Physical New York Rangers Winger Chris Kreider Must Play Smarter Going Forward

A wise man related to Peter Parker once said, “With great power comes great responsibility,” and that is something that New York Rangers power forward Chris Kreider needs to come to grips with.

The 6'3", 226-pound power forward has a ton of power and physicality at his disposal, but he needs to be smarter with how he uses his strength.

The Massachusetts native is in his second season with the Rangers, and he was off to a great start with six points in eight games heading into Monday's contest after tallying 37 points in 66 games last year.

While the young speedster has had a solid start, it could be derailed if he has to sit out a few games after delivering a hellacious hit on Minnesota Wild defender Jonas Brodin. If that is the case, Kreider will need to serve his time, reflect and move on.

As time was running down at the end of the first period, Kreider hit Brodin about 10 feet from the boards. Kreider received a game misconduct and a five-minute major for the hit, and he drew the ire of tons of fans on Twitter.

It wasn't a surprise, especially when you consider how Kreider knocked Carey Price out of last year's Eastern Conference Final by driving hard to the net on a breakaway.

His hit against Brodin won't do him any favors in the court of public opinion, and he will need to learn going forward to make sure this type of play doesn't happen again.

The hit looked really, really bad at full speed, but when you look at the entire play in slow motion, not everything in the sequence is bad.

Kreider does almost everything right in his pursuit of the puck, but his fatal flaw was making a very bad read during the last few milliseconds when he finally got within range of Brodin. 

To better explain the situation, here are some screenshots that break down the play and show what Kreider did wrong.

Screenshot via NHL Gamecenter

As the period ticks down, Kreider was charging at full speed down the ice after a puck fired in by Mats Zuccarello. The Rangers had just won a faceoff after an icing, and it was a situation in which Brodin and Kreider were both racing for the puck.

In the image below, Kreider is at a point where he thought he had a chance to win the puck. He has speed and position on his side. Brodin has his back to the boards during this time and is monitoring where Kreider is on the ice. The Rangers forward has a lane open if he skates quickly enough.

Screenshot via NHL Gamecenter

After advancing a few frames, you can see that Brodin realizes how close Kreider is and makes the decision to commit to the puck.

In the process, Brodin attempts to take over the ice between Kreider and the puck. He does what most NHL defenders do every night, attempting to control the gap by skating slowly toward where the puck is going to end up.

There are a number of cases where a forward will bump into the defender and draw an interference penalty, as a referee will deem that the defender gave up on the play and only attempted to impede the attacking player's progress.

Screenshot via NHL Gamecenter

At this point, Kreider continues to charge in at full speed in an attempt to win the puck, but Brodin has slowed up in an attempt to protect the puck from Kreider.

Screenshot via NHL Gamecenter

Instead of slowing up and grabbing on to Brodin in an attempt to coast toward the boards for a normal body check, he extended his forearm. With his extra two inches and 26 pounds, Kreider sent the 6'1", 194-pound defender violently into the boards.

This is 100 percent the wrong play on Kreider's part because Brodin was too far away from the boards. Had he been closer, the hit would have sent Brodin into the boards more gently and there would have been less surface area for him to pick up velocity. 

Screenshot via NHL Gamecenter

After looking at the images and the clip in slow motion, Kreider took an aggressive approach toward a puck he thought he could win cleanly.

When Brodin closed the gap and slowed down, Kreider chose to engage him with a forearm that caught Brodin off guard.

Screenshot via NHL Gamecenter

While the NHL has usually maintained a stance on players making sure they don't turn their back going toward the boards, the onus is on Kreider to slow himself up.

Furthermore, Kreider could have made the decision to cut left past the goal mouth and into the corner because he would have arrived at the puck based on how fast the puck was traveling and how fast he was skating.

Instead of holding back, he made the wrong move, and it was a poor decision on his part. While a suspension could ultimately hurt the Rangers, it might be the right decision for all parties involved.

A suspension would send a message to other players around the league, reminding them that these types of plays are reckless and unwelcome in the NHL.

A suspension would also make Kreider think about what he did and send him a wake-up call. Kreider's speed, size and physicality allow him to be an effective offensive player and forechecker, but he needs to dial it back a bit.

His combination of raw size and speed is rare, and sometimes the combination of the two can get you into trouble. By no means will this incident make Kreider scared to hit again, and it shouldn't. He made a bad decision, and he can learn from it.

Brodin returned to the game, and from the looks of it, the hit had no impact on the rest of his game.

The NHL usually factors in whether or not a player was injured when it comes to dishing out a suspension, and hopefully in this situation it realizes that some action needs to be taken.

Kreider is at his best when he is using his tools effectively, but he must play smarter going forward so he doesn't hurt himself, his team or, more importantly, other players in the NHL.