The New York Rangers entered the season in a strange place. With Mike Sullivan coming on board as the new head coach, normally the expectations would be very high. You don’t hire a two-time Stanley Cup winning coach with the intentions of rebuilding. However, the Rangers were terrible last season, strangely following a season in which they were two wins away from making the Stanley Cup Finals. This year had a range of possibilities, with a general consensus that the Rangers would be a playoff team in transition. But now the Rangers are in the mushy middle, the worst spot to be.

You could certainly argue that the Rangers are below (or even well-below) average, which falls more in line with their place in the standings and their ghastly play at home this season. Still, not many teams can claim to have an all-world defenseman and an all-world goalie like the Rangers do in Adam Fox and Igor Shesterkin. Add forwards such as Artemi Panarin, Vincent Trocheck, and J.T. Miller to the fold, and on paper, the Rangers don’t look bad at all. 

Still, hockey is not played on paper. Vincent Trocheck missed time with injury, Artemi Panarin appears to be a shell of himself, and J.T. Miller is a mixture of the two issues. Combine that with the subpar play of Alexis Lafreniere, the slump of Will Cuylle, and the lack of secondary scoring, and it’s clear the Rangers aren’t anything special up front. 

On defense, the Rangers, a historically inept team, appear to be much improved. Adam Fox is back to being all-world, Vladislav Gavrikov has been worth his big contract, Will Borgen has been excellent, and the rest of the defense has been good enough. 

Combine a slightly above expectations defense with a slightly below expectations offense and what do you get? An average hockey team.

Mike Sullivan is pushing every button possible to get more out of this team, but there just isn’t much potential to untap. The roster is fine. Not great, just fine. The players struggling have reason to be struggling. An aging core is showing they’re moving in the wrong direction. The youth aren’t picking up the slack. It happens.

What is really worth considering the most, however, is to get out of the mushy middle. Artemi Panarin leaving in free agency will create cap space, but for who? Nobody good is going to be a free agent. Maybe J.T. Miller gets healthy and improves, but his 99 point days are behind him. Maybe Alexis Lafreniere becomes a bonafide top-line winger, but what does that look like? In our wildest dreams, it feels like it’s 75 points. 

Simply put, the ceiling appears to be an average team propped up by an amazing goalie. 

The floor appears to be a bad team.

Doesn’t inspire confidence, does it?

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