Chris Kreider discusses trade talks and injury issues as excitement mounts for Rangers

RALEIGH, N.C. – When the Rangers’ longest-tenured player, Chris Kreider, was suddenly sidelined a day after his name was mentioned in president and general manager Chris Drury’s league-wide trade recruiting memo, it seemed like a strange coincidence .

However, the 33-year-old wanted to set the record just before his second consecutive scratch.

“Back spasms,” Kreider said after an optional morning run before the Rangers took on the Hurricanes on Wednesday night. “The back is locked on me – sacrum. A few games ago it was the lumbar spine (the spine, the lower back is made up of five or six vertebrae that support most of the body’s weight and allow movement), and during training camp it was the thoracic spine (the chest or body part in between) . neck and stomach).

“Very independent, annoying things. So we’re working on it. Did a few things to fix the problem so it doesn’t happen again.”

Kreider hasn’t heard his name in the conversation since the 2020 trade deadline, when the Rangers essentially had to choose between him or defenseman Brady Skjei due to salary cap constraints.

Skjei was sent to Carolina, and the Rangers signed Kreider to a seven-year, $45.5 million contract with a no-move clause – which was changed to a 15-team no-trade list this season.

Kreider noted that he has been in New York for 13 seasons now and said there will always be noise when playing for a team like the Rangers.

Still, the way Drury declared himself open to business with the NHL’s other 31 general managers less than 20 games into the season – mentioning a list of players that didn’t just focus on Kreider or their captain Jacob Trouba – is telling limited -, traits of ruthlessness on The Rangers’ boss has shown that he avoided Barclay Goodrow’s no-trade list this summer and his $3.6 million cap hit handed over.

“You shouldn’t trivialize someone’s feelings, but how you feel has no impact on your ability to do something you’ve done your whole life – unless you let it,” Kreider said. “There are people here who say there are games where they come in, feel great but don’t play well. There are games where they’re feeling bad, they’re sick, maybe they’re a little under the weather and suddenly the puck follows them. The body knows what to do, it just has to do it its own way and let it do it.”

Kreider said he had conversations with Drury, who likely made a point of holding multiple meetings with players after all the outside chatter. There are always a lot of conversations over the course of a season, Kreider said, acknowledging that he has been part of the leadership group for some time.

With nine goals and zero assists this season, Kreider hasn’t contributed much to the lines he’s skated on, nor has he been his usual force on the power play.

There is dissatisfaction throughout the locker room with the way the entire team has been playing, but the Rangers are trying to use that as fuel.

“I think it’s pretty obvious that there’s frustration, fear and tension,” Kreider said of the feeling in the Rangers’ locker room. “Good. We’re 20 games in. Let’s go through this now and figure out who we are. We had the best regular season in the history of an Original Six franchise last year, won a Presidents’ Trophy and are not like that We’ve come as far as we would have liked. Our warts are out there and the teams are picking on the things we don’t do well and we’ve gotten away from the things we do well.

“We don’t necessarily know what that is at the moment, do we? That might just be part of the story. We look back and say, “That made us better.” ”