New York Rangers President and General Manager Chris Drury spoke to members of the media on Wednesday evening to talk about the trade of Artemi Panarin, and fans have every right to be skeptical about the direction of the organization post Letter 2.0. Panarin is now a member of the Los Angeles Kings, and the return for the Blueshirts' star player was way worse than anyone could have predicted. To make matters worse, Drury's comments on the transaction and overall direction the team are going in make it sound like the process is going to be a tedious one, and more along the lines of being a rebuild even though he's dead set that what the team is doing is a retool.
Chris Drury wants you to know the Rangers are retooling and not rebuilding
Mollie Walker was one of the media members who had a chance to answer a question, and here's what Drury had to say to the question of if he has a goal timeline in mind for when the Rangers would contend again.
"I think there's a difference in a retool and a rebuild. As we said in the letter, it is a retool. We're certainly not going to sit here and put a timeline on it right now. We're going to try to do everything we can to get back to being a contending team as quickly as we can. We have identified and continue to identity players that we want here and want to stay here and go forward and build around and move forward with."
This should be an immediate red flag, because not putting a timeline in place suggests that the Rangers don't want to be in a position where the fans can keep them honest. Drury couches his comments by insisting that they are going to do things as quickly as possible, and they have identified players they want to bring in, and players they want to keep around.
The Rangers have a Stanley Cup winning coach in Mike Sullivan, a top three defender in Adam Fox, and a top three goalie in Igor Shesterkin. To have those three in place and be in the position where the next two seasons, at minimum may not be competitive, is a very bad situation to be in. A true retool would have more of a timeline in place, and Drury keeping things open ended afford him the opportunity to change gears if necessary.
In general it is tough to chart out the direction the Rangers are going to go in, particularly because the free agent class is so weak. Alex Tuch is in line to make a ton of money in free agency, and that's not the exact type of player the Rangers need. There's the potential for them to try and accumulate assets and trade for impact players, and maybe that will be more clear after players like Vincent Trocheck have been traded. As is stands, the cupboard is pretty empty from an asset standpoint, and that just makes the need to win upcoming trades crucial.
Rangers have players in mind to be part of the retool
Drury was also asked about players who give him confidence that the he can build around, and why a retool is better than tearing things down. To that point, here's what Drury had to say.
"I'm not going to go player by player on our team, or players we're going to target in the league, obviously. Again, I think we have a lot of really good players at key positions. It has not worked out the way we had hoped. We're going to continue to look back at decisions we made and choices we make and try to make better ones. But I can tell you, I still believe in a lot of players in that room. We're going to try to build around some of them and try keep pushing this thing forward. As I said in the letter, try to be a contender as soon as we can."
Again, it remains to be seen which players they have in mind. If I had to guess, Alex Tuch is one, Brady Tkachuk is another, and Jason Robertson could be in the mix if he doesn't do something big with Dallas. Other than that, no one clear stands out that will become available soon. He admits the Rangers have a lot of really good players at key positions. If that's the case, why not be direct and admit that missing the playoffs two years in a row is unacceptable, and that they can't do it for a third year in a row?
Drury was also asked by Mollie about what structural changes could take place, specifically when it comes to personnel, approach, and philosophy when it comes to scouting and development.
"Well, it's two huge, important pieces of the organization. The draft and development, organizations need to make good draft picks, obviously, and they need those draft picks to develop and get to the big club and impact the lineup. Again, those are two important parts of the organization, along with scouting and a number of other departments that we're always looking at and seeing if we can tweak things, seeing what we can learn from other organizations that have gone through this before, and always looking for ways in both those departments to be better."
This answer from Drury isn't really specific, and he's just restating the question in a different way. Drafting and development has been an issue for the Rangers, and when you have had as many early picks as the Rangers have had over the last 10 years, they really should have more to show for it. Alexis Lafrenière and Kaapo Kakko didn't perform up to their draft spot, Lias Andersson and VitalI Kravtsov were early picks made by the prior regime that didn't pan out, and these are just some examples that fans are quite familiar with. The Hartford Wolf Pack remain a joke, and until that changes, the Rangers won't have a place to bring players who aren't ready for the NHL to grow and get better.
Rangers may have a talent evaluation problem
It is possible that the Rangers have a talent evaluation problem, and that's something that is hard not to think about when listening to Drury talk about the key return in the Panarin trade, and just the overall process of trading Panarin.
When asked for an assessment on Liam Greentree, Drury said, "I think he brings a lot to the table. Certainly, just looking at his numbers and his offensive production, it's very exciting. He’s got some size to him. He's got a really good hockey IQ, and a lot of skill… We valued him, a prospect like him, higher than a '26 or '27 first-round pick. He's an '06 birth year and ready to turn pro and wrapping up on his junior career and looking forward to getting him to development camp.”
Valuing Greentree, a 20 year old player in his fourth season of OHL hockey, is an interesting take considering the way his development has gone. Greentree had 45 points in 61 games as a rookie, 90 points in 64 games in his second season, 119 points in 64 games last year, and he's on pace to finish with 70 points in 53 games this year. Right now the Windsor Spitfires captain has 23 goals and 45 points in 34 games.
To value a player like that over a future first round pick, when the Rangers don't have an idea when they are contending next, seems pretty shortsighted. There's always the chance that Greentree is an asset they flip in a future deal. What is more infuriating, if you are a Rangers fan, is that Ken Holland was interested in including other players in the Panarin trade, but Drury was more focused on getting the deal done for Panarin before the freeze went into place.
Holland says Kings briefly spoke with NYR about including other players in the deal, but Chris Drury wanted to really focus on getting a deal done for Panarin. #GoKingsGo
— The Mayor | Team MM (@mayorNHL) February 5, 2026
Part of the reason that the return was so light is that the Kings were seemingly the only team willing to offer an extension Panarin was comfortable with. That Drury didn't take the time to try and improve the return by expanding the trade is a managerial malpractice. It once again creates more pressure to win future trades, and I don't blame fans who aren't feeling confident in Drury's ability to do that.
Final thoughts
It certainly feels like Drury is operating in such a manner that he's trying to buy himself time. Fans have been pretty vocal with chants of "Fire Drury" at Madison Square Garden, and the timing of the Letter 2.0 coming out when it did isn't a coincidence. The Letter 2.0 essentially served as an unofficial vote of confidence in Drury, and was telling fans to be patient as the team started a transition. Drury failed the first big test in getting an underwhelming return for Panarin, and folding at an artificial deadline. His answers to questions about the Rangers' overall process are concerning, and it feels very risky to have Drury in charge of cleaning up his own mess. The Rangers are still too far along and talented to be in this position, and Drury's performance at the upcoming NHL trade deadline will give a better sense on whether or not he's built for this moment.