The Rangers head into this season having lost their best defenseman in Keith Yandle, and with Dan Girardi and Mac Staal hanging around things aren’t looking so hot on the blue line. There’s still some reason to feel hopeful at least, given that the Rangers 28th overall pick from the 2012 draft, Brady Skjei, is due for a real shot with the Blueshirts after just dipping his toes in the water last year. That’s not to say however that Skjei will replace Yandle, who is truly one of the elite puck-moving defensemen in this league, but it will at the very least be fun to watch him grow and develop throughout the season. Given his skillset and pedigree, here’s what to expect.
In Skjei’s first season as a University of Minnesota Golden Gopher, he registered three points in 36 games, but he picked it up from there and found himself producing 14 points in 40 games the following year and 10 points the year after that. Following the conclusion of his 2014-15 college campaign he joined the Harftord Wolf Pack, with whom he played eight regular season games (registering no points) and 15 playoff games, notching a goal and two assists.
Last season he played 68 games with the Wolf Pack, putting up four goals and 24 assists, and joined the Rangers briefly for seven regular season games. Although he failed to produce a point in those games, he did stay with the team for give playoff games in which he tallied two assists. All of this is to say that while Skjei can certainly pitch in on offense, it would be unreasonable to expect him to replace Keith Yandle’s point production that we saw last year.
It’s also worth noting that in his 12 games total with the Rangers he had a tough run of it, putting up a CF% of -4.07 relative to his teammates. That indicates that while the Rangers as a whole struggled to generate shots last season, the young defenseman saw 4.07% less offense than the rest of the team saw, not exactly a good look but not exactly surprising. He was a young defenseman thrown into a tough situation, and saw primarily defensive zone and neutral zone starts in his time with the Rangers. While it’s unlikely that he’ll be Erik Karlsson on the ice next season, with the right partner I think it’s reasonable to say that those numbers should come up and likely even be in the positive territory relative to his teammates.
Stats aside, the most important thing I saw in Brady Skjei’s game last season was that he has solid fundamentals. He’s an exceptional skater and is adept at making the first pass out of the defensive zone, something the Rangers have really struggled with. He has good hockey sense, joining the rush when the opportunity arises but not when it’s imprudent to do so either. Next season might be a work in progress for the young defenseman but rest assured that with his skillset he’s going to be an NHL player for a long time. Whether or not he’ll be a truly elite d-man is another question entirely, but given the state of the Rangers’ blue line let’s take what we can get, no?
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