I’ve been holding out hope throughout the ups and downs of the season. Fighting the urge to give in to the negativity on X that snowballs after a tough loss. Trying to ignore the body language and repetitive answers in media availabilities. Writing off the snake bitten stretches at MSG as anomalies. I tried to convince myself that the win over Florida at the Winter Classic was a turning point. That no truly bad hockey team could be 15-9-2 on the road. But the mental gymnastics are over.
It pains me to say, but this team just isn’t good enough. Not fast enough, not skilled enough and apparently not mentally tough enough. The “No BS” mantra introduced during training camp makes that last piece especially hard to admit.
There’s no excuses either. Injuries aren’t an excuse, as the entire league is dealing with a condensed schedule ahead of the Olympics in Milan, Italy next month. A new coaching staff isn’t an excuse, as there’s been a big enough sample size so far this season and this core cruised to a Presidents’ Trophy under Peter Laviolette’s first season in 2024. And related lingering culture issues can’t be an excuse either, as these guys are professionals and had a lengthy offseason after missing the playoffs to process the bad vibes and start anew.
So the question becomes, what’s next?
It’s been reported by Vince Mercogliano of The Athletic that Chris Drury and the Rangers front office would be taking the month of January to conclude on next steps based upon on-ice performance and what the Eastern Conference playoff picture looks like by 1/31. Lucky for him, the Rangers made the decision for him.
Hand up, I wasn’t convinced the season was over after the 10-2 loss in Boston. It’s been a weird season – they’ve beaten up on teams, come from behind to win, won close games, blown leads and everything in between. A kaleidoscope of contradictions, that started with leaving MSG extremely angry after attending the 3-0 centennial kick-off stinker against Pittsburgh. Even still, figured I’d at least wait until the game against Seattle at home, which felt like the real litmus test.
Well, they flunked that test miserably, going up 2-0 in the first period and then allowing 4 unanswered goals to lose. And if that didn’t convince you, the response (to the response) was going down 4-0 in the first period to Ottawa and giving up 8 goals by the time the final buzzer sounded, once again at home.
Everyone’s got their opinions and scapegoats, I just feel so bad for Jonathan Quick inside of all this. Wish he were going to the Olympics somehow, just to give him something to look forward to.
Unsure when GM Chris Drury was convinced, but he released “The Letter II” on X today. TLDR: It’s time to fire up that mysterious NHL GM text thread and host a yard sale.
It’s the right move and I’m glad everyone is on the same page here, but if I could nitpick a little bit – I don’t love the rhetoric. ‘This will not be a rebuild’ doesn’t really compute when what he’s describing is a rebuild, just dressed up as a ‘retool built around our core players and prospects.’ At some point, it’d be nice to drop the semantics and admit it’s time to go back to square one.
Either way, I imagine Igor, Fox and Gavrikov are untouchable and the rest of the roster has a price tag and propped up in the yard for interested suitors driving by.
In terms of the organization’s prized assets outside of the assumed untouchables, that would be Artemi Panarin and Vincent Trocheck. Both would return an absolute haul in a trade and have front offices in a bidding war against each other.
Particularly attractive is Panarin, who’s in the final year of his 7-year/$81.5 million contract with the Rangers (time flies) and set to be an unrestricted free agent this summer. Parallel to that, a lot of teams across the league had earmarked the summer of 2026 as a behemoth free agent class and one to clear cap space for. Lo and behold, Connor McDavid re-upped in Edmonton, Jack Eichel re-upped in Vegas, Kirill Kaprisov re-upped in Minnesota and now, it’s basically just Panarin that headlines the 2026 free agent class.
It’s interesting the way GMs can approach this scenario in one of two ways. They can approach this as a massive opportunity – trade for Panarin’s services to throw gas on a playoff run fire and be confident he signs an extension when the time comes. This is pretty much the exact rationale taken by Bill Guerin and the Minnesota Wild in trading for Quinn Hughes earlier this season. Other GMs may approach this with extreme caution – why would I trade an arm and a leg for half of a season of Panarin when I don’t know what happens after? Apparently, this trepidation was felt by Steve Yzerman and more or less the reason Quinn Hughes isn’t currently a member of the Detroit Red Wings.
From Panarin and his camp’s perspective – he’s not getting any younger, undoubtedly wants to win and performing in the playoffs on national television would certainly boost his next contract’s value – wherever that might be.
Chris Drury is telling the fanbase that Panarin is gone, so now it’s just a waiting game. I’m so curious to see what kind of return the Rangers can walk away with. Colorado, Dallas, and Minnesota all strike me as teams that would be interested and engage in a bidding war to not only get the player but keep him away from a divisional rival. And for the Rangers’ sake, thinking there’s no need to trade him within the division to Carolina or Washington, unless the offer is out of this world.
An important caveat to all this, Panarin and many other notable names have no-movement clauses and those would need to be waived prior to making a trade with certain teams. They’ve made a mess of this in recent memory, with Barclay Goodrow and Jacob Trouba most notably. You’d like to believe the organization has learned from the fallout of playing hardball and approach this current situation in a more collaborative and amicable fashion.
Chris Drury’s track record has been a mixed bag since taking over for Jeff Gorton in May of 2021. I thought he threaded the needle nicely in 2022 and 2024, picking up solid contributors in Frank Vatrano, Tyler Motte, Andrew Copp, Alex Wennberg and Jack Roslovic to propel runs to the Eastern Conference Final. People love to talk about the Pavel Buchnevich/Sammy Blais debacle – fair enough. There’s definitely been some cap constraints and roster churn that have ruffled some feathers, but he’s navigated a tough business fairly well overall.
I’m not ready to join the ‘Fire Drury’ chants growing in volume at the Garden, but this deadline feels existential. The name of the game is recouping assets, but it’s more about establishing a clear direction. The Rangers need a full-fledged rebuild. Whether Drury can deliver one is the question that’s about to define his tenure.
geryblogs 
Leave a comment