Confirmed with Link: Rangers sign K'Andre Miller

[Fugazy]

Welcome aboard K’Andre Staal

Don’t you put that evil on me.

 

[Amazing Kreiderman]

Don’t you put that evil on me.

I wouldn't be surprised when it's all said and done, Staal's career turns out to be better than Miller. As disappointing as Staal has been recently, he was a shutdown D-man for many years.

Miller has a ton of upside and I hope he reaches his ceiling though

 

[The New Russian Five]

I wouldn't be surprised when it's all said and done, Staal's career turns out to be better than Miller. As disappointing as Staal has been recently, he was a shutdown D-man for many years.

Miller has a ton of upside and I hope he reaches his ceiling though

Staal was one of our best D for about a decade before injuries started his rapid decline. We should be happy if K'Andre becomes as good as peak Staal.

 

[nyr2k2]

Oh god f***ing dammit..

1st Tupac dies. Then Biggy. Then Tom Hanks gets the Coronavirus..

And now K’andre is the next Marc Staal...?!?!

Peace out HFNYR. Was great knowing y’all.

Well if he became prime Marc Staal, before the concussion and the eye thing, that would be a great pick at 22.

 

[Edge]

I will admit that I have some concern with his ability to keep up with the AHL pace right now. But with the surrounding circumstances being what they are, this approach probably represents the best option.

Now it’s a matter of focusing on foundations and getting him tons of exposure to different situations.

 

[NYSPORTS]

Miller vs Staal?

not liking the comparison.

My pet peeve with Staal has always been this perception he doesn’t work the weights too hard b/c the his listed weight never went up until last year. He sat at 209lbs since age 21 through 32. Standing at 6’4 I expected a more physical player to develop and weigh in at 225lbs.

Miller is a string bean standing at 6’5. Like most men, I’m hoping he fills out b/c it would be a major disappointment, for me, if he remained at the same size and weight like Staal has for his career. That tells me weight and strength training isn’t on his priority list b/c everybody who gains muscle will gain some weight. Not Marc Staal though.

 

[will1066]

https://imgflip.com/memegenerator

 

[aufheben]

He seems way more similar to a poor man’s Hedman than Staal. I could see their development being similar as well. Remember Hedman didn’t really become a big factor until his 5th season (23 yrs.,) and it wasn’t until like his 7th-8th season that he started to reach his draft hype; offense didn’t come until way, way later.

Seriously when this kid takes the puck up the ice he looks identical to Victor Hedman. He might require a lot of patience from this fan base though, a lot. Miller is only 20, so...buckle up.

 

[Kovalev27]

There’s very little other than height maybe that id compare between Marc Staal and KAndre Miller

 

[NYSPORTS]

Seriously when this kid takes the puck up the ice he looks identical to Victor Hedman. He might require a lot of patience from this fan base though, a lot. Miller is only 20, so...buckle up.

like DeAngelo, this may take time. It’s a tricky rebuild with the Zibby, Panarin, Kreider group ready to win, the secondary group still growing and he kids trying to find their way.

 

[aufheben]

like DeAngelo, this may take time. It’s a tricky rebuild with the Zibby, Panarin, Kreider group ready to win, the secondary group still growing and he kids trying to find their way.

We hardly even had to deal with DeAngelo relatively speaking. Imagine this fan base dealing with DeAngelo since he was drafted.

 

[bobbop]

Oh god f***ing dammit..

1st Tupac dies. Then Biggy. Then Tom Hanks gets the Coronavirus..

And now K’andre is the next Marc Staal...?!?!

Peace out HFNYR. Was great knowing y’all.

13 year NHL career, 892 games. Yeah, I’d take that.

Killer meme though!

 

[offdacrossbar]

Called this one. Obviously the right choice to get out of wisco

he’s got work to do. IMO, no where near ready but a huge building block

welcome to the family kid

 

[eco's bones]

There are two basic requirements for Miller to turn pro. 1) that he skates well enough 2) that he can handle physical play. I don't see either as a problem.

K'Andre is by no means a finished product and it may take him 2 full years in the AHL before he's ready. In that respect Nils Lundkvist is well ahead of him--or at least at the moment. I think Nils could possibly go into training camp and take an RD job (even if there are no openings)---that at most he only needs a year in the AHL.

As for Marc Staal he was one of the best defensemen in the league before the head injuries and the one that caved in one side of his head particularly. There was some vision loss with that. FWIW I trust him more in defensive situations than Brendan Smith. Cap hit is way too high for what he brings to the team.....but he used to be an excellent player.

 

[Mikos87]

Good on him to sign. Smart move taking the step to get to the next level.

 

[GoAwayPanarin]

Since being inserted into the lineup as a D, Smith has outplayed Staal by a pretty significant margin.

Marc OTOH, has successfully dragged DeAngelo down to Staal levels while he himself has fallen even further into the pits of despair.

