Are the Rangers a better team after offseason moves?

One team that is trying to show that last year was a fluke is the New York Rangers.

After following up on a Presidents’ Trophy win with missing out on the Stanley Cup Playoffs entirely, general manager Chris Drury has made some moves so far this offseason, most notably signing defenseman Vladislav Gavrikov to a seven-year contract. That happened the same day Drury signed and traded fellow blueliner K’Andre Miller to the Carolina Hurricanes for Scott Morrow and a couple of draft picks.

Drury made other changes outside of free agency, including hiring Mike Sullivan as the team’s new head coach after firing Peter Laviolette shortly after the season.

That said, many wonder if the Rangers are going to be better than they were last season. With so many teams in the Metropolitan Division that are capable of making it to the postseason, the Blueshirts will have their hands full in 2025-26.

On Wednesday’s edition of Daily Faceoff LIVE, Tyler Yaremchuk and Jonny Lazarus discuss whether the Rangers are a better team now than they were at the end of this past season.

Jonny Lazarus:  I think Chris Drury had a pretty good offseason so far, at least a start to it with the hand he was dealt. Do I think this Rangers team, and the roster right now, is a better roster than opening night last year? No, I don’t. That’s mainly because of just their bottom-six forward group. … Their third line at the start of the year last year was [Kaapo] Kakko, [Filip] Chytil, and [Will] Cuylle, and they were their most consistent line in the beginning of the season, until Kaapo Kakko was traded to Seattle.

So, a lot of question marks for me as far as the New York Rangers go. The left side of their blue line – Carson Soucy and Urho Vaakanainen – I don’t think those two are going to help this team get into the playoffs. Their top pair will be great with Gavrikov and [Adam] Fox, but the bottom four defenseman, I just don’t have all the confidence in the world…a lot of what-ifs right now for the New York Rangers, and I do think there are three better teams in the Metropolitan Division. That’s the Carolina Hurricanes, the [New Jersey] Devils, and the Washington Capitals. There’s a bad taste in my mouth from this previous season, but we’ll see what Mike Sullivan and the new coaching staff can do.

You can watch the full segment and entire episode here…