Where the New York Rangers Stand After the Free Agent Frenzy
The Rangers made one big splash and a flurry of quiet moves. But are they done yet? We revisit the key offseason questions and what still might be coming.
Despite landing one of the big fish in this year’s free agent class, the New York Rangers were one of the quieter teams overall.
In addition to Vladislav Gavrikov, the Rangers mostly added some experience to their AHL depth by signing Justin Dowling, Derrick Pouliot, and Trey Fix-Wolansky. Still, Chris Drury was far from inactive, as he also extended Will Cuylle and worked out a sign-and-trade deal with K’Andre Miller and the Carolina Hurricanes. This brought the Rangers 22-year-old defenseman Scott Morrow alongside some serious draft capital, and gave Carolina eight-years worth of K’Andre Miller for a real pretty penny.
In the weeks leading up to the NHL Draft and free agency, I wrote a short series of articles posing offseason questions for the New York Rangers, most of which haven been answered but are worth reviewing to properly assess where the team currently stands as we approach the true dog days of summer. In doing so, we can come to potential conclusions on whether the Rangers are officially done for the summer or are still looking to make some moves before September rolls around and training camp kicks off.
Question 1: Chris Kreider's Future, Answered
This was one of the first dominos to fall and one of the more painful ones from a fan perspective. The Rangers officially decided to move on from their longest tenured player in Chris Kreider, sending him to Anaheim for Carey Terrance along with a pick swap. That move in itself didn’t necessarily make the team any better in the moment, but did create the cap space to allow Chris Drury to make the signings he needed to on July 1. This trade, barring any other major moves, will also allow for younger Rangers forwards like Brennan Othmann, Brett Berard, and Gabe Perreault to compete for a full time roster spot out of camp, which will hopefully help at least one or two of them develop into useful NHL players for the Rangers this season.
That being said, as much as it might hurt to see Chris Kreider playing for another team this fall, this was a move that needed to happen. In addition to the aforementioned reasons, this is a true core-changing move—which after the season this team had last year, changes that drastic needed to take place. Whether or not Kreider was at fault for last season, and to what extent, things were so bad that it left the Rangers no choice but to knock it all down and start again and as expected, it started with Kreider.
