It’s kind of weird, isn’t it? Three years after Chris Drury came in as general manager with one of his main mandates being to make the team bigger, stronger and tougher, the Rangers enter the 2024-25 season with one of the biggest questions being whether they are big enough, strong enough and enough tough.
That’s not, for the record, a knock on Drury — or at least it’s not meant to overshadow a very strong record he’s put together over the past three seasons.
It’s no coincidence that since he took over, the Rangers have climbed out of a rebuilding phase and into Stanley Cup contention, on a relatively straight path no less. There are no shortage of factors that saw the Rangers blossom into one of the league’s best teams and Presidents’ Trophy winners, and Drury’s leadership was one of them.
So yes, we’re doing a little nitpicking here, because the Rangers are now at a level where — barring disaster — the questions about the regular season have more to do with how they’ll win than if they’ll win, and nothing can be called a success until the next 82 games and then some.