It’s exceedingly difficult for a hockey player to crack the NHL as a rookie. Doing it again after a demotion is even harder.
For Jonatan Berggren, such a renaissance is the goal for 2024-25, when he’ll try to earn a full-time spot with the Detroit Red Wings after spending last season largely in the AHL. As other prospects mature behind him, Berggren is faced with a crucial season to prove his long term belonging with Detroit.
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It wasn’t so long ago that few would question Berggren’s future in Detroit. In his 2022-23 rookie season, he finished with a promising 28 points in 67 games. Even if his game was imperfect — even if his defensive play was subpar and his scoring wasn’t automatic — he played as well as one could expect of a first-year NHLer.
Year two? Call it a wash. He got into just 12 games last season, starting the season in Grand Rapids and getting stuck in mostly bottom six assignments when he got called up. Free agency additions made the Red Wings deeper with more proven players, and the more one-dimensional Berggren took a back seat. All the while, he was the subject of trade rumors as the assured stability of his future in Detroit crumbled.
“It’s a credit to him, he did a really good job in a really tough situation last year,” Red Wings coach Derek Lalonde said Aug. 7. “I’ll never say anyone’s played themselves out of the American Hockey League — it’s just too good of a league — but he’s proven, and maybe more earned, this opportunity.”
Berggren earned this season’s opportunity to stick in the NHL by making the most of a season where he earned more than he received. He led the Grand Rapids Griffins in scoring with 56 points in 53 games. He was the only point-a-game Griffin, with 19 more total points than the second place scorer, Carter Mazur. In his NHL 12 games, mostly from a depth role, he tallied six points. Four of those came in December, when he was called up to aid a banged-up Red Wings squad.
Last season wasn’t without its limitations, however, and they showed up late in the season. In his last three-game call-up to Detroit, he spent a lot of time as a healthy scratch to avoid playing his 80th career game that would’ve made him waiver eligible. He also earned that through his play, going minus-five on a fourth line that Lalonde rarely played due to its defensive struggles.
The problem for Berggren last season wasn’t that he is a bad player, just that he was not the right fit for Detroit’s needs. In a bottom six role, an offense-first winger quickly overstays his welcome. When so much scoring depth existed on last season’s Red Wings team, they didn’t have to settle for his defensive lapses. That’s why Berggren spent most of last season in the AHL.
Did he do enough to earn his way back into the NHL? That’s complicated. His time in Grand Rapids proved what everyone already knew: He can score a lot, especially when put in a top six role. What his play last season didn’t prove is that he can play the other side of the puck — check, defend, scrap, do the little things. This time around, Berggren has to prove his game’s more complex layers make him worth playing.
“He’s shown the ability to create offense. When he’s been with us, he’s created offense. But again, we have a lot of guys with a similar DNA like that,” Lalonde said. “We need him to be responsible, like we’re gonna ask the whole team to be conscious of a two way game without taking away from some of the offense.”
Competition, meanwhile, is only heating up around him. Berggren has an advantage to make the NHL roster because he must go on waivers if he gets sent to the AHL. But, some of the young players behind him have stronger overall games even if they aren’t as offensively driven as Berggren. Mazur is a goal-scoring winger whose grit and gall on the ice bring added value. Marco Kasper is a two-way player whose defensive game offers natural fits throughout the lineup. Even Nate Danielson, in his first pro season, might bring a more well-rounded game than Berggren right now. If Berggren can’t show the layers to his game that would make him valuable in a bottom six role, then he might just end up getting passed.
That’s why this season is so massive for Berggren. He needs to show he’s more than a scorer, which could help the Red Wings decide whether to keep him around or cut their losses.
Already this offseason, Detroit has struggled to decide what to do with him. Berggren, a restricted free agent, still does not have a contract. That might be more a testament of the Red Wings’ struggles to sign fellow RFAs Moritz Seider and Lucas Raymond, whose contracts will probably eat up most of the current $17.6 million in cap space. Even so, it’s not an encouraging sign to see Berggren sweated out like this either. It’s unlikely that he won’t sign a new contract at some point, but waiting until within a month of training camp shows that Berggren isn’t so high on the Red Wings’ priorities.
All Berggren can do to change that is prove he belongs in the NHL with his play — not just as a scorer, but as a well-rounded player. Scoring might have gotten him to the NHL one time, but it’ll take a more well-rounded game if he wants to make it again.
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