Broken Rangers must waste no time for change after Philadelphia fallout

PHILADELPHIA — In a matter of weeks, the Rangers have become the Giants and Jets.The season has devolved into dysfunction marked by a fifth straight regulation defeat that matches the club’s longest stretch of futility since the tumultuous final week of the 2020-21 season — during which president John Davidson and general manager Jeff Gorton were fired days ahead of the dismissal of head coach David Quinn.Now GM Chris Drury and head coach Peter Laviolette have the responsibility of fixing what has become a broken unit.It is still November, the Rangers still have a winning record of 12-9-1, but there is no time to waste for either of these gentlemen, and there is no time to waste for a cast of characters in the room who appear to have lost their will.The empty-net-abetted 3-1 final here in going down to the Flyers on Friday afternoon flatters the squad.

The Rangers were run out of the rink by a pedestrian opponent in the first period.They did not get their first shot until the 11:11 mark, by which time they were down 2-0 at the 4:14 mark on a pair of goals 1:10 apart.They were ultimately outshot 15-3, with the scoring chances and high-danger chances coming in at 13-4 and 10-2 against, respectively.

This was essentially a repeat of first periods last week in Calgary and Edmonton, where the Rangers seemed unprepared.The league-wide memo distributed by Drury, advertising that Chris Kreider and Jacob Trouba were among the many available, seems to have blown up in the GM’s face.Why he would have sent that missive instead of peeling the paint off the wall in no uncertain terms in a face-to-face meeting with the team in the room either on an off day or after a game is beyond me.The Rangers have a lame-duck captain who seems to have checked out.Perhaps that’s only natural.

Trouba knows the Rangers had every intention of trading him in the offseason, before he used whatever leverage he could to block a deal.He knows he is on the block now.I was wrong about Troub...