Why the Rangers could struggle to find a trade partner

On November 28, 2024By Littum

Typically, with the Rangers now 20 games into the season, this would be the day to write my annual quarter-pole column.

I will outline how they stepped up on a soft schedule to start the year but have gone 1-6 against teams currently in playoff position. I’ll point out that they’ve looked a step slow and have struggled to maintain puck possession, then point to stats that show they rank in the bottom 10 of the NHL in goal percentage (46.55%), expected goal percentage (46.75%) , shot percentage (45.08%) and high-danger scoring chances (47.6%) in the past month, according to Natural Stat Trick. And I would express concern about diminishing returns from a group of veterans that has largely stagnated or regressed.

But I don’t have to keep questioning whether this core is good enough to end the franchise’s 30-year Stanley Cup drought because team president Chris Drury has given us his answer.

By sending out a memo to every general manager around the league announcing his intention to relieve established players in an effort to reshape the roster, Drury signaled that he doesn’t believe this group can get the job done.

That’s a fair conclusion given what we’ve seen since he took over as front office boss in 2021. The Rangers have built their lineup around a very similar cast of characters in all four seasons with Drury at the helm, with the talented players admirably, they took them to the Eastern Conference Finals two of the last three years and captured a President’s Trophy last season. But despite arguably the NHL’s best goaltending during that span — and certainly the best in the playoffs — it still hasn’t been enough to push them over the championship hump.

Despite Igor Shesterkin’s brilliance, the Blueshirts haven’t been able to impose their will consistently enough in front of him. They’re an underwhelming five-on-five team that doesn’t match up well against aggressive forecheck opponents and is vulnerable to the rush. And the production from their best skaters seems to shrink, rather than rise, in tight playoff settings.

The fear is that this core has reached its ceiling, leaving Drury to run in search of a shakeup that will raise the collective level.

But the timing is peculiar. He had all of that evidence over the summer and did little beyond trading another former top veteran in Reilly Smith. Granted, he tried to move on from Jacob Trouba, which would have cleared significant salary and opened up options, but ran into a series of roadblocks and had to settle for a far less ambitious plan.

Whatever the reasons, this inaction sent the Rangers into what always felt like a lame duck season. The players would understandably want another crack at it, but Drury’s job is to make the hard evaluations and necessary changes.

He has had four full offseasons to pursue upgrades, with the only significant multiyear addition coming when free-agent center Vincent Trocheck was signed in 2022. Other than that, the current team was largely built by former GM Jeff Gorton, who drafted or acquired 18 of the 23 players on the roster to begin the week. (That includes Jimmy Vesey, who was signed by Gorton as a college free agent in 2016 and re-acquired by Drury in 2022.)

The difficulty of a trade

Multiple league sources, who spoke to lohud.com, part of the USA TODAY Network, on condition of anonymity, believe it will be extremely difficult for Drury to make his mark on the roster at this odd time.

For starters, big trades are extremely rare at this early stage of the season, with most teams content to wait for the clarity (and urgency) that comes closer to the March 7 deadline. Then there’s the prohibitive size of the contracts Drury is looking to move, with Trouba on the hook for an average annual value of $8 million this season and next, while Chris Kreider is signed through 2026-27 at an AAV of $6.5 million . And finally, there is the leverage problem. Opposing GMs know Drury is eager to make a deal — he told them as much — and will try to use that to their advantage. That means limiting return offers while, particularly in Trouba’s case, insisting that Rangers retain a portion of the outgoing player’s salary.

Even if they do find a receiver, it’s hard to see how they’ll come out ahead. Among the two well-known vets who have been floated, Kreider is a much more attractive piece. But can the Blueshirts improve while dethroning their all-time leading playoff scorer? That would require a true hockey trade that brings back a hitter or two ready to contribute this season and beyond.

And what about the rest of the list? Trocheck, Artemi Panarin and Mika Zibanejad have full no-movement clauses, while Shesterkin and Norris Trophy winner Adam Fox are likely off limits (or is Shesterkin?), leaving the Rangers’ younger talent as their most enticing trade chips. But many have been bright spots to begin the season and will be needed as cost-effective role players moving forward. Dealing with any of them only makes sense if there is a significant package in return and there is serious doubt as to where it would come from.

Other motives?

No matter how you slice it, Drury has a tough road ahead of him – and his tactic of sending group messages to each team, knowing the high likelihood of it being leaked, leads many to believe he had motives other than simply finding a trading partner.

The implication was clear. Kreider is his longest tenured player and Trouba is his handpicked captain. If they’re not sure, who is?

The hope was to push all players to up their game, but the effectiveness of this strategy is highly questionable. That didn’t seem to help in Monday’s uninspired 5-2 loss to St. Louis Blues.

If anything, it risks cracking what has been a tight but increasingly tense dressing room. Trouba put on a strong front after Tuesday’s practice and must know deep down that his days in New York are numbered, but how will the ever-loyal Kreider react to having his name dragged into the rumor mill? And if a trade doesn’t materialize, how will that affect his relationship with the only organization he knows?

There is also the question of how it will be perceived by other players, both current and potential signings in the future.

Business is business, but people around the league are taking note of how these uncomfortable situations are handled. They see respected leaders like Kreider and Trouba twisting in the wind with little communication or fair warning — just as they noted the sneaky way Barclay Goodrow was uprooted over the summer — and realize how easily they could be tossed aside.

Maybe that’s the point, but these main games have created an air of desperation that feels like it could be avoided. Drury had plenty of time to change the makeup of this roster and mold it into the tough-to-play-against force he described when he first took over, but instead it backfired at least one time too many.

It will be his biggest trick yet if he finds a franchise-changing trade at a time when several factors are stacked against him, but the odds seem long and the timing feels wrong.

Vincent Z. Mercogliano is the one New York Rangers beat reporter for the USA TODAY Network. Read more about his work at lohud.com/sports/rangers/ and follow him on Twitter @vzmercogliano.