2025 Rangers Season Previews: Jonny Brodzinski

The slow burn of Jonny Brodzinski's career continued in 2024. As we look ahead to the year ahead, I very much want to believe that the 2025-26 Rangers are good enough to not need Jonny Brodzinski.

Oh, Jonny Brodzinski. What is there to say about him that I haven't said? On the one hand, Jonny Brodzinski is a player you want to root for. He's a heck of a nice guy who has worked his butt off to become a viable NHL player at an age when most players in his situation would have considered hanging up his skates or moving overseas in a desperate attempt to cling to professional hockey. On the other hand, if Jonny Brodzinski is playing a significant role for your team, something has probably gone terribly wrong with whatever plan your organization had when the season started.

So, as we look ahead to the 2025-26 NHL season we can root for Brodzinski while also sincerely hoping we never have to watch him play.

Previous Performance

Hall of Fame NFL coach Bill Parcells once (or more than once) famously said, "you are what your record says you are." The gist of this was that whether you think your team should be better or should be worse doesn't really matter; at the end of the day, the only thing that matters is the record. Everything about that could apply to Jonny Brodzinski.

The nine years since the Los Angeles Kings drafted him tell us Brodzinski should be the captain of the Hartford Wolf Pack. Watching him run around the ice like a chicken with its head cut off tells us Brodzinski should be a terrible NHL player. The record though, says something else.

The 2024-25 season saw Jonny Brodzinski tie his career high in points (19), set a career high in goals (12), and provide respectable play up and down the lineup, on wing and at center, and even on the seldom-used but often-talked-about second power play unit. He drew into the lineup 51 times (often at the expense of players we fans wanted to see play) and averaged 11:41 TOI. On a team where you often questioned the effort of the best players, you never questioned Brodzinski's. It was, for a player like Brodzinski, an A+ season.

Expectations

This is fairly straightforward. Jonny Brodzinski will be the Rangers' top center, put up 90 goals, 200 points, and be the most coveted free agent on the market come July 1.

No? OK, fine...but it's still pretty straightforward.

With Mika Zibanejad slated to open camp on the wing the Fighting Sullivans will have some open competitions for the bottom six. While I think the expectation is that Brennan Othmann or Brett Berard would have the inside track on the third line left wing spot, and that Juuso Parssinen will have the first chance to secure the third line center spot, Brodzinski isn't going to make it easy. There's also a chance he could unseat Matt Rempe on the fourth line. In short, Brodzinski is the kind of utility player who is going to force young players to raise their games if they want ice time. That's a good thing. Hopefully they do that and hopefully Brodzinski gets to watch them do it from the Adam Clendening™ Press Box.

Prediction

Barring complete incompetence from the young kids mentioned above, I think Brodzinski does open the season as the team's 13th forward. He'll play more than I want him to, but when he does play he will do so with the kind of passion that is infectious. He will also serve as a mentor and big brother for the young players trying to make their way in the NHL, a role he embraced last year and made him a fan favorite. Well, for most fans.

Conclusion

Jonny Brodzinski is a player you absolutely root for even if you disagree with how he has been used. He's a guy who had enough leadership qualities to emerge as the best captain the Wolf Pack have had since Ken Gernander and enough ability to make it to the NHL where he has helped pave the way for some of the younger players that the Rangers have been integrating into their roster. This is Brodzinski's final year under contract and while I hope the Rangers are good enough and deep enough that he doesn't have to play, his speed and tenacity make him a very solid 13th forward.