I love how the Pro-Staal crowd always brings up his games played as if they're a badge of honor. The only thing impressive about that number is how hes hoodwinked an organization into allowing him to continue to play.If K'Andrew plays 900 NHL games, I hope he doesn't do it in a Staal like fashion where he compiles half of them as a player who doesnt belong in the league.

 

[nyr2k2]

There’s very little other than height maybe that id compare between Marc Staal and KAndre Miller

Stick work, maybe. Staal was killer with the stick. Miller is so big and lanky, he's the same way. Poke checks all day long. People used to get pissed at Staal because he'd use a poke check instead of taking the body. Miller is kind of similar--totally capable of crushing people but he'll use the stick instead.

 

[NYRFANMANI]

Give him some garlic and he'll be with the club in no time.

Welcome aboard K'Andre!!

 

[Roo Returns]

Would've preferred he stay one more year but it's the best of the situation right now.

I hope he's using this down time to hit the gym and get ready. A lot of patience will be required.

 

[pblawr]

There is definitely truth to the narrative that K'Andre is raw and needs time to develop, but sometimes I feel like it gets overblown here.

Statistically, he was fantastic in the NCAA:

- Mitch Brown shared this analysis (credit to @GoAwayStaal for posting first) showing that Miller's tranistion defense was literally off the chart.





- EP Rinkside tracked him in the NCAA his freshman year and found he had a 65% Corsi, which again is off the charts good (for comparison's sake, the best in the NHL is 60%)

So the stats offer pretty compelling data points that he was too good for the NCAA, at least in terms of transition defense and driving play.

I've also watched him play 5-6x, both at the WJSS and at Wisconsin, this year and generally thought he was really good and, at times, dominant.

So when I hear people say he's not ready to leave the NCAA because he's a huge project and he's really raw, sometimes it feels to me like they are saying he has been a bad player at the NCAA level and I 100% do not think that was the case.

What I do think is true is that, in order for him to become an NHL player, he needs to improve his defensive positioning, particularly in terms of 1) his positional play in the D Zone and 2) the consistency of his judgment about when to be aggressive and when to be conservative. So, I also think people who are penciling him into the NHL starting line up for next year are getting ahead of themselves. For me, the truth is somewhere in between.

Personally, I think Hartford would be a better place than Wisconsin for him to develop those skills. Both of those things depend on having teammates who cover their responsibilities and provide support, and that was not the case at Wisconsin this year. How is K'Andre supposed to learn defensive positioning when he regularly gets burned even when he's in the right position because his teammates haven't covered their positions? Then, on top of that, he'll also get more reps, better coaching, and be able to exclusively focus on hockey in Hartford.

I also think it's really tough to say how long it will take him to develop those skills. Generally, development isn't a straight line but consists of leaps and stagnant periods. That's been true with K'Andre, who took a huge leap from his pre-draft year to post-draft year when he almost doubled his scoring rate while moving up a league, and then seemed to stagnate from his first post-draft year to his second post-draft year. I could see him taking a leap in a better environment with more reps in Hartford next year or I could see him following a more gradual learning process in Hartford that takes a few years. The key, I think, is not having really firmly set expectations, but just sitting back and letting him develop at his own pace. What makes him such an exciting to prospect for me is that he's already a really good player AND he still has a ton of room to improve.

 

[GoAwayPanarin]

There is definitely truth to the narrative that K'Andre is raw and needs time to develop, but sometimes I feel like it gets overblown here.

Statistically, he was fantastic in the NCAA:

- Mitch Brown shared this analysis (credit to @GoAwayStaal for posting first) showing that Miller's tranistion defense was literally off the chart.





- EP Rinkside tracked him in the NCAA his freshman year and found he had a 65% Corsi, which again is off the charts good (for comparison's sake, the best in the NHL is 60%)

So the stats offer pretty compelling data points that he was too good for the NCAA, at least in terms of transition defense and driving play.

I've also watched him play 5-6x, both at the WJSS and at Wisconsin, this year and generally thought he was really good and, at times, dominant.

So when I hear people say he's not ready to leave the NCAA because he's a huge project and he's really raw, sometimes it feels to me like they are saying he has been a bad player at the NCAA level and I 100% do not think that was the case.

What I do think is true is that, in order for him to become an NHL player, he needs to improve his defensive positioning, particularly in terms of 1) his positional play in the D Zone and 2) the consistency of his judgment about when to be aggressive and when to be conservative. So, I also think people who are penciling him into the NHL starting line up for next year are getting ahead of themselves. For me, the truth is somewhere in between.

Personally, I think Hartford would be a better place than Wisconsin for him to develop those skills. Both of those things depend on having teammates who cover their responsibilities and provide support, and that was not the case at Wisconsin this year. How is K'Andre supposed to learn defensive positioning when he regularly gets burned even when he's in the right position because his teammates haven't covered their positions? Then, on top of that, he'll also get more reps, better coaching, and be able to exclusively focus on hockey in Hartford.

