It has become blatantly obvious that the New York Rangers are in deep trouble.
On Monday night, the Los Angeles Kings, a team with an anemic offense that ranks among the league's lowest scoring squads, walked into Madison Square Garden and put up a six-spot on two different Blueshirts goaltenders.
Igor Shesterkin is sidelined for the rest of the season with a knee injury, and with each passing game, it becomes abundantly clear that his record-setting contract extension was worth every single dollar. This organization is drowning without him, and the external goaltending market offers virtually no life rafts.
President and General Manager Chris Drury tried the quick-fix route by inking 38-year-old veteran James Reimer, and that experiment lasted all of three goals on eight shots before Mike Sullivan pulled the hook after 20 minutes. It was another band-aid applied to a gaping organizational wound, and it completely failed to solve New York's biggest issue.
Shesterkin is Rangers' Most Valuable Player
Dylan Garand has held his own, but the workload is starting to get to him. He cannot start every game until Joonas Korpisalo returns, and that timetable still hasn’t been established.
Reimer deserves some leeway. Father Time, zero NHL game action this season, and minimal practice time before being thrown into live fire at MSG was a recipe for disaster. But Sullivan panicking and yanking him after one period defeated the entire purpose of the start, forcing Garand into his ninth straight game appearance.
Shesterkin’s absence leaves the kind of crater rarely seen in modern hockey. When Sidney Crosby missed significant time with concussion issues in the early 2010s, the Pittsburgh Penguins maintained their identity and comfortably reached the playoffs.
Goaltender and center are fundamentally different positions, but with a revamped blue line and a possession-heavy offensive system, a competent NHL tandem should give this roster a chance to win. Instead, the team is leaking high-danger chances and looks completely fragile in its own end.
Do the Rangers have a chance without Shesterkin?
At 7-6-1, these losses keep piling up. Garand was supposed to get some rest against the Kings, but he had to finish out the last 40 minutes, which made starting Reimer pointless. Luckily, the Rangers have a bit of a break here with their next game being after Halloween.
That gives Garand a good bit of time to rest, which should give the Rangers a good chance to win that November 1 contest at home against Edmonton. But after that, the situation of workload management comes back into effect.
The Rangers have a chance to keep this up and make the playoffs without him, but support is going to have to come. Korpisalo has to be a dependable goaltender when healthy, giving the goaltending tandem a nice 1-2 punch.
Shesterkin is a steal at $11.567 million
When Drury locked up Shesterkin to an extension carrying an exact $11,567,857 cap hit, plenty of cap purists questioned such an investment in a goaltender. The argument that "goalies are voodoo" and don't warrant double-digit cap hits was repeated ad nauseam across national media.
This early-season collapse obliterates that argument for good. Shesterkin impacts the outcome of this entire franchise whether he is standing in the blue paint or watching from the trainer's room.
Locking up No. 31 when they did was a blessing, and they deserve credit for going all in with an eight-year deal when they did. Had this campaign been his contract year, Shesterkin’s leverage with an escalating salary cap would have easily commanded $14 million or more on the open market.
Instead, the franchise netminder is locked in on Broadway through the 2032-33 season. The present without him is painful, but the alternative of entering free agency without him signed would have been an unmitigated disaster.
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