Gonna throw it out there for discussion. Was Panarin some kind of issue in the dressing room and on the ice? Zibanejad for one seems a lot happier and playing loose like in the past. Lafreniere looking like a number one overall. But that just might be idiot Ranger coaches finally giving him the opportunities that other teams successful high picks got. To not have made room for him on the PP after his 2023-2024 regular season and playoffs was a self inflicted growth stunting move by Drury. He was ready and he sat watching PP's again for all last year and the start of this year. Very poor asset management by the Rangers. That being said Lafreniere is also playing loose not looking for Panarin every time he has the puck. Been reading this Panarin cancer stuff on the net and think it might have some merit.
2020-2021 -The original problem for Laf (age 19, first season) was he was a left wing and the Rangers had CK and Panarin as the top 6 left wings. There is no way he displaces either one. The right side had Buch figuring it out as a #1rw, then a series of kakko/Kravstov/blackwell/chytl/Newbomb Gauthier/even Howden and also Laf and CK trying out the RW on the 2nd line.
What a mess. They also only played 56 games in the Covid season.
2021-2022 Buch traded to make room for Kakko, Panarin 22g/74a/96pts and CK goes insane with 52g, with 25ppg, Zib has 15ppg fed by Panarin/Strome/Fox. The pp was insane. So no room for Laf on the pp and Gallant was pretty much not changing what was working. Occasionally, the Laf/Chytl/kakko line showed some juice. Gallant probably should have left that line intact, but Goodrow/Hunt/Gauthier should not be playing top 6 rw.
The right wings that season were Laf/Goodrow/Kakko/Hunt/ Gauthier and then they picked up Vetrano and Copp for the playoffs because the right wings were not cutting it. They probably should have kept Vetrano.
2022-2023 Dump Strome, sign Trocheck, and the right wings are more or less Laf/Kakko/Goodrow/Vesey/Gauthier(40 games)/Kravstov(28games!) and they then sign Tarasenko and effing Kane for the playoffs. There is still no way laf moves ahead of CK and Panarin. Chytil has his best season with 22g/23a/45pts. Kakko hits 40pts, laf hits 39. The kid line shows some juice again, but kakko and Laf are rotated thru the top 6 on right wing. The goaltending covers up a lot of problems again and they lose to the Devils in round 1 and Gallant is fired. Gallant was no help for young guys either as he ground down the 2 top lines night after night.
The point here is to show that there was no way for Laf to play his natural position from the beginning of his career unless he was playing with Chytl as the 3C. Also, there was no way for him to get #1pp time due to the success of the #1 pp unit. Throw in Gallant/Lav and Laf's age, own personality, and the deferring to the older guys and you see what happened. Also, these were Ranger teams that were expected to go deep in the playoffs, so there was no room for patience. It was also becoming clear that Kakko was not really a #1rw and maybe not even a #2rw. That left a hole that was never quite filled and led to the Rangers going the rental route for the playoff push.
Panarin drove the offense and laf pretty much deferred to him when he finally locked up a RW slot with the Trocheck line. The locker room stuff is really hard to figure. Comments from 1 player about another player are subject to a lot of interpretations. It always seemed Panarin was well liked, but what do I know? Hazing younger guys affects everybody in a different way.
I think Laf has finally matured. Sometimes we forget how young these guys are when they come straight out of juniors with insane expectations. You could always see the offensive creativity in his game. With the lack of pressure right now, he can just play hockey instead of avoiding making mistakes.
1 Cup in 85 years
2048
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