Well, that was a nice, quiet week, wasn’t it?
The New York Rangers made plenty of noise and solved a few issues. Jacob Trouba is a Duck, Igor Shesterkin is a Ranger for eight more years and Chris Drury, as he said on Saturday, hopes the Rangers can proceed with some calm and cohesion.
“It’s my job to try and figure out on a day-to-day, week-to-week basis what the team needs,” Drury said. “I’m certainly not opposed to (making) more changes, but big picture, with that said, the team has been through a lot the last couple of weeks and certainly this week. I’d like to let the dust settle a little bit. … Just like to see the team get settled in with this a little bit.”
Sunday’s 7-5 loss to the Seattle Kraken may not exactly calm the waters, leaving the Rangers 2-7-0 in their last nine, but unless Drury has another big move in mind, it’s not a bad time to just try to put the pieces back together.
Here’s some more detail on the Shesterkin contract, Trouba’s exit and some 4 Nations Face-Off chatter from inside the Rangers’ room:
• Shesterkin’s camp wasn’t interested in negotiating after the start of the season, but clearly things progressed from two months ago when the Rangers were finally willing to make Shesterkin the highest-paid goalie in NHL history. There’s no question Shesterkin would have gotten more than $11.5 million per had he hit the open market — two league sources said they thought Shesterkin could have even gotten more total money than the $92 million he’ll get from the Rangers, even though other teams could only offer seven years on July 1.
And, interestingly, a league source said Shesterkin turned down more than $92 million from the Rangers. It’s believed the higher AAV offer had a different bonus structure that didn’t appeal to the goalie. Shesterkin also, according to the league source, didn’t want to hamstring Drury and the Rangers in their ability to keep a competitive team in front of Shesterkin.
• It’s not like Shesterkin did the Rangers a huge favor, though. He’ll still get $30 million in a 366-day span from July 1, 2025, to July 2, 2026. And now, even with Trouba off the books for next season, the Rangers have $70.9 million committed for 2025-26 on just 13 NHL players. If the cap goes up to $94 million, that’s not terrible, and you can pencil in Gabe Perreault to the group most likely, so that’s an entry-level contract that the Rangers need to slot in.
Drury is still looking at an extension for Will Cuylle, big decisions on K’Andre Miller, Kaapo Kakko and Ryan Lindgren, and possibly a need for a backup to Shesterkin. That space will go quickly while Drury may also be looking for a blockbuster deal to shake up his group.
So it was imperative that Shesterkin get signed before the offseason was fully underway so Drury knows what he’s looking at. It’s no surprise that the GM kept the lines of communication open with the goalie’s camp in recent weeks to get this done.
• Trouba’s comments during his first Anaheim Zoom call with reporters were revealing. Even more revealing were his comments to ESPN during the intermission of the Rangers-Pittsburgh Penguins game on Friday. He was asked about the possibility of a move to Detroit last June and Trouba gave a very tongue-in-cheek reply to that rumor: “Obviously I’ve thought about that. I think somebody should maybe verify with the Red Wings if they were interested. Has anybody taken that route?”
At the time the Trouba-to-the-Wings rumor popped up in June, a league source said Detroit hadn’t had a conversation with the Rangers. It’s not believed there were any talks between the two teams at all before the season began; there were some initial talks this past week but the Wings would have needed the Rangers to retain salary, so those talks went nowhere fast.
Trouba’s a pro, so it’s doubtful he’ll be spilling much more about his time with the Rangers. But when you handle your business the way the Rangers have, there will be some hurt feelings — and perhaps some raw comments from those unhappy parties.
• One other Shesterkin note that relates to Trouba: The goalie made sure to get a no-move clause for the life of his eight-year deal. A league source mused that anyone, Ranger or free agent, doing business with Drury going forward will insist on a full no-move to avoid the kind of exits Barclay Goodrow (15-team no-trade clause) and Trouba (four years of a no-move that dropped to a 15-team no-trade clause last July 1) had.
That may make things a little tougher for Drury when trying to sign free agents, or it may make things tougher years down the road when trying to get out from under a big contract.
• Urho Vaakanainen is on injured reserve, so he’s part of the big club until he’s healthy. We’ll see if the Rangers want to give the 25-year-old a look in the lineup when that happens or if they’ll try to pass him through waivers to get him to Hartford.
Interestingly, there was a chance Vaakanainen could have been a Ranger once before. When the Rangers sent Rick Nash to the Boston Bruins at the 2017-18 deadline, Vaakanainen was a Bruins prospect, the 18th pick in the 2017 draft. A league source said the Bruins had Vaakanainen on their “untouchable” list when the Rangers were trying to find a prospect to add to the first-rounder in the deal; the Rangers chose Lindgren. Turned out OK, I’d say.
• Wild GM and U.S. 4 Nations GM Bill Guerin told ESPN last week that Chris Kreider told Guerin he’d do anything the U.S. team wanted — even scrub the floors of the locker room — to be part of the squad. Kreider should get to do more than that.
Penguins and U.S. coach Mike Sullivan was a Rangers assistant under John Tortorella when Kreider first became a Ranger a dozen years ago. He’s seen Kreider mature from a big, fast body who didn’t have the greatest on-ice awareness to a player used in all situations who’s become perhaps the most dangerous special teams player in the league at age 32.
“Kreids has done a great job of just understanding how to leverage his strengths and play to his strengths,” Sullivan said before the Penguins’ Friday loss to the Rangers at Madison Square Garden. “He’s a guy we had long discussions about for the U.S. roster and he’s deserving of a spot there. … He’s a fundamental part of the power play in New York. So that’s an element we could use him. He also kills penalties, we could use him there. We feel we can move him all around the lineup.”
• The Rangers have five players in the February tournament, but if this were a true international competition, it’d be far more. No Russia in any international play means Artemi Panarin and Shesterkin wouldn’t be part of arguably a team with as good a shot as Canada or the U.S. at winning it.
And, as Filip Chytil sternly pointed out during a casual conversation in the Rangers room last week, the reigning World Championship gold medalists, the Czechs, aren’t in the tournament either.
“Fil,” said one Ranger, “go sit on a beach (in February). Get some vitamin D.”
That might be the preference of the entire organization for their players in a compacted season — Kreider, Vincent Trocheck and Mika Zibanejad are all north of 30 years old and the round-robin tournament may not be what Drury and Peter Laviolette would like.
• Shout out to Sam Rosen, who went into the U.S. Hockey Hall of Fame on Wednesday as this year’s Lester Patrick Award winner. Lots of MSG Network folks were on hand in Pittsburgh for the induction ceremony, as was Laviolette, who also coached player inductee Matt Cullen and is close with inductee Kevin Stevens. Rosen’s final season behind the mic for the Rangers has been a wild one already and his induction was a bright spot in a bizarre week.
(Top photo of Igor Shesterkin and Jacob Trouba: Bruce Bennett / Getty Images)
