Here is the Rangers’ Exhibit A of how to nurture a first-round draft pick. Here is Filip Chytil, the season’s Breakout Kid who on Wednesday agreed to a four-year contract extension worth an annual cap hit of $4.4375 million.
This was a win-win for the 23-year-old Czech and for the cap-challenged Blueshirts, who are now set down the middle for the next four seasons with the impressive triumvirate of Mika Zibanejad, Vincent Trocheck and Chytil — the latter two in no particular order.
Chytil, the 21st-overall selection of the 2017 draft who is the third senior Ranger behind Chris Kreider and Zibanejad, had been a pending restricted free agent with arbitration rights, and hypothetically just two years away from unrestricted free agency. Hence, there could be no bridge deal here.
So for a total of $17.75M over the next four years, general manager Chris Drury was able to buy out two years of arbitration rights and two years of free agency. More to the point, the Blueshirts were able to retain Chytil, who has been a special one since forcing his way onto the 2017-18 opening night roster at the age of 18 years and 30 days.
This has been the season when so much has come together for No. 72 as he spearheads the Kid Line skating between Alexis Lafreniere and Kaapo Kakko. Chytil has already established personal bests for goals in a season (22), assists (20) and points (42) with eight games to go in the season. He has, in his fifth season, become a young leader teeming with self-assured confidence. He has become one of the team’s spokesmen.
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The Rangers have been questioned legitimately about their approach to developing high draft picks, specifically when it comes to forwards. Lias Andersson and Vitali Kravtsov come to mind. There are those who have a bone to pick with the process as it has applied to Lafreniere, a first-overall, and Kakko, an overall second.
But Chytil has been an emerging success story pretty much from Day 1, taking it step by step, brought along by two front office regimes. After opening the season in New York for the first two games of 2017-18, Chytil spent the remainder of the season with AHL Hartford until recalled for a cameo over the final seven games of the NHL season.
He played the entire 2018-19 season with the Rangers under then-head coach David Quinn, but almost shockingly found himself with the Wolf Pack to begin 2019-20 after a substandard training camp. Chytil was back by the end of October. He has been a staple since even while at times seeming to take a step back for every step forward.
Until this season in which Chytil has taken the next step. There is room for improvement, of course — at the faceoff dots and in avoiding open-ice blows — but he has become a dynamic skater, a daunting force with the puck at 6-foot-2, 205 pounds. He is not a physical center, but he has become a playmaker who makes his linemates better. And he loves to shoot the puck.
The Rangers would have been foolish to have allowed Chytil to become a casualty of the looming cap strangulation that Drury and the hierarchy will confront after the playoffs. That simply would have been unacceptable.
Artemi Panarin, Zibanejad, Chris Kreider, Trocheck, Kakko, Barclay Goodrow, Chytil, Jimmy Vesey, Adam Fox, Jacob Trouba, Ryan Lindgren, Braden Schneider, Ben Harpur and Igor Shesterkin are under contract for 2023-24. Patrick Kane, Vlad Tarasenko, Tyler Motte and Niko Mikkola are pending unrestricted free agents.
If, as anticipated the cap increases by only $1 million to $83.5M next season, the Blueshirts theoretically will have approximately $12.375M in space to accommodate the signings of five forwards, two defensemen and a back-up goaltender. That includes re-upping Lafreniere and K’Andre Miller, both of whom are pending restricted free agents without arbitration rights but who could both troll for offer sheets if unsatisfied.
There are difficult decisions coming down the road that will surely be informed by the upcoming tournament. But signing Chytil to this kind of an extension was not a difficult call at all.
This was a good day for the Rangers … and for Chytil, too.