The phrases “difference-maker” and “elite-level talent” have come up often when discussing the Detroit Red Wings’ ongoing rebuild. The task of any rebuild is to find and add players that those phrases apply to, and teams usually need luck in the draft lottery and the draft as a whole to accumulate that kind of talent.
The reason these types of players come up when discussing the Red Wings is because they haven’t had much luck when it comes to the draft. They swung and missed on several picks in the years leading up to the Spring of 2019 when Steve Yzerman took over as general manager, and they’ve never picked higher than fourth overall because they’ve never been on the winning side of a draft lottery. When people talk about why the Red Wings aren’t further along in their rebuild, the conversation usually leads to this fact.
But the notion that the Red Wings haven’t been able to add a “difference-maker” during this rebuild is a faulty one – not while Lucas Raymond is wearing the winged-wheel at least.
Whether you use the eye test or a deep dive into his statistics and analytics, there is plenty of evidence that points to Raymond being that type of player – the type of player that will power the Red Wings’ next run of success.
Raymond’s Production
Since the days of Pavel Datsyuk and Henrik Zetterberg leading the charge, the Red Wings have had just one player exceed a point per-game pace. It was Dylan Larkin, the player that became the team’s top player the moment Zetterberg stepped away from the game in 2018, and it was just last season as the Red Wings captain totaled 69 points over 68 games. While point production is not the only way to determine the quality of a player, the best players in the world tend to accumulate a lot of them on a consistent basis.
That is why it is so impressive that, as of this writing, Raymond has 41 points in 39 games, which leads the Red Wings this season and is eight points ahead of the player in second place (Larkin). Since last January (84 games), Raymond has 83 points, with only 35 of them coming on the power play. Over the Red Wings’ 82 games in the year 2024, he was the only Red Wing to record a point per-game pace.
Raymond also ranks second in goals and points among members of the 2020 draft class, trailing only Tim Stützle (third overall) of the Ottawa Senators.
Raymond has established himself as a creator in the Red Wings’ top six. When he isn’t playing on Larkin’s wing on the top line, he is often tasked with “carrying” the team’s second line as the line’s primary play-driver. That is something the organization has tried with him more and more as he has matured, and his late-season heroics last season seemed to cement his status as a player that has the innate ability to make things happen when the puck is on his stick.
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Speaking of his late-season heroics, the final month of the 2023-24 season was the most dominant hockey Raymond has played to this point in his NHL career. As you probably recall, the Red Wings were jockeying for a playoff berth on a nightly basis, and every loss felt like the end of the playoff chase. It was during this period that Raymond led the charge, recording 7 goals and 12 points in 8 games. Fans watching the games at home likely got used to hearing commentator Ken Daniels exclaim, “everybody loves Raymond!” because the Swedish winger consistently played a role in key moments for the Red Wings.
For some players, you have to dissect film and recognize the little things to fully appreciate a player’s value. Raymond is not one of those players. His value is on display on a regular basis, and the major step he has taken over the last year is that his impact is being felt equally on the scoresheet and on the ice.
Raymond Becoming a Leader
Another notable development has been how the Red Wings have handled their alternate captains and who wears an ‘A’ on their sweater on a night-to-night basis. That letter has moved around among the same five or six guys throughout the season, with Raymond being one of them for the first time in his young career.
This is particularly notable because Raymond wasn’t necessarily drafted to be a leader; his skill set always suggested he could become a dynamic point-producer and his two-way ability was maybe a bit underrated in his draft year, but he wasn’t always someone you would say sets an example for his teammates the same way he does now. During the 2024 World Championships, he wore an ‘A’ for Team Sweden along with Tampa Bay Lightning defender Victor Hedman while Pittsburgh Penguins defender Erik Karlsson wore the ‘C’. That’s pretty prestigious company, and it further showed the maturation of Raymond as a player on and off the ice.
With the big-money, eight-year deal Raymond signed with the Red Wings back in September, the young winger is now firmly entrenched as a core piece of this roster and a driving force behind the team’s aspirations. He is producing points at a pace we haven’t seen since the Red Wings were making the playoffs on a yearly basis, and he clearly has the respect of his teammates in Detroit as well as on the national stage with Sweden. He turns just 23 years of age in March, but he is already a player that sets the standard in Detroit, and the organization’s prospects will look up to him as they look to carve out a role in the NHL for themselves.
That’s the kind of player you hope to add when you hold the fourth pick in any draft. It’s what the Colorado Avalanche got when they took Cale Makar with the fourth pick in 2017 after enduring a disastrous season of their own. It’s what the Senators got when they took Brady Tkachuk fourth overall in 2018. Neither of those teams had luck in the draft lottery, but both Makar and Tkachuk are on track to be considered all-time greats for their respective franchises when all is said and done.
The Red Wings have almost a century’s worth of talent to draw from when it comes to franchise greats, but make no mistake: Raymond is on track to join that conversation one day too. For as much as pundits like to talk about the Red Wings’ lack of “superstar talent”, he is doing everything he can to sway some opinions. On a team with high-end wingers like Alex DeBrincat and Patrick Kane, Raymond stands out as the team’s most complete winger and arguably THE guy fans and coaches want on the ice when the Red Wings need a goal.
If that’s not the definition of a stud player in the NHL, I don’t know what is.
