Matt Robertson’s long-awaited Rangers future finally could be here
NY Post
He first stepped onto the ice wearing Rangers regalia at the club’s 2019 development camp conducted at Chelsea Piers in Stamford while the Tarrytown training facility was undergoing a renovation.
Matt Robertson was strutting his stuff after having been a second-round draft choice, selected 49th overall after the club had taken Kaapo Kakko second overall. He was on the ice with, among others, Kakko; incoming defensemen Adam Fox and K’Andre Miller; and future goaltender Igor Shesterkin.
Five years later, the 6-foot-4, 209-pound defenseman is back again. Five years later, now 23, Robertson is still looking to make his NHL debut. It is extremely unusual for a North American player going through the CHL route to take five years to make his big-league debut and make the team— and it would be unprecedented within the Rangers organization— but that will be merely a footnote if Robertson sticks.
Not all players adhere to the same timetable. Robertson has played 190 AHL games. The Islanders’ Scott Mayfield played 223 games in the AHL while his teammate, Ryan Pulock, played 163 games with Bridgeport. It took until age 26 for Taylor Fritz to reach his first Grand Slam final at the U.S. Open.
Injuries may have been part of the factor holding back Robertson, but No. 44 revealed he had worked with a mental skills coach this summer in order to address confidence issues he has encountered through his career.
“I really worked on the mental side of the game this summer, try to improve that,” the Edmonton native said. “I think that was probably the biggest thing holding me back, just my mental psyche, being confident and consistent each day.
With the Yankees on an impressive run of mostly correct decisions, there’s some reason to leave them alone and just let the best team in the American League continue to roll. But they did raise serious doubt and leave room for suggestions (and even ridicule) following maybe the most inexplicable decision of this season, or any season.
The Giants have never been 0-2 under Brian Daboll, until now. They were 2-0 and flying high in 2022 and 1-1 after a rousing comeback in Arizona in 2023. So, this represents a low point as far as early-season difficulties for Daboll and the Giants. They had no business beating the Vikings in the opener and no business losing to the Commanders in Week 2. But here they are.
KANSAS CITY, Mo. — Harrison Butker kept making a lonely walk to midfield after each quarter Sunday to check on the direction of the wind, which tends to swirl inside Arrowhead Stadium. He did it one last time during the 2-minute warning, when his Chiefs were trailing the Bengals by two and trying to give him a winning field-goal attempt.