2025 Rangers Season Preview: Artemi Panarin

No matter what happens after this upcoming season, Artemi Panarin will go down as one of the greatest free agent signings in the history of the New York Rangers—and, arguably one of the best free agent signings of any major New York sports team.

After all, this is a franchise that was once renown for being a helicopter of cash, carelessly raining greenbacks down on typically past-their-prime stars. You know the names, so sing along with me: Bobby Holik, Darius Kasparaitis, Wade Redden, Valeri Kamensky, ::looks both ways:: and Chris Drury. Even when the player wasn't clearly past their prime, they contracts they doled out were often terrible in their own way—think Brad Richards and his 9-year, $60 million deal.

When Panarin inked a 7-year, $81.5 million deal in 2019 it was widely reported that he had spurned more money from the New York Islanders to make Madison Square Garden his home. Even from the beginning his cap hit percentage was a very acceptable 14.3 percent for a player of his quality, and today only represents 12.2 percent. And we haven't even mentioned yet his actual performance on the ice.

Panarin signing that deal accelerated the Rangers' post-Letter rebuild into a retooling, or a rebuild-on-the-fly. Whether that was the best strategic move is something we can debate in the coming years. But now, with Panarin entering the final year of that contract and with the Rangers coming off an abomination of a season, what can we expect from the team's offensive superstar?

Previous Performance

Artemi Panarin has been nothing short of brilliant during his time with the Rangers. In 430 games he's posted 186 goals and 364 assists for 550 points. Over the last four seasons he's produced at a 1.28 points per game pace, which is good for fifth in the NHL in that period, behind only Connor McDavid, Nikita Kucherov, Nathan MacKinnon, and Leon Draisaitl. Even in last year's slow-rolling catastrophe of a season, he posted 89 points (37 goals and 52 assists) to lead the team, still scoring at more than a point-per-game pace.

In 46 playoff games he's notched 12 goals and 23 assists for 35 points. If there's a place that you could look at and say that you want to see more from Panarin, it's here. But at the same time, Panarin and his performance was adequate at worst, and wasn't at the top of the list for why the Rangers didn't take home Lord Stanley's Cup in those seasons, as it's perpetually been the defense that has let the team down in crunch time.

Simply put, Panarin has been everything the Rangers hoped and expected he would be since he first donned the Blueshirt.

Expectations

There's a sense in which this is one of the easiest player previews to write. The expectations for Artemi Panarin are that he is and continues to be Artemi Panarin.

The early sense of things is that he'll be seeing familiar linemates, at least to start the year. At times the line of Panarin with Vincent Trocheck and Alexi Lafrenière was dominant. That was less true last season. While Panarin had a (still good, but) comparatively down year, both Trochek and Lafrenière were quite miserable. A big question for this year's team will be in this line can click together again.

Because the expectations for Panarin are so locked in, it necessitates turning our attention to those linemates—particularly Trocheck, who I still contend is ill-suited for a second line center role and would be much better as a third line center—to ponder if they can up their games to where they'd been when this line was a matchup nightmare for opposing teams.

Another big question is about the power play. Similar to the Panarin-Trocheck-Lafrenière line, once up on a time the Rangers top power play unit was among the best in the league. Somewhere between the 2023-24 season and last year, that ceased to be true. They went stagnant. Every team knew they were looking to feed Mika Zibanejad for the one-timer from the top of the faceoff circle. That predictability, coupled with everyone having a down year, made them much easier to defend.

We haven't seen enough from training camp or preseason contests yet to know what the power play formations are going to be on opening night. There's some evidence to suggest that the only personnel change will be subbing in J.T. Miller for Chris Kreider. But, while I'm sure Miller can be a net-front power play guy, no one is the tipping king that Chris Kreider was. So that alone should necessitate some differences in the approach of the top unit. No matter what, Panarin's role will be similar to what it has been in the past: being the other creative puck distributor who does his "stupid shit at the blueline" that we've come to love.

Predictions

Again, there's a sense in which this is the easiest profile to write. I predict Panarin will put up Panarin-like numbers—better than last year, buoyed by the team being better, but probably not quite as jaw-dropping as his 120 point performance in 2023-24.

Expect Panarin to come in around 100 points, roughly 35 goals and 65 assists. A huge part of this will revolve around the success of that top power play unit. For context, the power play accounted for 44 of his 120 points in 2023-24. Of the last four seasons, last year was the only one where Panarin's power play points accounted for less than 30 percent of his total points. Getting that special teams unit click has to be—and will be—a priority for Mike Sullivan and crew.

Barring disaster or injury, you love guys like Panarin because you can lock them in for 100 points, set it and forget it.

Conclusions

Here's were we should take a quick look beyond this coming season.

This is the last year of Panarin's current 7-year contract with the Rangers. On one hand, given his clear affinity for New York and, particularly, for the Rangers, combined with him still being a premiere performer in the league at age 34, you'd probably pencil him in for a team-friendly contract extension.

But this coming offseason is (possibly) no typical offseason.

As we've discussed ad nauseam on the podcast, all of Connor McDavid, Jack Eichel, and Kirill Kaprizov are—as of now—set to hit free agency next summer. It goes without saying that, assuming any of these players are actually available, the Rangers should be in on them. Connor McDavid is the best player in the game, full stop. Jack Eichel is Chris Drury's white whale and one of the best two-way centers in the NHL. And Kirill Kaprizov is a supreme talent. All of them are on the right side of 30 years old. Assuming they hit free agency (or, possibly in the case of Kaprizov, become available via trade) adding one of these players has to be a top priority for the Rangers.

However, signing one of these superstars doesn't necessarily mean the Rangers would have to part with Panarin. The Breadman has already signed a team-friendly deal once. Adding a player of the caliber of McDavid, Eichel, or Kaprizov (especially the fellow Russian in Kaprizov) could be enough for Panarin to want to stay on a deal that would work given those new salary cap constraints.

On the other hand, if the array of NHL insiders suggesting those players are going to re-up with their current teams turn out to be correct, it would make Panarin returning to the Rangers all but a lock. After that elite trio and Panarin, the 2026 free agency list gets into "good but complimentary" kinds of players really fast. Panarin would arguably be the best of the remaining bunch.

All of that to say, there's a chance we're watching Artemi Panarin's last season on Broadway. No matter if he ends up returning or not, settle in and enjoy ::checks notes on Panarin nicknames:: Yeast Mode and his stupid shit on the blueline for at least one more year.