New York Rangers: Takeaways from Kevin Hayes one-year deal

Reading between the lines, there’s a lot more to the one-year deal Kevin Hayes got from the New York Rangers than meets the eye.

The New York Rangers are a rebuilding team. Right now, they’re gauging who’s going to be a part of their future. Everything the Rangers are doing right now has a specific purpose – to help the team in the future.

On Monday, July 30, the Blueshirts re-signed restricted free agent center Kevin Hayes to a one-year deal worth $5.175 million. This will make the 26-year-old forward an unrestricted free agent after the 2018-19 season.

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There is more to this deal than meets the eye. Let’s dig deeper and see what the Hayes deal means for the Rangers, both in the present and the future.

1. Mika Zibanejad Stays Over Hayes

Next summer, the Blueshirts will have an important decision to make. Do they keep Mika Zibanejad or Hayes? Though the latter’s one-year deal doesn’t guarantee he’ll be leaving, it appears the Rangers have made their decision.

Zibanejad has a no-movement clause, which begins on July 1, 2019. It appears he’ll be their number one center for the new few years over Hayes. A good thing about the one-year deal is it still gives the Rangers a bit of flexibility. They can re-sign him after Jan. 1 if their plans change.

Like, let’s suppose Zibanejad’s health is still an issue. After all, he’ has missed 36 games in two seasons with the Blueshirts. Perhaps the Rangers would rather have Hayes than him. Or maybe he does so well in new head coach David Quinn’s system, they realize he’s worth keeping around.

That’s fine, the Rangers can re-sign him to an extension. Granted, it would most likely be more expensive than if they did it now. Which is why the Rangers have likely made the decision to keep Zibanejad over Hayes.

2. Rangers Getting Younger

After the 2018-19 season, assuming the Blueshirts keep Zibanejad over Hayes, this will mean the Rangers will have at least two centers under 21 years old in their everyday lineup – Filip Chytil and Lias Andersson. That’s before factoring in Boo Nieves, Vinni Lettieri, and Brett Howden, not to mention Ryan Spooner and Vladislav Namestnikov (though one or both of those two could be gone by next summer).

The Rangers are fully embracing their rebuild, as they’re clearly getting younger. Their roster has a ton of flexibility moving forward, which is likely by design. The Rangers have just 11 players signed past the 2018-19 season and merely six signed past the 2019-20 season. Ideally, that’s how you want to look when you start a rebuild. Otherwise, you start to resemble the Detroit Red Wings.

3. There’s A Trade Coming

The biggest thing to take away from Hayes getting a one-year deal is that he’s an obvious trade candidate. Though it’s not set in stone, you can tell he’s probably not a part of their future because the Rangers refused to commit to him long-term. It’s not like they couldn’t afford him, as they have a shade under $10 million of cap space even after factoring in Hayes’ $5.175 million cap hit.

So when is the inevitable trade happening? Well, as stated earlier, the Rangers might want to make sure they don’t want Hayes to be a part of their future. After all, things can change in the blink of an eye in the NHL.

Unless a team blows them away with an offer they can’t refuse, expect the Blueshirts to keep him at least into 2019. A hypothetical deal like that would have to include at least one top prospect or quality young player, as well as a first-round pick.

Hayes will enter the season as the premier center available at the trade deadline. The Rangers have been meticulous and deliberate with their rebuild so far. Expect them to set a high price and wait for someone to match it, much like the Colorado Avalanche did with Matt Duchene.

4. Andersson And Chytil Likely Aren’t Starting In The NHL

Another thing this signing tells me is that Andersson and Chytil will not both be in the NHL to start the season. Most likely, neither of them will be. Which is fine because Andersson and Chytil need minutes to develop. If that’s not going to happen with the Rangers, they need to be sent to the AHL, where they will (hopefully) get those big minutes.

This is a good thing because both players are still under contract for the next three years. Their entry level deals slide if they don’t play in at least eight NHL games in 2018-19. If neither of the two appear in at least eight games in the NHL, both will be under contract until after the 2021-22 season. Having two cheap, potentially very good, centers is extremely valuable. That’s likely when the Rangers will be contenders again too.

It should be fun to see what the Rangers do over the next 12 months. What they do should tell us a lot about how far along in their rebuild they truly are. As long as the Rangers can avoid taking shortcuts in their rebuild, they’ll be good again very soon.