On the NY Rangers trading up or down at the NHL Draft

One of the many options the NY Rangers will have at the 2020 NHL Draft will be the option to trade up or down. While packaging the pick in a non-draft related trade and keeping the pick are both options, trading up is an option as well. The Rangers likely have their eyes on a handful of prospects at this stage in the draft. If someone they like falls, trading up is always a strong possibility.

The Rangers have done this before, trading up in 2018 to land K’Andre Miller. This year is a little tricky though, as they do not have a 2nd round pick to dangle. Instead, they have a pair of 3rd rounders, #70 (their own) and #85 (Dallas). They received the #85 in the Mats Zuccarello trade.

The question is going to be cost to move up. To that, we look at some historical trades from the past four drafts (per prosportstransactions):

2019

• Arizona gets the #11 for the #14 and #45

2018

• Rangers get the #22 for the #26 and #48
• St Louis gets the #25 for the #29 and #76

2017

• Chicago gets the #26 for #29 and #70

2016

• Ottawa gets the #11 for #12 and #80
• Winnipeg gets the #18 for #22 and #36
• St. Louis gets #26 for #28 and #87

There’s some precedence here for the Rangers to move up. The best comparable here is the 2016 Winnipeg trade, moving up four spots to get the #18 for the #22 and #36. The thing is, it’s rare to trade up more than a few spots at the NHL Draft. That pair of 3rd rounders is about 40 picks higher than some of the other picks needed to move up. So unless the Rangers have their eyes on someone that falls to the high-teens, they will need to part with roster players to move up.

About those roster assets, are they enough to thrown in a trade to move up at the NHL Draft? Does Alex Georgiev fetch only a 2nd round pick? If it’s more, is Georgiev and the extra 1st enough to move up to get, say, the #14 from Edmonton? Are the Rangers willing to package Tony DeAngelo in such a deal to move into the 10-14 range?

Conversely, the Rangers can hold onto their roster assets and use that additional pick to trade down. It might be enough to get them back into the 2nd round. It doesn’t seem likely given the course the Rangers are on, but it could be an option.

If the Rangers trade this first round pick, it will be in a Jacob Trouba like trade. It will be for a young player they’ve had their eyes on for a while.