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What We Learned: Are the NY Rangers actually this good?

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(Hello, this is a feature that will run through the entire season and aims to recap the weekend’s events and boils those events down to one admittedly superficial fact or stupid opinion about each team. Feel free to complain about it.)

The Rangers are one of those teams again.

The results are stellar (10-3-0), the underlying numbers are so-so at best and the eye test tells you it’s not a fluke.

But the eye test can lie to you, right? Teams that win a lot tend to look very good even if they aren’t. So the question for the Rangers is what does a full season of playing like this look like?

Right now, just to throw out some basic numbers, the Rangers have a plus-26 goal differential, and that’s with Henrik Lundqvist playing like garbage for the first two and a half weeks of the season. Already he’s back around recent league-averages in save percentage, so it’s not really a huge problem. And there are signs that Alain Vigneault and the team in general have kind of figured some things out about what was holding them back in the past.

For instance, they spent the summer shopping in the bargain basement for players who could move the needle on the cheap. This came partly out of necessity, but it’s not like they signed a handful of Tanner Glass-type guys who can’t skate. Pickups like Brandon Pirri and Nick Holden were low-dollar buys that seem to be paying off a month into the campaign.

Plus there was the Mika Zibanejad trade; and while Derrick Brassard is a decent enough player, Zibanejad is a younger and roughly equivalent version of what Brassard provides. More to the point, he’s cheaper too (for now). Zibanejad has nine points — but only two goals — in 12 games this season, and you take that happily, every day.

Perhaps most encouraging of all, a $5.5 million boat anchor named Dan Girardi has seen has seen a three-minute drop in his ice time. He’s still quite bad (not surprising), but if he’s only quite bad for 17 minutes a night instead of 20, well, that’s a positive for his club.

But as to the team’s quality as a whole, there is a bit of smoke-and-mirrors to their performance. Better-than-average special teams hasn’t really been their calling card for the past few years, but that’s been the case early in this season. Does that last? Well, special teams are notoriously prone to huge swings in apparent “luck;” good power plays can go silent overnight, good PKs can suddenly take on water in huge volumes. But even if the power play quality declines, having a goalie of Lundqvist’s quality is always going to make you capable of staying above-water on the kill. That might also be true given the decline in Girardi’s use in particular, as he was a top penalty killer last season and this year he is not.

But as for the 5-on-5 play — where wheat is truly separated from chaff in this league over 50, 60, 82 games — it’s tough to buy into what the Rangers are doing here.

Once again they’re below-water in terms of possession, which is the best long-term predictor of success, but they’re only marginally underwater. Being a little below 50 percent here really is a marginal difference, especially at this point in the season; with nine additional shot attempts at 5-on-5 they’d be totally even.

But in all other regards, New York is a little above water, or better: Unblocked shot attempts and shots on goal both slightly favor them in much the same way straight-up shot attempts slightly do not. So you start to get a picture of an average NHL team here, more or less.

Except: They lead the league in scoring chance percentage — at 59.5 percent, which if it holds up (it won’t) would be the largest single-season percentage since 2007-08 — and do so by a pretty decent margin ahead of even the second-place Sharks. The Rangers generate the second-most medium- and high-quality chances, but allow the 13th-fewest. Pretty impressive, really, and to some extent it helps to explain why they’re doing so well when it comes to scoring and not letting the other team do the same.

Maybe, then, you say it’s another test to appease the “shot quality” crowd. The Rangers are getting a lot more looks from relatively close to the goaltender, and it’s leading to a goals-for percentage of more than 59 percent, right in line with their chances-for percentage. Yeah they’re losing the possession battle — again, only marginally — but they’re getting in on so many looks for clear reasons that they might be able to keep this up in theory. They’re faster than hell and they’re using skill on every line for the first time in forever. These aren’t even last year’s Rangers, let alone your dad’s.

But there are still reasons to be skeptical that this performance won’t last, and not just because no one in recent league history has been able to sustain this level of chance-related dominance. For instance, the Rangers have the highest 5-on-5 shooting percentage in the league at 11.7 percent. And yeah, based on the chance numbers you’d expect them to be a little elevated, but not that high. Look at the individual shooting percentages this team boasts in all situations. Three guys (Michael Grabner, Jimmy Vesey, and the injured Josh Jooris) are above 30 percent. Two more (Kevin Hayes and Brandon Pirri) are north of 20. Another seven (Zuccarello, Girardi, Nash, Holden, Miller, Fast, and Kreider) are above 10 percent. Tough to see too much of that as being sustainable. And when the floor drops out on them in this regard, they either need Pavel Buchnevich and Zibanejad and Derek Stepan to tick up a little bit, or for Henrik Lundqvist to start bailing them out more reliably.

The good news is Lundqvist is Lundqvist, so he probably will bail them out plenty for the rest of the year, in much the same way he has for pretty much his entire career.

Right now, in terms of “expected goals” — which tells you how much a team “should” have scored or allowed, mathematically speaking — the Rangers are likewise first by a pretty wide margin. That number isn’t as high as their chances-for or current goals-for percentage, so again they will take a step back because no one can keep up this level of dominance.

How much of a difference does that early-season luck mean? The offense is outperforming expected goals by 0.4 per 60 minutes, which is a significant number; the Rangers only outscored their opponents by 0.48 goals per 60 last season. Certainly all this thins out their future margins a bit.

