Alexis Lafreniere’s rise has become a reminder that sometimes the NHL just needs to get out of a player’s way.
For years, the conversation around the former No. 1 overall pick circled the same questions: why was it taking so long, and was the promise real? Now, with Lafreniere continuing to climb and producing at a level that has him among the NHL’s top scorers, the picture looks a lot different.
The Rangers’ own view of him shifted too. When they extended him, they clearly saw a top-six forward with room to grow, and his $7.45 million cap hit fit that profile.
It did not, at the time, look like superstar money. It does now.
That doesn’t mean Lafreniere has turned into Connor McDavid. It does mean the idea that he lacked top-line potential looks a lot shakier than it once did.
The rocky start to his career has clouded how some people read him, but the talent was always there. In his first NHL season, he was still adjusting, as many high picks do.
The problem was that he had less development time because of Covid, and the Rangers were loading up on star talent ahead of him at even strength and on the power play.
New York was trying to win, and the priority was clear: performance over patient development. That left Lafreniere stuck in a difficult spot.
In his second and third seasons, he finished with 31 and 39 points, while playing only 13:59 and 15:13 a night. He bounced between second- and third-line usage and got very little power-play exposure.
Under those conditions, the frustration around him made sense, even if the underlying setup was never ideal.
Things changed when his ice time rose to 17:16 in the 2023-2024 season. He was placed on a line with Artemi Panarin and Vincent Trocheck, and the results followed. That became a career year, and he was one of the Rangers’ leading scorers in the playoffs.
Even then, he still wasn’t being treated like a centerpiece. He remained stuck on the second power-play unit and wasn’t a featured option in the biggest moments.
When the Rangers took steps back in 2024-2025 and 2025-2026, his production dipped along with them. Then Panarin was traded, and Lafreniere was finally pushed into top-line minutes and top power-play usage.
Since then, he has been a point per game player.
That part really does tell the story. Hockey players aren’t machines.
Confidence and role matter. After a strong 2024-2025 postseason, the Rangers still did not fully hand him the keys, and that had to be discouraging.
He kept getting nudged back into a supporting role instead of being treated like the player his draft slot suggested he could become.
Last season marked the beginning of the Rangers developing him the right way again after the Panarin trade. Mike Sullivan gave him that chance. Now Lafreniere is established on the first line and the first power-play unit, and he’s playing like a star.
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Rangers Just Got Another Reminder About Jaroslav Chmelar
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