Eric Hartline-Imagn ImagesThere’s no hiding the fact that the 2025-26 season hasn’t gone as planned for Adam Edström.
Edström’s emergence was a pleasant surprise for the New York Rangers during the 2024-25 season. The 2019 sixth-round pick made the Rangers’ opening-night roster out of training camp and was a mainstay in the lineup through the first half of the season, playing in a fourth-line role.
However, his momentum was put to a screeching halt when he suffered a lower-body injury in February of 2025, which sidelined him for the remainder of the season.
Given the strides he made during the 2024-25 campaign, it appeared as if he would continue building upon his success under new head coach Mike Sullivan despite his previous injury.
The 25-year-old forward struggled out of the gate though, recording just four points over his first 24 games.
Edström revealed that he was dealing with a nagging lower-body injury to start the season. He originally tried to play through it, but the injury progressively worsened to the point where the Rangers placed him on long-term injured reserve.
“I mean it sucks,” Edström said of dealing with constant injuries. “What I was dealing with this year, I felt for a long period of time that I can push through it and take care of it after the season, but the more I played, the worse it got. It finally reached a point where the doctors and me made a decision together, it was better for us to just take care of it right away.
“That also puts you in a bad spot, not playing at 100%, playing injured, and from there, missing a lot of time. When you get put on the sideline for that amount of time, it’s not good for your career. It’s been two frustrating years, and knock on wood, I’m hoping I can stay healthy.”
Edström confirmed that he’s currently feeling 100% healthy.
Upon returning to the lineup on March 5, Sullivan experimented with Edström in a few different roles, including on the top-six forward unit and playing center on the fourth line.
In his 11 games played since being activated off LTIR, Edström tallied one goal.
Edström has suddenly found himself as the odd man out of the Rangers’ lineup, being a healthy scratch for the team’s past seven games.
Sullivan pointed toward inconsistencies in Edström’s game for his reasoning behind scratching him from the lineup.
“I think with Eddie (Edström) I think we would just like to see a little bit more consistency with his game,” Sullivan said. “What we like about Eddie's game is his size, his strength, his skating ability, his reach. He's a disruptive player, but it has to be consistent. He's got to skate, he's got to finish checks, he has to make good decisions with the puck. When he plays that way consistently, he’s an effective player. I think consistency has been the challenge.”
For Edström, who had grown accustomed to his consistent role from last season, has now been forced to adapt to the new reality that his spot isn’t necessarily secured.
The rise of players like Tye Kartye, Jaroslav Chmelař, and Adam Sýkora is making it difficult for Edström to recapture the spot in the lineup he once held, and it’s been a difficult pill to swallow for the Swedish forward.
“It’s never fun, you always want to be out there,” Edström said. “You want to help your teammates and play your best hockey. I feel like it ended up being a very choppy year for me with my injury and then kind of coming back and felt like I never really got going. So it's tough. It's been a tough year.”
Through this recent stretch, where Edström has continued to serve as a healthy scratch, there’s been healthy dialogue between him and Sullivan regarding the roster decision making.
“We’ve had some conversations,” Edström said of his dialogue with Sullivan. “He's kind of told me how he looks at my season, and I got to talk to him and kind of tell him how I felt. At the end of the day, it’s his team, and he decides who plays, so all I can do is respect that.”
The Rangers have won five of their last six games, finding consistency in their line combinations, which does not bode well for Edström’s chances to work his way back into the fold.
With four games remaining this season, Sullivan did not specify if he had plans to insert Edström back into the lineup at any point before everybody packs their bags for the summer.
Sullivan praised Edström’s professionalism over this time, while confirming that they’ve talked at length about why Edström hasn’t seen the ice in a number of games.
“I think he’s handled it extremely well,” Sullivan said of how Edström is handling being scratched. “No player likes to sit out. I know he’s not happy about it. I'd be concerned if he was, quite honestly, so I think he's handled it extremely well. Eddie and I have had a number of conversations around this.
“One of the things I always try to do is communicate with the players and explain the whys. They don't necessarily have to agree with the decision. My hope is they'll respect the decision based on the conversations and the whys. Eddie and I have had a number of conversations around that, but I think he's handling it extremely well.”
In 35 games this season, Edström has recorded three goals, two assists, and five points, while averaging 9:28 minutes.
What does this all mean for Edström’s future and his spot with the Rangers?
The Blueshirts will certainly have an abundance of players competing for a bottom-six spot come training camp in about six months’ time, with Edström likely being just one player amongst a whole pack vying for an NHL spot.
“I feel like there are a lot of parts in my game that I can develop for sure,” Edström said. “I can work on physicality, always skating hard, those kinds of things. It’s been a very choppy year, playing big amounts of the year not feeling well, playing injured, missing a lot of time. As I said, it’s been a tough year.”