Igor Shesterkin’s injury on Friday night didn’t look promising at first glance, and the testing has revealed a worst-case scenario.
The team relayed to reporters, including Peter Baugh of The Athletic, that the star netminder’s 2026-27 season has come to an end.
Additionally, they noted that backup goaltender Joonas Korpisalo will miss another four weeks with his lower-body injury while center Joe Veleno will miss three to three-and-a-half months with his lower-body injury.
Shesterkin’s injury is a massive blow to a Rangers squad that had gotten off to a solid start to the season. The 30-year-old is consistently viewed as one of the elite netminders in the NHL and is being paid as such; his $11,567,857 cap hit is a league record for goalies.
His campaign comes to an end with a 1.79 GAA and a .927 SV% in five games, while also scoring his first career goal. For his career, Shesterkin has a 2.51 GAA and a .917 SV% in 330 games, helping him earn his current deal. Simply put, players of his caliber are hard to replace.
Given that they’re already very tight to the upper limit, the Rangers will be moving into LTIR in the near future. Because this is a season-ending injury for Shesterkin, they will have close to his full salary cap charge available to spend. Teams that put players without a season-ending designation are capped at the lower of the players’ cap hit or just over $3.9M, representing last year’s average salary. That will give GM Chris Drury some spending flexibility to work with. That said, given that Shesterkin’s contract runs through 2032-33 and that Korpisalo has another year on the books as well, it’s fair to surmise that he will only be looking for goalies on expiring contracts to try to stabilize things.
To that end, there are a handful of veterans who have started before that are in the final year of their respective contracts. If Detroit decides to pivot to a short-term rebuild given their situation, John Gibson could be a fit. Jordan Binnington is now the second-string option in St. Louis but has been a capable starter in the past. Darcy Kuemper is off to a rough start in Los Angeles and doesn’t appear likely to be re-signed so he could be a potential target as well. If they want to aim for a cheaper option to acquire in terms of assets, inconsistent veterans like Philipp Grubauer (Seattle) and Sam Montembeault (Montreal) could fit the bill. In terms of veteran free-agent options, James Reimer is probably the best one available but he didn’t take part in training camp anywhere, meaning he would need some sort of conditioning stint to get up to speed, at a minimum.
In the short term, Dylan Garand, who cleared waivers in training camp, will be the starter for the Rangers for the next four weeks at a minimum, barring another goalie being brought in. While AHL veteran Spencer Martin was unable to play last night due to a lower-body injury, Vince Z. Mercogliano of The Athletic notes that he has been cleared to return, paving the way for him to be recalled. Martin has a handful of NHL games under his belt if he’s called on in a pinch but it’s fair to say that Drury will be calling around about assessing his options soon, if he hasn’t already started.
Meanwhile, Mollie Walker of the New York Post relays that the Rangers will make a pair of roster moves for LTIR optimization purposes. Cole Beaudoin will be sent to AHL Hartford with Juuso Parssinen coming up in the short term. Beaudoin will play for the Wolf Pack tonight, making him eligible to be brought back to New York on Sunday.