“This organization doesn’t work without the players,” the New York Rangers‘ forward Mika Zibanejad said with a long face after the team missed the 2025 Stanley Cup playoffs. With that, he also urged everyone to work together to improve the next season. However, looking at the debatable decisions the management took throughout the season, fans can’t help but wonder if the current situation could have been avoided.

After the Rangers were unable to clinch a spot in the postseason, New York netminder Igor Shesterkin grumbled with pain, “In my mind, something broke during the season and went the other way, and we couldn’t handle it.” Difficult words to come from someone who left everything on the ice. But what sent things the other way? One answer has come to light, and the fans are livid.

While almost all New York Rangers players struggled to cope with the pressure this year, forward Chris Kreider‘s 13th season with the team was an especially poor one. While it wasn’t initially clear as to why the veteran couldn’t step up to carry the weight of the expectations, it is now. The Athletic reporter Peter Baugh posted on X on April 21, sharing what caused Kreider to have such a horrific 2024-25 season. “Chris Kreider said he dealt with back troubles early in the season, an illness that resulted in vertigo midseason, and then suffered a hand injury the first game after 4 Nations,” the post notes, while affirming that the Rangers’ celebrity will need surgery.

Kreider picked up the hand injury, possibly on February 22, when the New York Rangers faced the Buffalo Sabres. Combined with his back troubles, Chris was then out for six games, which ultimately affected his entire season significantly. The same star who produced 39 goals and 36 assists in the 82 games last season could only bag 30 points this time around. Indeed, a tough situation for any NHL star who has dealt with injuries before, and hasn’t exactly started his hockey career only a couple of years ago. But the physical ordeal was only half of it.

Throughout the season, and even now, trade rumors involving the Rangers’ winger have surfaced several times. The official NHL website also claims that general manager Chris Drury had discussed Kreger’s possible trade with some of his colleagues. Despite the speculations, Kreider has noted that he wants to continue his NHL career in New York. “I mean, this is home for me,” the player said on Monday, “This is the organization that gave me an opportunity to live out my dream. I’ve developed so many incredible relationships and grown up and spent in this area…this is where I want to be and this is the group I want to help in whatever fashion and win hockey games.” An emotional whirlpool? You betcha!

Naturally, fans were furious as to why the information was just revealed instead of being kept in the loop from the beginning. “Why on earth was he allowed to keep playing through all of this,” one fan was bewildered as to why the New York Rangers’ management would even take such a dumb decision to make an injured player continue on despite their physical discomfort. Others agreed.

New York Rangers take the flak from the fans

Chris played 68 games of the 82 regular season games in 2024-25. He was even part of the Team USA roster for the inaugural 4 Nations Face-Off, held earlier this year. Unsurprisingly, the injuries’ impacts only grew with Kreider playing so many games in his condition. For obvious reasons, fans think it was a display of carelessness by the New York Rangers to allow one of their key stars to lace up like that. One fan seemed stunned: “Why did anyone on the coaching staff let him play?!” Another was equally flabbergasted, as their comment read, “poor choice by him, even worse the organization didn’t do anything about it.”

Like every time, injuries have been a continuous troublemaker throughout the entire 2024-25 season. The 4 Nations Face-Off only added to the elevated blood pressure, as it took as many as a number of key stars out of their respective teams, ultimately negatively affecting both the stars and the franchises. But fans think that the New York Rangers should have taken the situation more seriously, as the team was still in playoff contention even in mid-March. “Great coaching to play injured players,” said one fan, comment dripping in sarcasm.

However, most injured players took the rational route and stayed off the ice for some time to recover from their injuries. Many of them are expected to return with their squads qualifying for the playoffs, including the Florida Panthers’ Matthew Tkachuk. Exactly why playing Kreiger makes all the less sense to fans. “People better apologize to Kreider right now. I can’t imagine how hard it would be to fight through all those things in one season. He wasn’t mentally checked out, he was hurt!!!” fans bellowed.

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