needs its core players to play up to or above their cap hit.
A costly misfire is salvageable (Martin Havlat and Dany Heatley), but you need the rest to play up to or above their earnings. If a team is paying three players 33 percent of its salary, you need to have them be game-changers who steal games – help you win games when you should not. Like what Crosby did against the New York Islanders the other night. Nash and Richards are not those players anymore. Lundqvist was, and maybe still can be, but the age factor is just so concerning. It also has been noted that when goaltenders turn 35, bad things start to happen.
All of this will be addressed imminently because the expiration date for the compliance buyout is this summer, and the UFA and RFA list for the Rangers is long and uncomfortable. Most notably, Ryan Callahan, Dan Girardi, and Anton Stralman become UFAs, and John Moore, Derick Brassard, Chris Kreider, and Mats Zuccarello become RFAs. Moore and Kreider are coming off their entry-level contracts, so a bridge contract is possible, and likely, for at least one of them.
But very important pieces will be expecting raises, and unless Richards gets bought out, there will not be enough money to go around. The salary cap is expected to continuously rise over the next five years, but New York’s finances will be determined this summer. You can always replace spare parts, but many of the aforementioned pieces play crucial special teams’ roles and crunch-time minutes for the Blueshirts. All of which begs the macro question: Can you win with a core built around Nash, Richards, and Lundqvist?
Rick Nash
Nash put up gaudy stats last year, his first on the Rangers, scoring 21 goals in 44 games. Nash’s talent is obvious, and advanced statistics measured out his ability to push the puck north, since he led the Rangers in Corsi and Relative Corsi in 2013 per Behindthenet.ca. His stickhandling skills are outstanding, his mobility is excellent for his size, and he has a hard, penetrating shot.
But this season his impact has been more modest, largely because he had a serious concussion which sidelined him for 17 games, or maybe because the quality of competition relative to his teammates’ has been the toughest. Despite goals in three of his last four games, there have been long spans of time when Nash has not looked like the best player on the ice. His distaste for defensive play persists, and often his solo efforts result in turnovers. The advanced statistics in his 11 games are middling; he has Corsi and Fenwick for percentages of 50.8 and 50.3 respectively, and his PDO is high, which is because the goaltending when he has been on the ice has been unsustainably great. Look for more goals to be scored against Nash in the games going forward.
In 2012, Neil Greenberg presciently warned against the risk of trading for Rick Nash. Greenberg said Nash was a one-way player who will not maintain his high level of production from the ages of 28 to 33. Nash is entering the years of diminishing returns for a winger, and is not adapting his game in such a way that will help him find scoring in other facets. He avoids the corners and does not go into the dirty areas for goals.
In the postseason, when teams clamp down defensively and space is precious, Nash struggled to perform under the tight-checking game conditions. He finished the 2013 playoffs with one goal and two assists in 12 games. Nash has a strong Olympic performance on his resume, but that was four whole years ago. To put that in perspective, Chris Pronger was an assistant captain and Steven Stamkos was not on the Canadian team back then. A lot has changed.
The best players use give-and-gos, and work off the puck to find space to create scoring opportunities for themselves or their linemates. This can mean setting up along the half-boards so they can one-touch a pass to a teammate in the slot, or receiving the puck, drawing the attention of the sagging defense, and then kicking it out for a one-timer to the better-positioned defenseman. In many ways, what you do off of the puck is as important as what you do with it.
The best players navigate through coverage and position themselves for the play if they get the puck. They will get in the tough areas to make a deflection. They can shift the angle with the blade of their stick to warp the ice to their pleasure.
Nash does none of this. Nash is puck-dominant – and what he does is seldom within the flow of the offense or the four Rangers players on the ice with him. If he does not have the puck, he really does not know what to do. It seems fair to wonder whether he developed some of his bad habits when he was shouldering the load for so long in Columbus, but Nash’s go-to move off the puck is to stand around and hope someone gives him the puck.
If this happens, he will shoot, or he will try to deke around a few opponents before opening up his scoring chance. Nash will pass, but he has to create and possess the puck first. Because of these reasons, it is actually more understandable why he has meshed with Derek Stepan and Chris Kreider. Both of those players have versatile skillsets and work well away from the puck. Kreider is speedy, powerful, and a good forechecker. Stepan is crafty and a good distributor; he also forechecks well and can move to spaces where he can be useful.
If Stepan or Kreider are controlling the puck, Nash is standing still, waiting for a pass. A sniper like Alexander Ovechkin can do that, but he has become more active since Adam Oates went behind the bench – and if he is standing still, it is on the power play. Additionally, Ovechkin’s shot is a missile – Nash’s shot is not nearly that puncturing. The inactivity displayed by Nash is rare in a star player, and does not project well for his future success. Nash has so much talent that he can get by with his stickhandling and one-on-one ability. But as he ages, will he be able to retool his game to mitigate his diminishing speed and waning one-on-one finesse? IH is skeptical.
Brad Richards
When Richards was a younger lad, he had a big, heavy slap shot and white-hot speed. He also possessed good vision and a penchant for making a hardnosed play in the gritty areas. Richards still has those skills he had in the mid-aughts, but their impact has lessened as he has gotten older. Richards does not pick corners on his shots or turn the corner on a defenseman. Instead, he has been forced to become a more resourceful player. And his adaption to aging has taken some tinkering, but this season he is leading the Rangers in scoring. Richards is playing well.
But the risk/reward for keeping Richard is extremely concerning since he is signed until 2019-20 and his contract is attached with a no-movement clause. Moreover, by the contract’s conclusion, Richards would be 40. If New York were to buy him out, it would cost the Rangers $18 million spread over 12 years — pricey, but mangeable.
Richards’ game now consists of shooting a high volume of pucks towards the net and exhibiting patience and poise with the puck. New York has some very fast players, and Richards, being the smart player that he is, finds ways to spring his linemates. However, Richards’ reliability at winning faceoffs in his current form is close to a coin toss.
The smart move for New York would be an amnesty buyout. If that happens, 29 teams should be lining up to sign him, because Richards could still be a top-six player on a contender. But Richards is no longer superstar caliber, and the length and cost of his contract demand that he be one.
Henrik Lundqvist
It seems foolish to bet against Henrik Lundqvist, he has been so great for so long. Additionally, you need very good goaltending to win a Stanley Cup, but incredible goalie play is not a requisite. A deep, talented, healthy forward group and mobile, responsible defensive corps are arguably more important. If Lundqvist can maintain a save percentage in the .915 range for five more years, New York’s metaphorical Cup window remains open. However, the rest of their roster is littered with uncertainties — who will stay and who will go — with the crux of the problem lying at Richards and Nash’s skates.