I also think it's really tough to say how long it will take him to develop those skills. Generally, development isn't a straight line but consists of leaps and stagnant periods. That's been true with K'Andre, who took a huge leap from his pre-draft year to post-draft year when he almost doubled his scoring rate while moving up a league, and then seemed to stagnate from his first post-draft year to his second post-draft year. I could see him taking a leap in a better environment with more reps in Hartford next year or I could see him following a more gradual learning process in Hartford that takes a few years. The key, I think, is not having really firmly set expectations, but just sitting back and letting him develop at his own pace. What makes him such an exciting to prospect for me is that he's already a really good player AND he still has a ton of room to improve.

The good news is #1 is 1000000% coachable and extra reps will help there. Film room is great to let you know what you did wrong, but you aren't going to learn to correct those mistakes just by watching video. He'll get many more opportunities to fix those mistakes in the A than he would have in the NCAA. Hartford is the perfect spot for him, our staff down there knows what they're doing.

#2 is much tougher and really one of those things that you either have a feel for or you don't. I know its easy to look at it like "hey, he doesn't have a ton of experience so it may just take time" but this is one of those hockey sense things and I'm just not sure that it will ever be there with Miller. Not a knock, I don't think its crazy important anyway.

As the charts showed, Miller is basically a God when it comes to controlled entries and denying entries from the opposition. The latter of those 2 are, IMO, the most valuable skill set a D can have in today's game. If you're sniffing out and shutting down plays before they get into your own end on the regular, you can play for my team any day. If you also excel at zone entries and maintaining possession, you're golden.

I kind of look at his development the same way I look at the Rangers' current roster. The hardest pieces/skills to acquire are already here and there are plenty of tools available to close the gaps in the other areas where weaknesses exist. It's not a perfect analogy, but I feel like it fits.

 

[Rongomania]

There is definitely truth to the narrative that K'Andre is raw and needs time to develop, but sometimes I feel like it gets overblown here.

Statistically, he was fantastic in the NCAA:

- Mitch Brown shared this analysis (credit to @GoAwayStaal for posting first) showing that Miller's tranistion defense was literally off the chart.





- EP Rinkside tracked him in the NCAA his freshman year and found he had a 65% Corsi, which again is off the charts good (for comparison's sake, the best in the NHL is 60%)

So the stats offer pretty compelling data points that he was too good for the NCAA, at least in terms of transition defense and driving play.

I've also watched him play 5-6x, both at the WJSS and at Wisconsin, this year and generally thought he was really good and, at times, dominant.

So when I hear people say he's not ready to leave the NCAA because he's a huge project and he's really raw, sometimes it feels to me like they are saying he has been a bad player at the NCAA level and I 100% do not think that was the case.

What I do think is true is that, in order for him to become an NHL player, he needs to improve his defensive positioning, particularly in terms of 1) his positional play in the D Zone and 2) the consistency of his judgment about when to be aggressive and when to be conservative. So, I also think people who are penciling him into the NHL starting line up for next year are getting ahead of themselves. For me, the truth is somewhere in between.

Personally, I think Hartford would be a better place than Wisconsin for him to develop those skills. Both of those things depend on having teammates who cover their responsibilities and provide support, and that was not the case at Wisconsin this year. How is K'Andre supposed to learn defensive positioning when he regularly gets burned even when he's in the right position because his teammates haven't covered their positions? Then, on top of that, he'll also get more reps, better coaching, and be able to exclusively focus on hockey in Hartford.

I also think it's really tough to say how long it will take him to develop those skills. Generally, development isn't a straight line but consists of leaps and stagnant periods. That's been true with K'Andre, who took a huge leap from his pre-draft year to post-draft year when he almost doubled his scoring rate while moving up a league, and then seemed to stagnate from his first post-draft year to his second post-draft year. I could see him taking a leap in a better environment with more reps in Hartford next year or I could see him following a more gradual learning process in Hartford that takes a few years. The key, I think, is not having really firmly set expectations, but just sitting back and letting him develop at his own pace. What makes him such an exciting to prospect for me is that he's already a really good player AND he still has a ton of room to improve.

Dude those college stats are f*cking unbelievable.

Can anyone get a hold of Foxys to see how they compare ?

Love this kid, excited that he's so confident and hope he shines in the A. I wanna see the Krav-K'Andre connection !!

 

[GoAwayPanarin]

Dude those college stats are f*cking unbelievable.

Can anyone get a hold of Foxys to see how they compare ?

Love this kid, excited that he's so confident and hope he shines in the A. I wanna see the Krav-K'Andre connection !!

IIRC Fox had other worldly numbers. Like 70% CF and 50+% break ups in his Jr Season. I don't know about the controlled entries but they were probably pretty damn good too.

I hope we get to see K'Andre and Nils spend a ton of time together and perhaps make the jump up to play on our 3rd pair together.

 

[egelband]

@pblawr thank you for that. Your posts are always a must-read for me.

 

[aufheben]

Oh, shit we got fancy stats now?

*boards hype train*