by Deb Seymour ~ December 15, 2022
Last season, when the NY Rangers’ bottom six was scuffling, head coach Gerard Gallant reportedly told third line center Filip Chytil that he should try to “play like Mika (Zibanejad).” That conversation, no matter how it actually unfolded in real life, seemed to be a catalyst for Chytil — who’s spent the better portion of five seasons with the NHL team though he’s still only 23 years old.
Chytil’s had a bit of a bumpy road between his AHL and NHL days, falling victim to multiple injuries and getting bounced around a bit between center and wing. But one important quality he brings to the table is speed; and with the Rangers not being particularly speedy for a hockey team, that matters.
Back in September 2021 I wrote about Filip Chytil, and about the 2021-2022 season being a pivotal one for the young forward. It was almost a “prove it now” season for him, after the inconsistency in development he’d shown over the previous three seasons (See https://bigapplebite.com/2021/09/22/at-22-years-of-age-is-this-a-pivotal-nhl-season-for-new-york-rangers-center-filip-chytil/).
Toward the end of last season, after the “play like Mika” incident, something in Chytil seemed to wake up. Call it leadership, call it generating scoring chances, call it keeping things simple (just “get the puck and shoot”) — but whatever it was, Chytil became the center for what came to be known as “the kid line,” on which he was flanked by first overall draft pick, left winger Alexis Lafreniere and first round second draft pick, right winger Kaapo Kakko. The kid line became a notorious symbol for what the Rangers managed to accomplish in the 2022 postseason; a brash, upstart team fighting its way to the Eastern Conference Finals (See: https://bigapplebite.com/2022/05/03/the-kid-line-what-it-means-to-the-ny-rangers/).
And yet the 2022-2023 Rangers are a different team from the 2021-2022 team, and not just due to player turnover — but due to specific challenges they’re trying to overcome a little more than a third of the way into this season. Chris Kreider isn’t scoring at the rate he was last season, Artemi Panarin has somehow not looked quite like himself, Alexis Lafreniere isn’t playing with the same tempo he had toward the end of last season, Jacob Trouba (now captain) is making some surprising defensive mistakes, and the power play, which was the Rangers’ hammer last season, just isn’t hitting the nail on the head the way it did a year ago.
We can speculate all we want about why the team hasn’t had the same fire it did (most especially in the second half of) last season; but what the seeming apathy has engendered is constant line changes by Gallant, and nothing seems etched in stone quite yet.
And almost incidentally, this leads us back to Filip Chytil, who’s centered the third line for most of the season to date with changing linemates; and as one of the latest innovations, centering the second line flanked by Panarin and either Barclay Goodrow or (rarely) Vitaly Kravtsov. Most recently, we’ve seen Chytil centering the kid line again, but with an important distinction — they’ve moved up to second line.
Suddenly, Filip Chytil, who was barely mentioned in any conversation about the Rangers till April 2022, has become one of their most important forwards. With Chytil at center, Panarin seems to have taken on new life. Panarin may now flank Zibanejad on the top line for some unpredictable number of games, but Chytil’s overall, prorated, advanced stat line is better in most categories than it’s ever been to date in his career:
Chytil’s sitting at 22 games (out of 30) played into the season at this moment, about to become 23 tonight; and the stats would need to be projected out to however many games he ends up playing to provide a true picture — but in terms of productivity, even if we simply and conservatively triple his current stats to 66 games played this season, he would still surpass what he’s managed to do in his career to date.
Naturally, the hope is that he stays healthy for the remainder of the current season and exceeds 66 games played. That’s relevant because the Rangers are facing a very real cap crunch in 2023, and in order to retain Chytil, who becomes a restricted free agent at the end of this season, they’d want to prevent a situation in which he’s offersheeted to go elsewhere and leaves. And a healthy Chytil is a pretty desirable Chytil in the NHL, at this point.
Who’d have predicted we’d be saying that, even a mere two years ago?
Filip Chytil is still no Mika Zibanejad; and it would be unfair to expect he would be, at this stage of his career. But he’s a lot closer to that goal than he was even just a year ago. His speed and versatility, along with the simplicity of his approach, make him a valuable asset to the Rangers. He’s developing his own style of play, and there’s no doubt the NHL is taking notice.
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