One of the potential issues is something I mentioned a few weeks ago with respect to the Canadiens, another team that could keep up quality performances all year: There really aren’t too many defensemen on the Rangers’ roster who can carry the puck out of their own zone, and relying on forwards to do that instead can work for a while, but I’m dubious that it would be effective for an entire season. The Rangers do have the advantage of having at least a few defensemen who can lug the puck, but perhaps not as many as they should, or would like.

So yeah, it currently seems as though reports of the Rangers’ demise were exaggerated. Doesn’t mean they’re this good, and all it took was a wholesale change in philosophy from both coaching staff and front office. A rich team that spends money wisely should be worry a lot of NHL fans because efficiently rolling out a larger amount of resources means that they’re getting more bang for a whole hell of a lot of bucks.

In the meantime, let’s keep in mind there is no such thing as a team that goes 9-3 every 12 games forever. They simply don’t exist. So the Rangers will start losing more, but right now they’ve given a pretty clear baseline for performances of a quality they haven’t displayed in years. If they can stick to that baseline, they’re gonna win a whole lot of games this year.

But they sure as hell won’t shoot like this forever, so don’t get too excited. This isn’t a Presidents’ Trophy winner, folks. They’re merely “quite good” to this point.

And given the early expectations, that should be enough.

What We Learned

Anaheim Ducks: The Coyotes are so bad that a banged-up team coached by Randy Carlyle whaled on them.

Arizona Coyotes: Tough to give up a 4-0 lead and expect any sort of punch in the second half of a game.

Boston Bruins: Perhaps this team is… bad? Hmm.

Buffalo Sabres: If Robin Lehner can stay healthy for any reasonably long stretch of time I think the Sabres will be in good shape. I’m a big believer.

Calgary Flames: You’re not gonna believe this, but the Flames went to Southern California and got annihilated.

Carolina Hurricanes: The Hurricanes blow a huge amount of leads. Which seems like a bad trend, but that’s what you’re buying with this goaltending pair.

Chicago: They got a good performance against a higher-end team from the penalty kill? That can’t be right.

Colorado Avalanche: Truly hope the Avs are good this year. Maybe this win can start something. I don’t know. Probably not, right?

Columbus Blue Jackets: Hmm, John Tortorella — who chooses his words carefully so as not to use war analogies that diminish Our Heroes — has no problem calling Ryan Reaves, who is black, an “animal.” Seems really good. On top of being one of the best coaches in the league he is also one of the best people.

Dallas Stars: Well this seems bad.

Detroit Red Wings: A Red Wings losing streak? Oh jeez who saw that coming?

Edmonton Oilers: The Oilers are getting a lot of injuries these days but still winning. I wonder how long that lasts.

Florida Panthers: C’mon guys you gotta win on the road sometimes.

Las Vegas No-Names: The future Golden Knights are already stocking their scouting department.

Los Angeles Kings: Look it would be great if Devin Setoguchi is impactful at the NHL level this year but also he scored against the Flames, so let’s not get too excited.

Minnesota Wild: Well, if the offense is going to be punchless

Montreal Canadiens: Amazing what starting Carey Price will do for you.

Nashville Predators: The Predators have a lot of problems right now, but Filip Forsberg not scoring is kind of a big one. Even worse, though, is that the guy with no goals leads the team in scoring through 11 games (0-7-7).

New Jersey Devils: Another team I expected more out of this year is likewise very bad on the road.

New York Islanders: How has Jack Capuano not been fired yet? Wild stuff.

New York Rangers: Even when they start the backup and give up 37 shots they can’t help but romp. This is a scorching team right now, simple as that.

Ottawa Senators: “They’re the Senators.”

Philadelphia Flyers: Yeah, still not impressed with this team.

Pittsburgh Penguins: Crosby has eight goals in six games, folks. He’s good in my opinion.

San Jose Sharks: Hmm, yes.

St. Louis Blues: This is more like it from Tarasenko. Goal-scorers should score lots of goals. Just my thoughts.

Tampa Bay Lightning: Buying low on a Tampa turnaround here. They’ll very be there at the end of the year.

Toronto Maple Leafs: No.

Vancouver Canucks: What a charming team.

Washington Capitals: A thing I’ve been thinking about for a while now is how much TJ Oshie makes this summer. Probably too much. That’s my guess.

Winnipeg Jets: Yeah, we know.

Play of the Weekend

This shorthanded goal from Arizona first-rounder Clayton Keller was very good live, and even better on video. Also, this game was incredible. College hockey is the absolute best.

Gold Star Award

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Getty Images

Thank you to the Canadiens for losing 10-0. Lots to like about hockey this weekend, but that was No. 1 with a bullet.

Minus of the Weekend

Truly as bad a Raffi Torres take as you can get.

Perfect HFBoards Trade Proposal of the Year

User “Edmonton Express” is a double agent.

To Vancouver:
Ryan Nugent-Hopkins ($6M)
Jordan Eberle ($6M)

To Edmonton:
Chris Tanev (4.45M)
Brandon Sutter ($4.375M)
Jannik Hansen ($2.5M)

Signoff

Little do you know you’re drawing ever closer to the poison donut.

Ryan Lambert is a Puck Daddy columnist. His email is here and his Twitter is here.

(All stats via Corsica unless otherwise noted.)

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